First Impressions: Norn9 Var Commons

First Impressions: Norn9 Var Commons

This is my first impression for the visual novel otome game Norn9 Var Commons.

 Platform: PS Vita

ESRB: T for Teen

Genre: Visual novel, otome

Release: November 2015

I don't really know if this could really count as a first impression since I've easily put multiple hours into this game. However, given the fact that this is an otome game with nine different routes, and I've only completed the happy endings for four out of five of the characters, it should still apply, right?

Anyways. Norn9 is an interesting one. As mentioned earlier, there are nine guys whose routes you can pursue, and the endings you get are determined by the choices you make through the story. What's different about this game compared to others in the same category is that you have a choice between three female protagonists. Depending on who you choose, you can go through the route of three of the nine guys. To be honest, I'm not sure if this is something I'm a fan of. I mean, it's not bad, but I don't think it's something I'd like to see become a "thing". Personally, I kind of wish I could go through the guys' routes as a different protagonist, but I guess the guys will only fall for certain characters.

What's been completed...

• Sakuya (happy ending)
• Kakeru (happy ending)
• Itsuki (happy ending)
• Senri (happy ending)

What I like so far...

• It's a visual novel, an otome one. We're getting more of these over on this side of the Pacific! I bought this (full price, $39, new at Gamestop) mainly just to support these kinds of games and hope that we'll get more.

• There's lots of characters to choose from. Nine guys and three female protagonists. It feels a bit like overkill, perhaps because the routes aren't always that enjoyable to go through, but there's lots of options, which is a good thing.

• Timed choices. They're few and far between and not all routes have them, but this was an interesting mechanic. When these choices come up, you have nine seconds to make your choice. Can be nerve-wracking since I suck at making decisions in general, but it's a cool feature.

• The voice actors! There's two from the Hakuoki series: Yusa Kouji (Sanosuke in Hakuoki, Itsuki in this game) and Yoshino Hiroyuki (Heisuke in Hakuoki, Heishi in this game). There's also Ono Daisuke, which may not matter to anyone else, but he is definitely one of my favorite Japanese voice actors.

• I also liked that you have the ability to turn certain character's voices off. I personally prefer the protagonist I'm playing as to be unvoiced, so it was good to be able to turn off one of the girl's voices, but keep the other two enabled. You can do this with any of the character voices.

What I don't like so far...

• I'm still trying to figure out what the hell is going on in this game story-wise. I'm hoping that maybe after I go through all the routes, it'll all come together and form this "Aha!" moment, but I kind of doubt it. When you go through a route, there seems to be no congruity. It's like the only constant thing is that there are 12 people on a flying ship going to see "The World". I've gone through four happy endings, and certain elements (major plot points, in my opinion) weren't even mentioned in some routes, but were the major climatic point in others. I want to keep this spoiler-free, so I won't go into details, but it makes no sense for a primary antagonist who is the catalyst as to why they're on the ship and why war may break out at any moment, to be the center of the last two chapters of one character's route, barely mentioned and easily absolved in another, and not mentioned in the least in another. I still haven't given up hope that it may all come together at some point, but I just think that if you go through one character's route you should get a complete story, and if not, it should be clear how others connect to it. 

• They have characters that they recommend you play through first before you play others. I don't like this because I want to be able to pick whoever I want, but aside from that, this could be an enjoyable feature if I could see that it truly made a difference. For example, with Mikoto, they recommend you play through Sakuya's route before you go through Itsuki's. I did that, but I didn't really see the point. It wasn't like Itsuki's route would make no sense if you did it the other way around. Now, with Koharu, they recommend you go through Kakeru and Senri before doing Masamune (that's what she said). I saw the point since in otne route a certain circumstance with Kakeru is explained in his route and barely touched upon in Senri's. It doesn't make a difference with Senri's storyline, so in all honesty, they could've completely omitted the one line Kakeru says regarding said circumstance.

• The only other otome visual novel I've gotten the chance to play is Hakuoki: Demon of the Fleeting Blossom, which I really enjoyed. One of my few complaints with that game, however, was that there could have been a bit more romance (an issue that was kind of resolved with the Memories in Hakuoki: Memories of the Shinsengumi on the PS3). This game did not suffer with that, not in the least. Hakuoki's romance, while maybe not as frequent, was definitely done better, though. I believe all characters' routes are seven chapters long, and after chapter two, there is literally no overall plot development until chapter six and then it goes quickly and finishes in chapter seven. All the other chapters are just interactions between the protagonist and whatever male character's route you're on. This would be fine if the game wasn't mentioning all these overarching problems in the beginning just to not touch on them until the very end, and then it all gets hastily (sometimes messily) resolved. I like the romance, yes, but if there's going to be a (what I believe to be a main) story besides the character's relationship, that shouldn't be sacrificed. 

• The prologue. That prologue was pure torture for me to go through. You start as a 12 year old know-it-all kid named Sorata Suzuhara who ends up in a different time period. Since he knows everything, he refuses to believe he traveled in time because science says it's not possible. The kid says he doesn't even read fiction books or play video games because they're too unrealistic. (Ironically, he's in both a video game and a fictional story at the same time, so joke's on him). Anyway, I still have yet to discover the point of Sorata at all. He's like the plot, only after chapter one, he hardly shows up again. In some cases, all he gets is a one line "Sorata chose to do the thing, so don't worry about him." And that's all we hear of him. I've gotten hints about what his purpose for traveling back in time was, but I still don't know why we had to go through that whole field trip thing at the beginning.

• Time is weird. Yes, there's time travel, but the timeline is confusing. Sorata traveled back in time (from what he thought was 2015, I believe) to what everyone else believed to be the year 1919. Then they end up finding out that they are in a year that is very much not 2015 or 1919 (trying to not spoil anything). And while they were on the ship, there's hardly any way to tell how long they were traveling. Long enough to stop in towns and get random supplies (door hinges lol), I guess. Was their trip a couple of weeks, months, years, does time not flow while they're in the ship? I don't know.

• I've run across a few typos, wrong names next to text boxes, and times when the protagonist's name will go back to default. It's not permanent, but in one phrase, the name you chose will come up, and then in another, the guy may call out to you as "Koharu!" when you've changed the name. It's just weird because it's like this guy says he loves me so much, but he can't remember my name? I've also had it happen with Mikoto as well. 

(Somewhat) Final Verdict

Had this not have been an otome visual novel, I probably would have returned it and got my $40 back. Only thing that really stopped me is that I want to have it in my collection, and it would take me longer than seven days (window for returns) to finish it. These visual novels are a rare treat since there aren't that many that make it to the US, and it's even rarer to see something so aimed directly at my demographic (late teens to twenties female) that would have little appeal to the general male demographic in that same age group.

While it may seem like I was really harsh on this game, there have been some good points. These good points, however, were not enough to make ignore the bad ones. This visual novel is a bit of an embarrassment. Perhaps my expectations were too high after Hakuoki, but I don't really think so. There are so many issues with the writing itself, I'm surprised this got published the way it did. Just imagine how it may have started out if this is the final finished product. 

Another thing, and this has nothing to do with the game itself and is a bit nitpicky I'll admit, but the localization and translation of this game is kind of weird. I also felt this way about Hakuoki, which was also localized and translated by Aksys. I'm by no means fluent in Japanese, but I can manage to understand at least 30% of most lines and all of others and the way they chose to translate some of them is just strange. They add so much extra dialogue that's non-existent in the Japanese. I'm not saying they should just translate it word for word, I wouldn't even encourage that, but I feel like they could tone it down with the extra words and descriptions. They make it seem like they're trying too hard, and some of them are just really cheesy and weird to read. I understand that Japanese has a lot of small grammatical differences and the like that make things sound either very formal or very informal, and I also realize that we don't really have that in English, but it's just unnecessary and kind of painful when you can understand the Japanese and then read the English and you're like, "Why would you translate it like THAT, of all the possible ways you could do so?" 

There was also an option in Sakuya's route early on in chapter one or two where the choices are something like a white rabbit, a hiyoko, and some other animal I don't remember. I believe Sakuya asked about an animal other than a human that warms itself by a fire or something like that. Now, prior to playing this game and up until this point, I had no idea what a hiyoko was. Sakuya then explains that a hiyoko is a baby chick-like thing. Now they choose to do all that extra stuff with the easy translations, but not translate hiyoko when it's an answer choice that's never even been mentioned previously?

And last thing. Why are the hiyokos even there? I love them and how they talk, but what is their purpose? To aid the characters while they're on the ship? Why are they baby chickens?