[Release] Sharin no Kuni, Himawari no Shoujo Complete English Patch

[Asceai]

Originally Posted by Kenn

Ah, I remember this game... But of course I do. It left so much psychological trauma that whenever I play a VN now, it doesn't matter how carefree and soothing the story is, I'd always get this feeling that something very very bad is coming just around the corner.

As an ex-victim, I'd like to just give a warning: this game is extremely dark, and this is coming from an avid guro fan.... I'd go as far as to say only a bona fide masochist would enjoy the whole of it. It was a captivating game, but not in the good sense. I had to finish it, to chase the flimsy hope that there might be salvation in the end.

Now if some of you are still not persuaded, perhaps already been hooked in by the earlier chapters, then my only suggestion is to not read any reviews. That's all. Prepare some hot cocoa and enjoy the numerous touching moments that it does provide. Let's hope you'll find it more palatable than I did.

What the heck, Sharin no Kuni isn't anywhere near that dark. It's not an utsuge for a start.

Heck, I would report the opposite; I felt Sharin no Kuni was an incredibly UPLIFTING piece. I was left with a better impression of the world as a whole from playing it. The overall message was quite positive, as it generally is with Looseboy games.

[Hopeful Death]

Yes, the theme of the game is generally positive and it has an uplifting, triumphant tone. Bittersweet at times, yes, but I have to wonder what kind of drugs you are on to call it dark(or maybe you just haven't actually played a dark VN before)

[MaccaSvenne]

I wonder if what Kenn is talking about is the same kind of feeling as Sono Yokogao, the only other experience I have with Akabei Soft, gave me.
The Mio route was, to me, really depressing and somewhat painful to read but still captivating and hard to stop reading. Can definitely say that I'm a bit more wary towards starting to read another of their games after that.

Though after what other people said, these two games might not be similar, as I can't imagine anyone finding the Mio route in Sono Yokogao "uplifting".

[Moogy]

Originally Posted by Hopeful Death

Yes, the theme of the game is generally positive and it has an uplifting, triumphant tone. Bittersweet at times, yes, but I have to wonder what kind of drugs you are on to call it dark(or maybe you just haven't actually played a dark VN before)

sharin is real deal man

better than that black cyc disney shit

[Kenn]

Hahah, I'm beginning to wonder if we played the same game.

This is the one where the girl gets shot point blank and dies about 10min into the game right?

Spoiler

The one where you and some/all of the main heroines die or suffer eterally in its plethora of bad ends; the one where whenever you feel like you can relax, something bad happens, right? Every time someone struggles and strives and finally is about to attain their bliss, something would happen to abruptly take it away, leaving only more gloominess. That's quite sadistic, at least.

Only if you've finished the game:

Spoiler

And the main problems I have with this game is all its "what the fuck" moments, but of course I can't explain this without spoiling the game, so I didn't.

"She" just popped out from no where, and I'm expected to just accept it and go on; the special high class committed all that atrocities and inconsistencies along the main routes and the bad ends, but in the good ends, I'm just supposed to believe he was providing benevolent guidance to our hero all along.

Uplifting? Where? The momentary calms before the storms? The route endings? Those feel too much like an afterthought to provide any mental salvation, and I simply couldn't accept the plots after that random cliche ladder cutting shenanigan near the end.

The dark taints are fine, as long as they're handled well, but all these fickle plot decisions have left me feeling like I've been cheated, and the last chapter of the game felt like it's detached from the rest of the plots all together.

That's my take. The warning's for the general public. The people with "dark VN" credentials will probably want to play it even more hearing it's dark. If they find it uplifting too, I suppose I'll never understand them, and the same vice versa.

[Moogy]

Originally Posted by Kenn

plethora of bad ends

There are four bad endings in the entire game, and they're all short and difficult to even get to. Edit: In fact, going by line count and excluding ero, the bad ends take up a whopping 1% of the game.

You should probably avoid ever playing a real dark eroge.

[Hopeful Death]

Anyway, it would be better for you not to advertise a positive game as dark. You're just going to get dark game fans playing it and then make them utterly disappointed.

[Kenn]

I can see my post was perhaps too long for you folks to read its entirety. Ah well, I did my best. :P

[Hopeful Death]

Fine fine, these are major spoilers, don't look until you beat the game.

Spoiler

Well, there are no 'atrocities' on bad ends that are not also present on the normal paths.

Also, considering the climaxes that every moment prior to it had built up to for the sake of that single moment as "after thoughts" is incomprehensible.

The "what the fuck" moments you describe are all logical and one even serves as a very nice and unique example of the fact that it's a different world and demonstrates that effect to you first hand using a very creative POV. You can actually look back on the game and think that you could have seen it coming if you had just been in the correct mindset for the world the game established. Thinking outside the box, as it were.

Anyone who didn't already see the basic gist of the final part after the ladder coming was honestly, not paying attention to the game. Also, Houzuki was not just providing good-willed guidance. That is also incorrect. Though if you hadn't played the fandisk, I'll forgive that mistake(though honestly, anyone paying attention should be able to faintly realize what Houzuki was doing even without the fandisk.)

And overall, you just didn't seem to grasp the beauty of the strength shown by everyone in the face of adversity to overcome everything. The people in the game itself were not sad, despite their circumstances, they fought on and found happiness. The game is all about human strength and its ability to overcome adversity. It's inspiring, you would be hard-pressed to find someone who thinks of that as depressing. Not to mention, the adversity they faced in general was still minor compared to a lot of other truly dark games.

[Kenn]

Spoiler

I used "benevolent" satirically. I consider public executions to be atrocities. Selling off little girls as slaves and getting that mother killed in re-education camp don't seem too mild either.

Sure, some of the WTF moments were obvious. So obvious I thought to myself, they can't actually put that in there. It'd be such a cliche and a cheap tactic to do so.

I would have appreciated the beauty and strength therein, except the story had decided to ruin every fruit of their toils. They fought, but instead of happiness, they only found more turmoils ahead, and this happened again and again and again. I won't bother rehashing examples, and I do hope you see what I mean. Even that glimpse of refuge found in the final good endings was so flimsy and unrealistic, without closure.

The whole game seemed to just slowly torture the players, occasionally giving you hope, but only to take it away and throw you deeper into the abyss of depression. Like Houzuki did. And they'd achieved it very well.

As I said before, if after all that you still find yourself uplifted by the story, then we'll probably never understand each other.

Oh, and sorry that my simple warning has turned into somewhat of a thread hijacking. I think I'll just leave it here even if there are more replies. Regardless of how the game is, the patch staff members truly deserves a big kudos for their enormous efforts.

[Minimoto]

God people, you keep posting spoiler tags everywhere and I'm itched to click on them but I haven't played through the whole game yet. So far though, this seems like one of those games that has a some dark but gives a really nice ending. Sort of reminds me of Sakura's ending from FSN. Not the story but the vibe I feel might come later.

Hi I have question to your walktrough Ascenai I got all the endings except the last one "other" but I don't know how to get that one. There seems to be a gaap in the walktrough, as save1 from which we are to load seems to be much further in the game then the one we were supposed to save. I tried to just take the last decision that was supposed trigger that ending "worry about isono" but it didn't work. I am sorry that I am vague but I din't know how to use spoiler tags and I don't want to spoil anyone.

Well never mind now I figured it out sorry for the spam

[zalas]

This tweet speculates that the reason Sharin no Kuni is #9 in terms of eroge sales at ErogeShop.com is because of the patch.

[Ithy]

Well wow, this visual novel is great. i started on it today, and couldnt let it go till i finished chapter 2. The characters are interesting, and so far a great emotional story. I'm so excited to see what will happend in the next chapters, too bad i will be busy tomorrow so might not play it much :x

I love that alot of vn's get translated at the moment, i just managed to finish aoi shiro, and then this comes out.