But that isn’t the drama. The drama was there the whole time. Perhaps the resolution was forced, and that’s why I called it anti-climactic. So if you want to call it “forced resolution” then perhaps I could accept that.
I’m not saying Haruka’s routes were perfect, just saying that all the other routes were worse than it From a non-relative point of view, I’d say all of the routes in LB were bad.
N-no… RL romance is amazing and really fun
Sharing headphones by itself isn’t romantic, but the story behind it kind of is. Unless you have that kind of story with the girl you are sharing with, it won’t have the same impact
Sharing the headphones was so cute…
Idk, music is such a personal and emotional thing, and being that close to someone… it doesnt have to be romance but then its certainly another kind of friendship
Maybe where you live, yes… But here it’s completely normal. I’m not even friends with the people I’ve shared headphones. They just wanted me to listen to some songs they like.
The resolution was dramatic, so the drama of it was forced.
And using your concept, every route that isn’t “tense” in the beginning could be called forced drama.
It’s simply laughable to think you can call Haruka’s route out on having forced drama while praising the king of forced drama in LB with Kud’s route. I’m sorry, I can’t call you anything but disillusioned with that.
Kud route spoilers: WOAH LOOK AT THAT A WAR IN MY COUNTRY OUT OF THE BLUE THE ONLY INTELLIGENT COURSE OF ACTION IS TO GO THERE, OH FUCKING NO I’M CAPTURED IN THE SACRIFICIAL RAPE DUNGEON, it’s idiotic and there is simply not build up, it’s impossible to connect to because the situation is so out there and dumb, bred for drama and cheap emotional pay off and nothing more.
Haruka’s route has a more down to earth situation, one that is believable and built up, it IS two teenaged girls fighting, not some Grisaia tier edgy nonsense chucked in with no sense of storytelling.
Because you didn’t pay attention.
Neither of them wanted this, they more a less were forced into an endless and escalating battle, the more they fought, the more they began to forget those original feelings of companionship, the harder they tried to fight, it was a vicious cycle.
It’s because Riki Gave her the dicki more a less forced Haruka to open up friendly relationships between the two that Kanata’s wall was broken down. The two girls just released with Riki’s help that they have no need to continue the dumb ‘contest’ forced upon them and remembered the love they had for each other from their childhood.
Elements introduced > The fights between the girls get harsher for a bit > Haruka breaks and gains Riki as her ally > Kanata changes to trying to break that bond instead of fighting as they have before > Both girls begin to doubt the point of all this > Riki initiates operation get back together.
I’m sorry what? What part of this isn’t a story split into parts that progress it meaningfully?
[N O]
[T H A N K]
[Y O U]
Yoooooooou wot m8.
Haruka’s route has the most romantic line in the entire game and absolutely the best romance, I cannot see how you feel this way about the romance. Nobody will agree with you on this, that’s the best I can say, I just cannot understand what part of it you see as flawed, I at the very least cannot see this ‘bad chemistry’ whatsoever.
It’s not even ‘boring and just there’, it has some interesting aspects to it. Haruka being so broken and love starved that she straight up says ‘I might have just fallen in love with anyone that helped me’ is sooooo much more interesting than Komari and Kuds ‘schoolgirl crush’ for example. And on the Riki side of things, he gets to pull Haruka out of her bubble of self loathing, he gets to protect her, he gets to have her come out of a shell and embrace the world, he gets to be her Kyousuke. Little Busters is all about Kyousuke building Riki into someone who can do these things without needing it himself, and this romance shows that Riki has that potential, Riki can be the person Kyousuke wants him to be, tying the romance into the main theme of Little Busters wonderfully, meaning that even if you don’t think it can stand alone, you should at least appreciate that. Which again, is a little bit better than ‘schoolboy crush’.
To finish this off, I’d like to apologize to Kuds route for shitting on it so much, it’s just you gave it as an example of a good thing compared to Haruka when it actually had all the ammo I needed to point out why Haruka succeeded where it failed.
In the context of “forced drama”, it seems you totally misunderstand the meaning of drama. “Drama” here refers to the introduction of a plot point that serves to add conflict for the sake of eliciting an emotional response. It cannot solely refer to the resolution because the resolution exists only because of the drama. What I am saying here is that you are using the words wrong.
See, the point of words is to get one’s idea across. You used the words “forced drama” which imply a claim that is different from what you are trying to portray. As such, you have caused a great amount of confusion, which is very counterproductive.
Now then, if you said something along the lines of “the resolution was forced” then this confusion would not exist in the first place. In that case, was the resolution forced? Perhaps it was, but sometimes, that is the only way to achieve resolution.
There’s such a thing called “progression” which you yourself referred to a few posts ago. If you really do understand progression, then you would realize that a route could start off as not tense at all, then slowly build up towards the ensuing drama. Rin’s route, for example, is one that I think had good progression. It starts with a cat claiming to give the “secret of the world” which doesn’t feel so tense at first. Then it goes on to having her do random things. These things slowly start becoming more and more tense until the actual drama occurs.
As I said, I agree that Kud’s route has forced drama. However, I don’t think Kud’s route is really a good route. I just praised it because the drama had a reasonable impact on me, in contrast to Haruka’s route, that didn’t hit me at all.
Actually, Kud’s route is the second worst route in my opinion, only behind Haruka’s.
Yes, I agree that the drama of this route felt out-of-place, but not that it’s impossible to connect. From the beginning of the route, you could build a connection with Kud, knowing her better and liking her more. But when you see (Kud’s route spoilers) her finally happy that she can see her mother, than being tortured and blaming herself when she’s done nothing wrong, it’s almost impossible not to feel the drama. . Haruka just keeps pushing things too much on her side, trying to make Kanata look bad, but none of them were right. I couldn’t really feel the drama, because it felt like she was just exaggerating to make Riki pity her.
This is what I don’t like about it. The answer was right under their noses the whole time, and they couldn’t realize it because of their stupid actions. As you said, it was indeed a “dumb contest”. This is why I don’t like it, it feels terribly immature.
From the part when Haruka gains an ally until the climax, nothing really affects the plot. Kanata’s efforts have no effect (I thought they would do something to Haruka, but nothing actually happened), and Haruka keeps going to who knows whose father in order to find out the truth, but her efforts lead to nothing, until the guy sets a condition. It gets tiresome, besides the mood doesn’t really evolve, it stays basically the same until the climax.
Riki feels much more like a “Kyousuke” in Komari’s route. The strength he gives to her by letting her face the truth, and showing her that she could still be happy was crucial for her development and for the end of the conflict With Haruka, Riki just picked her side of the conflict and helped her realize the truth that was right under her nose all along.
And the romantic scenes in her route were less remarkable or special than any other route. Mio had the beach scene, Kud had the painting scene, Komari had the shooting stars scene, Kurugaya had the fireworks scene. Haruka’s route didn’t have any of those, it was too mundane, nothing outstanding or breath-taking.
Umu… I get it now. So let’s say the resolution is forced. The problem is that Haruka’s route could afford to have a conflict from the beginning. Komari’s route couldn’t, it just gave hints, until you really found out later. Also (Komari’s route spoiler) the “cat thing” was only the beginning. It kept evolving until you hit the climax. It had to appear out of nothing, but its purpose wasn’t to receive an emotional response. Instead of it, the reader would have a question hitting his head: “What the heck is wrong with this girl?” This would prepare the reader to the revelation.
Not if they had planned the route differently. The revelation of the conflict was too early, it could have been more in the middle, and then have the beginning giving hints and progressing towards it. After the revelation, it would grow more depressing and tense until the climax hit. Then, you wouldn’t have a forced resolution.
Komari’s route, as I said, before, couldn’t afford to do this. Rather, it would even lose part of its impact, from the contrast between ‘happy’ and ‘sad’.
I feel bad using something as stupid as an image macro, but I feel that this fits perfectly: http://puu.sh/hKjZ7.jpg (check under “forced drama”)
You know what this sounds like to me? This sounds exactly like how I felt about Haruka’s route.
Yes, the revelation of the conflict was very early, but they still had many hints that progressed towards it. After the revelation, it definitely did get more and more depressing as you saw both girls becoming more and more desperate to go against each other, until Riki finally initiated the climax. The scene where Kanata pretends to be Haruka is the highest point of that “depressing and tense” feeling, and after that is when Riki starts to step in and make stuff happen.
It’s not like I get confused or anything, I just don’t like drama moved by characters’ stupidity.
What hints? It was all spilled from the beginning.
And depressing? I guess our perceptions of this route diverged a lot. I didn’t feel sad, or this depressed feeling after the revelation, or even tense. The mood was basically the same for me, and as I said, it just felt like two teenagers fighting each other, which wouldn’t make me depressed or anything.
Starting all the way from the common route they were pacing in a very good way o_O First we see how antagonistic Haruka is with Kanata, but we don’t know why. Then we learn that they are twins, but are still left in the dark about their history. Only until we find out about their backstory do we know the whole reason for their antagonism. Like I said, route-wise, revelation was early. But considering the foreboding starting all the way from the common route, it was approached in a way that did use hints for it.
Yes, this might be the most personal part of the argument. I, for one, found it immensely depressing and tense to see the cheerful girl known as Haruka Saigusa to naturally be forced into desperation and anger. We see that that anger and antagonism are her true emotions that co-exist along with her happy-go-lucky demeanor, and found that it immensely absorbed me into the story.
Litbus is allll about immaturity. They are all dumb teens, and the dramas all factor in how dumb and teenage the characters are.
That’s all he had to do. It was Haruka’s problem, not Riki’s.
Disagree. The only ones that were even notable from what I remember of the game were Yuiko’s and Haruka’s.
Mio’s beach scene was boring. Kud’s painting scene didn’t mean anything to me because there was no real background to it beforehand. The shooting star scene in Komari’s route was as awful as the rest of the route.
Haruka’s was mundane, and it was simple,. but it was good, and that’s a pretty rare thing with romance in Litbus.
It did this. There was a playful start, then Haruka started getting in trouble, then there was the bench thing and the defamatory writing all around the school, and then it devolved into backstabbing and lies.
There’s progression.
I think it’s the route that did it most. If it was an individual VN I wouldn’t be surprised if it was an Utsuge.
The atmosphere of the route was set to choke out anyone who dare try to read it’s contents.
Sorry, I thought you were talking about hints after the revelation. Until the revelation it was done very well, and it had hints, I agree. My complaint is that the revelation was early, and it could have been more in the middle.
So, then, you felt anger towards Kanata? I didn’t like Haruka, and I was trying my best not to be biased towards her or Kanata. So, I saw the conflict “externally”, and I couldn’t be absorbed into it because both of the girls were wrong, and Haruka was just pushing Riki to her side.
Kud’s route’s drama wasn’t like that, neither was Kurugaya’s. Mio may have had a bit of this, and I also thought the resolution was a bit forced, but it wasn’t as much as in this route. As for Komari it was a mental hereditary disease, not immaturity .
Mio’s beach scene wasn’t boring in the least. I’ll tell you why:
They were in the beach (a romantic setting)
Riki woke up seeing Mio there (something that relieved him)
There was those romantic lines :“This wasn’t my first kiss, etc.” (made you go Aw…)
That beautiful CG
Kud’s scene was something special to her, and something beautiful, you don’t see IRL. Komari’s shooting star scene emphasized the route’s themes, and isn’t something you see daily. Two people in a rooftop, seeing shooting stars feels really romantic for me.
Haruka’s scenes have nothing special, or that makes it stand out from real life. It was just… there and it didn’t seem like they put much effort or creativity into it.
As I said it was fine before the revelation. But then, it could have been later, it was too early.
All of the routes did. They wouldn’t exist if they didn’t.
Eh, she’s still immature, regardless of what reasonings exist.
You can’t tell someone why something isn’t boring.
To me, all you pointed out was a boring cliche setting, with a boring character, and some boring cliche lines… With a CG (oh wonder of wonders.) Not forgetting that it was part of a boring route.
That’s what makes it good in my mind. It’s normal. It was two people interacting for the sake of interacting. No crazy rituals or beliefs.
What do you consider the revelation? Because there’s a bunch of moments that fit that title.
I believe this has already been said, but I feel it’s worth reiterating. Almost everything that happened in Little Busters, the entire focus of the VN as a piece, is that these are immature teenagers fucking up. Everyone was like this. (Refrain spoilers) The entire setting of Little Busters is this hyperbolic world where teenagers were using their traumas to ‘help’ Riki and Rin survive. It was fucked up and wrong. That’s why it didn’t work, Kyousuke placed these hyperbolic immaturities as essential things that by fixing would mature Rin and Riki. But of course they didn’t. Little Busters was never about solving these things, rather about moving on past them. No matter how painful they may be.
I’m not sure if this will matter or anything to what is being said. But it definitely feels like that central theme is being overlooked a lil with regard to Haruchin’s route.
EDIT: I’ve noticed that moving things from topic to topic via quotes is favoured on this forum. Is there any kind of guidelines I should have for doing that?
@sillylittlemelody It sounds to me like your whole post basically just boils down to: “I don’t like the real world and conflicts that actually seem like things real people might do.” Thats fine. Im not gonna judge you for what you like and don’t like. But all the things you are describing as forced and stupid are all things that would be believable as happening in real life.
Besides, you keep saying “it was all so obvious” and “its so stupid that they were fighting about this when it could have been solved from the beginning”, but it really couldnt have been solved until Shou Saigusa agreed to tell them the truth.
In some ways, I agree with this. I could go through each route and tell you how the characters acted immature. I wont though, because that would be going way too off topic. You have to remember that immature isnt necessarily a bad thing. I could also go through and tell how each character acted maturely as well, so that seems like kinda a moot point anyway.
I wouldnt agree that the drama and immaturity is (Refrain) what caused the events of Little Busters!. Mature people have regrets too. And even if many of them didn’t deal with it in the most mature ways, I wouldn’t call any of their regrets immature.
If you don’t like it don’t read it. No one sees this story “everywhere and every time in real life”, and its not repetitive. Most people like it because characters who act like real people are much more relatable.
Yes, when you want to furthur discuss something someone brought up, but it doesnt apply to the topic its in, it is better just to continue the discussion in a more fitting topic. There aren’t really any guidelines besides just try to keep from going to far off topic.
For example, I’m about to reply to your post in the Refrain discussion, partly because I dont feel like putting a bunch of spoiler tags on it, but mostly because my comments dont specifically relate to Haruka and her route, even if your’s did.
That’s life. Is there anything wrong with that? Repetition can be good if you know what to repeat.
Pinpon~ It’s about adolescence, the good and the bad of it.
Basically, if you read something, and you think your response would be better suited for a different topic, move to that topic. If something is vague, or you are lazy like Taka, let the mods judge.
Shou was just the last straw. It could have been solved if Haruka and Kanata were more mature and thought about their actions more. Except they weren’t.
I’m not talking about the story or the characters. Just the romance, specifically. I don’t look for “relatable” romance, I want something beautiful.
Dude, after 17 years of Haruka being treated like crap, and being told it was her fault that she was treated in such a way, and after 17 years of Kanata being told that she was better than Haruka in every way, and that basically everything that ever went wrong was Haruka’s fault, you seriously expect them to just suddenly think “Oh wow, we’re being immature and stupid. Lets just make up.”?
Now that would be unnatural and forced. I almost think that that seems more immature.
Like I said, man, Im not gonna judge you on what you like and don’t like. But you shouldn’t then come in here and say that the romance was bad because you didn’t think it was “beautiful.” That’s not really an expectation you can go into romance with anyway. (EDIT: Please see my next post below)
Come on now, people are entitled to their own opinions on what’s good and what’s bad, and there’s nothing to stop them from saying it. Given how it’s all subjective anyways, there’s not really a wrong answer on what constitutes a work being good or bad. Discussion is fine, but let’s not attack people’s opinions here.
Yeah, it’d be really naive for both of them to come to the consensus that they should set all of their bad blood behind them and mend their relationship. It would be a crazy, blinding idealism that would end up with people walking all over them; not really the best way to show the pair maturing.
Although I’m kinda preaching to the choir with that one.
@HeliosAlpha Yeah I meant it’d be unnatural if they did it from the start. Guess I wasn’t clear on that.
From a non-relative point of view, I’d say all of the routes in LB were bad.
