>similar niche genres of games have managed to mostly ignore each other
replyThat's only because they are only "similar" on the surface. It feels like saying "football, volleyball and basketball are similar" just because they are all team games played with a ball.
Isn't it the opposite, that they are mechanically the same, but differs on the surface (art style and type of stories)?
replythank you for sharing this! I never heard the two website you mentioned while being very familiar with vndb. I guess there will be always another corner of the internet that you don't even know existed.
replyIf you are curious, vndb has a guideline you can see about what can be added here: https://vndb.org/d2
I think IF games tend to be more puzzle games with some story segments. Gamebooks are much closer, but still often have proto-RPG mechanics. (I remember tracking inventory and HP for the ones I played/read through). VNs are much closer to pure story, with some tracking of earlier decision flags for callbacks later in the story.
replyVNs are not games. They're a kind of ebook.
replyBut only people who are really into computers read them, so they like to use game terminology to talk about them.
(also, none of the creators of "VNs" call them "VNs".)
Some VNs have no real choices and could hardly be called games. Others are deeply branched.
replyBy the 2010s many JRPGs such as the Hyperdimension Neptunia series and Danganronpa pretty much stole all the visual elements of visual novels and mashed them up with gameplay from other genres.
Danganronpa is a true "adventure game" (which is actually what Japanese VN developers call their VNs…). It's pretty faithful to its genre.
replyPhoenix Wright is the only one of those Westerners really know about.
By now the term "visual novel" got re-imported back into Japan so even Japanese creators have started using it for what they otherwise call "novel games" and VN-like "adventure games".
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