It gets better with each chapter, though I can't say I've been enjoying the non-sports side too much. The play-off of each other well enough for every scene to be entertaining, but the need to insert dumb clichéd fanservice every now and then is really grating. The usual stuff like tripping and undressing a girl, or preventing them from falling only to realize you accidentally touched their boobs! It feels particularly bad because right now Masaya is not even a character, but rather just a facilitator to these types of situations. This, coupled with his awful "overly self-conscious around girls" internal dialogue are just a pain to get through, and remain the only bits of characterization he's been graced with. The only thing that makes him different from what I can only read as the "VN protagonist template" is his past, but the story can't elaborate on it for the sake of the mystery, and the trauma caused by it doesn't seem to have affected him beyond the refusal to play and the occasional flashback.
The story has been gradually been leaning more and more on shonen sports, which has been great, though it brings its own share of problems. Being a VN, I understand that they are limited on time and resources, but it's still weird seeing such a small amount of unique characters for our group to face, as well as few actual matches against those characters. It's not a small number for a VN (I think), and I'd never complain about the production value of Aokana, but the feeling is inevitably there due to comparison to sports anime and manga, which can pump out many more characters with unique designs, as well as interesting matches involving side-characters. Not a problem really, just something that I thought of as I was playing.
I can't say I'm in love with the writing during the matches though. They are great, and every single match so far has managed to get me engaged. Misaki vs Shindou, in particular, was incredible. But the actual written description during those scenes... The're very dry, and analogies don't quite seem to land. I'm also not happy we learned about some techniques just as Shindou used them. Though I understand why they decided to do that, they feel more like information that was withheld from me than secret moves, probably due to the fact that this is a fictional sport and the extent of my knowledge only goes as far as the writer is willing to convey.
I'll say that it ended up being for the best though, since the introduction of so many flashy techniques in succession served as the perfect contrast to Inuisaki's bizzarre playstyle. I was very surprised to find myself agreeing with Masaya during Inuisaki vs Shindou. I can't say I expected the game to be able to convey so well the... very subtle difference between how she and the rest of them play. Obviously, they spell it all out later, but I was still impressed by the fact that I was able to pick up on it solely due to how the match was playing out. Good stuff.
Also about the writing: the really aren't managing to sell me this talent/prodigy theme that is being set-up. It's hard to care for Misaki's surprise and despair at Asuka's inexplicable talent when Misaki herself is also naturally talented in everything. Asuka just happens to be a bit more gifted on this particular sport.
It's pretty obvious that she's going to have to struggle with her outlook on life and work harder to keep up with Asuka, but still, the set up fails pretty hard. "Talent vs less talent" just doesn't work as well as "talent vs hard-work".
Regarding the other two girls... Mashiro is great and I groan every time Rika appears, though it's not her fault as much as the writers just seem to love filling so many of her scenes with the shittiest writing.
Some predictions for the future, just for fun:
Masaya is the girl who helped Asuka break out of her shell when she was a kid. He looked like a girl as a kid, they made sure to emphasize how it was totally not a boy on her own flashback, Asuka mistakes him for a girl when she's watching the match... Yeah, I'm pretty sure of this one.
Alternatively, they could say it's Inuisaki instead, that wouldn't surprise me either.
Misaki may be the kid that traumatized Masaya? I'm less confident on this one. I feel like I'm only entertaining the idea to begin with because it feels right for both of the main heroines to be connected to his past, that is, if my other prediction is correct.
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Originally Posted by pinetree
