Planetarian - "Please do not divide heaven in two."

Planetarian is a magnificent piece of work that does what, in my opinion, more science fiction should be doing.

I've only read a handful of visual novels... three, in fact. First there was Fate/Stay Night, which was a decent fantasy yarn with a really out-of-place and too-long sex scene. Then there was Clannad, which were a web of reasonably well-told romances. Then there was Chaos;head, which was a wacky and good fun, though not really fantastic. Planetarian though is the first one that I actually want to actively recommend to people.

It's a short read. Took me around two hours to get through in its entirety, and this was while pausing to make a snack. The premise is simple though I think unique... it takes place after World War III/the apocalypse and stars a nameless 'Junker' (basically a heavily armed and grizzled veteran looking to loot things in order to survive) who is looting a 'Sarcophagus City' for when he stumbles across a still-functioning humanoid robot whose function is to guide tourists at a planetarium before the war.

(The spelling 'planetarian' in the title isn't wrong, by the way. The robot's name is 'Reverie Planetarian')

The story that unfolds is deeply moving and emotionally engaging, while the ending is something that I will always remember. There are only the two characters in the story (the Junker and Reverie) but they both get their hooks into you in a very short time. The setting is nicely conveyed and I think overall the work is a refreshing bit of science fiction.

My opinion is that all of you should try giving it a read.

It is a Visual Novel though and I would like to talk about that medium for a bit, if you don't mind.

Visual Novels vary in structure, but generally speaking it's a normal novel that you read on your computer usually with artwork, voices for the dialogue, music and the occasional sound effect. So the questions then are: Is that really necessary and would this work just as well as just a plain old novel?

In all the other Visual Novels I've read, I would say that the art isn't anything to get excited about. When a character is talking, one of several stock images of them will appear on the screen in one of maybe a dozen or so poses depending on what their mood is. Their lips don't move in sync with spoken dialogue and they aren't really animated at all. Planetarian sticks to the system in that respect, with Reverie on screen for the majority of the story.



I think it is cool to have an image of a character presented and by alternating the poses you can often get around doing a lot of the description work and keep the dialogue concise. The problem is though that often it seems like the images were drawn after the story was written. So when Reverie first enters the story, you have the protagonist in first person narration describe her, right down to her hair and ear-piece. But really, she's right there. I know what she looks like. What's the point of the visual part if you're just going to describe her to me anyway?

Though on the flip side, I think it is effective when the narrator later points things out about her as the picture changes. Like when she smiles and he points out as much, it tells me where the man's eyes are pointed, which is always a nice thing.

The other part where I think the artwork contributes is in the backgrounds. In the other Visual Novels that I've read a background is going to be a really boring picture that never ever changes. It's also kind of annoying, as there will be a big chair in the middle of a room and no one will ever sit in it. What Planetarian actually makes the backgrounds part of the story... I don't want to say too much about the fantastic astronomy scene, but if you're the kind of person that can (like me) be instantly distracted from anything by pretty space photos you are in for a treat. And certain images will hit the reader hard, no matter what his or her aesthetic preferences are.

I would post a picture to demonstrate that, but the scene I'm thinking of had such impact that I don't want to spoil it.

After artwork, comes sound...

Soundtrack-wise this isn't that exciting. A couple of good piano pieces (one of which I really like) and a few sorrowful tunes that set the mood well. An expanded musical budget to include some violins here and there would still have been opportune. During the battle scenes, you can hear gunfire and such as the fight is being described as if it were a novel, which I guess sets the mood (or at least isn't jarring at all).

The striking audio thing is really the dialogue...

All of Reverie's lines are spoken (in Japanese of course), but the protagonist's are not. I've read that in a later version of the novel the protagonist is voiced by Daisuke Ono (Koizumi from Haruhi). With all respect to Mr. Ono, I actually think that I liked the half/half structure stylistically. The protagonist is supposed to have a mysterious sort of air to him.



One of the objectives that the writer of this story has very early on is getting the reader to thoroughly love Reverie. That's in large part accomplished in record time by her voice. No matter what level of understanding one has of Japanese, her actress (who I looked up and found to be a completely unknown person who has done almost nothing besides this role) has this robotic sort of earnestness to her that is difficult for a reader to deny. That primal music of language that Patrick Stewart is always talking about is employed here to devastating effect.

All in all, I still consider Visual Novels to be a generally unproven medium. Most of Planetarian's success comes from the same place that any novel's success comes from - i.e. the writing. But I think that as production values increase and more things like Planetarian are made they'll become much more relevant to the discerning scifi fan.