Rainshowers and More Katawa Shoujo

It was surprising Sunday, at least as far as my usual day at the office went.  It wasn’t headache-inducingly stressful at all, and the gap in between calls made it seem like what I’d expect on a Monday.  Okay, there were instances where the queue suddenly overflowed, but that only happened once or twice over the course of the shift.  That pretty much meant that, once again, we were mostly left to our devices.  It wasn’t enough for us to wander around the floor to chat up some batch-mates, but the avail time did allow us to browse the net while we waited for the calls to come in yet again. 

Although it wasn’t so when I came into the office, it started raining sometime mid-shift, so our view of the city outside the office was veiled again in grey.  It was still raining once I got out, but it wasn’t so hard that I got soaked before I could find a jeepney to ride in.  The downpour continued for most of the afternoon, which had the welcome effect of making the afternoon much cooler… Which meant it was so much easier to go to sleep.  Which obviously I did, since I was going on just an hour or so of sleep.

The reason why I didn’t sleep that well can be easily inferred by the picture above.  Yes, like many of my peers in the community, I’m playing through Katawa Shoujo.  Though it would be pushing it to say that the writing for the game was perfect, it’s still very good, full of nuance and, hmm, sensitivity?  I’m not really sure that’s the right word to describe it, but obviously when you’re dealing with a cast full of characters with physical disabilities there’s an expectation that the narrative might trivialize or otherwise put undue focus on the disabilities rather than the characters who have them.  

That’s not quite what happens here; while the disabilities of each girl are shown front and center, they’re simply very small aspects of what makes them who they are.  Indeed each of the characters (yes even Kenji) have vibrant personalities separate from the disabilities that they have, so much so that it’s easy to forget that, yes, they’re even disabled to begin with.

I’m not yet far enough into the game where I have to make a definite choice of whose route I’d go with, but at this point I’m fairly taken with Rin, who has the right mix of contemplative and just plain loopy that makes me want to find out just what makes her… tick, I suppose. Unfortunately her route is probably the most complicated in the game, and I’m no Keima Katsuragi. So I think I’ll think I’ll leave her story for last, and focus on the more obvious choices…

Like Lily.  Not that her route is any less complicated (it would be wise not to think that way, else you’re on the road to the Manly Picnic quicker than you can say ‘uncle’).  Okay, there’s Misha and Shizune, but given how the council president and her sidekick is pretty much in your face from the get-go I think it’s best to give some attention to the other girls first.

Speaking of which, I better get to playing.

P.S. I added another Puella to the stampede.  While the relatively simple designs of the extras shown in Episode 12 make them easy to sketch and make lineart for, their simplicity makes them look boring compared to, say, Oriko or even Yuma.

That leaves, hmm, two more extras from the series proper left undrawn.  Oooh.

Of Workshops, and Sad Girls With Disabilities

It’s the start of classes again, as far as yours truly was concerned, and although I did wake up in the expected time (that is, around nine in the morning), I still ended up getting to the campus slightly late.  The plan was, of course, to leave around an hour before twelve, but in the end I still left around forty-odd minutes before noon.  Why this happened was because I suddenly remembered the voice recorder my father mentioned a few months back, and I thought it might be helpful with regards to the lectures in the class.  So I (and eventually my father) spent some time digging through the detritus sitting in my sister’s bedroom, but when the recorder was found, I didn’t spend too long trying to puzzle out the functions (or read the manual for that matter), and unceremoniously slid it into my pocket after putting in the triple-As that came with it.

So after a short bus ride (well, as short as you can get close to the mid-day rush hour), I found myself at EDSA station with about ten minutes to noon… Which didn’t really mean much, as the train from Baclaran took its sweet time in getting there.  The ride to DLSU once a train did arrive was quick, but it was already a little past twelve when I got to the campus.    A brisk walk to Miguel Hall later, and I was at the classroom that was listed on my Enrollment Assessment Form.

Only there was no one there.  Apparently the class had relocated to a screening room one floor down, so with your expected amount of panic I rushed downstairs.  

Incidentally, despite going to classes there for almost two years, I’ve never really poked around Miguel Hall, so actually finding the screening room the class had relocated to took another extra minute.

Thankfully though I was able to find the room, and with just a bit of embarrassment I let myself in. The lecture hadn’t started in earnest yet, so there wasn’t any problem for a late-comer, but I did have to lead the class in prayer… Anyway our professor this time around was really soft-spoken and, in a word, relaxed, though he does seem to have this habit of staring at a particular person in the eye… Or maybe that was just my impression.  Anyway, he’s an industry veteran, as is expected in these sorts of classes, but is more into doing non-mainstream works these days, and doesn’t seem to be bothered much by the strictures of screenplay writing that were hammered into our heads last term. 

As for the class itself, it was more of a refresher than anything else of what we learned during the previous semester (which meant that the recorder wasn’t really needed).  We watched some movies in between the lecture (because our professor admitted that he’d be hard-pressed to fill the three hours our class was allotted), including a set of ten-minute long shorts (one by Bernardo Bertolucci), and talked about which screenplay we would use for the duration of the workshop.  There was a lot of groaning (I’m sure I’m not the only one who’s slightly embarrassed at the output from last term), but in the end most of us decided to stick with the screenplays we already had, rather than start something from scratch, although there were those who bit the bullet and opted for a rewrite.  Brave souls, those ones are.

Since our previous professor so enthusiastically forwarded our screenplays to our current one, we’ll be going with the final version of the so-called first draft.  The rate should be around two to three screenplays per session (the better to spread the embarrassment around!), picked randomly of course.  I am so looking forward to seeing mine read and critiqued, so so much (read the sarcasm in my tone).

Anyway, after that there’s little really to say. It started raining a little after class ended (relatively early I might add), so obviously I was more than a little soaked once I got home, and after a perfunctorily look at Twitter and Pixiv, I went to bed for the afternoon.

Now enough of this real-life nonsense.  I’m awake, not doing any drawing right now, and don’t have Skyrim open for a change, so I figure it’s about time for me to boot up Katawa Shoujo (かたわ少女) and devote some hours on it.  

For those who’re not familiar with it, it’s something that’s been a long time in coming, and anticipated by more than a few folk in the circles I’m part of.  What started as a thread on the (in)famous 4chan turned into a sprawling project to create a Visual Novel in the usual Japanese style of the genre…  And here it was, finally completed five years later, after who knows how many staff changes and whatnot, nevermind the internal politicking that darned near torn the project asunder. The fact that it’s distributed free online does not diminish how tremendous an achievement this was.  In the words of the much-esteemed 2DTeleidoscope (in the interview by the Otaku Journalist):

“Think of every novel that never gets written, every Internet community that dies in flames. Realize that Four Leaf Studios endured five years of rewrites, revisions and personal drama to produce this product, shuffling through staff like cards in a game of Old Maid. And yet the idea survived. The work is done. This is great and worthy of our admiration, no matter what you think of romance with disabled girls.”

I’m not sure we can call the culmination of the project as the Great Western Visual Novel, but it’s a momentous achievement, and it’s one that deserves playing… And sharing.  And don’t let the fact that the girls in question are disabled (lets not mince words here), or the fact that the games isn’t ‘all-ages’ (something that’s easily remedied in the game options), turn you away.  Give it a chance.  It’s quite the gem.  

As for me, I think I’ll take my sweet time on this. Oh yes.