If you’re willing to give H manga a go there’s lots of good consensual stuff to be found, though finding ones you can actually buy in English isn’t so easy. You might like Aqua Bless or Cheerful Eros Project. Should be able to find them on sites that sell anime and manga without too much trouble I think.
I definitely think Sagara Family is a good first time game.
None of those are good at ALL.
Try these
-Yu-no
-Eve burst error
-DESIRE
-Suika
-Tokyo Alice
-ef
Desire,Eve and Yu-no have lots of choices.
Don’t worry about offending us; we’re all adults (over 18 right? right? 
here, and it is a very niche hobby, after all. You should say exactly what you think – if you don’t, then you get bad advice. Which, unfortunately, is I think kind of what happened with your first batch of recommendations 
I do apologize for (being part of) convincing you to waste money on a game you hate … that always sucks.
As for what happened? Based on your reaction, some … err … lengthy ramblings –
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A quick note: As (I think) the first one who recommended Let’s Meow Meow - I recommended it specifically because there are a lot of catgirls and the like in it. The complaints that you have - I will generally concede. The game’s very much got a “Did somebody order a pizza”? type of excuse plot. LMM appeals to people who like catgirls and so on (which is why I listed it as a possible choice). If that’s not you, then the game’s not for you. If the pizza-deliveryman “plotline” bothers you, then it’s not for you. Sagara is not all that dissimilar; it’s just better.
-
If you actually want a good story, that’s an entirely different kind of game. There are several different main genres in h-games: Games that are primarily about lots of sex, all the time, typically featuring excuse plots. Let’s Meow Meow is a good example of the sort of games along these lines available in English. Then there are games that actually try to tell a story; these typically focus less on sex (because throwing tons of h-scenes into such games feels out-of-place) and more on … whatever type of story they’re trying to tell.
You said you liked Hourglass of Summer, but that there wasn’t enough sex to hold your interest. So the recommendations you got were skewed to one side … when it seems like you might actually be more interested in the other.
- As for the ‘not truly a game’ complaint … J-List likes to call these ‘dating sims’. Very few actually qualify for this definition. Most of us here call them ‘visual novels’ … because that’s generally what most of them are: A novel with audiovisual components. The majority of games out there have gameplay similar to LMM – a novel with branch points. Personally, as someone who spends a lot of time reading, this isn’t a problem for me. If this IS a problem for you … then it might be good for you to just check out.
And as for the ‘uninteresting still images’ - that’s basically par for the course. Very few h-games feature large amounts of animation; it costs a lot of money, and still images can be way more detailed than animation can be.
- Since you seem interested in a good story, I’d recommend putting off Sagara Family for awhile. Get yourself Soul Link (the opening kind of drags; once terrorists storm the space station, it’s way better), Demonbane (Cthulhu + Giant Robots!), or Kara no Shoujo (detective story; get it right or be unable to stop grisly mutilation-slayings).
Demonbane has very few choices; the ones that are in the game essentially serve to tell the game which character you’re trying to get an ending with. Soul Link and Kara no Shoujo both have a lot of choices; get them wrong, and a whole bunch of bad things happen.
You said you’ve ‘had access’ to other games … being as vague as possible, you should try to ‘get access’ to Ever 17 and Nocturnal Illusion as well. (They’re out of print, which is why I didn’t recommend them at first. Tracking down OOP stuff is not something to ask a newbie to do.) They both have much better stories than LMM. (Be warned, NI is very old and has dated game design, so I probably wouldn’t try it first. Ever 17 is much newer, but also non-adult.)
Also, there are some games with actual gameplay around. Brave Soul is an RPG. Upcoming are Aselia the Eternal and Yumina the Ethereal, also both RPGs.
If none of these can hold your interest, then probably these games are not for you. You tried pizza delivery simulators, and if the more story-driven kind of games don’t appeal to you either, then it is probably best to write them off entirely.
Also - You said you got 3 games: LMM, Sagara, and Guilty.
The only one of those three that even tries to have a good story is Guilty. LMM and Sagara are both excuse plot type stuff. Guilty is not. If you found LMM excruciating, then my recommendation - if you don’t want to buy any new games (understandable) is to try Guilty next.
I haven’t played it myself. So I have no idea what you should expect. (I do want to play it - but I can’t recommend something I’ve never played, which is why I never mentioned it.)
Guilty ~the sin~ is tricky, actually. It just can’t decide if it’s an excuse for porn or not. Both the porn and story suffer because of it. So, it’s a very mediocre experience. I couldn’t comment on it before, since I’ve finished it only yesterday. Now I know Narg’s review was, in my honest opinion, very lenient. I’m still hoping you’ll like the Sagara Family. It IS an excuse for porn, but at least the porn is nice, the characters aren’t annoying (I really thought they were likable, myself) and it managed to make me laugh here and there.
That … will be problematic for you. Almost all of these games feature very large quantities of text, and the ones that don’t have basically no story. Dubbing the voices into English just plain would cost waaaay too much money, and you’d have a hard time finding good actresses willing to do h-scenes.
(Unfortunately, the market is so small that a game selling several thousand units is a successful title. You can’t pay for voice redubbing off of that.)
The three I recommended are very good in the story department. You should check them out, if nothing else.
We … uh, sort of knew that 
However, this IS the official company board from a company that localizes these games for a living … kind of a “first rule of Fight Club” kind of thing …
If I were to take a stab at what would be a good choice for you…
I’d say get School Days HQ. I HAVEN’t played School Days enough to know anything about the ero scenes, but that title seems like it should have all the “choice matters”, not as much to read; constant visuals to entertain. And I like the voice actresses…
DONT SPOIL YOURSELF if possible! Spoilers are everywhere! They are always watching… and waiting… :shock:
(…half the youtube videos when searching for School Days have spoilers in the title…)
Here’s one of the openings to the game :
Setsuna Op (video is a bit laggy)
Unfortunately it won’t be out till next year sometime, but I’d think it would be a great one to start out with. Although, you’re not going to find many (any?) other english animated novels soon…
Other highlights of JAST’s collections I might recommend to you :
My Girlfriend is the President (sorta sci-fi?) [???]
Demonbane (sci-fi) [a bit of H]
Yume Miru Kusuri (just a good novel) [plenty of H]
Saya no Uta (highly rated) [???]
And for MangaGamer’s collections I might recommend to you :
Soul Link (sci-fi)
Shuffle!
Kara no Shoujo
ef (when it is out)
Edelweiss
My advice when choosing a VN/eroge… First, read about it, check the visuals and see if it looks like something you’d be interested in…
Then, check the ratings for the game on vndb.org and maybe ask around about the game somewhere…
Also, you can haphazardly gauge a visual novel’s success if it has an anime…
I’m a fantasy/sci-fi/action/detective etc junkie… If you want my recommendations on those just ask~
I have Hourglass of Summer but haven’t played it yet… doesn’t that still have plenty of text? But, perhaps it is more exciting, thus you forget are reading plenty?
If you really can’t have much text… uh…
a) Stick with the titles that are short or have gameplay
b) You could organize unofficial english dubs! Or have someone read it to you… [depending on who it is, it can be fun or AWKWARD!]
c) Watch the anime versions of these novels when they exist~ (Although usually it is non-ero)
Besides VNs and eroge there are H-games of varying types… Although you will need luck¬ô to find one with a strong story that is in english.
Also there should be plenty of H-manga and stuff…
I second LexarV’s recommendation of School Days HQ. It’s essentially an interactive anime series with a story that grabs you by the heart and threatens to tear it out (and I’m putting it mildly here). Like Lexar said, stay far, FAR away from spoilers - so much happens in a single chapter that it’s incredibly easy to spoil (I had two of the game’s endings spoiled for me by some nimrod who used GIFs of the endings as his avatar and signature, respectively). Hell, pretty much every image board’s Animated GIFs section contains School Days spoilers, so proceed with caution. No Wikipedia, no TV Tropes, and no anime blogs.
Yume Miru Kusuri is an excellent beginner title with a strong story and plenty of (plot-relevant) sex. Lexar uploaded the work-safe demo here, if you’d like to check it out (the demo doesn’t really do it justice, but if you like it, trust me when I say it only gets better).
If you have a tolerance for graphic violence and you like H.P. Lovecraft / the Cthulhu mythos, Song of Saya is worth checking out. It’s relatively short (a single playthrough takes four hours), but the writing is great (it’s Gen Urobuchi - easily my favorite visual novel author).
On the subject of Urobuchi, I’d suggest checking out Phantom of Inferno, especially if you liked the story of Hourglass of Summer. There are two anime adaptions - the game is bundled with the terrible first one, “Phantom the Animation”, at RightStuf. The second adaptation, “Requiem for the Phantom”, is very well-done; I’d suggest watching the first three episodes, and, if you like what you see, buy the game. Incidentally, Phantom is #2 in my VN Top 5.
Crescendo is my all-time favorite visual novel, narrowly beating out Phantom. Each playthough is on the short side (roughly 4 hours), but the story and characters are well put together and everything feels very down-to-earth and realistic. I’m a bit of a sap, so I’ll note that this one isn’t for everyone - if you liked the romantic parts of Hourglass of Summer, you’ll like this.
Titles with short individual playthoughs (note that this has no bearing on actual quality - I think the last three suck):
- Kana ~Little Sister~, Crescendo, Song of Saya, Hanachirasu, Doushin ~Same Heart~, Virgin Roster, D.O.R, Water Closet
Titles with traditional gameplay (again, no bearing on quality):
- Brave Soul (Action-RPG), Lightning Warrior Raidy I/II (First-Person RPG), Pretty Soldier Wars 2048 AD (Strategy RPG), Yukkuri Panic ~Escalation~ (Qix Clone), Princess Waltz (Card-Based RPG), Aselia the Eternal (Strategy RPG), Yumina the Ethereal (Strategy RPG), Downhill Night Blaze (Initial D clone)
My ears are burning. 8)
On a related note, imagine Norio Wakamoto or Jurota Kosugi narrating when your character caresses the flushed cheek of his chosen sweetheart as a passionate sigh escapes her lips and sweet nectar flows from her soft inner folds…
I wouldn’t advise this. A lot of anime adaptations of visual novels… tend to suck. Phantom ~Requiem for the Phantom~ and Suika ~Wet Summer Days~ are the only exceptions that readily come to mind (to be fair, I’ve reduced my anime viewing significantly since 2009, so there are plenty of newer titles that I have yet to see). The Demonbane anime was a disincentive for me to check out the game, as was Hourglass of Summer’s. Many people harp on about how bad Chaos;Head’s anime turned out. Even the School Days anime contains gaping plotholes. The general rule here is that the original work is almost always better than the anime version (I’d honestly love for this statement to be proven wrong someday).
Love & Hate (Yanagida & Mizuno) by Enomoto Heights is an excellent H-manga to start off with. Personally, I think it’s the best H-manga to get an official English release, but my personal bias plays a large part of that seeing as I prioritize story over sex. The English publisher has uploaded an official (but criminally short) teaser here, if you’d like to give it a look.
I’ll be able to give more-personalized recommendations once I have a better sense of what you like and what you don’t, so keep those comments coming.
I dunno, the Dragon Half OVAs are absolutely hysterical, yet I never managed to get very far in the original manga. Similarly, the Excel Saga anime was a lot funnier than the manga (to me, anyway). I find that comedy can be improved quite a bit by adding good VA to a scene.
I actually found the School Days anime far better than the game. Shuffle! is another case with decent anime but mediocre game. The TokyoAni Key adaptations are also very decent, from being practically textual (Kanon) to having some content suppressed but being very good besides that (Clannad).
I hated it for, IMO, killing the best part of Mai’s route, but other than that it wasn’t bad.
Hm, what part was it? I don’t remember any ruined scene or the such
Not a scene; I thought they ruined all of it. They cut out important emotional cues (remember that scene?), they cut out most of the backstory presented so you end up having absolutely no idea how Mai and her mother got into this in the first place (that whole psychic powers demonstration thing? I did, at one point, record the number of seconds they spent on that but I forgot how long it was- it was in the low single digits, though, and there is absolutely no way you could tell what happened in the few frames shown what the hell happened unless you already played the eroge!), they cut out important character development-- they took a hatchet to Mai’s route like they did to no other and, being by far my favourite route in Kanon (in fact, the only reason I consider it a worthwhile title at all) I found this more than a little bit vexing.
YMMV of course; if Mai isn’t your thing the Kanon anime is just as good as the game.
I can see where are you coming from. I also thought Mai was the best part of Kanon.
It’s been some time since I’ve played/seen Kanon, so don’t remember many details, but never found so glaring flaws. Though having played the game first the lack of backstory probably wasn’t much of a problem to me.
“Haphazardly” indeed. In general: If something got an anime, then that means it was relatively popular in Japan. This often means the game is really good; sometimes things are popular for other reasons.
I bought Da Capo based on this premise - anything with a dozen spinoffs, a full-fledged sequel, and a TV show cant be THAT bad … can it? Turns out yes, it can, and I hated it.
^^^^^^ This. All an anime adaptation tells you is that the game is not a really terrible nukige. Plenty of room for the game in question to be BAD. Sure, Hitomi doesn’t have an anime adaptation, but neither does Cross Channel. In fact, virtually none of my favourite eroges have anime adaptations.
Nandemonai, we’re talking about visual-novel-to-anime adaptations here. I agree that there are plenty of good manga-to-anime adaptations. Take the anime version of Secret Sweethearts / Boku wa Imouto ni Koi wo Suru (to be fair, it only adapts the first 16 chapters, but it’s a good adaptation nonetheless - I’d love to see the rest animated). In general, though, anime based on visual novels tend to suffer from heavy adaptation decay, as the other posters have already highlighted.
Note that I’m only halfway through Clannad ~After Story~ at the moment, and have yet to touch the original game, so I’m reserving my judgement until I’ve completed both. Suffice to say, I like what I’ve seen.
Granted, I loved the anime ending and felt it was both more in-character and appropriate to the show’s theme, but I have to bang my head against the wall for things like the paper-thin play metaphor, having Setsuna betray “the world” and comparing Makoto to… a flower, of all things? Also, why do we jump from a clearly-ready-to-commit-murder Kotonoha to days/weeks later with Hikari in Makoto’s bed even though they’ve made it anviliciously clear that she has a crush on Taisuke? Plotholes, plotholes… I swear, the show had to have been slated for 13 episodes, but they just didn’t make episode 11 and decided to renumber the rest. I know that’s not what happened, but that’s certainly what it feels like.
Precisely.
Any more updates Psycho? I’m actually kind of amazed your GF is willing to read these to you aloud or read them with you-it’s pretty hard for me to imagine even bringing up the idea to my current (or past) girlfriend. I’m impressed she’s open to this kind of hobby, because there’s no way in hell I’m giving the missus any clue I have this kind of hobby until we’re bed and wed for years :lol:
Also…it seems Koihime kinda got shoe horned somewhere? IMO it’s the closest VN to an actual game from what I’ve read and it’s loaded with sex of all kinds with voice acting (if you know where to get the not so legal patch anyhow, and you should get it).
If you want some games with more gamplay with frequent breaks from text there aren’t many out there, but there are a few. Brave Soul is one. Casual Romance Club is another and has an option to listen to the voices spoken in English by a Japanese voice actresses. Neither have high marks for their epic stories though. There aren’t many games out there that try to give good gameplay and a good story or even a decent adventure story (they aren’t the greatest stories, but I enjoy the Rance series because of its ability to merge the gameplay with the story). Those that do are mostly only in Japanese with a few fan translations scattered around.
As for KM, its basically a VN with a combat system tacked on to break up the monotony of text. They battles have no bearing on the game beyond needing to beat them to continue. Reminds me of the sub-par JRPGs where you are basically b-lined into a specific path and the story is not enough to make up for the fact you don’t have any way to change the outcome.
Popular doesn’t mean everyone will like it. It also doesn’t mean because someone liked one version they’ll like another. Everyone is an indivisual and has their own tastes. My friend doesn’t care for Higurashi VN, but likes the anime (he said it bored him and he expected at least some level of interaction) whereas most people who’ve played the VN and seen the anime (including me) say the VN for all its faults is still a better product.
Being popular doesn’t mean you’ll like something and being rated crap doesn’t mean you won’t (although that generally is more likely to be true).