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Review of Sanoba Witch

SubjectSanoba Witch
ByHelpfulness: 6
Vote: 6
floating-twine on 2020-11-16
ReviewPros: Great art; really moe voice acting; catchy tunes; occasionally hits the mark for humour

Cons: Often falls flat when trying to be genuinely dramatic/emotional

Sanoba Witch is an interesting little piece. It's evidently been given a great deal of love in terms of development, with plenty of nice CGs, individual ending songs per heroine, a lengthy "true" route, etc

Where it fails to live up to expectations is when it tries to generate drama - I feel it doesn't do a good job of creating any relatable sense of emotion. Most routes often have to resort to magic-ex-machina (or character idiocy) to push the plot forward & generate tension, and it just becomes dull after awhile

That said, if you temper your expectations & you're just in this for the moe, I think it can still be a fun read
6 points
#1 by diabloryuzaki
2020-11-16 at 18:46
< report >did nene route included to your cons? because i think nene route is quite dramatic
#2 by c2k
2020-11-17 at 09:22
< report >the only useless thing in the game is shuuji's ability to read people's emotion. Its like he can read it and never use it in a way that is helpful for him. like what the heck bro
#3 by diabloryuzaki
2020-11-17 at 10:16
< report >#2
well, read people's emotion didn't always give you motivation to use it for good like what happen if you read the most ugly emotion and what you will feel from it then did it still motivate you to do it for good? meguru route really know how to explain it, moreover always know when a girl being in heat situation very clearly than surrounding people when you are not her boyfriend is not what gentleman do lol
#4 by cameron997456
2020-11-18 at 09:22
< report >Obviously people have their own opinions but I though overall sanoba did well with relatable emotions. The protag had to basically shut himself away for a long time because his ability would be A HUGE issue if a normal person had it. Nene had realistic emotions, so did meguru and wakana. I thought all of them were better than a lot of VN's do in terms of emotions. Tsumugi well that route was a mess minus one thing and for Touko I mean no emotion was sort of the point. Also not sure if you haven't played Yuzosoft Vn's before but there normally isn't any real great tension, its normally fairly small and not the biggest thing (but its also the point).
#5 by floating-twine
2020-11-18 at 15:13
< report >Oh, I think it's a decent enough VN - I did complete it, after all. I just don't think it's anything special. Regardless of what their No 1 priorities were, the writers devoted a lot to building drama. And I just don't think they did a good job at it. It felt like they just waved around "magic" whenever they hit a dead end on the emotional rollercoaster and needed a reason for it to be moving (Tsumugi's route really is the worst offender). It became a really tiring plot device.

And I actually loved Wakana's route - it's my favourite of the whole batch. Probably because it doesn't depend on "magic" to push the plot forward much - the drama is believable, and human, and pretty sweet.

That said, I've got nothing against using fantasy for drama. By all means, writers - do so! I feel Key visual novels pull it off to great effect by trying to be subtle & mysterious. And of course, fantasy-heavy stories like Tsukihime have a pass because the fantasy elements themselves are a major draw. I just feel like Sanoba Witch does not do a good job at either. It isn't subtle with its fantasy, and it's fantasy elements on their own weren't very interesting to me.Last modified on 2020-11-18 at 15:15