I'm a sucker for a good Visual Novel. A rare breed, when you discount games like Ace Attorney and Zero Escape, which supplement the formula with actual gameplay. I do love those games to bits, but I don't always want the book I'm reading to suddenly present me with a locked room to escape from before I can continue reading. Good visual novels of this type are hard to come by, so Highway Blossoms is a rare pleasure.
Videogame narratives are, lets be honest, often a bit shite. It's a medium with a lot of potential, but for the most part, the constraints of every scene having to end in the same way so that gameplay can happen holds back a lot of genres, and writers still have a tendency to underestimate the intelligence of the player. Think of your favourite videogame characters and chances are you can remember the time when you were told their motivations and character traits. Usually in a scene where they leave the room and another character monologues about why they did that.
So the jump from that kind of affair to Highway Blossoms was... noticeable, to say the least. Most clearly in regards to that respect. The story never sits you down for an extensive chat about the protagonist's history before assuming you've got it, it saves that for AFTER you've got it, as a character moment. It's clear from the opening scene what's gone on, and there's no catering to the theoretical lemons that didn't pick up on the hinting. It's odd that I find such basic stuff refreshing, and yet, here we are.
To talk a bit less generally, Highway Blossoms is a Romance, Road Trip and Drama story all in one, with the three genre's intermingling and bouncing of one another effortlessly, keeping up a wonderfully engaging pace throughout. All the characters are memorable and a joy to be around (Except Jumbo. Fuck Jumbo), and the main arc of each of the three genres is excellent, each going in unexpected directions and with satisfying conclusions for each. Blossoms' writing has a wonderful knack for the everyday, it kept me grounded in reality and used that to play with my expectations and my anxieties. There were times when I was almost in awe of how well the writing captured my own everyday fears and dilemmas. I say "almost" because I was too busy being swept up by feelings of anxiety.
While the art style is clearly anime-inspired, don't let that fool you. This is a western production, set in the American Desert, with very little in the way of "Anime-ness" outside of the cute joke stuff you unlock after finishing the game. The most Anime the game gets is the presence of the character pictured below with perpetual chest exposure, which, lets be fair here, is a pretty sensible move in the middle of the desert. The art is delightful, with simple and expressive character portraits and lovely scenery shots. And of course, there is an adult patch which adds some more explicit materials, available on the site. Like one of my other favourite Visual Novels Katawa Shoujo though, these scenes are still mostly in service of the character development than titillation. Which isn't to say titillation was not on the minds of Alienworks, I have no doubt that it was, but as grown-ass adults I feel we can probably appreciate the mature use of sex in a narrative, yeah?
When it comes to story, the biggest advantage games have over other mediums is the ability to create incredibly strong connection between the characters and the audience. The ability to interact with the story being told can grant a level of immersion and understanding that other mediums simply can't achieve, and yet I felt more engaged with the characters in this Visual Novel than I have with a lot of recent story-based releases. Which isn't to say said releases had bad stories, just that the presentation of their stories falls flat in comparison to what can already be achieved in a game where your only interaction is advancing text boxes.
And Highway Blossoms is a Kinetic Visual Novel, which is to say a Visual Novel without any choices, which I suppose makes it the purest form of the purest form of videogames. And the fact that with this lack of interaction Highway Blossoms has managed to elicit this response from me says a lot. But if that sounds like me shitting on game narratives, don't think of it like that. Videogames are still the youngest entertainment medium, they'll be playing catch-up for some years now. Right now, narratives in games are playing second fiddle to the games themselves. Games like Highway Blossoms are nothing but a good sign in the long run, a sign that there are people making games right now with the writing skills to propel good narratives into great stories. I look forward to when that's the standard, rather than the exception.
So yeah, a great read. You should do that. Reading. It's good. There are also pictures that are nice.
This Thursday, Planetary Annihilation: Titans. Not Toukiden, as I had planned. Not I'm thinking of dedicating a week to Toukiden on Monday and Monster Hunter Generations on the Thursday. That will come at some point soon, though probably not next week. Just so you know where it's gone off too.
Videogame narratives are, lets be honest, often a bit shite. It's a medium with a lot of potential, but for the most part, the constraints of every scene having to end in the same way so that gameplay can happen holds back a lot of genres, and writers still have a tendency to underestimate the intelligence of the player. Think of your favourite videogame characters and chances are you can remember the time when you were told their motivations and character traits. Usually in a scene where they leave the room and another character monologues about why they did that.
So the jump from that kind of affair to Highway Blossoms was... noticeable, to say the least. Most clearly in regards to that respect. The story never sits you down for an extensive chat about the protagonist's history before assuming you've got it, it saves that for AFTER you've got it, as a character moment. It's clear from the opening scene what's gone on, and there's no catering to the theoretical lemons that didn't pick up on the hinting. It's odd that I find such basic stuff refreshing, and yet, here we are.
To talk a bit less generally, Highway Blossoms is a Romance, Road Trip and Drama story all in one, with the three genre's intermingling and bouncing of one another effortlessly, keeping up a wonderfully engaging pace throughout. All the characters are memorable and a joy to be around (Except Jumbo. Fuck Jumbo), and the main arc of each of the three genres is excellent, each going in unexpected directions and with satisfying conclusions for each. Blossoms' writing has a wonderful knack for the everyday, it kept me grounded in reality and used that to play with my expectations and my anxieties. There were times when I was almost in awe of how well the writing captured my own everyday fears and dilemmas. I say "almost" because I was too busy being swept up by feelings of anxiety.
While the art style is clearly anime-inspired, don't let that fool you. This is a western production, set in the American Desert, with very little in the way of "Anime-ness" outside of the cute joke stuff you unlock after finishing the game. The most Anime the game gets is the presence of the character pictured below with perpetual chest exposure, which, lets be fair here, is a pretty sensible move in the middle of the desert. The art is delightful, with simple and expressive character portraits and lovely scenery shots. And of course, there is an adult patch which adds some more explicit materials, available on the site. Like one of my other favourite Visual Novels Katawa Shoujo though, these scenes are still mostly in service of the character development than titillation. Which isn't to say titillation was not on the minds of Alienworks, I have no doubt that it was, but as grown-ass adults I feel we can probably appreciate the mature use of sex in a narrative, yeah?
When it comes to story, the biggest advantage games have over other mediums is the ability to create incredibly strong connection between the characters and the audience. The ability to interact with the story being told can grant a level of immersion and understanding that other mediums simply can't achieve, and yet I felt more engaged with the characters in this Visual Novel than I have with a lot of recent story-based releases. Which isn't to say said releases had bad stories, just that the presentation of their stories falls flat in comparison to what can already be achieved in a game where your only interaction is advancing text boxes.
And Highway Blossoms is a Kinetic Visual Novel, which is to say a Visual Novel without any choices, which I suppose makes it the purest form of the purest form of videogames. And the fact that with this lack of interaction Highway Blossoms has managed to elicit this response from me says a lot. But if that sounds like me shitting on game narratives, don't think of it like that. Videogames are still the youngest entertainment medium, they'll be playing catch-up for some years now. Right now, narratives in games are playing second fiddle to the games themselves. Games like Highway Blossoms are nothing but a good sign in the long run, a sign that there are people making games right now with the writing skills to propel good narratives into great stories. I look forward to when that's the standard, rather than the exception.
So yeah, a great read. You should do that. Reading. It's good. There are also pictures that are nice.
This Thursday, Planetary Annihilation: Titans. Not Toukiden, as I had planned. Not I'm thinking of dedicating a week to Toukiden on Monday and Monster Hunter Generations on the Thursday. That will come at some point soon, though probably not next week. Just so you know where it's gone off too.
Comments
Post a Comment