Akira Pseudo-Route [Complete!]

[neio]

it seems like Emi and Rin have been shaped by their misfortunes, whereas Lilly and Hanako are who they are in spite of such things.

I seem to remember quite the opposite in canon. Whether it was Emi's or Rin's path (or Act 1) I can't recall, but it was noted that Emi runs in spite of having no legs, and Rin paints in spite of having no arms. Meanwhile, Hanako is certainly shaped by her condition; she's shy, her hair covers her burns, etc.

[Thanatos02]

Wheee! I'm tired.
I like how you got Hisao onto the roof for that conversation. Although I think it happened after the exams though. But you talked about Lilly and the mafia. So all is forgiven.

In the VN it happens in Lilly's route, and it happens before Lilly leaves for Scotland. I figured working it out in this manner wouldn't be too farfetched, although there's certainly other ways I could have done it. Maybe having Emi show up to the empty classroom to deliver a message to the class rep and she stays for tea, at which point Rin shows up lunchbox-in-mouth wondering where Emi went.

Spelled Ibarazaki wrong.

D'oh.

Change of tense with crossed.
In my deprived state that's all I can manage, but I'm sure I saw at least 2 more errors on my first read. Also editing work is super hard on a phone.

Thanks for all that. I don't even bother trying to read over my stuff on my phone because the text is always super small, can't be resized, and gives me a headache after 5 minutes of trying to focus enough just to read a few lines.

OH SHIET, things are going to be getting juicy by the looks of it soon. I like what I see and patiently await the next update! :3

4-5 is going to contain a lot of story points I've been waiting to employ, so yes, the next chapter is going to be rather content heavy to make up for the filler episode.

You probably meant "more than enough"

That would be correct, yeah. Thank you.

I don't quite get what you intend to say with this sentence.

I seem to remember quite the opposite in canon. Whether it was Emi's or Rin's path (or Act 1) I can't recall, but it was noted that Emi runs in spite of having no legs, and Rin paints in spite of having no arms. Meanwhile, Hanako is certainly shaped by her condition; she's shy, her hair covers her burns, etc.

I acknowledge that the remark Hisao makes is technically incorrect, but he isn't omniscient. Hisao doesn't know about either of the four of them beyond names and a few conversations. He's taking a bit from his own situation and trying to see through their eyes, from which he believes that Rin and Emi do what they do regardless of whether or not they have handicaps that would prevent them from doing that. He sees Lilly being so independent despite her blindness as something she exerts in spite of the fact that she's blind, considering her position of power as the class rep for another room. He groups Hanako under the same umbrella even though it's totally incorrect, because he doesn't know anything about her beyond "shy" and "books."

And Emi seems rather rinnish in the later part of the conversation

Are there any quotes that felt a little off to you? In the scene in Lilly's route, Rin accuses Lilly of being in cahoots with butterfly spies. I figured I'd play around with that and have Emi play at the fact that Lilly might have some kind of protection or secret service, which may have come off as a shot in the dark, something Rin seems to do a lot.

Oh hey, look! My limbs are back!

Are you a wizard?

One question, do you intend to split this at some point into a good/bad end or no?

There is going to be a split into a neutral end near the end of this act. I'm still debating the possibility of a bad end, seeing as how anything I can think of is just a matter of forced drama, and I'd like to employ something that actually hits as a "oh shi- you dun goof'd" moment rather than "Akira is leaving because the plot says she has to. I hope you feel bad for choosing something that had no indication of being a bad choice."

[Mirage_GSM]

Are there any quotes that felt a little off to you?

Mainly the Yakuza stuff, but I admit it's more a mix of kenjiish and rinnish

I'm still debating the possibility of a bad end,

Don't.

[StudyOfWumbology]

Don't.

Amen to that.

[Mader Levap]

Nice, short filler. Next part should be content-heavy? Aw, appetite just grew even larger.

One question, do you intend to split this at some point into a good/bad end or no?

There is going to be a split into a neutral end near the end of this act.

In my personal opinion, you can do away with whole "multiple endings" thing. It does not really fits story (prose) format.
Of course, it is your fanfic, you do what you want with it, etc, etc.

[Orieujac]

Wow, is it just me or this fanfic is better than the actual game? Even J.K.Rowlings would roll her eyes with so many coincidences, but this is one hell of a story. Very detailed, an incredibly deep Akira character, and even has interactions with the other characters in such a way that it looks like im playing KS, only without the music. Why werent you hired as writer of the Akira arc?

[fancywalrus]

There is going to be a split into a neutral end near the end of this act. I'm still debating the possibility of a bad end, seeing as how anything I can think of is just a matter of forced drama, and I'd like to employ something that actually hits as a "oh shi- you dun goof'd" moment rather than "Akira is leaving because the plot says she has to. I hope you feel bad for choosing something that had no indication of being a bad choice."

This is my concern with a bad end as well, they usually seem a bit forced. Do whatever you are comfortable with obviously, but I think you would be better off going with a neutral end and good end. Just my opinion but with the way the story has gone, I really like the idea of a neutral/good split and feel like a bad end may get in the way.

[Carighan]

Bad end! Bad end! Bad end! If anyone takes less than a week to feel anything again, it wasn't horrible enough!

To be fair, given the age-difference and how you did the confession I can't truly see a bad ending be believable, either. It's easy to see a neutral-ish ending, ofc.

[Orieujac]

I say no to a bad ending, it would feel too forced. But a neutral ending would be ok, possibly by making Hisao choosing between his job and Akira. I think it would be the least forced possible neutral ending. But! You are the writer, and until now you have been writing an amazing story, so choose what you think is better.

[griffon8]

One question, do you intend to split this at some point into a good/bad end or no?

There is going to be a split into a neutral end near the end of this act. I'm still debating the possibility of a bad end, seeing as how anything I can think of is just a matter of forced drama, and I'd like to employ something that actually hits as a "oh shi- you dun goof'd" moment rather than "Akira is leaving because the plot says she has to. I hope you feel bad for choosing something that had no indication of being a bad choice."

Boo!

As much as I enjoy reading people's 'pseudo routes', I find the forcing of choices on the narrative to be distracting. They totally bring me out of the story and into 'this is just something I'm reading' territory. It often seems that too much effort goes into figuring out that one key moment which makes or breaks it for the characters, when in reality, there is no one single thing that does that. Helbereth's story 'Tomorrow's Doom', while otherwise excellent, suffers from that I feel. And I say that without him having finished either the good or bad end path.

That said, I think Scissorlips's Suzu route and Rikibro's Riki route were very well done. But those are the exceptions.

[Doomish]

I still maintain that I don't think route-based choices work in a narrative text style. As the writer, you have to explore one path entirely before immediately going back to an earlier point in the story to say 'no, that didn't happen, instead this happened'. It's jarring to have the story come to a conclusion, only to immediately pick up at the split point and have things play out differently. I'd compare it to finishing the VN, then loading your save to see what would have happened otherwise; or maybe like keeping your thumb in a choose your own adventure book page just in case you don't like the result of what you picked.

Yeah, it flows as a completed work because readers can just pick the choice they want to proceed with once it's finished, like in the actual VN... but in a chapter-by-chapter environment it really interrupts the flow of the story. The difference between a VN environment and a narrative environment is that you don't have the choices in your peripheral at all times. In the VN, there's no table of contents to browse through wherein you'll see all the choices listed in a top-to-bottom row, for example.

My advice is that just because it has "route" tacked onto the name, does not mean there have to be branching choices. It's your story and you can do what you like, of course, but I personally don't think anyone will be mad if you opt out of doing different paths.

[Thanatos02]

Wow, is it just me or this fanfic is better than the actual game? Even J.K.Rowlings would roll her eyes with so many coincidences, but this is one hell of a story. Very detailed, an incredibly deep Akira character, and even has interactions with the other characters in such a way that it looks like im playing KS, only without the music. Why werent you hired as writer of the Akira arc?

Because one wasn't slated to be made. Also 'hire' implies that there would be any money in it.
Honestly, though, that's not really a compliment I feel I'm worthy of. While it's a given that I read my things from a different perspective as someone who didn't write it, I still say the game did a much better job of emotionally involving the reader. That's part of the reason of why I'm a little jealous of Scissorlips' ability to do just that, because it's not something that's easy to pick up, and you're truly fortunate if you're able to naturally get the reader involved in such a way.
I do appreciate the thought, though. Most of the time when I write I'll have the OST on repeat, and that helps to get the proper mood into my head. I don't really see the point in fanfiction if it's not something that could fit in the little nooks and crannies of the canon, so I try to get things as close to the source material as possible.

This is my concern with a bad end as well, they usually seem a bit forced. Do whatever you are comfortable with obviously, but I think you would be better off going with a neutral end and good end. Just my opinion but with the way the story has gone, I really like the idea of a neutral/good split and feel like a bad end may get in the way.

I say no to a bad ending, it would feel too forced. But a neutral ending would be ok, possibly by making Hisao choosing between his job and Akira. I think it would be the least forced possible neutral ending. But! You are the writer, and until now you have been writing an amazing story, so choose what you think is better.

Boo!

As much as I enjoy reading people's 'pseudo routes', I find the forcing of choices on the narrative to be distracting. They totally bring me out of the story and into 'this is just something I'm reading' territory. It often seems that too much effort goes into figuring out that one key moment which makes or breaks it for the characters, when in reality, there is no one single thing that does that. Helbereth's story 'Tomorrow's Doom', while otherwise excellent, suffers from that I feel. And I say that without him having finished either the good or bad end path.

That said, I think Scissorlips's Suzu route and Rikibro's Riki route were very well done. But those are the exceptions.

I still maintain that I don't think route-based choices work in a narrative text style. As the writer, you have to explore one path entirely before immediately going back to an earlier point in the story to say 'no, that didn't happen, instead this happened'. It's jarring to have the story come to a conclusion, only to immediately pick up at the split point and have things play out differently. I'd compare it to finishing the VN, then loading your save to see what would have happened otherwise; or maybe like keeping your thumb in a choose your own adventure book page just in case you don't like the result of what you picked.

Yeah, it flows as a completed work because readers can just pick the choice they want to proceed with once it's finished, like in the actual VN... but in a chapter-by-chapter environment it really interrupts the flow of the story. The difference between a VN environment and a narrative environment is that you don't have the choices in your peripheral at all times. In the VN, there's no table of contents to browse through wherein you'll see all the choices listed in a top-to-bottom row, for example.

My advice is that just because it has "route" tacked onto the name, does not mean there have to be branching choices. It's your story and you can do what you like, of course, but I personally don't think anyone will be mad if you opt out of doing different paths.

Allllllllllllllllright, no split endings, then. It makes more sense to have everything out at once in order to do something like that, I suppose. The plan was to release the two splits at the same time so there's no "welp, read the neutral end, now to wait for the continuation" issues, but there's no dodging something like that when it comes to episodic content either way. The concept I was going for was to represent a sort of "what-if" that works to build the characters around a situation that wouldn't happen if everything were one straight line, but now that I think about it, it's probably a bit of a bad idea to be writing "what if" situations when the "this actually happened" situation isn't even resolved at that point.

I do like the idea of extra content, though. Something like a prologue through Akira's eyes that doesn't have huge impact on the story, just for fun.

[Hoitash]

I do like the idea of extra content, though. Something like a prologue through Akira's eyes that doesn't have huge impact on the story, just for fun.

I support this decision. When a writer has built a world -which you have done- it's always nice to see them use it more than once, to get the most bang for their metaphorical buck. One shots are good for that.

Looking forward to seeing how this works out. I imagine a lot of scotch is gonna be involved

[neio]

I seem to remember quite the opposite in canon. Whether it was Emi's or Rin's path (or Act 1) I can't recall, but it was noted that Emi runs in spite of having no legs, and Rin paints in spite of having no arms. Meanwhile, Hanako is certainly shaped by her condition; she's shy, her hair covers her burns, etc.

I acknowledge that the remark Hisao makes is technically incorrect, but he isn't omniscient. Hisao doesn't know about either of the four of them beyond names and a few conversations. He's taking a bit from his own situation and trying to see through their eyes, from which he believes that Rin and Emi do what they do regardless of whether or not they have handicaps that would prevent them from doing that. He sees Lilly being so independent despite her blindness as something she exerts in spite of the fact that she's blind, considering her position of power as the class rep for another room. He groups Hanako under the same umbrella even though it's totally incorrect, because he doesn't know anything about her beyond "shy" and "books."

OK then. I'm still not clear on how he draws those conclusions.

[Solistor]

Oh boy time to start anticipating updates!

Liking it so far, mate; keep up the good work.