The short version is: “Katawa Shoujo” is an interesting and very unique game in many aspects, while the narrative isn’t always perfect, the characters are incredibly well designed, making it a worthy time investment.
As a side note – this review will have no story spoilers.
“Katawa Shoujo” is somewhat different in nature to most other games you’d find on this website, it has no intention at all to be a “sex” game, and, while that is present on the story, it serves a narrative purpose, demonstrating, in a way, the advancement of a relationship. With that being said, both the story and it’s characters are very well designed.
STORY:
This game has a “generic” first act that serves the purpose of, via your choices, decide which of the more “specialized” following acts you will get to play, in total there are 5 “main” paths, one for each of the women, said paths can once again branch into good, neutral or bad endings.
With that being said, most choices do not appear to matter all that much, the exception being on act 1 since they serve the purpose of deciding your following acts. On the following paths this is not necessarily a bad thing, because the story is interesting, but it does mean that it is very much railroaded, and there’s a very low number of decisions to be made that make a big difference, mainly the ones that dictate your ending, most of them just cause minor dialogue changes.
As for each of the 5 main paths themselves, I should also mention that they’re not all on the same quality level, they’re all enjoyable and should be a fun time, but a few of them definitely stand above the others. Opinions on which of them are better do seem to vary though, which in a way is a good thing, because people with different tastes than me are also likely to find something they enjoy.
The general nature of the narrative is very much that of a drama, it has some light hearted funny moments, it also has some conflict and some sad moments, it doesn’t touch anything all that heavy, so don’t feel alarmed by those, it does, after all, concern the school and love life of 18 and 19 year-olds, so there’s nothing all that complex.
CHARACTERS:
The characters are by far “Katawa Shoujo”’s biggest stars, they are where the game shines its brightest and every single one of them is interesting in one way or another, even the side characters are interesting.
If I were to make one “bad” criticism to any character in this game it’d be to the main character, but even that is rather light as my main problem with him regards his inability to actually comprehend how other people feel, which, in a way, is justified, since 18 year-olds rarely manage to do that well, but from a different perspective also means that a very good chunk of the “issues” that the narrative deals with stem from him. Even then, it works for the narrative, since the idea is that he is as “new” to this world as the player is likely to be.
Each of the game’s characters is very unique, with a particular set of abilities and quirks, learning more about them is always interesting and is probably one of the main draws of the game, so much that I’ll probably miss reading about them now that I’m done with the game..
You might have noticed that, so far, despite the game’s description, I haven’t mentioned any of the characters’ disabilities, and, the game kind of does that to you, this is its true master class, it teaches the player to look at its characters for what they CAN do rather than for what they cannot, this serves a narrative purpose as much as it serves an educational one, both of which are done very well.
If nothing else I’d say that the game’s ability to make the player at least a little bit a better person is already an astounding success, very few games manage to do that, and the ones that do deserve all the praise they can get.
SEX SCENES:
To be perfectly frank I don’t really care about the sex scenes on this type of game, they’re not really why I’m playing and most of the time I just find them boring, there are very few that I find graphically enjoyable.
With that being said it’d be unfair for me to be harsh to games on this specific point – I’ll not kink shame though, go nuts people – that’s why I’ll write about them either way.
For “Katawa Shoujo” specifically, they’re not it’s thing, if anything they’re as awkward as you’d expect a first time to be, they’re in the story for narrative purposes and they do fill that role well, they’re also normally on the final stretch of each characters’ route, meaning there aren’t any on the early acts of the game.
CONCLUSION:
If reading through a somewhat long story with incredibly well designed and unique characters sounds interesting to you – give “Katawa Shoujo” a try.
It is worth how much time it requires to be finished, while it does have some “low” points where the story does drag a bit, they’re few in number, in a way that doesn’t really tarnish the whole product.
With all that being said – “Katawa Shoujo” is deserving of a very solid 5/5 as both a visual novel and an educational narrative, in a way that very few other materials achieve.
CREDITS:
I normally use this last part to credit the authors but this game has a longer than normal list, so I’ll drop a link serving that purpose.
Most people that worked on it are nowadays working on other unrelated stuff, but I’m certain they’d appreciate anyone clicking their links and checking them out, so feel free to do just that at:
www.katawa-shoujo.com/staff.php
