So, Rin2; what I said in the Common Route: cats are devil spawn 
I’m not sure what I was expecting but it certainly wasn’t that, I think it’s quite a brave choice though and gives you a big appetite for Refrain
I can’t put it any better than that myself. After all the emphasis on the character routes on friendship overcoming the challenges, it’s a bit of a jolt to see it all falling apart - I like it!
And here comes the route I was the least enthusiastic to read again. Turned out better this time.
Rin, Legendary No-con
Aaaaand this helps, I liked Rin more this time, in the past I’ve always considered her a bit bland, that she’s just as dumb as a sack of bricks and has excessive anxiety issues that I cannot relate too. Not to say both these opinions on her are gone, but I still ended up finding her more enjoyable this time, she’s cute, and I really did enjoy her more this time around, but she’s far from a favourite.
So the route starts off with one of the best god damn scenes in the VN with Miles the cat, Rin’s mugshots where she’s holding him, and the CG and just the entire situation given such a somber and mature atmosphere and it makes me mmmmmmmmmmm~
Then the usual Rin1 stuff plays out, nothing wrong with this, nothing outstanding, it’s what comes after that is far more interesting. When Kyousuke becomes the villain.
The glorious CG of the reveal, along with the question the player hasn’t heard since the very start of the game. "Have you figured out the secret of the world?’, oooooooh it feels good, and the SYMBOLISM of them running away after but Riki lets go of Kyousuke’s hand, in that single moment Kyousuke shifts from the dear friend and older brother to the eerie and ominous villain.
And what a fucking villain Kyousuke plays the part amazingly, ‘A world where nothing happened’ goes from an extremely rare song to making common appearances with him, and what a song it is, I hate it, it’s so unpleasant, on it’s own I’d never want to listen to it, but as atmosphere setting music it’s perfect. It all builds up and builds up to the pinnicle of Kyousuke’s villainy, the glorious scene where after supposedly employing some Cheap Tricks, he looks down, smug look on his face, declares that he won, and walks away. It’s absolutely chilling.
Oh right Rin is in this route. See this is the part I was concerned about, after they run away, I remembered it dragging on and being boring, but it wasn’t nearly as bad as I remembered, but it’s definitely the weakest part of the route and not something I really have anything to say about, especially after Kyousuke’s villainy completely and utterly stole the show. Honestly I find the interesting parallels this part of the route has with Hanabi far more interesting, a song Maeda composed in 2003(before Clannad’s completion!) that has striking similarities to the end of Rin 2, suggesting that Little Busters, in some form, was conceptually swirling around in Maeda’s head for at least four years before it’s release which I find super neat. The fact the song was dug up and used in the Rin 2 Anime is the most damning evidence.
ALSO I’M STILL MAD WE DON’T MEET NATSUME-JIISAN. He sounds like a Kyousuke with a lifetime of experience, I’m sure he’s A M A Z I N G.
Overall the route is a bit weak as a ‘Rin’ route, but it’s very good at it’s real purpose, being the prologue to Refrain.
Okay, I’m still not done reading Rin 1, but I need to talk about something that legitimately bothered me.
Just to let you know, if the principal or whoever is saying something like this to you, a student, out of the blue, lash out in full glory and call the police. This is sexual harassment and it’s not something you should just be prim and proper about.
But what if it’s Masato saying it to me?
Kyousuke made Masato say that to distract Rin from her training, but it looks like Rin isn’t the only one who got affected 
その後しっぽりむふふ・・・といきたいものですな
The route was actually much shorter than I expected, so I don’t have too much to say.
Let’s talk about Rin as a character. I like her. I hated her as a first impression, but she grew on me when I read Rin1. I realized she has a cute side to her, not just a violent one. Aside from being a cat-lover, cute, shy and violent, there is not much more about. Which makes her rather boring.
She does develop a little bit during the multiple readthroughs. But not much. She stays boring. I was hoping she’d hae bit more development to make me like her even more, but that did not happen.
The first part, that played even before the Rin1 content, with the dying cat was, I am pretty sure of it, foreshadowing to Refrain. It gave me goosebumps, like a lot of the earlyier scenes of the route.
The content after Rin1 starts with confirmation on who was bringing this task. Kyousuke was pretty much expected at this point. But the music and the CG…left a very ominous feeling. @Kanon described that part of the route pretty well:
That’s basically the impressions I got.
Oh, and Kengo is totally aware of his Cheap Tricks, and probably how he did it. I am not though - yet.
Then…things quited down. A lot. Again, I agree with @Kanon:
It was relaxed, but the tension going from so high to so low was a bit disappointing. It was nice to just see a … well, not really happy, but okay life with Rin. They clearly felt close, but I did not really feel much romance. I know that is what they were going for, but they might as well only have been close childhood friends at that point with no additional romance. Not saying they aren’t close childhood friends.
The whole situation did not really feel very desperate to me either.
I think however the cats represent something. Actual people probably. Not only with Kyousuke giving her the cats, and he is a big mastermind here, I am pretty sure they hold more significance. Them not following her past the school gate, Riki not wanting her to return to them before they leave. Her getting a bunch of new cats - it’s probably significant that they went from 2 cats (Riki and Rin, one caught by each of them even) to 5 cats at first (original Busters), and an unspecified higher number later. I’ll see soon enough.
And yeah, I’d liked to have met her grandfather as well. Too bad we couldn’t.
And then it just…ended? The sudden and abrupt end shocked me, I figured we end up on a more happy note. Well, that keeps my hopes high for Refrain ending happy.
I agree that Rin did that bad ending to herself, like a lot of you stated, after all Riki did for her.
The final scene, after the credits, conveyed a good feeling of helplessness that Riki must feel.
Well, let’s become stronger!
I’ll leave the good parts of Rin2 for another time and mostly focus on the second part of the route. This might be a rare chance for me to make a Kanon-style rant (hope I won’t get sued for copyright infringement here) 
Welcome to Rin2, where everyone is a fucking idiot. (Except for Masato.)
First of all, why did Riki let Rin go? So that she can grow up and learn to love.
How did Riki explain it to her? “You just have to go. And you’re stupid.” And then he bitched about how she didn’t understand him! How about you give her a damn reason for leaving behind EVERYTHING SHE EVER HAD, if only temporarily? Bruh…
So then AMAZING stuff happens but I’ll talk about that sometime later.
Riki and Rin just run away. It’s a harsh trial, but surely, their love will pull them through… oh wait, they don’t have that. So, in a crisis like this, cooperation is essential. Thus, the labor is divided equally: Riki goes out to procure food while Rin just sits around doing nothing. Wait, what?
Just so we’re clear, playing with cats all day is a fucking shitty survival strategy - cause you sure as hell don’t look like you wanna eat them.
But no matter how hard it gets, Riki keeps stacking up those man points. He never complains, never tells her to help cause teamwork can go suck it. But then the police comes knocking on their door.
And THIS is the part that completely FUCKS ME UP. This is some Brutus-level backstabbing right there. How the hell could this brat be so ungrateful? He gave up Kyousuke for you! He gave up the Little Busters! That was literally worse than death for him! No lack of love could possibly explain her literally biting the hand that feeds her. But because muh random cats are more important, it’s game over.
People be wonderin’, “How could you possibly dislike Rin?” THIS is why!
Kyousuke’s at fault too. You fucked up big time, brah. You thought just cause she can talk like a normal person now, she’s ready to depart for despair island? You shoulda installed some brakes on your Plan train, cause the signs were clearly there.
Like, open your damn eyes, man. She was completely destroyed within just a week. And more importantly, her mental age is still on the clock! Which brings us to:
Rin - adorable little sister character
What’s “love”? Is that a TV show? Can you eat that? What kind of wood do I need to build a relation-ship? Hell if I know. Guess I’ll ask the cats.
Anyway, Rin completely fails as a heroine. Romance doesn’t work if you can’t love. She’s clinging to Riki, but not helping much, then ditching him without a second thought because cats.
So, Riki, my boy man. Just let her be a little sister character. She’s quirky and cute and super fun as long as it’s just fun and games. Let her play with the cats in a corner. But don’t ruin your own life over this kid. If Kyousuke thinks he’s so fucking smart, let him take care of his own damn mess. Surely, he’s got a plan for that…
Don’t get me wrong, fam. I absolutely LOVE this route. I also love the mistakes (almost) everyone’s making. I just skipped all the good parts the deliciously good side of things to make a clean rant. Everything about this route was pure awesomeness… except for Rin. Not saying she’s pure evil or the only one at fault and I didn’t miss that she did try helping in her own way. But overall, I simply find what she did in the end nigh unforgivable.
Because the entirety of Kyousuke’s plan was to make Riki stronger in order to protect and support Rin, it didn’t work out as a plan to make the two stronger since Rin was scarcely ever confronted to the heroine’s problems
You have to understand that Rin is written as a character who has a need for attachment and habit to a safe environment (much like cats, yes) because she’s not grown enough as a person to be able to stand on her own if she doesn’t have a single place to rely on when she needs to, which, with her early-game personality, is something she needed to do a lot.
Not to mention that, as you said, Riki never properly explained things to her because he wanted to provide that exact environment that Kyousuke always did: let him do everything and live your life. She’s shown in the game to be very comprehensive even if reluctant as long as everything was explained to her properly, but was that ever done? No. Riki precisely didn’t say anything and that’s what Rin took as a go-ahead, especially in her familiar environment of her grandfather’s house.
He wanted the change in her life and environment, separation from the brother she trusted and the only friends she’d made in life to not impact her. He wanted to be Kyousuke’s replacement to her to make sure she’d never have to worry about anything much like how he did for the both of them their whole lives. While this does make Rin a terribly selfish character as a whole for never realising that she should’ve stepped up on her own, the fault lies on both of them for not establishing things before running away and planning accordingly.
TL;DR: Rin was selfish as fuck, but it was also Riki’s fault for not setting down their relationship prior to escaping and trying to replace Kyousuke’s role and place in her life instead.
DAYUM LOOK AT THIS MAN, HE’S A SAVAGE.
kindaofarightsavagetoo
Rin2 was a wild ride and I really enjoyed it. That said, my favourite parts of it actually had no Rin in them. The reveal of Kyousuke holding Lennon curled up in his arms (which is spoiled by his trading card. Nice work guys! Thankfully I had friendos to keep me away from it), and obviously the baseball game where Kyousuke sets himself up as both a villain and a Christ figure for Riki, were such beautifully executed scenes. I was fully expecting the novel to pull something like this, but that in no way lessens the perfection of the first half (two thirds?) of Rin2.
I mainly want to focus on Kyousuke, he’s such an interesting character. He’s been foreshadowed as a Christ figure for ages, all the way back when he was reading his manga by the windowsill he was ‘holy’ and ‘innocent’ and all this other jazz because of Riki putting him on this unreachable pedestal, pure sweet perfection that Riki can never reach. And then, in Rin2, Kyousuke tears all of that down at a breakneck pace. He pulls a bunch of what I can only describe as Game Master Bullshit and puts himself very intentionally in a position where Riki thinks of him as a bad guy, forcing Riki to act. Thinking back on all of the previous routes, we’ve learnt all about the good intentions of humans, how no one is evil, and honestly Kyousuke’s plan to help Rin mature is Kanata-levels of nonsense.
This isn’t even a theory-crafting session, it is 100% clear to me that this is a test or ‘mission’, whether it will be revealed that Kyousuke in-universe is testing Riki or whether this will just pan out by the end of Refrain to be a final test for Riki, I’m not entirely sure. What I can say for sure is that I will not make Kyousuke my enemy. He’s so clearly being set up as Riki’s antagonist that I can’t possibly believe it can last. Riki also sees almost every other Buster as an enemy, this is totally blowing things out of proportion and I fully expect to have a ‘getting the band back together’ sequence either as the initial conflict or somewhere towards the middle-end to show how much they’ve all grown as characters.
I also noticed the final nod to the field trip at the end of the route, it’s happening. We’re heading full speed ahead towards a tragedy of Visual-Novel-starting proportions and I look forward to seeing how it all pans out. I honestly don’t care too much at this point about like, ‘predicting events’, I think the time for that is long past. Of course I will be constructing an interpretation based on the ending, but I’m not the kind of person to reach for a crazy interpretation, this is the part to take in what the novel is telling me (bearing in mind the themes of the previous routes) without restraint.
That said, if I may, I had mixed feelings on uncovering that Rin isn’t supposed to make it to the field trip. I wonder if that will change? I would find it strange if she were not part of the route, and certainly the ‘constructing the van’ portion of the novel that I think exists should involve all of the Busters. My current theory going in is that she also was part of the accident but Riki isn’t sure if she survived, and so only by believing that she had the strength to survive can he too pull himself forwards to face the truth, whatever that may be.
Anyway, enough theory nonsense, enough flowery words. I embark on the greatest journey of my Kazamatsuri experience soon… I’ll see you all on the other side of Refrain! 
Gee whiz would you look at the adorable spoiler… oh and there’s a Lennon there too 
I tooootally forgot to post in this topic because I was too excited to start Refrain. I guess you can’t blame me. Refrain is great, after all.
Now, I don’t have much to say on this route, because I don’t have much to think about this route. It is, after all, an incomplete story. But I do have a lot of feelings about this route…
And boy did this route sure make me uncomfortable. Their entire journey, starting from Riki challenging Kyousuke, to running away with Rin, just made me feel awful. Maybe it was because I knew that this was the wrong decision to make. Maybe because I knew that they only had despair waiting for them. Maybe I just didn’t want to see them in that situation again. Probably my only recompense while reading this route was seeing Rin actually do something (the laundry) for once, and even then it is meant as a cute little thing about her being embarrassed about her underwear…
Either way, fact of the matter is that this route made me feel very uncomfortable. And I loved every second of it. I just love it when writing is able to transpire the mental faculties of the reader and actually make them feel something; feel something that one of their characters is feeling, or feel something that the author wants them to feel. Sasuga Maeda. Sa-su-ga.
Sidenote, to continue discussion:
You hit the nail right on the head there, eh. Maybe if they learned to help each other out; you know, the kind of mature love that a married couple should have; instead of her being completely dependent on Riki, they could have actually made something out of it. But Riki says it again and again, Rin is, at heart, still a kid. She has yet to understand what love is all about. And, I think even by the time they “elope”, Rin is incapable of figuring out this kind of selfless love needed to succeed.
And this is also why I never ship Rin with Riki. She doesn’t get love, and I don’t think she will until a few more years.
Perhaps, as I’ve walked this journey and been pierced with the warm and familiar lances of what it means to be a friend, the character of Rin Natsume, like those of Komari and Kud, has grown on me. I’ve said it before, and it rang true even more when I dove into Rin2: the Little Busters are more than characters than characters to me. They are more than reflections of myself. They are truly like my actual friends, that I care about and miss deeply when they aren’t around. This cast, moreso than any others, feel so real to me.
Rin was admittedly my least favorite character at first. She was physically abusive toward Masato and had nothing to offer my narrative interests that the other characters could not. I think she hit me in a low place, representing my faults moreso than my neutral or positive traits. This applies to lots of people, I’m aware, but I just so happened to be one of them. Thankfully, her violence is restrained to the common route, and her true character is fleshed out during the route. I wonder, why is Rin the way she is? Was she born with this inability to communicate to lead, or is it all a result of her past trauma?
Here it is, the rainfall that finally pounds the Earth from the darkened skies above. Kengo, the mystery, the enigma, reveals his true power in this route. In the first common route, Kengo wants nothing to do with baseball, and spends all his time in the kendo club. Then, in the second common, he gets the entire part with saving Koshiki and then decides to give the Busters his all. He, like Riki, has just been slowly unraveling into a character just as important as Kyousuke or Masato. I knew I wasn’t going to be let down by this loyal friend of mine.
Continuing from Rin1, Rin hates going to the new school, and Riki is at a loss for what to do. He is defeated at every turn, as the Hydra continues to regrow its many sinister heads and blocks his path. One of Rin’s cats is old and Kyousuke espouses to Riki the importance of accepting loss, oddly mirroring the recent loss of my own beloved pet, which ironically Little Busters helped me deal with. We get Rin and Sasami of all people having a spark of understanding as Sasami gives Rin her glove, as Rin’s is torn from obviously going through multiple timelines. 
After a bit of running around, the shadow reveals itself to be none other than Kyousuke, cradling Lennon in his arms in the dark of the night, and speaking of ‘the secret of the world’. It was all a game; nay, a test, from Kyousuke to his sister and Riki. To help others, to establish a foundation for life, and to put the needs of others above your own. Not for your own gain, but for the happiness of others.
Then we come to the climax of this story. Kengo stands with Riki against Kyousuke’s plan. Masato stands with Kyousuke, though he is incredibly reluctant and upset about it. Riki, for some odd reason, believes that getting a home run on Kyousuke will somehow compel him to bring Rin back from the sister school. For the first time, this web of steel snaps, and the Busters, the very definition of unity to me, is broken. Riki places no faith in himself and instead has Kengo bat for him, and Kengo sadly misses. This is not important, so much as Kengo’s reaction. It was a shock to see him explode the way he did, and basically tackle Kyousuke to the ground in absolute rage the likes of which had yet to be seen in the game by anybody. Kengo, the blue to Masato’s red, the calm and collected kendo god, succumbing to his emotions and letting them control his actions, left me in awe. Then, Kyousuke stands up and declares the game called, as Riki fears him to be the messiah himself, his shirt being torn at the side where Longinus stabbed Jesus, whose blood healed Longinus’ blindness.
From here, Riki decides to take Rin and simply run far away, ignoring the advice of Kengo whom Riki sees as his only ally. They go primal, and admittedly the route loses my interest here. At the Natsume’s grandfather’s house, Riki does all the work despite his narcolepsy, while Rin lounges around and gathers mouths that Riki cannot feed. I hated Rin here. She simply places burden on Riki for no reason, and then whines when there are not enough resources to sustain them. Slowly, surely, the thread dangles further and further, until Riki runs into (and away) from the police officer who is merely doing his job. This leads to the couple being captured, and the next scene is Riki alone in the classroom, lamenting his poor plan and the loss of Rin who is now alone as well. The field trip gets mentioned, and here my theory was solidified as I unsheathe the cold sword and walk into the battlefield of Refrain.
This is the main problem with the route. Rin and Riki are not in a romantic relationship. They are friends who are locked in a fantasy because they don’t know any better, and cannot crawl from the cave and into the light of the painful world. Only when it is forced on them far too soon than when they are ready is the ugly, dirty truth of the world shown in its angelic light. Perhaps if Rin was a little more considerate of the situation, rather than still being dependent on Riki, it would be a much more tolerable route for me. The entire game we’ve been leading up to the two of them needing development, but here it has yet to show.
Okay so before i read little busters the only reason i was interested in this form of Japanese literature (Manga, anime, Vn) only for bewbs! (Yeah i was that kind of guy).
My first impression when i saw Rin - ‘oh what a cute girl! She’s the main heroine, her route is going to be fantastic.’
Now my impression after reading all other amazing routes(don’t count kud), by now my previous hentai self had died a miserable death after being purified by this holy work of digital literature media.
Anyway onto Rin, the ‘let’s date’ scene was bullshit.The way Rin asked Riki, seemed like she was only interested in it because it was something new. She was like - ‘Oh date! That sounds like something fun, let’s try it’.
Riki was worse then her - ‘Oh Rin just asked me to go out with her, to be honest i didn’t really think of her that way until now but my heart is really racing now, is this love?.’
Hell no Riki! Anyone’s heart would rage like that if someone asked him/her out of the blue to go out with her/him. Take a minute and think clearly about this, Don’t go with the flow and make a decision in haste. But still he does exactly that.
To be honest the reason i dislike this route is because Riki gets the least attention from the heroine from any other route. The most attention he got was when she asked him to date her. Immediately after that Rin’s attention shifts to ‘the secret of the world’ and after that when Riki runs away with her, she engrossed herself with cats. Remember whenever cats and Riki both are present, cats get prioritised. This means cats are more important then Riki.
Now enough criticising let’s look at her strong points. I’m surprised by this but she shines more in other heroines route and common route. The examples are, when She takes care of komari after she breaks down in her route or when she protects her during the sword fight in common route, in mio’s route when she tells Riki to believe in himself. These are the instances when i truly thought of her as my friend.
Her route… only contains one scene involving her that is memorable. When her cat Miles was dying i was surprised by how mature she seemed, at that moment my respect for her went yay high. Sadly it didn’t last long, it only made me think that ‘if only she was like this with people instead of cats then i would have actually fallen for her’.
This maturity was the biggest thing needed for her character development. And she does get mature but only at the end of refrain when she has a nice little chat with komari that everyone is dead and she’s going to be alone. by this far it’s too late. She’s no longer the main focus. Now it’s kyousuke.
I read somewhere in this forum that suginami was a stepping stone for Rin so the relationship between her and Riki can begin. If we go by that logic then i will say that Rin was also a stepping stone… for Kyousuke!. The only way Kyousuke gets to shine is… yes! send his little sister away so she can become strong while he fights with riki. If we compare the scenes of kyousuke’s reveal that he was the messenger and cheap tricks easily surpass the rest of Rin route.
Rin is only there to drive the plot forward and give us refrain. Expecting anything else is foolish.
There’s one thing that has bothered me for the entirety of Rin2 all the way up to playing Refrain. As we all know, Kyousuke wanted Rin to grow. That’s why he sent her off on that mission to the sister school. Unfortunately, his means were a tid bit too extreme, and we all know that that did not end up well. At all.
But that begs the question: What does Rin actually need to grow?
Kyousuke thought he knew what she needed, but he was wrong. And, seeing Rin how she is, it’s a very difficult question to answer. How can you get a girl like that, childlike mind as she is, totally antisocial, to grow into a person who can stand on her own two feet? I’ve thought about this for a while and I’ve realized, Rin has a whole bundle of problems, all of which need to be solved:
But, most importantly:
Does all this sound familiar to you? Well, allow me to explain my Eureka moment from Episode: Rin
(everything following this will be spoilers to the Refrain route; I was tempted to put it in that topic, but this is all about Rin, and in Rin’s topic it shall stay)
All throughout Refrain, we see Rin being as childlike as ever. She pays no attention to the problems that Riki is facing, and she just wants to have fun. Even as the boys are parting, she is completely oblivious to the situation, and just keeps pitching the ball as Riki instructs. One could blame this all to her regression after Rin2 but, really, hasn’t Rin always been this way? Hasn’t she always been completely oblivious, not facing the problems, and just finding the fun things in life?
She has. And that’s why she could never grow. Even after Kyousuke sends her off to the sister school. she refuses to see her purpose there, and shuts off from the entire world. And her growth remains stagnant…
Until we get to Episode: Rin. What I believe Episode: Rin implies to us is one simple thing: Riki isn’t the only one who learned from the girls’ stories. Rin was there. As much as a background character she might have seemed in the other routes, she still watched Riki from the sidelines. She observed the other girls, saw their problems, and watched as Riki helped fix these. And this growth is kept all locked up in her head until we get to Episode: Rin and she remembers everything.
Her parting with the girls came as a heavy-hitting blow to me, emotionally. And they never do explain, why is it that Rin has these scenes with them, but Riki never does? Wasn’t it Riki who learned and grew from these routes?
Yes, Riki did grow. Grow enough to be the man who can support Rin. But Riki never had the problems that the girls did. He couldn’t heal himself by learning from them, since he couldn’t relate to those problems.
But Rin did. And Rin learned, from all of them. These were all things that Kyousuke couldn’t teach Rin; they were things that he didn’t even know Rin needed to learn. With Komari being the one she had to learn from, more than others. Komari’s wish was that Rin could face all the sad things with a smile. As her hairpin fell, akin to a shooting star falling from the sky, her wish was granted. It was at that moment that everything Rin observed from her friends, from all the other members of the Little Busters, came to her. It was at that moment that she realized that: she has to open up to others to grow; that she has to face the sad things in life; that she learned to love; that there are no evil ones trying to push her down; that she has to find her place in this world; and that she truly did make friends in this small, temporarily world.
And it was at that moment that Rin grew.
So, after the rant on the bad parts of the route, let’s get to the good parts! And it’s all about the boys.
First of all, we have two incredible transformations. Kyousuke, who was the most dependable and perfect person on earth became an unbeatable enemy, a cruel villain. Rin was not the only reason. What bothered Riki the most was how Kyousuke was supposedly planning to destroy the Little Busters, Riki’s safe haven and the symbol of friendship. That he’s using this group of friends for an elaborate scheme. This new villain isn’t exactly generous with his kindness. He stands by his goal and demands only one thing: strength.
Riki is trying to be defiant, but Kyousuke proves his dominance time and time again. Riki can only watch on helplessly as his world, his happiness is slowly coming apart. The secret of the world? Who cares about that?
And that’s where the second transformation happens. Kengo, who was always there, but either kept watching on from the sidelines or only joined in to have fun, has become the new most dependable friend. The one who treasures friendship as much as Riki. He does not waver and offers to help him challenge the unbeatable Kyousuke. He offers Riki everything he wished for: “If you win… the Little Busters will be eternal. You’re not alone. I’ll be there for you.”
Masato is still unchanged. He’s still there, doing work. If Riki needs someone to cheer him up, Masato is there. He’s prepared to do homework in Riki’s stead, knowing it would take him all night to finish. If Riki needs the room, Masato leaves, not asking for anything in exchange. Even with the Little Busters split apart, Masato does what he always does. He said he decided on it a long time ago, and Riki finds that mature.
And then, the four of them clash. Yes, Masato is on the enemy team, though unwillingly. “Consider the irony of the situation. Four friends glaring at one another defiantly.”
Think about it: By opposing Kyousuke, Riki is putting the Little Busters at Risk. Kyousuke has yet to disband them. If Riki stays silent and complies, maybe, just maybe, they can keep playing. And who knows? Maybe Kyousuke was right after all? His plans always work out, right? It would be so easy to give up. It would be pathetic. They would probably just be keeping appearances. Riki could still lie to himself and find comfort in this lie. But Riki chose Rin over the Little Busters.
The match. The rain. Riki is a wreck, but he can rebuild his confidence with Kengo’s help. And…
Cheap Tricks. Called Game. Something terrible had happened, but what? What made Kengo, the most disciplined, the most calm and collected person ever, the man who was always in control, get violent on his friend?
So Riki decides to run away. I don’t think this was merely an escape. Yes, Kyousuke was unbeatable and could not be trusted anymore. But Riki actually still had options. He could give in to his weakness in a different way. But he didn’t. He once again chose Rin over the Little Busters, displaying his trademark dedication. He left behind everything he knew and held dear just to save one girl.
So, despite this being the route tied to my namesake, this is actually one of my least favorite routes. However, I think that’s what makes it a great route.
The former half of the route seems like any of the others, really. You’ve got your basic story premise and nothing’s really happening at any big pace. And when it abruptly ends before you’ve completed all the other routes, it felt strange but fitting for how short it was. What caught me off guard, however, was how quickly the route kicks into gear once you pass that point and move onto Rin 2. And that’s where my true dislike of the route starts. Which again, I think is what makes it a great route. Here’s why.
The route makes me feel incredibly uncomfortable. While I’m not sure if there’s any personal reasons behind that, I can tell you there’s plenty of game-related reasons behind it. You spend not only the Rin route but the entire game getting attached to these characters and the relationships they have with each other, the stories they experience. And even though most players, myself included, are well aware of the overarching plotline tying them all together, what I didn’t expect was for everything to fall apart.
To spend all that time, all that effort, solving problems and building relationships, and have everything crumble to pieces. For Rin to be thrust into a life of unhappiness, for no one being able to reach the other girls, for Kyousuke, the character Riki has spent the whole game looking up to (and by extension, the player has likely started to look up to him as well) has now become some sort of antagonist figure. And with the baseball match and the cheap tricks, the friends literally start to fight each other.
Compared to all the other routes, everything felt so wrong.
Add to that the fact that the character Riki is now relying on is Kengo, the one character who was often not on board for all of the stuff that happened, especially so at first.
Fast forward to Riki and Rin running away to her grandfather’s house without a plan, and the relationship between the two of them slowly falling apart as well. To reiterate my point, everything was wrong. And it made me feel so uncomfortable. And I don’t like feeling like that. So naturally, I don’t enjoy the route. But I feel that’s the point. To make readers feel like that. And they did an amazing job.
So yeah. I dunno about any of you guys. But this route is complicated for me. One of my least favorite routes. Yet one of the best routes in the game.
I think what makes it great is that it doesn’t have fear of taking all of, as you said, the reader’s comfort zones (such as knowing that when Kyousuke appeared in a route, he was a sign of support) and push them out of those boundaries. I also think it’s pretty effective within the context of the story itself because what makes a group of friends genuine isn’t how much fun times they’ve had together, but also how many burdens they’ve overcome together.
This is the largest one to date, breaking all of the habits and points where the reader would rely on the story by having Kyousuke appear to be having more ill will towards Rin’s mental well-being than usual and Masato who mysteriously stays out of this despite the fact that he almost feel like decking out one of the girls bullying Kudryavka and the ones gossiping about Haruka; so the fact that he’d be so silent about the way Rin was pushed away from the group and destroyed is more than ominous on its own.
Overall I think it’s a great route that regroups all that you’ve seen so far in the game and just destroys it to precisely show you how precious it is and how strong it is to either survive to this trial or not. 
I don’t like having precious things destroyed. Curse good writing and its ability to cause these feelings. I feel like it destroyed ME.
Your point about Riki taking action with all the other girls but taking action far too late with Rin is indeed ominous, but also is likely due to his trust and belief in Kyousuke. Whereas he sought Kyousuke’s advice in the other routes, in this route Kyousuke is essentially more of a commander than an adviser. And when you haven’t been given a reason not to trust him until it’s too late, I dunno if I can blame Riki for that. Not entirely, anyway. He needed to also be stronger and think for himself.
But that’s the whole point, isn’t it?
Well, that’s exactly the thing. Rin2 is meant to be so fucking ominous it’s not even LB anymore. 
In previous routes Kyousuke stood as someone who understood Riki, or otherwise was willing to fully trust what he said and give him as much advice as he could within the knowledge he had, but he always left the choice to Riki to figure out. Here, on the other hand, he tries to keep that appearance up but it’s a lot colder in an evident way to the reader.
Masato was always silently providing support (burying the kitty’s body in Komari’s route, covering for him when he wasn’t at the dorm, and otherwise making sure to provide him as much space as he needed unless he was specifically called out to) to Riki throughout the game and then he suddenly sides with the side that encourages Rin’s suffering…
Kengo was the friend who’d always kept himself at a distance to some degree, but then becomes the sole person you can rely on because suddenly no one seems to care about Rin’s well-being anymore besides those two and Komari, but even that is weird because you’ve never really been made to trust him as much as the other two except in very specific situations.
Suck it up, it’s meant to be so ominous you’d cry because it’s like your own personal group of friends is coming apart and THERE’S NOTHING YOU CAN FUCKING DO ABOUT IT BECAUSE YOU DON’T HAVE A CHOICE.
I hadn’t even considered that part about Masato! You’re totally right. I suppose a new question would be, why do you think he did it? He spent the entire game prior supporting Riki and Rin whenever he could. So why not this time?
Did he do it because he was loyal to Kyousuke, or did he do it because he believed the same?
I think it’s more about his stance as a neutral element to the group. He’s not really meant to side with either Kyousuke or Riki, but it doesn’t balance out if he sides with Riki and it could impact Rin much more harshly if there was even more infighting than there currently is since we know what stakes are on here.
He said it himself that he hadn’t trained this hard in his life for something like this, and it’s obvious to anyone he’s keeping himself out of the matter precisely to not influence things because it’s not his position to make any decisions in the group; he just works them out somehow. In that sense, Masato is pretty mature and courageous as a whole to willingly take on the boys infighting without ever trying to influence things because he knows he doesn’t know best and it’s not his role in this group’s dynamic to do so.
