This series of blogs is intended to document my journey as a new comer to the world of Visual Novels. After an exhausting day, I have finally finished playing and writing up my impression for Sora’s route. If this is your first time reading this series of blogs, be sure to start from the first post here: https://synian.wordpress.com/2012/12/25/ever-17-beauty-in-the-eyes-of-a-nonbeliever-day-1/

Day 2: Sora’s Route

Note: This post contains spoilers

Time spent playing: about 11 hours

Expectations; it is the one thing that can make or break just about anything. For Ever 17, my expectation was that it would have something to do with time travel or multi dimensions. I knew that I’m supposed to be patient and play through four different routes before the “true” route can be played. I even expected to go through with some repetitions. What I did not expect was cliche love stories that are virtually identical from one another. I had an extremely difficult time getting through Sora’s route. Story wise, it’s not any better or worse that what I played yesterday. Instead, it’s almost exactly the same, and it’s not a story worth playing twice, let along four times!

Playing another route also reveals how artificial the whole setup is. For example If I chose to fix the generator, I go fix the generator. If I don’t choose to fix the generator, I still have to go fix the generator. If I chose to play tag, I play tag. If I don’t choose to play tag, I still end up playing tag. Most of my choices were effectively useless.

With that said, playing Sora’s route wasn’t a complete waste of time. As I played, I was able to pick up on subtle things which I missed first time around. Dialogues, or events which I initially thought was random are beginning to make more sense. Example includes when Tsugumi randomly said she hates cats, because cat eats mouse.

Unfortunately more questions were raised than solved. Coco said that this is her first time to LeMU, then where did she get Tief Blau from? Sora knew about Tief Blau before any flooding occurred, why did she not warn anyone throughout the six days? You knew that Sora was just a computer hologram, why did she suggest splitting up and look for Sora when the generator broke? Also, Sora is a hologram, then why did the life indicator show 6 people instead of 5? Lastly who’s the daughter of that dead researcher anyway? Coco? Sora? You? or someone else entirely?

Another thing I realized is that every person trapped in LeMU are connected to LeMU somehow. Tsugumi was one of their experiment, the Kid is probably the boy who Tsugumi talked about; the boy who can see the future. Coco’s there to visit her father, You is there to find her father, and Sora is an AI. If this is no coincidence then it raises the question; who is Takeshi? And what does he have to do with LeMU?

Perhaps the most exciting bit of information I got out of Sora’s route comes from Takeshi and Sora’s discussion about multiple dimensions and the nature of choices. It hit me then that this might be exactly what Ever 17 is all about. The person who chose to go with Tsugumi’s route was me, the person who chose to go with Sora’s route was me, and the person who will choose to play You’s route tomorrow will also be me. Yet I am not playing the three route at the same time, while all three route supposedly happened at the same time.

If that was true, then that would be quite an ingenious set up. Of course, the other possibility is I could just be thinking too desperate to read something brilliant out of nothing. Maybe I’m just trying to motivate myself to keep going. Maybe if I don’t try and deceive myself, I would eventually give up. That is not too hard to imagine. After all, I’m having trouble imagining an ending that could be worth all this pain and boredom. That said, I do intend to keep going, even if to prove Visual novel is just not for me. But I’ll leave deciding whether to continue for my self to make.

In the mean while, I thank you for taking the time to read my blog. Be sure to follow me on twitter, and subscribe to my blog. Check back soon, and I look forward to seeing you again next time!

Click here for day 3