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Visual Novel Debate: Chaos;Head Vs Steins;Gate

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Darth_Caedus

No longer canonical
Random little idea here. Just want to see people's opinion on the two English translated games in this series.

Chaos;Head
Everyone hates it because the crappy anime adaption but having seen the source material it's really good. The characters are strong and the story is insane and full of mystery and suspense and well written. It's a lot faster pace than its "sequel" and spends less time waiting around. Takumi Nishijou is one of the best written protagonist in gaming. He comes off as 100% unlikeable but that is on purpose of course. He is by all accounts mentally ill and they depict in such a fantastic way. It really feels like your in the head of someone not completely here. His development into a stronger willed character that can handle his delusions is great. Plus he is still his mentally deranged self there is no 100% better. The other characters are likeable and have some time to shine as well. This VN is a lot more story focused though and a lot darker than Steins;Gate. It has harem aspects but so does SG and fanservice is easy to avoid if you don't do certain delusions. By the way the delusion system in this game is so unique and well done. The romance is great just like its successor in that it's really subtle.

I urge anyone who is on the fence of this game to play it. I'm also hoping they will release it officially in the States.

Steins;Gate
Everyone knows how great this game is so there is not much to say. Fantastic characters and a great story. A lot more slow paced, and that's good, I love fiction that takes time to build its characters. Once the story gets going you already are attached to them. The ending is great and the romance is well handled. Rintarou Okabe, just like Takumi, isn't 100% here and it's handled just as well. The harem aspect doesn't get in the way.

I slightly prefer Steins;Gate due to the slower paced plot and better more fleshed out characters. I also really wish Robotics;Notes was translated, but alas. Love this series and its themes.

What are your opinions on these two games? Which do you like more?
 
Haven't played Chaos;Head, but I played Steins;Gate.

Hated it. I really tried my best to enjoy it, but the whole Otaku thing with the main character got to me, and bugged me in all the wrong ways. I couldn't find a way to like any of the characters either. All have annoying tendencies I couldn't let go of.
 
I don't play a lot of visual novels, but Chaos;Head was easily the most boring time I've had with a VN. The story takes way too long to get interesting.

I get that the main character is supposed to be unlikable, but you spend so much time with him, he is just unpleasant to be with. If I can't relate to a main character at all, then the plot is simply a slog.
 
IceDoesntHelp said:
Haven't played Chaos;Head, but I played Steins;Gate.

Hated it. I really tried my best to enjoy it, but the whole Otaku thing with the main character got to me, and bugged me in all the wrong ways. I couldn't find a way to like any of the characters either. All have annoying tendencies I couldn't let go of.
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You probably wouldn't like Chaos;Head either lol. Takumi is worse than Okabe.
 
Jangowuzhere said:
I don't play a lot of visual novels, but Chaos;Head was easily the most boring time I've had with a VN. The story takes way too long to get interesting.

I get that the main character is supposed to be unlikable, but you spend so much time with him, he is just unpleasant to be with. If I can't relate to a main character at all, then the plot is simply a slog.
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Really? It felt fast paced to me. A lot quicker than Steins Gate. Takumi doesn't start getting likeable till towards the end.
 
IceDoesntHelp said:
Haven't played Chaos;Head, but I played Steins;Gate.

Hated it. I really tried my best to enjoy it, but the whole Otaku thing with the main character got to me, and bugged me in all the wrong ways. I couldn't find a way to like any of the characters either. All have annoying tendencies I couldn't let go of.
Click to expand...

I bought Steins;Gate after people noted vague similarities to Life Is Strange, and ran headfirst into one of the most unlikable protagonists I've ever seen in a video game. The rest of them seem more standard misfit characters and are thus not awful, and I assume the main character has to get better or else people wouldn't praise Steins;Gate the way they do. But man, it's a hard hurdle to get past.
 
I finally played through Chaos;Head this summer and am currently on chapter 4 of Steins;Gate (I played a bit when it came out on Vita but only really got back into it these past few days).

Chaos;Head's a game that I ended up liking by the end (to the point I would reluctantly replay it if Noah gets released here), but was rarely entertained and at some points actively annoyed by on the way there. There were moments like
Takkun pathetically going out of his way to buy a shitty toy sword
that were pretty great, but those didn't happen that often. I should say that the horror aspects were actually very well done and consistently succeeded in making me feel actually uncomfortable. (I also posted some more thoughts in the Steins;Gate OT, for what it's worth.)

Like I said, I'm not very far into Steins;Gate, but the cast was immediately way more likable. Honestly, just about every part of it was. It's much more interesting and I actively enjoy reading it. There's still some frustrating moments with pacing where I wish characters would just talk to each other about something already, but it's much more understandable
because it's due to Okarin being chuuni as hell as characters are actually trying to convey things to him instead of Takkun just being overly pathetic (and sometimes gross)
and so far this moments have actually been resolved relatively quickly for the most part.

EDIT:
It's kinda weird for me that you think Chaos was faster paced, to be honest. Maybe it's not pretty much confined to one room like Steins is, but I much prefer the way
actual progress seems to be getting made in the experiments and information's being gained about SERN
to Takkun bumbling about being overly paranoid (and even then in illogical ways) forever and ever and ever.
 
chrominance said:
I bought Steins;Gate after people noted vague similarities to Life Is Strange, and ran headfirst into one of the most unlikable protagonists I've ever seen in a video game. The rest of them seem more standard misfit characters and are thus not awful, and I assume the main character has to get better or else people wouldn't praise Steins;Gate the way they do. But man, it's a hard hurdle to get past.
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Not surprising, since you need to reach chapter 5 to see the story kick into high gear

Btw, here's a recommendation from Kotaku's Jason Schreier. Like many here, he had his issues with the VN, including exactly the same ones I'm seeing popping-up here, such as how he hated Okabe at the beginning, but ended up liking it.
 
It's kind of weird when people talk about S:G as being slow when I actually think it's well paced for a genre that tends to have severe problems with pacing.

Like look at this quote from Schreier:
The first thing you have to know about Steins;Gate is that it’s excruciatingly slow. American fans of visual novels like Danganronpa and Virtue’s Last Reward might be used to stories that, while not exactly blistering, at least ramp up the conflict right away. In Steins;Gate, the first two chapters are solely devoted to setup, and things don’t really start picking up until the third. By the end of chapter five, though, you won’t be able to put the game down.
Click to expand...
Using Uchikoshi games as a favorable example of better paced visual novels? Utterly bizarre.
 
Basileus777 said:
It's kind of weird when people talk about S:G as being slow when I actually think it's well paced for a genre that tends to have severe problems with pacing.
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Every VN has pacing problems lol. Like Grisaia. Fate Stay Night is fine but I might be bias because I'm a Type Moon homer.

I'm fine with slower starts though, in fact I prefer them, makes me get to see the characters in normal situations more. Form bigger attachments. I'm a character>plot type of person.
 
Steins;Gate. Okarin, Kurisu and Suzu are some of my favorite characters. Then again I haven't checked out Chaos;Head before so I'm a bit biased :P. Is the VN available in english?
 
gdt said:
Is Steins Gate available on PC or ps4?
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In English you can get it on PC, PS3 and Vita.

There's a PS4 port, but sadly that one's stuck in Japan.

EDIT: Forgot to mention that the English PC version is NOT on Steam, and it's unlikely to be published there. SNAFU with the contract between the developer and the PC publisher
 
Hugstable said:
Steins;Gate. Okarin, Kurisu and Suzu are some of my favorite characters. Then again I haven't checked out Chaos;Head before so I'm a bit biased :P. Is the VN available in english?
Click to expand...

No. There have been hints that it might be getting an official localization, but for now all we have is a fan translation for the PC version.
 
Robotics;Notes at least has a decent anime, but it's a shame the VN is stuck on consoles, because much like S;G, the game is even better. The tablet interface and things like actually being able to play Gunvarrel really add to it.
 
I like how people are trying Steins;Gate now because of Life is Strange, as I'm doing the opposite as soon as I finish FFVII.
 
Marche90 said:
In English you can get it on PC, PS3 and Vita.

There's a PS4 port, but sadly that one's stuck in Japan.

EDIT: Forgot to mention that the English PC version is NOT on Steam, and it's unlikely to be published there. SNAFU with the contract between the developer and the PC publisher
Click to expand...

It was in the Steam DB leak.
 
Shizuka said:
Which doesn't mean a whole lot, not after JAST USA publicly said that it wouldn't happen because of the licensing contract. Between a public confirmation saying it won't happen and a Steam DB leak, I wouldn't hold my breath for that one.
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I can't stop hearing everything you say with Bernkastel's voice lol.
 
Basileus777 said:
It's kind of weird when people talk about S:G as being slow when I actually think it's well paced for a genre that tends to have severe problems with pacing.

Like look at this quote from Schreier:
Using Uchikoshi games as a favorable example of better paced visual novels? Utterly bizarre.
Click to expand...

I won't say I'm some expert on the genre, but it seems like every single one has pacing issues to some extent, even Danganronpa which is probably the most fast-paced of the bunch.

Outside of super short stuff like Phenomeno, I'd say Danganronpa is the high end of a nice brisk pace in the genre while stuff like Umineko is at the absolute bottom end. Uchikoshi stuff is somewhere in between, maybe at the low part of the high end or upper middle end. At least with Zero Escape. Ever 17 is definitely on the low end.

Even the one English-developed VN I played (Katawa Shoujo) had shit pacing.
 
Marche90 said:
In English you can get it on PC, PS3 and Vita.

There's a PS4 port, but sadly that one's stuck in Japan.

EDIT: Forgot to mention that the English PC version is NOT on Steam, and it's unlikely to be published there. SNAFU with the contract between the developer and the PC publisher
Click to expand...

Didn't it pop up in one of the recent Steam database leaks, though?

It's interesting to see people talk about Okabe/the otakuness of the cast without having played Chaos first, since I really do wonder if that affects things. I could see myself being annoyed with him if I hadn't played Chaos before it, since he's so much more likable than Takumi in a lot of ways and that definitely helps. He's weird and chuuni but he's nowhere, nowhere near as bad as Takumi is. I also like little touches I've noticed so far, like him casually just getting Kurisu coffee when asked without commenting on it at all, that make him seem like an actually nice person when he's not raving about chaos. Similarly, the cast actually being generally likable and joking around with each other helps me look past stuff like some of Daru's jokes going a bit too far/happening too often.
 
Darth_Caedus said:
I can't stop hearing everything you say with Bernkastel's voice lol.
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tumblr_ndcb14kaEe1tw806ho3_500.gif
 
Shizuka said:
Which doesn't mean a whole lot, not after JAST USA publicly said that it wouldn't happen because of the licensing contract. Between a public confirmation saying it won't happen and a Steam DB leak, I wouldn't hold my breath for that one.
Click to expand...

It needn't be JAST though. 5pb could very well put it out themselves or use a different partner like they did on PS3/Vita.
cosmicblizzard said:
I won't say I'm some expert on the genre, but it seems like every single one has pacing issues to some extent, even Danganronpa which is probably the most fast-paced of the bunch.

Outside of super short stuff like Phenomeno, I'd say Danganronpa is the high end of a nice brisk pace in the genre while stuff like Umineko is at the absolute bottom end. Uchikoshi stuff is somewhere in between, maybe at the low part of the high end or upper middle end. At least with Zero Escape. Ever 17 is definitely on the low end.

Even the one English-developed VN I played (Katawa Shoujo) had shit pacing.
Click to expand...
It's a common problem with the medium. I've heard that visual novel writers tend to get paid by the word so they have incentive to fill the games with bloat.
 
Hasn't Steins;gate been in the Steam db for years though? Probably from back when I thought they were considering it.

I can't really remember much of Chaos;Head despite having finished it a good few years back. I think I remember being kind of lukewarm over it.

Steins;gate has always been more interesting to me, but I've never managed to find the time for it.
 
I played and enjoyed both games, though I have never watch either of their anime (well, maybe the first few episodes of Steins;Gate), so I can't really comment on the anime part.

But, from what I can remember, I didn't feel Chaos;Head was slow pace, though it was great, and exciting enough for me to keep on playing more and more. personally I liked the delusional trigger, the fighting/violence, and the mysteries(Shogun, etc), it was something that Steins;Gate didn't really have. And, as much as I enjoyed Chaos;Head, between the two, I still would've prefer Steins;Gate better, the overall game, the story, and especially its characters (Really like Okabe, Kurisu, Maho, Suzuha, etc) In comparison, Takumi was somewhat weaker, Rimi was good, but the rest of the cast wasn't as great imo (I've mostly forgotten all about them)

And, I watched the anime for Robotics;Note, didn't like it that much

その目だれの目...
 
Steins;Gate and it isn't even a contest. Better writing, better production values, and Chaos;Head just shits the bed at the end while Steins;Gate has a great ending.
 
jonjonaug said:
Steins;Gate and it isn't even a contest. Better writing, better production values, and Chaos;Head just shits the bed at the end while Steins;Gate has a great ending.
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Chaos;Head's ending is one of the best ever.

The say his name thing was handled really well and the song was awesome to match.

I prefer Chaos;Head's whole finale more. It was epic and glorious.
 
I don't dislike Chaos;Head, but I feel it kind of started to fall apart at the end, and I didn't care much for some of the plot points.
You can say the protagonist is unlikeable on purpose, but that doesn't exactly make me enjoy reading his shit any more.

The characters in Steins;Gate are just much better written, and the plot is solid and interesting through out the whole thing.

Personally my favourite so far is Robotics;Notes, though I know most people will prefer Steins;Gate. It's just a lot less otaku pandering which I enjoy more.

Haven't had a chance to read Chaos;Child yet.
 
Basileus777 said:
The last 1/3 of Chaos;Head is the worst part of the game.
Click to expand...

I have to ask- what did you think about the first 2/3 then? Because to me it's that last 1/3 that makes the first 2/3 worth it at all.

With regards to liking Okarin, my mind's changing a bit again. I'm playing more Steins right now and since my playing this got delayed so much, it's been 3 months since I read Luka's intro. I'd forgotten how much Okarin sucks when it comes to them. "He's a guy!! This is wrong!! Gross!!!!" isn't funny to begin with, and it gets old so fast when it keeps getting repeated over and over in the same scene. Daru's jokes can be annoying at times but at least he doesn't do this shit.
 
chrominance said:
I bought Steins;Gate after people noted vague similarities to Life Is Strange, and ran headfirst into one of the most unlikable protagonists I've ever seen in a video game. The rest of them seem more standard misfit characters and are thus not awful, and I assume the main character has to get better or else people wouldn't praise Steins;Gate the way they do. But man, it's a hard hurdle to get past.
Click to expand...

Exactly the way I felt until I reached a certain point in the game lol
 
I dislike Chaos;Head quite a bit. The concept of an unlikable protagonist always has potential but here his growth feels forced and hackneyed, losing my care for him as a character. I also feel he's tolerated too much at the beginning for being such a despicable person and is ultimately rewarded for something he doesn't really earn.

The genre also seemingly changes from a psychological thriller - which at least piqued my curiosity a bit - to battle action with power levels of literal "I reject your reality and substitute my own," which was really boring to me.

The game actually made me very apprehensive about trying out Steins;Gate, despite the praises it gets.
 
IceDoesntHelp said:
Haven't played Chaos;Head, but I played Steins;Gate.

Hated it. I really tried my best to enjoy it, but the whole Otaku thing with the main character got to me, and bugged me in all the wrong ways. I couldn't find a way to like any of the characters either. All have annoying tendencies I couldn't let go of.
Click to expand...

I found their character quirks endearing until the 500th time. They really bash your head in with the same jokes.
 
petghost said:
I found their character quirks endearing until the 500th time. They really bash your head in with the same jokes.
Click to expand...

The jokes mostly stop by the time you get through Ch.4. Once shit gets real Okabe develops to be fairly great. Steins;Gate has perhaps the best time travel story in years and the ending is very very good. The character is quirky but he is great and you understand why by the time the game really gets going.

Anyway, Steins;Gate is one of my favorite novels/games of all times due to the story and I didn't find pacing bad at all, but I don't mind a more novel like format where first few chapters are spent on world/setup.

Never played Chaos;Head.
 
I always felt S;G second half doesn't live up to its potential, the game basically turns into a "catch the girl" game.

Didn't know C;H was translated, I kinda want to check it out, but I'm kinda over VN at this point of life.
 
For those that quit SG because of Okabe, the whole point of the plot is him having to mature and face his childish delusions in order to save those he loves.
 
Stein's;Gate was okay IMO,
I just wish I had more 'predictable' control over how the story progresses. I was well into two thirds of the game before I grasped the central concept around the textmessages. And even then it's not really transparent what action led to a particular outcome
.Those other games mentioned didn't come out on PS Vita in Europe or the US right?
 
IceDoesntHelp said:
Haven't played Chaos;Head, but I played Steins;Gate.

Hated it. I really tried my best to enjoy it, but the whole Otaku thing with the main character got to me, and bugged me in all the wrong ways. I couldn't find a way to like any of the characters either. All have annoying tendencies I couldn't let go of.
Click to expand...

+1. The characters were so grating. If S;G was my first VN, I would never have played another given how S;G is supposed to be the best vn ever.

Ot, Code:Realize is quite enjoyable if anyone is looking for a good vn and they aren't scared of Otome games.
 
I haven't played CH but I want to take this opportunity to say how much I love Steins;Gate.

I love Steins;Gate a lot.
 
Atolm said:
For those that quit SG because of Okabe, the whole point of the plot is him having to mature and face his childish delusions in order to save those he loves.
Click to expand...

I finished it and it didnt change my dislike for the game, fwwiw. I just think the excessive praise the game gets probably turns some people off VNs if it is their first one. It reminds me a little of 999's excessive praise.
 
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