Well, I never thought I would say this, but the music of Katawa Shoujo has grown on me, specifically the more poignant pieces. The scenes for which they are composed and selected for has thus far been impeccable; the scenes seemingly giving meaning to the song, and vice versa.
          Warning, spoilers ahead. After finishing Rin’s route, reaching the good and the bad ends, the environment in my mind was perhaps much like hers, a jumble of incoherent thoughts and feelings. Sadness, sympathy, curiosity, frustration, confusion, and a host of unnamed sentiments washed over me as Rin’s story unfolded. To be able to elicit this many emotions out of me, deserves applause. The difference between Rin and Shizune, and their routes, is very much night and day respectively. Rin’s story was moody, capricious, and filled with uncertainly, from beginning to end. Shizune’s, aside from Misha’s revelation, was mostly lighthearted and predictable. Shizune herself is like a square piece of glass: transparent, with a clearly defined shape. It takes but a glance to see who she is. While Rin is more like an unknown opaque liquid or gas. She is there, but no one really knows what she is, and its structure alterable, and defies containment.
          I was much more absorbed and determined while reading Rin’s route than Shizune’s. Rin’s route was highly philosophical, touching upon themes of self-identity, semantics, definition, art, meaning and purpose of life. These are all profound questions that I believe one eventually ask of themselves at some point of their lives. Rin is a soul all too aware of these questions. Troubled and without answers, she appears as an enigma to those to who try to define her. There is a hurricane raging inside Rin, and her consciousness lies in the eye. Who knows how long poor Rin has suffered, and because of our similar struggles, I deeply sympathize and care for Rin. Unable to express herself cogently, and unsure of what to express, her turmoil remains caged, but little does she know a certain boy named Hisao will stumble upon her eating lunch, and will thenceforth constantly prod at her lock…
          Eventually in the good end the storm is released, and she finds and accepts herself. And her final words are these: “What’s the word for when it feels inside your heart that everything in the world is alright?” How many people are already able to say this during their senior high school year?
          I think the answer is “peace”, my love. I wonder what that feels like…

I finished the first route of Katawa Shoujo yesterday. Those of you who frequent /a/ of 4chan will have heard and may have even anticipated for this game, or rather I should say, visual novel. For those with virgin ears to Katawa Shoujo, you can read about the details of its history and conception at the developer’s blog site. I will give a very brief background here. It all started with a drawn concept image of five handicapped girls, and the possibility of a visual novel was suggested. A team of people formed Four Leaf Studios with the goal of turning that possibility into reality, and roughly five years later the complete program was released a little over a week ago. A testament to determination.
I first chose Shizune based on one simple reason: because she is bespectacled. Glasses score big points on my list of criteria of female attractiveness. Shizune is also a forward, strong-willed, hardworking, and responsible girl. These are all qualities that I respect, and as such, Shizune’s personality is one I can hold in high esteem. However, her character feels a little bit, and pardon the pun, two dimensional. The writing forming her character is lacking in emotional impact. By the end of the route all I learned about her is that she is a deaf-mute, ambitious, assiduous girl. And little more. One can already gather this information without needing to journey through her route anyway.
Misha, on the other hand, was the one who generated most of the emotions of the route. Where there is laughter, there is Misha. Where there is drama, there is Misha. So despite a specious impression of simple-mindedness, Misha possesses more emotional complexity than Shizune, and I dare say due to that Misha is the more interesting character of the duo. I must say though, without spoiling too much, the tension that surfaces between Misha and Shizune came somewhat out of left field, and felt underdeveloped. Or it could be me, missing the hints. Certainly, Misha deserves a substantial role and her own spotlight in Shizune’s story. After all, she is nearly an inseparable part of Shizune’s life during the course of the game, and to not involve her between Shizune’s and protagonist’s budding relationship would have been a greater atrocity. To have limited Misha’s character as nothing more than Shizune’s walking translator would have done Misha a disservice, and the writers has rightly avoided that by injecting drama centered on Misha.
As for the presentation. The art is serviceable, although the obvious changes in art styles can be a little jarring at times. Some of the music almost borders on catchy, however, their simplicity and restraint evinces their purpose as background lullabies. The writing I will hold judgment until I have finished more routes.
Shizune’s playthrough lasted an almost exact duration of nine hours. I have just begun my second, aiming for Rin. I hesitate to praise or denigrate Katawa Shoujo as a whole at this moment, as I am far from full completion of the game. What I can say is I like it enough to play it for the second time, which is more than I can claim for a lot of games. And oh, by the way, the game is free.

I absolutely loved the first episode. Another is my type of show, and pushes all the right buttons. The atmosphere is as gloomy as I envisioned, and it is so thick and relentless I wonder how the characters in the show even breathe. Silence in the horror or mystery genre such as this speaks volumes, and often tells more than overt music or explications. And where there is music in Another, it is never overbearing, deftly fitting and timed to happenstances. The animation is equally impressive, with painting-like quality in backgrounds, and polished character models. It also helps that all the females in Another are very pretty.
The peaceful looking town of Yomiyama belies the fact that it is enshrouded by secrets and mysteries, events so unsettling that the whole town, or at least quite an amount of townsfolk are intent on keeping them hidden. Kouichi is essentially an outsider, and he possesses the naivety and inquisitiveness to unravel the town’s secrets. I keenly look forward to how Kouichi start to form questions and searches for the answers that we as viewers are all looking for.

With a drink in hand, to the New Year. Cheers.

I very much liked UN GO. Every episode was aptly paced, and the case studies were complex enough to obfuscate my senses, but yet not enough to break plausibility. UN GO managed to trod that fine line between obviousness and absurdity. I am, however, a little disappointed in the animation, especially in the last episodes, where it was clear that budget was a concern. The show does not quite fully answer the questions I would have liked to hear. We can try to read between the lines, whatever happened in the war, it probably did not go very well for Japan, as a significant portion of the city’s buildings are left in rubble. One thematic consequence of the war that can be clearly seen was information control, in order to keep the public’s probably already low morale (perhaps due to the poor outcome of the war) under control. UN GO once again prompts the age old question: should the truth always be revealed? One thing that still bothers me though is, why does someone, or rather, something like Inga and Bettenou exist? They are supernatural beings in a mostly logical world, sticking out like Lamborghinis in a Toyota dealership. Anyways, eleven episodes of UN GO felt a little short, and its setting is still ripe for exploration. Here’s to hoping for a second season.