Really cool game. The writing is fantastic, and there's so much of it! Everyone's all distinct, the plots are varied and interesting in their own way, and the nonverbal choice system is just awesome. Shoutouts to the way Cirno speaks, it's so goshdang cartoony. I have no idea how her "accent" would actually sound, but through text alone she's got tons of bombastic energy.

Music-- yay! It's tami, and wow, I could barely recognize her stuff. This soundtrack felt incredibly different from the work she did for the Kotohime games. A lot bouncier and more cartoony. Though, maybe you could've done a slower track or two, or placed them differently? Some songs seem oddly upbeat during serious moments. Don't worry though, it's still a 5/5 to me.

Great sprites, and there's a lot of them. Fun backgrounds, too. But one kinda distracting thing is that the expressions seem very off in places. Characters are often crying when a more subdued emotion would work better, and some faces look just plain unfitting for the dialogue. And nobody's getting (physically) hurt here, so what's with the bandages? It's quite a nitpicky complaint, but I think facial expressions are really important for more subtle characterization and development in a VN-- a picture tells a thousand words, and all.

I was only able to get Ichirin's good ending on my first go, but then I went back and got Aya's and Wriggle's good endings as well, as the correct choices seemed obvious in retrospect. I still don't know which choice branches in the Prismrivers' story get you the good ending, let alone what the right options are... and I think that's kinda cool. In general, I really like how the choices are made, as well as what effects each choice has.

Though, I have a question about Wriggle's route. ROT13: Cnegjnl guebhtu Jevttyr'f ebgr, Pveab nfxf "V qvqa'g qb abguva' jebat, qvq V?" be fbzrguvat gb gung rssrpg. Naq, ba zl vavgvny cynlguebhtu, V jvfurq gb cvpx "Sbetvirarff" ohg qvqa'g, fvzcyl orpnhfr "V sbetvir lbh" naq "lbh qvq abguvat jebat" ner irel qvssrerag fragvzragf. V flzcnguvmrq jvgu Pveab'f zbgvingvba, rira vs ure rkrphgvba jnf xvaqn ohttrerq-- ohg gung xvaq bs ahnapr vfa'g ernyyl cerfrag jura nfxrq "V qvqa'g qb abguva'jebat, qvq V?", naq V gubhtug vs V rssrpgviryl fnvq "lrf" gb gung, fur'q frr vg nf na rkphfr gb qb vg nyy gur rknpg fnzr oyhag jnl bire naq bire ntnva. Vs fur unq nfxrq fbzrguvat gb gur rssrpg bs "Qb ln ng yrnfg trg jurer V'z pbzva' sebz?" be "Jung V qvq jnfa'g GUNG onq, evtug?" V cebonoyl jbhyq'ir cvpxrq "sbetvirarff". Jnf guvf fyvtug qvfpercnapl vagragvbany?

Aya's route in general seemed pretty rushed. Sure, the stuff that Aya talks about is really interesting, but it felt super fast. It just seems weird that a famous journalist who has stoically kept their inner workings hidden for presumably hundreds of years would be so incredibly honest and open and introspective and articulate about their identity crisis with a mute girl they met five minutes ago. It was a little jarring, and almost makes me wonder if Kokoro has some sort of hidden ability to make people around her more directly express their emotions-- I'm pretty unfamiliar with her, so that just may actually be the case. The the ending also felt a little outta nowhere. I dunno if that's intentional, considering being really fast is Aya's whole deal, but it was really distracting. That said, I don't know how to make it all feel more natural, considering this entire VN happens in a single day.

That same overly-open-ness shows up in the Wriggle chapter as well, and serves to make that section feel... kinda dragged out? Not necessarily by the events, but in the way the characters talk about them. It feels like most of the scenes involve one or more characters directly explaining why they did what they did in the previous scenes. With so many characters interacting and bouncing off each other and going through drama, I think a slightly more show-don't-tell approach would help here. Especially considering the childish vibe of these characters, they really don't need to be so good at articulating their feelings. Let the characters' actions (and facial expressions) speak for themselves a little more.

Sorry there's so much criticism here, or if my tone comes across as annoying or snooty. This is an awesome game, and I'm still giving it a 4 or 5 stars in every non-gameplay category.

In short, 'twas emotionally adventurous.

A very good read, even though I've seen only 4 of the 8 endings so far, I may need a break before I go for the other ones.

Anyway, I find the "answer by showing your emotion" mechanic to be quite fun and interesting, it's like you play as one of these silent protags! (Wait, Kokoro IS one in here... uh)
I think you've nailed every aspect of a VN (hit the nail's head perfectly flat into the board even, ): the character portraits and the songs are indeed very cool, and the writing is solid as titanium.

So looks like Kokoro being silent makes it easier for others to talk and open up to her, I don't know why but having her be a listener is funny to me.
Though, I wonder why Chapter 2 lasted way longer than the others, it took half the time of my one and only playthrough.
But yes, very good stuff overall!

Very cute art, solid writing, and I'm big into the vibe of the music

First of all, thanks a lot for your help about the route system, it was awesome to see the developer on my stream.

I think this is amazing, characters are adorable and totally connected with them, specially cirno and the way she speaks.

Something still was kinda weird, when the prismrivers asked about her favourite flower, did kokoro got her voice back?, or else, how did she responded to that?

Still an impressive vn, funny how everybody loves to be listened despite her muteness, my favourite part was when she started dancing on the street, 'cause that's something I definitely would like to see irl. xD

Great music, great writing. The art and all the various portraits are super lovely. Having you make choices at crucial points using only emotions was very clever. Alas, despite my honest picks I didn't get a single good ending in my first run, and the normal endings weigh heavily on my heart. At least they were rather hopeful -- I left with an impression like "well, they'll figure it out eventually". While I've become much less of a completionist over the years, I went back today (I played yesterday) to try to get some of the good endings and I'm pretty happy with how the stories are resolved (only missing Wrigs' now). But damn. That choice at the end was so hard to make the first time!

I gotta agree with Kevin regarding the backgrounds -- in fact, at first I thought Wriggle's chapter had taken up the entire day. I wouldn't know how to show the passage of time during the day, though. Hmm...

Back to the story, I was pretty neutral towards Kokoro but this made me like her a lot more. I also really liked Ichirin here and her interactions with Kokoro. Certainly something I hadn't considered before. There's something to say and take from every scenario, honestly. Wriggle and the gang, figuring out things. Aya's development was quite surprising and written very well. And finally the Prismrivers seemed like a fun bunch each with their own unique and varied opinions about art and music. Everyone opening up to Kokoro and showing their vulnerabilities... it's simply good to read a story like that.

p.s. regarding the music, I'm a sucker for chiptune so I gotta mention Cirno's theme in particular. Very good chiptune in a hella sweet C64 (I think... or Gameboy?) style.

congratulations, my friend. it is a banger. there are many visual novels this jam  but this one is by far the meatiest. you coulda told me any of those chapters were an entire entry and i would believe you and still rate them well

and first lemme just say: silent protagonists in video games? very overdone. in fact kind of annoying by this point unless there is a very good in-story reason. but in a visual novel? stupid bold. thats a crazy thing to manage when you are doing much more conversing than jrpging or shooting. respect

the art is consistently very clean throughout and i absolutely appreciate even the slightest changes to the default ren'py aesthetics and the font you chose is very nice

speaking of aesthetics one thing you have probably heard about is the choice of real photos for backgrounds. and you know what: i totally get it (had to do the same thing)

i ended up putting some filters on mine before slapping them in and making some tweaks so first when i saw em here i was like "lame" but upon further consideration? ya know? kinda interesting

normally settings in gensokyo are idyllic or mystical or have some really heavy theme or something as goes anime-lookin environments but the very grounded aesthetics make gensokyo seem like a real place you could go to and then get arrested for trespassing. would not have fit my game but with what you are doing here (wandering around and talking to people) it is not even a problem at all and kinda cool

i got aya good ending. haven't gone for the others at the moment but i may very well do so later

This is a lovely game! The music and art are great, but my favorite thing is probably the character writing. While I wasn't familiar with everyone, their struggles were all realistic, and I found myself relating to different characters throughout the story. The endings were interesting, they kind of mirrored Kokoro's own struggles in a way. One small thing is I had trouble seeing the menu buttons at the bottom of the screen depending on the scene, but it wasn't a big deal. Overall I enjoyed playing this a lot!

That was a lot to process, but I overall had a good time. Using Kokoro's emotions to frame the story was a really bold choice, and it was nice how she was able to grow so much in likeability. I enjoyed most of the chapters, and the choices in them actually felt like they mattered, which I appreciated. However, I do wish some things were paced more evenly. The second chapter is far longer than the rest, which made it feel a bit dissatisfying to finally finish. The ending build-up was really nice, but I also wish there was a bit more to the one I got. Pacing aside however, I was impressed by most of the character work, and the music and art were both incredible. Good job.

Well now this is a big visual novel to take in. Presentation-wise it's solid. I wish the backgrounds could have received more polish - not necessary original artwork, but just having some filters on it to indicate when its afternoon or night like the writing indicates would have helped?

Writing is a bit cheesy but honestly it kinda grew on me, not every visual novel has to be deep or philosophical to be effective and well-written. Wriggle's chapter was so good and explored relationship topics that resonated with me so deeply... which, unfortunately, leads me into my main complaint below.

I've seen the "multiple chapters, multiple stories" approach done before, and while it's executed decently here as well... there's still much to be desired? If you're going to put many plotlines in a story, it's important to ensure that 1) each receives equal attention and/or there's a clear element of progression (the first chapter is short and simple to ease you into a longer second chapter for instance) and 2) all plotlines connect to each other in a significant way so as to not feel disjointed. I think this visual novel didn't really accomplish either, unfortunately. Wriggle's chapter is so long and fascinating for a first chapter (not counting the Aunn tutorial) that it felt like it should have been pushed back way later, and the chapters after that, while solid in their own right, just didn't live up to the expectations I had. They were also a bit disjointed like I mentioned - the only connection I could see was the Prismrivers hearing about a dancer in the village (Kokoro in Ichirin's chapter), the other ones just kinda existed in a vacuum. Would've been nice to have a little thread that ties them all together - like a Golden Ending from obtaining all four chapters' good conclusions in one run?

It was overall a positive experience with a lot of potential for improvement!