Review: Katawa Shoujo

A game five years in the making, dating back from a doujinshi artist called RAITA scribbled an idea for a Visual Novel (VN) in the back of one of his pieces in 2000 which ended up stickied on 4chan's /a/ board in 2007. From this initial idea, a bunch of passionate individuals created Four Leaf Studios to realise RAITA's dream. But is it any good? Has anonymous managed to make a mockery of disabled people, or has 4chan managed to produce something lasting?

[note this game does have erotic content which can be disabled, I give a passing mention to this content]

I think first, a primer is in order of what a Visual Novel is all about. Think of them as a novel that uses sprites, graphics and music, along with a "choose your own adventure" feel and you're pretty much there. Professional VNs can be more game like with RPG elements or more linear depending on the story and the developer. Now I wouldn't say I was an expert in VN's but I definitely have played a few in my time. The main thing to remember about a VN is that it has to have a strong story element, and VN's have a strong track record in being so popular that they get made into anime. Maybe you've heard of Clannad? Or Fate/Stay Night? Hirugashi When They Cry? Shuffle? Steins;Gate? All visual novels. VN's due to their limited market tend to have at least one or two erotic scenes to get people to buy them, cynical as it may be.

[When I talk about route I am making note of the fact that the main character is chasing after one specific girl]

Katawa Shoujo starts out fairly typically with our main character, Hisao, clutching a letter that told him to wait in the field as someone wants to speak with him. Luckily for him Iwanako, a girl he's had a crush on tells him she loves him. Unfortunately for him, he proceeds to have a heart attack which is then diagnosed as arrythmia. Hisao ends up staying in the hospital for a few months where people stop coming to see him, including Iwanako. He eventually gets released and has to go to a private school specifically for disabled kids called Yakuno where he meets five (technically six) girls with various disabilites and are the main plots for the game.

Each route is fairly different to the last with only a few sharing the same scene from different perspectives. The relationships of each person differ from person to person and they all have their own hardships that they have to get through. Although Katawa Shoujo literally means cripple girl, a better name might have been broken girl with the amount of personal strife that these girls have to go through.

Special mention has to go to the writers though with the amount of effort that has went into making each character memorable and not using their disability as a defining characteristic. Shizune, who is deaf, happens to be one of the more playful characters, even if her route happens to suffer from the worst writing of all the paths.  On the whole though, the writing is one of the best I've had the pleasure to read in games, visual novel or not. Each charater is seperate and defined, and if theres any criticism, its that the comic relief character Kenji, is more annoying than anything, and the sex scenes are a bit short, though that might be down to the artists.

The art throughout is generally of high quality, with the event art like the one above typically being good but sometimes suffering from poor quality control with the art looking a little ragged with the lines being unjoined. The sprite art however is very good with it easy to tell each characters moods instantly.

So the girls, what are they like? Emi, is a double amputee of the leg, below the knee, she is still very active though and is a member of the track and field team. Her friend Rin is a double amputee of the arm above the elbow and an artist, she lives next door to Emi and is reliant on her to dress, but she manages to do every day things with her feet. Lilly is blind and gets by with a cane, she's very well off and has an air of prestige around her yet she's independent of her parents. Hanako is Lilly's best friend and spends time with her in a disused classroom drinking tea. She also has burns over one side of her body which seems to have given her a very shy and easily startled persona. Finally we have Shizune and her interpreter and friend Misha. Shizune is deaf, and Misha signs for her and they are both part of the student council.


Some sound stereotypical and generic, but believe me, once you actually get into and read each girls story and how they became who they are, you'll come to love them in their own ways.

Another note has to be made about how fantastic the music is in this visual novel, from simple piano pieces to arrangements with violins, the music is bouncy and fresh whilst tending to fit the scenes perfectly well. Not much else to say about it other than the music is fairly memorable and well above anything I've heard before in a viusal novel. One thing that is conspicuous in its absense is voice acting, you may or may not miss it, depending on your take, but it seems it wasn't added to the game to allow translaters to translate the game and give fans in different countries the same experience as English fans are getting.

So, final thoughts? After playing the demo years ago, I was waiting to see what would happen to this game, but promptly forgot about its existence until a month ago when its release was finally announced. Does it feel like a game that came from 4chan? Not at all, and that isn't a slight at 4chan. This game feels, not professional, but not amateurish either. Its a fine game with some aspects that blow modern, expensive visual novels straight out of the water. The music and animated intros (viewable here) are some of the best I've seen in any visual novel or amateur game ever. I have but two wishes for Katawa Shoujo that will probably go unfufilled. Firstly I want to donate money to Four Leaf Studios who have graciously given this 30 hour game away for free and are not accepting donations of any kind. My second and most heart felt wish is that Four Leaf Studios wouldn't disband after this game like they say they are. It would be such a shame to see a group of people as talented as this not make anything together again, as much of a labour of love this was.

Katawa Shoujo manages to be a game about disabled girls where the girls are the most important thing first and the disabilities are handled with respect and care.

Give it a play, it may even make you cry...

[Katawa Shoujo is available to download via torrent (with DDLs later) here]