Looking for a VN suggestion

[KaioShin]

So, a friend of mine is going to fly to Japan in September. He promised to look for some CDs and VNs for me over there and bring them with him. I always wanted to go shopping in Japan and grab some stuff, but now that I really have the chance I can't decide on what to actually get :) So I hope you guys might be able to give me some suggestions.

First finding a place on where to buy them... from the "Going to Japan!!!" thread I gathered that this place called Softmap is the best to find eroge at reasonable prices? I don't mind if the game is used. What would you guess is the average price for a game, or is it totally random all over the place and totally unpredictable how much it will be?

Do they also have CDs? I'm specifically looking for Animetal CDs, as they are ridiculously overpriced on Amazon as import (like 45€ for an EP) and I can't find them anywhere else.

The main reason for making this thread was to get some suggestions on which VN to actually buy.

What I like the most are VNs with a focus on suspense and good stories. What I don't like at all is Slice of Life / High School stuff. Comedy I only like in small doses and not as a main attraction. There should be an English patch available or expected in the forseeable future (no projects that are stuck at 3% progress for one year now) or the game should have Japanese that's so easy AGTH can do a reasonable job on it (aka not so many funky accents). H content is prefered but not a must.

Some VNs that I already played and really liked were: FS/N, Tsukihime, Sengoku Rance (I know it doesn't fit my perferences that much, but the gameplay + h content made up for the lack of story for me), Princess Waltz, Gekkou no Carnevale and Dies irae. Some I played and didn't like at all were Tears to Tiara (can it get more cookie cutter than this?), One or X-Change 3.

Based on that, any recommendations for me on what to get?

[Sirf*palot]

Well, Cartagra and Kara no Shoujo seems to fit your catagory of suspense and good stories. Though both patches are in limbo (as the patches for both are almost complete but the fan-tl team is in dicussions w. mangagamer and innocent gray for an offical release).
Sekien no Inganock has a patch and so does Cross Channel. Both are very good vns (though CC is more character dev. heavy than plot heavy)
Muv Luv Trilogy - Patch for the original game (which inacludes extra and unlimited scenarios) is out (well, will be out by the end of the week probably and the group will be translating the supposedly EPIC sequel Muv Luv Alternative). So that would be a good purchase. Be sure to get the right release though, apparently their patch only works for 5.5/5.7 versions of the RUGP engine made by the eroge company age. So check their forums.
Osadai (aka. My Girfriend is the PRESIDENT) has a patch that looks like it will come out soon, seems comedy heavy.

Seinarukana (sequel to Eien no Aselia) both has RTS/RPG gameplay and both has translations. (Eien no Aselia finished tl. by Dakkodango) and Seinarukana on tlwiki. Again there are specific version requirements.

SWAN SONG tl is out so that would work also. The VN is pretty good, patch works for the 2 CD version I think. (check. yandere translations)

Kizuato and Killer Queen (doujin ver. and remake) also have active projects on tlwiki though I don't know much about both games except that they are in the horror/suspense category. For Killer Queen the doujin ver. will be tled first.

[Moogy]

Sharin no Kuni is always a good choice but I'm not sure I can recommend our messed up translation in good faith. Well, whatever, it's not like you'll know it's messed up!

If you can wait a few months, Muvluv Alternative is the best game (or at least my favorite one) being translated currently.

[Sirf*palot]

Also,

If you have a DS, you could try to see what the Love Plus hype is all about.

Full Chinese Translation (Simplified and Tradiditional) is out.

And English Translation in progress (30%?)

[Moogy]

The English translation will never be finished so don't bother.

And Love+ isn't really a game that fits well with translation in the first place, to be honest.

[Sabino]

For some of the stuff mentioned, be sure to check at Toranoana, because some of them might already be out of stock at other places.
If you have a PSP, you can get the PSP ported Utawarerumono. ... no wait, if you hated tears to tiara then it might not be for you...
Also, I've been hearing some hype about Cross Channel recently, not sure how it is tho.

[KaioShin]

Thanks for the suggestions.

I've heard a lot of good things about Sharin no Kuni, I'll definitely look into that. I don't worry about messy translations, can't be worse than me trying to decipher moonspeak ;)

Concerning some of the other suggestions:

Seinarukana: I actually played that in Japanese with AGTH for a while. The game has very pretty art and the RPG parts are fun, but it's just so endless. I think it took like 20 hours just to get through the prologue for the actual story to start. I quit after 40 hours or so and I still was just about half-through according to some walkthrough. There is a point when something just becomes too drawn out. The pacing was just so slow, every new "world" (or was it different countries? Can't remeber) you enter basically started again with a lot of setup episodes, where basically nothing happened over hours. Then you had some RPG battles and the whole thing started anew in the next chapter, the main story never went anywhere as far as I played. It would surely be much more enjoyable with a proper translation and not Babelfish, but I doubt it would fix the massive pacing issues.

Cartagra and Kara no Shoujo: Both sound interesting, but I rather wait how the legal situation develops. If they get commercial English releases anyway there is no need to get a Japanese version, if not there is a big chance the translations won't be released at all publically. Better to wait and see for now.

Sekien no Inganock: The visual style doesn't seem too appealing to me, but the setting sounds promising. I'll look more into it.

Cross†Channel: Description on VNDB sounds like a High School VN. What makes it good?

muvluv: I'm very interested in Alternative, though Unlimited is supposed to be rather generic high school stuff from what I heard, yet still required to enjoy/understand (?) Alternative. And I'm not sure I could trust my friend to pick the right version if it's only compatible with certain ones :-\

Osadai: Yeah, looks rather exactly like the opposite of what I'm looking for xD

Killer Queen: The setup sounds amazing, though I read TakaJun's review of it and he was pretty disappointed with it. But then again he seems to like Slice of Life stuff over everything else, so maybe I should disregard his opinions :P

Are doujin games even easy to find too? I'm really no expert, but from what I heard a lot were only released at manga conventions and stuff, so I'm not sure if they'd be easily available in shops around Tokyo, even used.

Those are just some first impressions after looking at descriptions of those games, don't shoot me if I'm completely off about some. Rather feel free to lead me to the right path if I did a game injustice :)

Thanks for the suggestions so far!

[Sabino]

Doujin Stuff:
Tora no ana would have many doujin stuff too, truithfully speaking; if a great deal of this board were to go to Japan, they'd find them selves in places like Gamerz and Tora no ana.
Also, take a go in to Melon books too. They do stuff exclusively for doujin and I know they sell some good stuff there... But I didn't have enough time to look for it the last time I was there, so I can't really tell about it in detail.
Also, there are many stores in Akihabara that do stuff centered around doujin stuff.
... It's just that for those doujin stuff you'd want to do some research before hand, since they lot up faster than stuff made by actual companies and such.
Do you know what games from what circles you're looking for?

[KaioShin]

Do you know what games from what circles you're looking for?

For now none is a fixed interest, until someone suggests one and convinces me about it in this thread ;)

Killer Queen was suggested and looks interesting with a few reservations, so that might be a candidate. If someone who actually played it convinces me it's good I'll tell my friend to look for it.

[Sirf*palot]

Speaking of doujin games, I can't believe I forgot to mention Umineko. The art style takes a while to get used to (believe me, I hated the low-budget sprites) but it will draw you in eventually.

Speaking of art styles, yea Inganock's art style is unique. When you actually play it (because its really hard to explain lol), the coloring/shading of CGs/sprites have fractal like designs in them..everything is hectic/rough sketch like feel to them and/or has patterns with like which really helps with the immersive atmosphere.

The OD/ED/OST for the game is pretty awesome too.

The hype about Cross Channel since I really didn't understand the supposed "awesomeness" of CC when I first played it is that since the characters and heroines are all mentally deranged and stuck in a "groundhog day loop" (yeah. I know tvtropes will ruin your life) the character development is very good. Though I frankly went through it in a haze as it was pretty mind-screwy for me.

G-Senjou no Maou is pretty nice from what I've heard and if the guys tling never finishes, if you know chinese there is a simplified chinese patch out their also

Ikusa Megami ZERO is also a gameplay/vn hybrid. Supposedly good. Never played it as I can't read jap.

[Moogy]

Originally Posted by KaioShin

muvluv: I'm very interested in Alternative, though Unlimited is supposed to be rather generic high school stuff from what I heard, yet still required to enjoy/understand (?) Alternative. And I'm not sure I could trust my friend to pick the right version if it's only compatible with certain ones :-\

Original Muvluv = Extra and Unlimited. Extra is horrendous food/slice of life/food/school/more food, Unlimited is... well, an entire game of training is the most accurate description.

You do indeed need to play both Extra and Unlimited to get the most out of Alternative, but the amount you have to actually play of the bentou jigoku in Extra is pretty short so it's not that big of a deal. I just ctrled half of it myself, to be honest.

Also, Cross Channel is a messed up timeloop story with an awesome ending, nothing like your average boring school game at all. Appearances can be deceiving.

[EmptyShiki]

i didn't really like it very much but alot of people seem like Phantom of the inferno.

It has some good ideas and some really cool scenes and some interesting political tensions between the characters which were interesting to see play out.

In a phrase i would say its like Evangelion's main characters meets metal gear solid without the sy-fi. Main character is not as much of a wuss though after the first act anyway.

Its not slice of lifey at all and its suspense so it might be up your ally, its unlike most VN's for sure.

if you loved MGS4's story you'd probably like phantom. Phantom and MGS4 have alot of the same problems in my mind. they were both designed to be action movie like so they get ridiculous, they both are tech and background heavy and that make the games longwinded at times, there is fair amount of angst in both and they arn't very subtle with themes at times. but if you are tolerant or respond favorably to these there is some good stuff in both.

Not sure how you would play it, i don't know the best version, the dvd player version is pretty annoying though bearable.

If you liked Gekkou no Carnevale, why not try something else by Nitro+? Satsuriku no Django is short, but fabulous for what it is - western in outer space with revolutionaries and gun porn added for good measure. It shouldn't be that hard language-wise if you've gotten through Gekkou. Saya no Uta. Kikokugai. Chaos;head. Nitro+ seems pretty loved by translators over here (for good reason). You might want to look into games by Propeller, too.

[fujifruit]

Anything by Liar soft/Rail soft (Pretty art =)

Killer queen- Patch is at 77% you can use the scripts along with the game to play

Sharin no kuni

Fate/stay night- Alot of people seem to like it although I don't.

Tsukihime

Katahane

[zalas]

Originally Posted by KaioShin

Killer Queen was suggested and looks interesting with a few reservations, so that might be a candidate. If someone who actually played it convinces me it's good I'll tell my friend to look for it.

Do note that the doujin version (Killer Queen) and the commercial version (Secret Game) are very different stories. The only thing in common is the setting, parts of the first arc, and the layout of the game (retelling of the story in several chapters, with next-to-no choices). The art is inconsistent, the music is pretty good and the story telling is more 3rd-person than 1st-person and does switch viewpoints a lot. I liked the overall story, but it's not unique or anything like that. The trial version of the doujin version was enough to hook me into buying the full doujin version through DLSite. I think the commercial version is a bit overpriced for what you get, and sometimes I get the feeling that the commercial version doesn't have a very clear point, while the doujin version has two main points it tries to bring across in its two arcs.

Oh, and I own the download version of the doujin game, the reprint physical package of the doujin game (bought it for one song on the OST) and the commercial release.