I didn’t see it.
That’s a good thing, then?
But yeah the only extra Extra route you needed was Ayamine’s I think
Overall one of the best visual novels I’ve read, but not without it’s flaws. Often I hear about people complaining about Extra and Unlimited, but my biggest problem with it was with Alternative. I couldn’t help but feel like the ending was rushed. A final, conclusive strike at the main hive was quite anti-climatic after such a well played out penultimate battle when the Beta attacked the headquarters. As soon as the main characters head underground, it seemed fairly obvious how the rest of the scenario would play out. Each of Takeru’s comrades dropping one by one (in order of importance?). After so much repeated self-sacrifice throughout the VN, at that point, I was immune and unphased by such actions and became quite unsympathetic to the passing of the main heroines who have been one the same journey since Extra.
I must praise this VN for it’s ability to really immerse the audience in it’s Sci-fi elements. Perhaps I can credit a lot of this to Unlimited, as it was able to build up such an extensive premise. Not seeing the Beta until half way through Alternative, the ever mysterious brain room & Yashiro. My favourite thing about Muv-Luv was it’s constant addition of quantum/classical mechanics. The references to Laplace’s Demon, Chaos theory & the butterfly effect, had my curiosity piqued through-out and after the read, spending hours reading articles on the subjects.
Overall a great VN, although, perhaps not quite deserving of it’s rating. I’m sure my thoughts of it now, looking back, would be very different from those when I finished reading it for the first time. I too, as with most people, suffered quite the withdrawal from this VN.
Spent a good day reading and now I’m quite a ways into Unlimited. I’m somewhere mid Chapter 8 now IIRC.
Interesting setup. It wasn’t quite what I expected when I read the description. Specifically I didn’t expect the whole “you’re in a different world” thing. Was quite surprised at Yuuko not knowing Takeru, and just generally having that setup of nobody knowing who he is.
Spoilers for just about all of Unlimited from here on. I miss Sumika. Ever since the encounter with Tsukuyomi I’m pretty certain that Takeru existed in this world before Extra-Takeru was somehow transported to it; removing all doubts from my mind that Sumika exists here. I wonder where though. She better not be that brain thingy.
It was a bit frustrating how useless Takeru was for most of the time. I guess it was inevitable to have him be the super-great pilot though. Also, what the hell is up with those suits (the female variant). Like, seriously.
I won’t judge it yet. I haven’t finished even one route yet, after all.
I thought the exact same things as you while reading Unlimited @Karifean.
Did I mention that ML is, among all VNs I’ve ever played, the game that breaks immersion THE MOST, and in the most disgusting way, with its misplaced fanservice and H-scenes? Yes, even more so than Grisaia and F/SN. It’s brutal, really. It started way back in Extra and it still happens in Alternative.
Despite all that, ML is still in my Top 5…
Why has no one told me about this thread?
Besides MuvLuv being one of my favorite VNs, the TSFs are also probably my favorite depiction of giant robots.
anyone have a personal favorite model? Probably mine would be the EF-2000 Typhoon.
Phew, finished Unlimited. It really is pretty redundant to go for all of its endings since they are literally the same except for the fact that Takeru’s partner is different.
I loved the part where one of the girls gets addicted to the Game Guy xD. That was so funny. The exam was a bit over the top, as well as Tama’s finest moment. Class Rep and Kei’s chapter was quite nice though, and the main story actually got pretty good towards the end IMO. The volcano mission especially I enjoyed a lot - and the talk with the CO. Of course the ending feels like a huge cliffhanger, but well, it’s all setup so it’s fine. Mainly, I now can hardly wait to move on to Alternative… although I do have a pesky university getting in the way of that.
…I really don’t have any more to say about Unlimited or Extra. I don’t regret having spent my time reading it, and I would be saying that even without Alternative existing. But I still wouldn’t ever recommend it on its own. It’s just… well it exists, it happened, what more can I say. Nothing.
I managed to push my Ending counter up to 14 since it counts if you just exit when the final monologue of Unlimited starts, but I’m still stuck with only 3 endings from Extra. Oh well, I don’t even know if getting 100% unlocks anything at all anyways.
From what I remember no, but then again its been years since I last read it.
I’ve just reached what I believe to be the halfway point or so in MLA (Start of Episode 8). Wow, that last chapter was just… wow. Excuse me while I continue reading…
Edit: Early Ep8 spoilers Totally called the appearance of the 00 Unit way before it happened.
good luck
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Finished it just now. TL;DR version of the post below: It was pretty damn good, but not as good as I’d hoped. Spoilers for all of Alternative, naturally.
First off, since I just went through it I guess I’ll talk about the final mission and ending. I must say, I found the buildup of Operation Cherry Blossom to be quite superbly made, and the operation itself did live up to that. My main problem comes with the last stages of the operation and the subsequent ending. Sorry, but having the protagonist’s growth and overcoming his weaknesses be pretty much the main focus of THE ENTIRE SECOND THIRD of the story and then having him nowhere near over those weaknesses in the last mission to the point where all the other characters purposefully deceive him so he doesn’t compromise the mission because of it… was not nice to see. Especially with how Meiya’s death scene was stretched out to I think almost ten minutes. If that scene had instead been Takeru making up his mind and just shooting immediatly, that would’ve been a great way to show how far he had come. I feel that really was a missed opportunity. I guess he’ll never really change after all. I still have no idea how the Susano’o suddenly got all its sapped power back to make that last shot btw.
As for the whole causality conductor thing… eh. I didn’t care for the final explanation. Maybe it’s because I never got an explanation for how the space-time continuum got ripped that satisfied me. Maybe it’s because I expected an explanation that just clicks all the pieces together for an ultimate “oh shit” epiphany. Maybe it’s because I had hoped it would include an explanation for the BETA’s existence in that world beyond “they came from somewhere for some reason.” But mostly I think it’s because it just felt kinda handwaved. Like yeah, okay, Sumika was able to do that. It happened. Uh huh. Oh well. I guess I’m spoiled from other VNs when it comes to great explanations for the multiple worlds plot point.
Final Episode MuvLuv was a bit too short for my taste. No idea how that world came to be, no idea where it’s headed. I also really, really wished for Takeru to just retain all his memories. So to me, that was not the best way to end the story. Also a bit disappointed in the lack of a Music Room.
But all that negativity aside, MLA was great. Atmospherically it was incredible, building a world with such a well-conveyed feeling of desperation and immersing the reader in it completely. It has by far the best-looking action scenes I’ve ever seen in a visual novel, and it was really good at making dramatic war and battle scenes. And yet, the chapter where Takeru returns to the Extra-world is probably my overall favorite part of the entire VN because it’s really gripping and makes you so badly want to find out what’s going on and how to stop it (too freaking bad it never got a proper satisfying explanation, but I’ve gone on about that long enough). That freak accident of Sumika’s was total coincidence, wasn’t it? …anyways. One thing MLA did wonderfully was to make the ‘fun times’ of Extra feel nostalgic and make you invested in having Takeru get back to them. Takeru x Sumika was my OTP since forever so seeing it be the main focus was quite satisfying. Poor Extra-Meiya though. Besides that, the entire scene with Beta-Sumika’s backstory was so damn well made as it simultaneously shocked me and made my immediate respect for Takeru for his reaction shoot through the roof. Finally, the OST and opening movie are amazing. The best I’ve seen in quite a while.
So in the end, what can I say? I enjoyed it for sure. It was a great read. But did it live up to the hype? No, definitely not. I suppose my final impression was hindered by the high expectations I had of the story’s integrity, which reaaaally isn’t one of MLA’s good points. It takes liberties that I was dying to hear an explanation for but never got one that actually satisfied me. And it’s not trivial details that went unexplained, it’s parts of the plot I was actually very invested in, which is why it bothers me as much as it does. The cast of characters was great, but not that outstanding either. Especially when it comes to development there was a lot to be desired. Don’t get me wrong, there was quite an amount of good character development… but there was the potential for so much more than that. And that’s how I feel about much of MLA, and the entire thing as a whole as well. Great, but with some improvements it easily could’ve been unforgettable.
Well that’s that. And with that I’ve finished my must-read list of visual novels. It was a busy three months.
Edit: I didn’t go back and choose any different choices yet. Should I?
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Depends on the type of person you are. I personally wont ever go back to it because, or do any more choices. The memories I have of MuvLuv will forever stay how I remember it. I don’t want to see any alternatives. Same reason why if an anime is ever made, I wont watch it.
But that’s just me. If you feel that there is more to the story then go ahead, but remember. you will never feel the same way as experiencing it for the first time.
Your opinions match the general sentiment towards MLA I think. The reason it’s rated so high is because a lot of people gave it a 10/10, not because it’s objectively better than other top VNs. (I would rate CLANNAD as 11/10 or 12/10 and MLA as 10/10, but the scale only goes up to 10, so the effective score is equal to a 10/10 score. So it appears as though I would rate MLA and CLANNAD equally when I don’t.
I didn’t really like the final chapter either, I completely agree with you there — Takeru hardly got any better throughout the story!! And I wasn’t really affected by the girls’ deaths (besides Meiya) because you knew they were gonna die. And the fact that Takeru forgot everything in the new universe just made me kind of mad. Seeing Kasumi cry was touching, though.
I was satisfied by the science even if it was lolwrong, though. They mentioned several times that the G-Bombs had strange residual effects, so it wasn’t too much of a stretch that the G-Bombs were able to propel Sumika’s consciousness to bring Takeru to the Unlimited universe. (Sort of.)
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The Muv-Luv localization kickstarter just went live!
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It hasn’t even been out for an hour and we’re already at $120,000! I pledged $800. Hype!
Grabbed the last $300 tier~
Will be keeping an eye on my income to try and nab that TSF jacket.
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Nabbed one as well.
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I’m trying to save as much money as possible to throw at Rewrite whenever that happens (please happen). As such, I’m still undecided how much to pledge. The BETA plushie is something I was really happy to see but $140 is a bit steep for my current finances.
WRT to the VNs: I’m hoping to play MLA - assuming the official English does come out eventually on Steam (2017 release still possible?) - to see what all the fuss is about.
So…I have completed Extra in double quick time, completing all routes but doing a hell of a lot of skipping, and all I can manage to say about it that at least lacrosse makes a change from baseball…
Just started Unlimited and it seems much more interesting and engaging right from the off although of course you need to have got through Extra to fully appreciate that.
Quite honestly, I did not find the side girl routes particularly good, with the exception of class rep’s. It gives you a taste of what Muv-Luv is really good at: Intense drama that persists over an extended period of time, never letting the reader off the hook easily. The main girl routes, however, were certainly enjoyable.
Unfortunately, the game also shows its bad side during Extra, like that disgustingly unnecessary and mood-breaking panty shot during the date with Sumika.
As for Unlimited, it can get pretty repetetive. But it’s not like you have to get through every single “route”…
Now, for the most important question, @BotanRugbyBall :
Sumika or Meiya?
