@Video_Game_King said:

@Ravenlight:

It's my duty as the site's resident weeaboo. Also, when you can, at will, transform into Crono, Link, The Prince, Stocke, that butthole from Singularity, or just about any other video game character who can travel through time, time itself becomes somewhat meaningless.

I didn't even @reply you! How do you do that??

@Animasta said:

@Ravenlight: it's catherine dawg

WTF am I thinking about, then?

@Ravenlight:

I AM ALL SEEING AND ALL KNOWING.

@Ravenlight: love? Ionno I don't really watch anime all that much.

UGH, It's not supposed to fetishize disabilities, If you go into the game wanting to fuck amputees, you will be sorely disappointed. The story doesn't even revolve around the disabilities, most of the time I FORGOT THEY WERE DISABLED.

It's a game about highschool love and interesting people, the disabilities is partly what makes it unique, but never the focus. Just because I think Rin is great, doesn't mean I'm gonna go out look out for a chick with no arms, I'd prefer a girlfriend who can put on a shirt by herself really.

This is perhaps one of the most mind-numbingly frustrating threads I have ever read.

Also; there's a good number of claims in your post that I don't think you can back up.

I think the people being repulsed at wanting to play this game, because apparently it requires a pre-requisite of wanting to date and have sex with disabled people are totally missing the point of this "game".

It's a visual NOVEL. Read: Book. You play the game to see how the story of a relationship between a student who has a heart attack and a girl at his new school begins and progresses. You play the game to experience the story, not to engage yourself in fictional scenarios where you get to date disabled girls.

Feel free to take my comments with a grain of salt. I have, after all, been wearing a Katawa Shoujo avatar for the month since I first finished it. I'm hardly impartial. But I was obviously won over by something, so don't write me off either.

I guess it depends on how you look at things and what you go into Katawa Shoujo expecting to see.

For me, there are two facets. One, I admire the feat behind the visual novel even existing. It's basically an indie game that ends up being of higher quality than many other visual novels in the, admittedly niche, genre.

Two, I don't see it as a porn game. I wouldn't have even gotten into it if that hadn't been confirmed to me beforehand by the Op linked thread. When you hear "disabled girls" and "4chan" in the same sentence, things could go down a really dark path. What we got is something that I feel is very tastefully constructed, mostly well-written (though sometimes immaturely, if more "realistically," written), and has a number of sweet and important morals and themes. There are a number of interesting characters (read: there's Rin) which makes for a number of good stories.

This is where I fel you've missed the point:

What I dislike is what we've made out of it, and the fact that people go into this game with the mind-set that they're not dealing with people able to feel, everyday people; but that they're visiting a zoo.

Because if you're the sort of person going into this with that mindset, I feel like Katawa Shoujo might set you straight. Even better that the same kind of person might be going into this looking for quick porn gratification and be woefully disappointed. Even the sex scenes that deal with what you'd probably take as fetish scenes have something more to them. Like the scene with Lilly and the blindfold, showing Hisao to experience life the way she does.

And if you didn't necessarily need that moral lesson, well, all the better.

@Video_Game_King said:

@Do_The_Manta_Ray said:

To synopsize and lastly fully explain, I dislike the notion of this game due to the fact that it centers on disabled people as a novelty.

No, it fucking doesn't. Oh, and two things on the title:

• It can't have been localized, as it was originally written in English. (I think. I could be wrong on that.)
• It's Shoujo, not Shouja. Just because the Japanese in the title isn't perfect doesn't mean your Japanese has to be even less perfect.

Hey King, It's not even worth it my brother. He just doesn't get it.

You clearly completely missed the point of the game.

Wait, you didn't even play it? Ugh.

@Akrid said:

You clearly completely missed the point of the game.

People of a lesser intelligence tend to do that, not just in games.

I dislike these kind of things as much as the next person with the same tastes as me, but dude, you really should do some research before you go off on one about something you clearly have no understanding of.

But it's ok, you've learned your lesson; next time you'll play the game, right?

I feel kinda obligated to reply to this since it specifically calls out my blog, but I really don't know what to say. Sure, some people go into this game with the intention of getting off on drawings of disabled girls. But some people go into the freezer to get off on a bag of frozen peas. Does that make the freezer bad? Does that make the frozen peas bad? People have weird fetishes. People get off on weird things. That's a fact of life. But that doesn't mean everything that someone fetishises is bad.

And ultimately, If you can't be bothered to play it, to see the thing that you're so outraged about, then I'm not interested in discussing it further. When you confront it and come up with a reasons why it is this horrible, disgusting thing, then I'll hear your reasons. People have varying opinions, and had you actually played the game and came to that conclusion I would respect your opinions, despite how much they differ from mine. But saying "I heard X, Y and Z about this game and it appals me" is just stupid.

I don't see how you dismissed the reason that people went into it looking down on it. It's a valid reason, and not an excuse. I actually had no intention of going through it, because I thought it was just a disabled-person sex romp. I was in the same boat that you were in thinking 'maybe I'm just getting to that point where I start drawing the line'.

Fortunately I tried it and found that there was more to it. I didn't find it as disturbing when looking at it from the outside, and actually enjoyed many of the characters. Kenji is hilarious!

But anyways, I can't start being that guy. I can't be that guy and still roam around forums/the internet, because times are changing and things are going to get weirder and weirder. In the end, I'm glad I tried it, and I understand why some people don't want to try it. I've written about it, talked about it, and asked about it in many places. However, I'd never pressure anyone into trying it. It's not for everyone, but most people who've tried it have found it to be a great experience.

I have a simple rule - if I didn't play a game, or watch a movie, or read a book, or seen a play, or heard an album, I reserve my opinion until I play the game, or watch that movie, or read that book, or seen that play or heard that album.

I've read blogs that talk lengthily about Katawa Shoujo and its flaws, including the concept, but these blogs were written by people who played and analyzed the game so, you know, they actually know what they're talking about. You're making assumptions based on assumptions. It's hardly material for any kind of discussion.

There's something incredibly off about your dislike of Katawa Shoujo. Indeed, it appears your knowledge of the "game" only goes as far as what basically amounts to the synopsis of your average book. You have almost nothing to say about any of the merits of the title. Rather, your biggest complaint is not of Katawa Shoujo's existence, but of the people who play it. Your post is a tirade speaking out against those who venture within the boundaries of your personally perceived stigma. You've allowed the myriad of different personalities and opinions to define a single complete stranger of an entity. It is a response I see potentially conceived by fear and ignorance, and quite frankly it's painful to see.

@Swoxx:

I think the post directly below your post says what I was going to say anyway.

I can only speak for myself, but I never felt like I was visiting a zoo. I felt like I was interacting with human beings that felt more human than in most games. Just because it's about disabled people doesn't mean it's exploiting them, that's like saying every WWII movie is exploiting the holocaust.

The characters don't feel like they are defined by their handicap. they have the same problems as "normal" people. I think if anything that the game does a good job of conveying that these are people, not some sort of freak show. You could argue that they could have made the game without them being disabled but I think the message that yes they are disabled, but they are still human beings with the same problem as other people is what makes it a beautiful story. It's the age old love story of "X don't matter" X being social status (in many classic romance novels for example), race or gender (in more recent stories) or in this case a physical handicap.

If this was a story about a white western student who studied for a year in Africa and all girls where Africans and he fell in love with one of the girls, would it have been a racist story? I certainly don't think so. I think it would be the exact opposite, showing that color doesn't matter, just like this game shows that a physical handicap doesn't matter.

I'd like to go out of my way here just to provide some nice closure on this topic, as it seems to have suffered some contuinuity errors. (I just came from the thread discussing the nature of The Thing's ending, give me a break for my choice of words.)

My issue was never with the game itself, though I will not deny that I found certain elements of it to be distasteful. My initial post was a commentary on the psychological approach to the game I'd seen around these, and other forums on the net. Every second post here (I'm generalizing) has suggested for me to go and play the game before I make statements in regards to it. Inbetween what is growing to be a need to pop an aspirin, and rubbing my temples, I'd suggest that you read through my first post once more. There is no need to play the title, as I was by no means reviewing it, nor searching for some soul-mate who understands my very specific pain who might provide me with the title's true name (because it's in japanese, get it?) that I might banish it back into the depths of hell that spawned it.

In a phrase: I took issue with some user's approach to the game, not the game itself. And again, I'd like to say that my dislike certainly doesn't lie with a majority of the interested parties, simply a considerable minority. So unless you've got something to feel guilty about, there's no need to take it personally. I never meant to call anyone out.

But now I am!

@dagas: You're completely and utterly right, mate. I mentioned having witnessed a spectacle of people being shocked to discover that this was the case; that these handicapped people were not defined by their disabilities, but by their personalities. And it was this that I initially found issue with; the fact that many were, indeed, approaching this title in a mindset that had not prepared them for the possibility that these different personalities were more than the total sum of their handicap.

@MattyFTM: I'd just like to reassure you that I have no issue with you or your finely written article, mate. (Maybe with your avatar, though. But that's neither here nor there.) Your post simply brought attention to a matter which I'd found to be highly distasteful. Imagine listening to a somber blues-track that reminds you of your ex-wife who left you with nothing but a cold cup of black coffee and an ashtray full of memories, (or drawn saucer-eyed, worryingly young-looking girlfriend, it's subjective, really.) that's the relation we're speaking of here. Once more, not the game itself, but the mindset which many approached the game with.

Cheers for the contribution, everyone. You can find this post on my blog if you'd like to comment further. As most people merely glanced through, misconstrued and seemingly took offence at the initial post (though god knows why they'd want to go through the trouble of actually being offended) ; I'd like to ask a moderator to close the topic. That said, if you're willing to read through the entire thing, please do so on my profile, and hey; may the force be with you.