These scenes are part of each character's story and add to how each character is understood. It isn't even what I would call "sexy," which I think made it all the more relatable and unporny, if I may make up a word. It was not a reward at the end of each girl's story, like certain other works I could mention. Here is found companionship.Ĭoming out of philosophical mode, I loved how sex was treated, for the most part, in Katawa Shoujo. Love is something that comes from standing alongside another person as equals, each desiring to stay with that other person despite the flaws and frustrations. Each person has their flaws and quirks and it is in this complex and flawed other human being that we find true love. This complexity cannot be contained in the limited, to say the least, by categories one so often makes for others. People are so infinitely complex, each one having more hopes, dreams, fears, experiences and stories than can be truly captured and understood that it is prideful and insulting to think that one can be understood simply by their superficial qualities. This really made me think of how often I have fallen into the trap of seeing only a person's superficial attributes and believing I understood that person. Their physical attributes do not define them. Each of these characters have depth and complexity like any other person. Instead of just being the deaf girl, Shizune is remembered for her competitive demeanor and her conflict between wanting to draw people close, yet giving off a cold and calculating air. This theme is made manifest by the protagonist Hisao's initial struggle to see past his new classmates' disabilities, to not merely define them by their physical appearance, what is only skin deep.
One of the central themes in Katawa Shoujo is the need to look past the superficial in others to look more than just skin deep.
These characters are relatable and feel real in ways that put characters from other interactive mediums to shame.
Will you end up going down the route with the passionate yet stubborn athlete Emi Ibarazaki, or will you get to know the quiet yet incredibly strong Hanako Izekawa? Each of the five potential routes one can go down are all given depth and complexity. The five women these paths center on are Lilly Satou, Rin Tezuka, Emi Ibarazaki, Hanako Izekawa and Shizune Hakamichi. These are defined by the romantic interest of the path. There are five separate paths that the player/reader's choices will send them down. Think of it as a romantic choose your own adventure with music and visual representations of the characters. The VN presents to you choices as you are reading that will send you toward one girl or another. As you read, these characters are given time to breathe and really come into their own. Characters are what is most important in Katawa Shoujo.
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