soundless - A MODERN SALEM IN REMOTE AREA -

Loved it! Some of it wasn't to my taste, but overall the story was wonderful, and I like how a lot of it was handled, especially after ~the inciting incident~ after the new characters were introduced.

The only minor gripe I had are that I thought some of the sections could have used ADV to good effect, as it was sometimes distracting to sit with the art trying to see detail behind the screen (on PC this isn't an issue, middle click hides the screen).

Overall I'd recommend it, if you can handle the things listed in the content warnings

Hello, I played this game a long time ago, when it first released, I do not even know how I found it seeing as I was not into VN's or anything remotely close, but by sheer chance I gave this a try because I thought it was an action game or something, it was really influential for me and changed my worldview quite a bit, so thank you for making this, you made me pursue the passion of creating stuff I love, and now I want to inspire people with my games like how you emotionally moved me with your game,
I am indebted to you, I really adore this game for it shaped a part of my childhood!
thank you a million times! 😊

absolutely loved playing this--so very glad i finally did. thank you so much!!

I just finished the game after putting on my backlist for gosh knows how long. It was great! I actually especially liked the Adiaphoron content, even if it was a little more optimistic than I was expecting; it helped give closure to the cast and the experiences depicted there personally resonated with me more. All in all I'm really glad to have experienced this game!

the new art is absolutely stunning!! and i can't believe the game is still free. amazing work, milk+ team!

I HAVE NO WORDS!! (not in a bad way)

Well, this was very upsetting! (in a good way!!!)

I actually downloaded this VN a few years ago (maybe back in 2018 or 2019... Time flies aaa), but never made much progress for no particular reason. I probably got distracted and then forgot about it...

Then, I was discussing dark yuri VNs in my own Discord server a couple of days ago, and lamenting that there aren't many dark yuri VNs out there; most of them tend towards the cute and fluffy.

Then, I remembered Soundless, and that it was billed as a dark yuri VN. I never actually read enough of it last time to get to the yuri, but I thought I'd pick it up and try to read through the whole thing this time.

I wound up reading it over the course of 2 days, in 2 sittings, so I got pretty engrossed haha ;;

Ah, I enjoyed this a lot! I'm not sure why past me didn't get that far in it. I think the writing is very effective. It feels very to-the-point, and there isn't too much description, but that makes it easy to chew through. The writing feels a bit minimalistic, but that's not a bad thing at all: I think the plain and matter-of-fact writing style makes the horrible nightmarish things hit even harder than if you lavished a lot of descriptive text on it. Mercy's life is awful, but she's been conditioned to think that's the way it is, so she recounts it in an almost detached way because she thinks it's 'normal'. The writing style works really well with Mery's character; it makes perfect sense.

The presentation of this VN is also great! I really enjoy your art, even if the sprites are a bit old. I think the big eyed early 2000s anime aesthetic is charming, and the fact the proportions of the sprites are a little off actually adds to the creepy atmosphere. The character designs themselves are very striking; especially Auma's. Also, filtered photo BGs, my beloved...

The use of sound effects and music is great too. There isn't that much music here, so a lot of the VN is ambient noise and SFX, but it works really well in establishing this creepy/isolated atmosphere. Some of the gory SFX during the more violent scenes are also pretty effective, and they help make scenes more visceral even though the writing itself isn't too detailed.

I'll not say too much about the actual story b/c spoilers (and I already talked too much lol), but it's very unsettling and depressing. The small village setting succeeds in feeling claustrophobic, and the exploration of Mercy and Auma's relationship is heartbreaking. The ending sequence is very depressing. It might be one of the most uncomfortable experiences I've had reading a VN (and I have read Subahibi lol, and I can see the inspo... Are the uniforms here inspired by Subahibi's?), but it doesn't feel like misery for the sake of misery. It feels like there's a real point to this story, and it's ultimately a hopeful message. We can still change, even if we're afraid of changing, and perhaps Mercy can heal and move on after all.

I'll be rooting for her...!

Thank you very much for creating this VN. It's very atmospheric and thought-provoking, and I understand why I see it getting recommended so often on r/visualnovels; it really deserves the acclaim.

Also, several people in my Discord server had heard of Soundless and were pretty complimentary about it (one person even said it was their favourite VN of all time), so I thought I'd pass that along in case you wanted to hear that even more people are in love with your story!

Holy shit- that was a surprisingly good experience. Terrifying, but crazy good.

Easily one of the best visual novels I've read (and I am a big fan of the medium!), this is a fantastically written and visceral dive into isolation, cycles of abuse and mental illness. It is especially written with a lot of respect and care, especially regarding the mental health issues, sympathetic and less so, faced by all of the characters. The dread is at times palpable, the characterisation and dynamics superb, and the after-materials really expand upon the story whilst also allowing the main narrative to stand as is. I've been hovering around getting into denpa VNs for a while, and I'd definitely recommend this as an entry point into the subgenre!

Nice new update! So fun to see the characters again also surprise pairing hehehe

One of the best visual novels I've read (and I've read a lot), and easily THE best EOLVN. Incredibly underrated in the vn community.

i played this game five years late, but..... man. this affected me more than i thought it would. i've never read a visual novel that has affected me as much as this one. i wish i could forget everything and read it all over again whenever i want to. this is the type of story you only read once due to its weight, however those are always the stories that stick with you the most. the writing is beautiful, harrowing, engaging and thought provoking. absolutely amazing work.

i played this game several months ago and i still think about it on a regular basis. it surpassed my expectations and i still speak highly of it to others. truly fantastic work

I really loved this. Amazing work.

I love this game It's dark but interesting you need to make more games like these

Fantastic game, I read it a while ago however I've been coming back to it over time to reread again. Am currently writing my own kinetic novel bc of this :)

i think i'm late to review this VN (it's 2021 lmao) but dude i need sequel or something else I NEED IT. Surely one of my favourite VNs ever after Fate i recommend it really. The characterization of the characters is fantastic, the backgrounds, the music, the sounds, all wonderful. at a certain point in the plot I started not understanding anything anymore and it reminded me a lot of the madoka complex and I was pleased that you mentioned that masterpiece. thanks again for this fantastic experience.

I've played this game quite a while ago, but I just have to say that this is probably in my top ten VNs/KNs of all time. This is an incredibly layered and complex and thought-provoking story that just kills me more with each reread. <3 If you're deciding whether to download this game, do it. You will not regret the experience.

Absolutely loved this, but one thing I would nitpick: the transcripts note several pauses of under a second. This is too short to even register as a pause in conversation. (Source: am a transcriptionist.) I assume you're just intending to convey a pause of some arbitrarily short length, so something like 3-5 seconds would be more realistic. (Using the decimal points, pause for 3.26 seconds or whatever, is good to demonstrate that the transcription is presumably made by a computer program that can get that accurate, rather than a human being.)

This was really great! The part where she had the dream that everything had gotten better after she woke up and got out the private hiding area trolled me, lol.

Ending was completely out of place to the point it felt like trolling.

I loved the VN it was fantastic. Cant wait to see what you make next.

That was really fantastic stuff. I got way more invested than I'd anticipated/been prepared for beforehand, hah. It was really nicely written and the characters were great. I felt so sorry for Mercy and really hoped she'd get her happy end all the way through. The artwork and character sprites were ace too. All in all, neat stuff all round, hope you continue making projects like this!