Bokuten is kind of crappy, and that's not a statement about quality. When you think of a protagonist who gets all the girls, the explanation tends to be "the gods of the universe favor him", and you ignore it, because applying real life logic to fiction, is an ever expanding rabbit hole. Turn that around to events with a negative connotation, and ignoring things is no longer an option, there needs to be a reason for all the trouble, tragedy and bad luck. Winning the lottery = good, no need for an explanation. Being accused of murder/death/kill = bad, things need to be made clear. And that's Bokuten, basically. Crappy things keep happening, because the writer wills it so.
Positive:
- Utsuge - If you turn off your brain, this VN will do its job and evoke all of the feelings you expect from the sub-genre. Forget sensitivity or empathy, it's like watching the news one day, and tragedies happened all over the globe, in quick succession. You will be sad.
- Protagonist - Not good in any plane of existence (not bad either), but combining dense, emotional, sarcastic and voluntary celibate(?) in one package, has value on the boldness scale.
- Conundrums - All criticism aside, it's interesting to think about some of the scenarios presented, and try to determine what's really important. The fact that you are not doing it for protagonist and heroine (different characters), is also very welcome, like most changes in POV.
- Common route - It's nowhere near as good as advertised, but it becomes awesome by virtue of comparison (to the rest of the VN). The number of characters, situations, and the interesting supernatural setting, is more than enough to separate Bokuten's, from your "average high school VN common route".
Negative:
- NTR - NTR in itself is no problem whatsoever, it's just an example of "crap" happening for the sake of shock value. There's an NTR segment here, that belongs in a low budget 15 minute hentai. "Nymphomaniac Sex Slaves" are wonderful, but not in a VN of this scale. And let's not bring up the psychotic little sister, or the score might drop further. Utterly lawless writing is the problem here, there's no need to bash this any further.
Score: 5/10. It's a VN you want to forget. There's no possible redemption here, the author was allowed (allowed itself?) way too much freedom, and the result is disappoitment, and 30 hours of your time wasted. Not recommended, unless you you want to feel miserable, and read something entirely capricious.
(H-scenes have characters going for them, meaning that you get to see the secondary cast in them. A bit of difference factor)
Positive:
- Utsuge - If you turn off your brain, this VN will do its job and evoke all of the feelings you expect from the sub-genre. Forget sensitivity or empathy, it's like watching the news one day, and tragedies happened all over the globe, in quick succession. You will be sad.
- Protagonist - Not good in any plane of existence (not bad either), but combining dense, emotional, sarcastic and voluntary celibate(?) in one package, has value on the boldness scale.
- Conundrums - All criticism aside, it's interesting to think about some of the scenarios presented, and try to determine what's really important. The fact that you are not doing it for protagonist and heroine (different characters), is also very welcome, like most changes in POV.
- Common route - It's nowhere near as good as advertised, but it becomes awesome by virtue of comparison (to the rest of the VN). The number of characters, situations, and the interesting supernatural setting, is more than enough to separate Bokuten's, from your "average high school VN common route".
Negative:
- NTR - NTR in itself is no problem whatsoever, it's just an example of "crap" happening for the sake of shock value. There's an NTR segment here, that belongs in a low budget 15 minute hentai. "Nymphomaniac Sex Slaves" are wonderful, but not in a VN of this scale. And let's not bring up the psychotic little sister, or the score might drop further. Utterly lawless writing is the problem here, there's no need to bash this any further.
Score: 5/10. It's a VN you want to forget. There's no possible redemption here, the author was allowed (allowed itself?) way too much freedom, and the result is disappoitment, and 30 hours of your time wasted. Not recommended, unless you you want to feel miserable, and read something entirely capricious.
(H-scenes have characters going for them, meaning that you get to see the secondary cast in them. A bit of difference factor)