Sweet Volley High

I have to admit I had a pretty weird angle playing Sweet Volley High: I bought this VN knowing that it's considered bad, atrocious by some. While I've read a lot of VNs here on steam, including free ones like Sepia Tears or Seduce Me, I've never had a really bad experience, so I wanted to see "if it's really that bad?", basically see how can you screw up a project like this, with seemingly decent art and premise. So, is it that bad? Yes and no. One thing that made some people furious about this game is that some romance options end in disappointments – I don’t find it that offensive, it’s more like a realistic approach, when some people just don't share your feelings or turn out being ♥♥♥♥♥♥♥♥ (and predictably so, considering their earlier actions). The one route I was really interested in, with Nanami, was actually quite sweet and the sad components only made it more convincing. That being said, it’s probably the biggest positive I see in this game. Its greatest sin is boredom, there’s tons of unnecessary filler text that adds absolutely nothing to the story. The first 1,5h could’ve been condensed to 10-15 minutes without losing much of value (if anything). Later on, the writing gets better, especially when it focuses on relationships, but it still has pacing issues. The writing is mediocre to poor. The protagonist is completely uninteresting at the beginning (and not “mediocre” in relatable ways, like in Sepia Tears or Everlasting Summer), getting only slightly better after that. She also just doesn’t feel like a girl – reading stories like Seduce Me or Starlight Vega I had a feeling that the protagonist had a bit of different perspective then I would have, here Aya’s thoughts and reactions are just blunt and generic. Other characters have more redeeming qualities, especially because they’re not bent just to be attractive options for dating – they keep their flaws and problems and those very much decide the outcome of their respective routes. Dialogues are mostly ok, but rarely get interesting – much of them is just filler or bland exposition. The lack of choices is another sin – there’s only a handful with very predictable consequences. Also, the first 3 hours of the game have absolutely none and the game just becomes the most boring kinetic novel out there before anything interesting starts going on. The rather ugly interface, limited and average voice acting and very limited amount of sprites make the whole thing complete in its mediocrity. In summary, when I picked this game up I knew what I was getting into, although I didn’t try to be negative about it. I simply kept my expectations very low and sadly, was not positively surprised by anything there. [b]Unless for curiosity’s sake, I can’t really see a way to recommend this VN. I can’t speak for the 18+ content, because I haven’t seen it, but I don’t think it’s worth the asking price or reading through the 3-4 hour of bland text anyways[/b]. ----------------------- PS If you're interested in quality western VNs, check out [url=https://store.steampowered.com/curator/32980295/]my curator page[/url].

Updated Review- Pros: -Easy to read relaxing story -Not really interested in volleyball but the writing made it somewhat interesting -I know some people complained about this in their reviews on another site. They didn't like the fact there was a guy option in mostly yuri story. I really enjoyed it though as a bi chick (despite the guys route being my least favorite) that I could pick either the ladies or the guy. *shrugs* Some guys that have a thing for Aya might like to see her get some sexy time with a guy (Imagine that it's them giving her the D something like that lol). -I felt most of the stories and characters were quite realistic and relateable. In some of the endings I was expecting the regular happily ever after and then I got smacked in the face with a heavy dose of reality. Refreshingly unexpected and brought on some feels lol! Any visual novel that can make me feel THAT upset about getting f****** over by the fictional character I was going for is a good one in my book. (Not going to mention which character but you can guess once you play. I was pretty mad lol!) Cons: -Some boring areas that I wanted to click through fast so I could get to the good stuff. -Wish the voice acting was throughout the game but im glad there's a least a little bit so I can get an idea of what they sound like. (Love Yuka's voice very sexy though her sex scene *uncensored version* made me laugh a bit I've seen enough hentai that I know it could have been WAY worse.) -I hate the menu that kept popping in an out everytime you clicked for the next conversation it's extremely annoying. Overall it was pretty good. I liked most of the characters and Aya reminds me a lot of myself. I would definitely get the patch they provide (the link is in the update/details area on the store page).

This VN was actually better than I thought. The art style is okay, there’s only partial VA (and it’s between good/okay for certain characters), and a few choices that lead to the main endings. What surprised me was the fact that not everything is “fun and games”, not all the routes have good endings, and when the endings are bad, some can be pretty awful (especially Nanami and Yuichi’s bad endings in my opinion). There’s a dose of “reality” too, especially on Yuka’s route. It starts with a fun and light story, but things can drastically change depending on the situation. 7/10.

[b]Warning[/b]: If you do get the content restoration patch, I [b]strongly[/b] advise using headphones. The voice actors in this one are... alarmingly talented. This visual novel seems to break all the rules for VNs here on Steam. [list] [*]It has a very solid story with multiple themes: love, death, betrayal, depending on your choices. [*]It was written by someone whose native language is English. [*]It is almost entirely devoid of typos, grammatical gaffes, plot holes, and in-story contradictions. [*]There are only four decision points, relatively late in the game, which select between the five very different end points quite simply and clearly. There are no pointless decisions to make. [*]While there are sex scenes (if you have the patch), they are organic to the story; they're not grafted in for faptastic effect. [/list] If you want a story with clothing magically falling off the female characters, or harems, go elsewhere. What you'll get in this story is believable characters, some you'll like, some you'll probably hate, in a story that holds your attention. Your main character is Aya, a high-school junior, who is suddenly dragged off the bench of her volleyball club when one of the two star players of the team is injured. The story follows her through her senior year and into the beginning of her life past graduation. How that life unfolds, happily or otherwise, depends on the choices you make. The story is partially voiced; voicing is used for the lines that are emotionally most freighted. The dev was, in my opinion, extremely apt in his choices of vocal talent. My only complaint there is that he did not choose to voice the viewpoint character. Play time: approximately four to five hours for all five endings. Full disclosure: As an independent tester for this title, I was involved in rather a lot of its development, from first script right up to release. I am not an employee of, or contractor for, New West Games and have no financial interest in this project.

If you’re looking for a heartwarming, cute yuri VN I would not recommend Sweet Volley High. I recently finished the yuri VN “Love Ribbon” which was a very positive experience. Love Ribbon has lovable characters, beautiful graphics, a well developed storyline and outcome. Sweet Volley High has none of the above. It was boring. The game has the illusion of giving the player the option to pursue a relationship with any of the girls, but realistically that’s not true if you want a good ending. I wouldn’t have minded if the character they fate you with was endearing. None of the characters are especially cute or appealing. The game really lacks character connection. It’s easy to continuously lose interest and disconnect with the story while playing through.

Well, Google corrected me redirecting to a TV series called "Sweet Valley High", so this game probably takes its name from that thing.. you know, never watched it, never even heard about it although we had it in Italy in the same years it was aired in the States.. Actually I watched only a single TV series in my entire 30+ life.. which was Stargate SG1 by the way. Apart from the word play, this visual novel of course focuses on other themes - the main character, Aya, is in fact a volleyball player and we're gonna follow her through her high school days and her sports dream. The game actually flows really well - it has all the right options (save and load features, different screen settings, skip and auto settings and so on) and the dialogue is always quick and without any clicking bug of sort (I'm quite used to them).. meaning that the developers spent actually some time in making this game really user friendly. For what concerns graphics, well I loved them! On the other side, the music overall is quite monotonous.. all instrumental and little more than an "ambient" soundtrack that has no particular inspiration. Voice acting is only partial and not that good either, but the most annoying thing is the repetitive soundtrack. Graphically though, you'll see lots of backgrounds and characters that I really loved - the game takes place mainly in a high school, so you'll see everything drawn in a very beautiful way; the characters aren't extremely detailed, but they all have their sprites and all in all it's a great job in my view. I've seen better designed visual novels but this one has very nice graphics, especially for what concerns indoor and outdoor settings. Ok, on to the main thing - the story. You'll have in first place to make some decisions, and of course you'll have half a dozen of different endings regarding romance, career and everything that regards Aya's future, starting from her new place in the volleyball world. And the game will be very realistic, you won't find any "strange" thing happen here - it's a girl following her dream, and routes taking into account the lives of other characters (don't want to spoiler anything but something's already spoiled in the store page xD).. so you'll have to make your own decisions and you'll see that everything will set up in a realistic way, which probably can make someone dislike two or three endings.. but that's how things go. I really liked this approach. And I loved the fact that actually it's written in an easy way - English only - so that even if you're not interested into volleyball at all you're gonna like the main characters and get somehow attracted to them and their stories, how they're linked to Aya and what will happen with her. Plus, as I said, the skip and the other options work really fine so that you won't really have to read through the story tons of times - especially because the whole first part of the game is much of a long kinetic introduction, without choices to make. I really can't understand completely why such a realistic story should be criticized for its yuri approach - meaning, ok, that doesn't involve romantic relationships with men. Who cares? xD It's a great story as it is. And there's really no need of the 18+ patch to fully enjoy the game (by the way it's been taken down from Steam as other patches in other games, I don't know the reason but you can find it simply by googling if you really want to xD). So.. all in all, I'm a fan of every game genre and I'm not a fanboy of any kind of game. I love visual novels and I tend to judge every game by itself - and this one's a very good romantic visual novels, with important choices to make and a great realistic approach to the events and the relationships between Aya and the other characters, both her romance stories and the other guys in her family, school and so on. Plus, it's very long. The writing's great - English as a mother tongue, meaning no typos and no errors ever - and although some parts can be a little bit repetitive or sound useless, you can always hit skip and customize your speed options. You'll have to invest probably 5-6 hours to get everything right (the patch as I said doesn't add that much content, I really can't understand how someone experienced that the game was not playable in a satisfying and complete way without it). I really suggest this visual novel to everyone who likes the genre, even if they're not accustomed to this particular sub-genre which is very realistic and instead of having tons of choices to make, focuses on reading and exploring "real life" experiences! Have fun :)

So.. First of all, don't trust any of those reviews having less than an hour in and pretending to have played the whole thing. The VN is so long to actually begin that even if you're a fast reader, you should finish your first road after at least an hour and a half, so honestly unless those people kept skipping everything to reach the R18 content, there is no way to finish it in 30mn as some reviews pretend. Now that is out of the way. WTF. I read books and VN since a long time now and this has the slowest and most boring beginning, the only comparison I can do is 75% of the VN feels as slow as the menu when you try to save or change an option. If the goal was to make you feel as bored and as slugish as the main character, wow, that's perfectly well done ! There is not much choice in that VN and they have absolutely no impact on the story except who your character will romance.. And it happens roughly at 95% of the game, before that, there is NO ROMANCE HINT WHATSOEVER WITH ANY CHARACTER so prepared to be highly disappointed. If you want to read good VN which have interesting lead, interesting romance and so on, play "Cinderella Phenomenon", play "Lost in secular love", play "TAISHO x ALICE", play the just released "My Vow to My Liege" which reviews are already overwhelmingly positive after less than a month, but damn, stay away from this garbage.

I don't recommend at all for no one this game, because one achievement is broke. I am leaving a dislike, as long as they not fixed this achievement. a lot of money cost this game, and one achievement I don´t get which is very frustrating. everything work except this one achievement. for this I can just say don´t buy this game if you want 100% achievements.

This is a cute little game. I bought it because it was on sale and it helped me round out some figures. For something bought on such a whim, this turned out surprisingly well. The circumstances are interesting. Aya Mizuki (you) are a bench warmer for the volleyball club. An accident removes one of the team's stars from the playing field and you step into that role... and find you not only like the game but are a natural. There are two good endings and three bad ones. One of the good ones is very heart-wrenching in its own way, but ends very well. The other is more a traditional romantic story. As for the bad ones... Well, two can be classified as flings, and the other... well, it happens if you don't make the right choice in the heart-wrenching scenario.... There is a patch that unlocks more... explicit content. It adds a little to the story. Downloading the patch and installing it is also the only way to get one achievement...

The art style is cute and the stroy is written well for the most part, with few errors. However it's not paced very well sometimes feeling like it went in circles causing me to get a bit bored reading this pictacular VN. I honestly only completed it to get the achivements. Yuka has the best written route over with an interesting twist at the end as many have said. Eri is a fun character and was a welcome addition to the cast. However, the characters still felt a bit forced at times. I dunno if it was just a problem with my installation but there was almost no audio lines at all limited instead ot just four words, 3...2...1 and Mizuki. I ended up muting the audio right after the summer break, so I'm not sure if there was anything later on. I'd give this one a 2.5/5, nice pick up for the price and supporting english VN development, but over all not anything that'll blow your mind.