Happy Birthday Kyousuke! Thread pinned for the duration of his birthday, please share some words for him~
Little Busters are forever!!!
As I see it, Kyousuke is the perfect leader figure for the kind of group the Little Busters are. Turning it around, you can also say that the Little Busters became what they are thanks to Kyousuke.
He is an indispensable character for this VN and no one else could’ve taken his place.
Kyousuke’s burden was a heavy one and the task he had tackled was enormous. He had to turn the weak, extremely dependent Riki and Rin into people who could face the cruel fate of losing all their friends and classmates, as well as standing on their own two feet and live a normal life after that.
Before Rin2, his methods were flawless. Every new task was FUN at the beginning. He found new friends for Rin and had Riki recruit them. In exchange for having them participate in his plan, he had Riki help them deal with their regrets and face hardships. He sent letters to Rin to have her improve her social skills (and common sense). Loop by loop, Riki and Rin were slowly maturing and growing stronger.
Up to there, his methods were very fitting for those two.
But Kyousuke is not perfect. He’s just as human as anyone else. He has his own flaws and he makes mistakes. Since he held great power and responsibility, his mistakes resulted in causing a lot of damage. He grew overconfident and rushed things. With his goal in sight, he became cruel and put everything on the line. stopped being choosy about his methods. He destroyed the Little Busters in order to proceed with his plan, making Riki and Kengo his enemies. But he still failed and ended up breaking Rin, who wasn’t up to the task he forced on her just yet.
However, Rin2 was not a complete failure. After all, Riki had sworn to become stronger. His growth was almost complete.
Left alone with his guilt, Kyousuke still refused to give up. He left the details up to Riki, only occasionally stirring things up or giving him a hint and focused on taking care of the gas leak.
Finally, Riki had succeeded in taking Kyousuke’s place and he didn’t stop there. He exceeded all expectations and together with Rin, brought about the perfect ending.
To me, Kyousuke is one of the best-written characters. He has amazing qualities, but he’s not perfect. He is a believable and relatable character.
Every group of friends should have a Kyousuke ^^
PS:
Let’s not forget that, even as a kid, Kyousuke was already a savior. He saved Rin, Masato, Kengo and Riki and made it possible for them to play like normal kids. He essentially gave them a proper childhood full of fun and happiness.
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I don’t have words to do the man justice.
He is so very dear to me, I don’t let the barriers between 2D and 3D stop me from considering him a true friend.
Alright- So, I’ve said this plenty of times now, but I find Kyousuke to be the best written Key character to date. To put this simply- What Maeda did with Kyousuke in regards to the entire story of Little Busters… It’s just, really damned amazing to me. I can’t put it into words. Reading through that entire VN and hitting Episode: Kyousuke… One of the most surreal experiences I’ve ever had reading a story.
I won’t be able to say everything the way I’d hoped to, but here goes.
Writing aside, Kyousuke is simply amazing. Other than, well, yourself- I don’t think there are many other people you should strive to be. A ‘leader’, who is really just your great friend, who makes everything fun. Live life with goals in mind, but do it with fun. Just as you do when your a child. You then take that intellectual fountain of youth, and share it with others.
Kyousuke teaches you, or at least he taught me, to never forget your childhood- Because of what makes it so memorable. One’s state of mind, imagination, what inspires them- All of these things are part of being youthful. Other than societal norms, which are BS, there is nothing stopping you from maintaining the life that ‘you wish you could go back to’. This is something I live by, and will live by, for the rest of my life. I will never forget to have fun. I will never allow myself become jaded. I will not let what society expects of me control my dreams. I will always be myself.
All of that said, though, happy birthday to Kyousuke. It’s still his birthday here in the states, so I’m not that late! lol
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Well said!
One of the things that I wanted to focus on, both with the writing aspects and the ‘societies expectations’ thing, was his speech about job hunting and the Little Busters forming a baseball team.
Being a businessman or something, as he stated, (I don’t remember the thing word for word) was something that is not of his own will. Everyone has to get a job or something similar at one point in their life. A part of ‘growing up’. So, don’t be societies tool or a puppet. Do what it is that you have to do to support yourself and always shoot for your dreams.
In the position he was in, only then can anyone truly realize the importance of being ‘youthful’.
That whole speech, seemingly just wild Kyousuke gibberish from the beginning, was so full of valuable messages. It also points towards Maeda’s shocking level of literary genius.
It bugs me how many people (the characters included) dismissed that as Kyousuke being a whimsy idiot as usual. That quote holds such a profound truth to it, they’re words that continue to guide my decisions in life.
Kengo definitely got it, but continued to lie to himself. I think Masato got it for the most part as well. Perhaps a bit too well, considering he seemed to think ahead about ‘what if something goes wrong’. Just what I took out of it. Same would apply to any other cautious person. Pursuing your dreams, first and foremost, leaves room for you to endanger that goal if you don’t accept or ponder the necessities.
I always thought Kengo understood it, but didn’t agree with Kyousuke’s ideas. Masato understood it until the “let’s play baseball!” part.
I think they both understood the meaning about dreams and youth, just not Kyousuke’s baseball idea.
Because that’s for Riki and Rin~
Hence Masato’s confusion being somewhat (maybe a stretch) insightful- Because with that in mind, it seems like him forcing everyone into a baseball team makes them collateral for his goal. Just, his goal isn’t really for himself. It’s for them.
Didn’t make it in time for Kyousuke’s birthday 
I gotta say though, Kyousuke is my favorite character in Little Busters. Everything he planned was for the best. It was just sad how he was driven to desperation and I think it shows how even the most stable characters can bring out their cold side because of what needs to be done. Does seem to be one more sign of “growing up”
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I really like Kyousuke. He’s an admirable character, in my eyes. A very capable and dependable leader, and it seems like hanging around him would never get boring. Someone you can have an infinitely good time with. That’s something Riki got across really well. But that’s just the beginning.
Even at a young age, in his ‘mission’ to find a circle of friends in which Rin feels comfortable, he gives Masato a place to belong, shows Kengo the world of fun he actually really desires, and snaps Riki out of cold depression. And he just does that, because he can, and he wants to.
Fast forward through I don’t even know how many awesome years, up until the bus incident. An immense tragedy about to destroy everything, leaving the two lone survivors in despair and depression until the end of their days. No. It must not go this way. The two of them must survive and live on. And through a miracle, a world is born.
Fast forward to Rin 2. This is where Kyousuke’s dedication towards his goal is more than clearly shown, and not in a good light. He doesn’t care about remaining in this world - to use this miracle to have some more good fun until their end. No, he wants to mature Riki and Rin and send them on their way, and to that end he will use whatever means he deems necessary. This is where we see Kyousuke’s “dark” side, and without love, you may see him as an antagonist. I never did. But, Kyousuke does mess up, he overestimates their accumulated strength, and just about all progress on Rin is lost.
Enter Refrain. Rin is even less sociable than at the start of the game, and Kyousuke, fully aware that it’s all his fault, lives in depression.
Or does he?
No, he doesn’t. He doesn’t let that failure get him down. He pushes on. He realizes that while Rin suffered a deep wound, that very same event gave Riki all the resolve and strength he had wanted him to get in this world. Through Lennon he still led Riki on, to baseball, presented himself as the equivalent of child Riki before Kyousuke met him, and ultimately he caused Episode Masato. Kyousuke led Riki through Refrain, until finally, everything was ready. They would live on, and that was enough.
Yes, he’s ruthless. He violates morality, as he himself says, but he does know how to achieve his goal. And he knows how to have fun doing it, but he never loses himself in that fun. I find that very admirable.
And besides all that he has the most awesomely random ideas ever, something the visual novel really manages to convey by more than just Riki telling us he does. Harye Hore UMAU!
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Why are you here? This is a topic where spoilers run free. Do not come back here until after you finish refrain.
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As long as he doesn’t look at any other replies it’s fine~ Though this should probably be moved anyway
This is something I’ve been meaning to throw around for some time and for the good old sake of discussion, but I was waiting on finishing LB (though replaying Saya may give me some further ideas on this), but when I thought a little about it, I’ve been wondering.
Why is Riki Kyousuke’s best friend?
Sure, we know the other way around. Kyousuke has always been a source of support, protection and encouragement for Riki since the moment they met and Riki looks up to how strong and reliable Kyousuke is no matter how cunning he can be; taking pretty badly the fact that he couldn’t trust him anymore in Rin2.
But as far as this side is concerned, you see evidence of this all around even if we ignore the fact that he openly said it to Riki in one of their unconscious communications and pretty much their entire interactions in Bokura no Asa: it’s not like he ever had favourites but Kyousuke always seemed to care for Riki at least marginally more than for the other Busters besides Rin (as evidenced by the frequently evoked hand-holding between the two and the fact that every childhood scene depicted them as nearly glued to each other and if not, within very close proximity) and just overall was more oriented towards talking to Riki than to anyone else when the Little Busters as a whole weren’t messing around. The fact that RIki openly declares that he’d never felt like a burden when his narcolepsy acted up in front of the others also somewhat implies that Kyousuke (or even the others) don’t dolt on or see him any differently just because he’s ill, so even if that was the starting point of Riki’s recruitment into the group, I doubt it became the founding factor of their relationship.
I’m especially intrigued by this because the novel never really tackles things from his perspective prior to Riki and Rin’s lives being endangered (IT COULD’VE IF WE’D GOTTEN NATSUME AFTER 
) , and even though Riki hasn’t been there for Kyousuke nearly as much as the other way around, it still feels like that side of the bond is just as important to him as it is to Riki, so I figured getting some thoughts from recent read-throughs of LB could be pretty interesting.
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I can actually see two possibilities for that:
- Kyousuke has always felt the need to protect Riki, much in the same way he was protecting Rin. The game does mention that Kyousuke somehow sees him as a little brother figure (which would be impossible for Masato/Kengo)
- Kyousuke has always known about Riki’s potential. He has, ever since they were children, known that Riki was the person people would all come together to; the kind of person that anyone would feel comfortable hanging out with. In a way, maybe Kyousuke was secretly admiring Riki for this…
Perhaps, until we really do get that Natsume After, we may never know 
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I do agree that the first option is very likely, but I can’t help but feel intrigued on what it was for Kyousuke in a more casual setting since they appeared to be extremely close even prior the accident since the two seem to have a closer bond (whether sibling-like or not) than even Rin and Kyousuke do.
On the other hand, I’m not too sure about the second idea namely in that… that’s a very young adult Kyousuke reasoning. The way his character is portrayed in Refrain makes it clear that to his childhood self, there was never anything deeper about what he did and he just did it because he liked having and spreading fun. To him, regardless of how it saved the Little Busters’ members. It was nothing “praise-worthy” or even worth mentioning as evidenced by him claiming he’d never done anything important or that mattered in his life, and a child likely doesn’t reason that way anyway at that age since it’s a bit of a deep notion that people have potential that can be drawn out even for mature children.
To be fair, though, I do acknowledge that not everything has to have a profound, deeper meaning to matter in regards to how characters are written and portrayed. I just wish they’d elaborated more on Kyousuke’s feelings towards the Little Busters prior to knowing death awaited most of them and potentially expand on him as more than a reliable leader (which I guess wouldn’t have gone well alongside Episode: Kyousuke since its focus was Kyousuke’s struggle which was an inherently very altruistic episode) and make him exponentially more amazing of a character he already is. 
If Visual Art’s won’t give us Natsume After, we may need to make it ourselves for the greater good…
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