A visual novel can be seen as a combination of a novel and a computer game:
they're computer games with a large text based storyline and only little
interaction of the player. A typical visual novel consists of text over
an anime-style background image and is accompanied by background music.
Throughout the game, the player usually has to answer a few questions which will
have an effect on the story, thus playing a visual novel a second time while
giving other answers may result in an entirely different plot.
For more information see
the Wikipedia article on visual novels or the description on
Visual-Novels.net.
To get a general idea of the genre, try one of the free short visual novels from
al|together 2006.
An eroge or H-game is basically any Japanese game that features sexual
content. Many visual novels are eroge and many eroge are visual novels,
but this is not a rule. The definition of dating sim is a bit more vague,
but it's usually the same as a visual novel, except that a dating sim
generally uses a gameplay based on statistics.
There are no strict bounds to the definition of "visual novel", most
eroge and dating sims include elements of visual novels, but may -
strictly speaking - not be visual novels themselves. As VNDB aims to
be comprehensive, we simply accept any game that contains elements of a
visual novel and is produced by a Japanese or Japan-related company or
doujin cicle.
The internet is large, very large, but the number of English resources
related to visual novels is only very limited. VNDB attempts to collect
and present as much information as possible that would otherwise be very
hard to find for the English speaking audience. This way fans can easily
keep track of new releases and localizations of their favorite games,
while not having to browse numerous of indistinct Japanese websites.
Not here. We do not provide downloads nor links to resources that encourage the illegal spreading of visual novels.