Risingson: Hey, I am not a diehard fan either but let people enjoy things.
MeowCanuck: Exactly. I'd be eaten alive if I did the same thing to a common genre Orkhepaj enjoys by oversimplifying everything in a vacuum. Let people enjoy whatever they like as long as no one is being hurt.
EDIT: though I agree that there is a huge need of critical analysis in this subgenre. The fans think that each and every one of them is a masterpiece and their analysis consists of enumeration. In any case, Murder by Numbers is fun and does not have a lot of text.
MeowCanuck: I don't believe this is true. If you take a look at any of the games on vndb.org, most of the ratings are quite reasonable and accurate when looking at the data spread and sample size. I'm sure it looks that way to you because some hardcore fans are very vocal about those nukige subgenre games (e.g., RPGMaker engines, Miel, Black Lilith, etc.) with < 2 hrs gameplay and all that hentai and extreme fetish content appealing to their wildest fantasies. Or maybe those reviews on Steam that were designed to be funny gives a misleading perception of how the game is received by the entire base.
However, there are some of us who actually enjoy non-sexual VNs and/or those with unique gameplay too.
Immersive stories include Umineko, Steins;Gate, Fata Morgana, Clannad, G-senjou no Maou (all-ages), etc.
Gameplay examples include Ace Attorney series, Master Magistrate, Eiyuu Senki (all-ages), Baldr Sky (all-ages), Danganronpa series, Utawarerumono series, Kamidori Alchemy Meister, Sunrider series, Vallhalla Cyberpunk Bartender Action, Coffee Talk, etc.
Hey, you realised that you answered this to a comment of mine where I say that the critical analysis of the VM fans consists mainly of enumeration, right? :D
Really, if you say "immersive stories" it does not say anything to me. What I like about the Ace Attorney games is, in the first trilogy, how concise they are, how non filler is the text, which is a novelty for a VM. That and those moments where something completely absurd and out of the blue happens, like the plot twists in Justice for All, which is my favourite of the saga. I actually think that Great Ace Attorney and Miles Edgeworth 2 are very, very bloated in text. And for a detective genre, which traditionally consists of super short sentences and barely any exposition, I don't like it. Raymond Chandler, not Proust.
I wish VN were better written and the characters did not talk like they do, in meandering sentences with loads of "...". Or I wish there was a VN that did not follow these tropes.
