By the way, I did try out Haruka Kanata’s trial after reading all these complaints about the new engine on Erogamescape and getting curious.
It’s pretty much an illustration of why HTML and Javascript-based visual novel systems are a really bad idea for VNs with sufficiently complex systems or even just HD resolution. I was noticing delays – short, but still noticeable – between the sprite changing, the namebox popping up, the textbox popping up, AND the voice playing. The computer I was using was top spec as of a year or two ago and it’s what’s colloquially known as a Powerpoint game, so that’s just unacceptable. There were also a bunch of missing little things (no right click to esape the backlog, for example).
The concept of using a KiriKiri-inspired JS engine and node-webkit is kind of cool from a cross-platform standpoint…but why not just use KiriKiri for the official PC release :S?
And no, the story didn’t make it worth it. I’ve been wanting to try a SORAHANE game, so it’s too bad it didn’t prove me wrong.