Sunday, August 13, 2023
I Laugh, You Laugh, We All Laugh
Making
people laugh is a particular talent and more than any other it is
dramatically effected by the medium it is presented through. Stand up comedy
and visual novel humour might share a similar desire to entertain but
they could not be further apart in terms of how they reach that goal.
The unique set of tools available to visual novels has led to a
striking set of games which would not be possible in any other
medium. This stems from several factors, from their relative length to
the importance of thematic resonance to many visual novels, all
working together to tickle the player’s funny bone. For this
article the definition of a comedy visual novel will be narrowed down
to games which rely on humour as a core pillar of their content and
without it they would not be able to support themselves, such with
Lamination. This excludes most slice of life visual novels that use
humour regularly as a flavour rather than the main dish, but not
those like Maji Koi where jokes are a strong enough part of their
identity as to feel lacking in the absence of humour. Such an interesting
spread should reveal much about the nature of the comedy visual
novel, so let’s roll on the ground laughing and see what we can
find.
Subjectivity Of Humour
Everyone
has their own tastes and nowhere is this more obvious than with
humour since what one person laughs at another might find boring. As
such focusing your entire identity around humour runs the risk of
alienating potential players when they bounce off your brand of
jokes. Of course a developer could simply accept this eventuality and
lean into the people it will attract by going all out to please them
as Lamination does, but many other comedy visual novel instead opt to
lean on other parts of visual novel design to spread their net as
wide as possible. These often take the form of a secondary genre to
act as a backdrop and spice the jokes up as they can rely on or
subvert established ideas to create a variety
to their humour without compromising its core brand. Sankaku Ren'ai:
Love Triangle Trouble! and Rance represent the two extremes of this
philosophy with the first leaning into school slice of life and the
other high fantasy. However, despite their differing host genres
these games both utilise them to smooth over possible flaws in their
respective comedy. For Sankau Ren’ai this involves leaning into the
romcom nature of slice of life and cracking it up to match its banter
centric humour while also providing a through line of drama for every
player to latch onto so they can push past jokes that do
not land for them. Similarly, Rance takes its fantasy setting and uses
it to give the events of the story meaningful weight even as the game
often mocks the inherent absurdity of the genre’s tropes. Since
both are done with an unwavering commitment they act as counter
balances to allow for a well rounded experience to keep the player
interested in the jokes.
 |
| This feels so wrong... |
A
strange offshoot of this problem of player retention is the spin-off
comedy game which takes an established game series and inserts it
into a silly setting. In doing this a developer can guarantee an
audience from that previous title rather than risking an unknown new
game as the host for their comedy visual novel. Having established
interest is not the only benefit since these people will come into
this game with a set of expectations meaning this type of visual
novel often leans heavily into subvertion as a
source of humour. This can be seen in games such as Corpse Party:
Sweet Sachiko’s Hysteric Birthday Bash and Idol Magical Girl Chiru
Chiru Michiru which take the identity of their IP and put an absurd
spin on it to get the player laughing. Whether this be a magical girl
version of a fan favourite character or a harmless birthday party in
what was previously a death trap riddled school, there is a sense of
being in on the joke held between developer and player in which both
accept the non cannon nature of the work and agree to have a good
time reminiscing about how far the series has come by showcasing its
strong characters.
The Thematic Resonance Of A Good Joke
Laughter
is a powerful means of getting a people to bond with characters and
consider ideas in a new light. In the playful atmosphere we are taken
in and lower our guard in the face of what seem to be harmless fun
and it is in this state we become susceptible to engaging on a more instinctual level with what
is presented to us. Just as the jester
delivers news the king does not want to hear, so too do comedy visual
novels utilise the same techniques to put the audience in a trance.
Making jokes and laughing alongside our friends and family is a
natural part of everyday human interactions and emulating this is
what lends comedy much of its strength as a means of creating
empathy. Two visual novels which have a large reliance on this aspect
are Lamination and Marco & The Galaxy Dragon and these share the
common trait of doing so through the absurdity of their events. Lamination
takes a relatively grounded setting and has its character do things
that seem insane but are delivered in a straight faced way by the
cast, so it feels as if this is the most natural outcome in the world
and in accepting their silly actions the game snares the player’s
heart. The setting of Marco & The Galaxy Dragon is decidedly more
overtly not related to our real world and rather than take the banal
and ramping it up to insanity, it instead starts at that high point
and keeps going up in ways the player is likely not expecting.
Through a journey of hilarious surprises, it forges the bonds between
the player and its characters and ideas since they are presented as
an extension of the comedy. Of course you do not need to be out of
the box in order to achieve the same resonance as Starry Flowers
demonstrates with the intimate and cute humour that aims to warm your
heart and through this make the joke carry emotional weight the game
would otherwise lack.
 |
| Sometimes cute and funny is all you need |
Comic Fatigue
A
joke can only remain funny for so long before it wears out its
welcome and becomes tiresome and predictable. This is doubly true
when a brand of humour is played out over a long time as there are a
limited number of variations that can be formed to keep things fresh
and stagnation often follows. Such is the fate every comedy visual
novel is trying to avoid and broadly speaking there are two solutions
found in these games, keep the length down to not run into this
problem in the first place or rely on bringing in a narrative thread and
attaching it to the established resonance between player and
characters. In a concise structure the humour can focus on hitting as
hard as possible at all the times since the player will have completed
the game before they can become burned out on it. This is the most
common approach to comedy visual novels and can be seen in titles
like OshiRabu: Waifus Over Husbandos which embrace their short
duration as part of their identity to create satisfying morsels to be
enjoyed for their intense flavour then cast aside and forgotten.
Having such a direct angle to their humour does intensify the issue
of a player bouncing off the experience due to it not matching their
tastes but the lower cost of production ensure this does not lose
enough revenue to effect the end product.
 |
| Taking a joke and making it resonate with the player is a powerful tool |
Taking the opposite
approach of relying on additional narrative elements to supplement
the comedy and allow it to maintain itself over a longer play time
changes how the game is constructed. The more intense bouts of humour
tend to be focused in the opening sections such as the common route
or the beginning of a heroine route and slowly shift into a more
supportive role before coming into focus again after the main
conflict has been resolved. Maji Koi is the poster child of this
school of comedy visual novel with it being joke centric for most of
its duration, but knowing when it has to take the foot of the pedal
and give the player a substantial character arc for the heroine. By
mixing these narrative elements with the already established
resonance between the characters and the player formed through the
jokes and laughing alongside the characters, the game binds together what would
otherwise seem to contrasting tones.
Conclusion
When
talking about comedy visual novels there is the temptation to dismiss
them as simple in nature, just pushing out one joke after another
with no sense of greater purpose, but as has been shown this is far
from the reality. The risk brought about by the subjectivity of
humour makes many such games adopt a secondary genre to act as
background to prevent their jokes from becoming too one note. In
doing this they can leverage their biggest strength in the form of a
thematic resonance with the player through the cathartic and
empathetic natures of comedy to sell the characters and ideas present
throughout. They also have to consider their length since the longer
a brand of humour goes on the more the player will suffer from comic
fatigue. Some aim for a short and direct experience while others
choose to lean on other narrative elements to prevent the player from
losing interest. Overall the comedy visual novel is a strange beast
which captures the strengths of the medium and introduces its own
unique challenges to form a humorous journey that hits deeply and
makes you smile.
