WORLD END ECONOMiCA episode.01

After playing for 16 hours my save disappeared... Gone. Can't skip all the content I read before... I will now never finish this game.

Its joever...

After reading this novel I can finally follow the stock market news! Go Quants! XD

So much. I feel way too many feelings after finishing last hour of the game. God Hasekura outdid himself.

Maybe that's just translation, but writing here is less than average, the story overall isn´t engaging, and characters are bland.
It's pretty boring despite interesting idea, so can't recommend

I was a huge fan of Spice and Wolf so when I found out they had another beautifully crafted world to sink my teeth into I was on board. Instead of the relaxing atmosphere of a traveling merchant, they went with an action-packed story about investments. They exceeded my expectations and I highly recommend it to anyone

I'm a bit torn on this... This is a pretty unique visual novel in terms of topics, but the story and the visual is kind of lacking, and the pacing is quite chaotic. It's not bad, but also not good. I think bad translations kind of contribute to this...

This is actually a slice-of-life romantic which happens to have a sci-fi and economics-related backdrop. The things depicted in this visual is definitely NOT how the stock market works...

I'm just gonna start by saying I'm a fan of the author's Spice & Wolf novels and have been for about 10 years now. Even though I haven't finished reading through this story yet, I don't expect to be displeased by the story or characters. And it is nice that one can toggle between the English and original Japanese pretty easily, because I'm the kind of nerd that appreciates such a feature.

That said, an English translation has one job, which is to tell the story in English. I have already seen some pretty disturbing failures. It's one thing to be tempted, because I am a nerd, to switch languages to see what Japanese phrase prompted such-and-such English one. That's totally acceptable, and not something most people are likely to experience. The occasional misspelled word, while not ideal and a sign that perhaps the English version could have used another editing pass, is also not deeply concerning.

Tagging the wrong characters in the dialogue? That's a problem. Even if it turns out that it was only the one scene, it is a serious problem, guaranteed to confuse any reader of the English language version. Certainly, the Japanese script is easily available and reveals clear as day that the translation is incorrectly tagged, but as this is sold as a work translated into English: THEY HAD ONE JOB.

Six years after release, I doubt any fix will be forthcoming. It is sufficient reason to be wary of any other releases from the same developer.

A lot of people will probably buy all three visual novels at the same time, so below are my non spoiler reason for why you should/shouldn't read world end economica.

Episode 1: All in all a good visual novel with excellent world building. If you liked Isuna Hasekura's other work i strongly recommend episode 1

Episode 2: A Great continuation of episode 1, the fact that a large part of the plot and character development revolves around the problems that arose at the ending of the first, almost makes it feel like episode 1 was the prologue. If you liked episode you're gonna love episode 2.

Episode 3: The last episode are in many ways a letdown, it feels like it was something that was only made out of contractual obligation. The "economic" aspect is leaned into much more heavily than in the previous two, and the rest of the story is either neglected or under developed. Long stretches of the story is spent explaining how different financial products work, but it mostly feels like you're reading something copy pasted from investopedia. After having shoved financial textbook disposition down you're throat for the first half part, it presents the "macro economic" dilemma. Sadly I can't recommend the final even if your main interest was the economic part. As it in many ways seem to misunderstand and misrepresent the fundamentals behind the major macroeconomic issues, while presenting counterintuitive solutions.

TDLR: Ep 1 and 2 great, ep 3 bad

UPDATE:
After finishing it, i have to add that the latter half gets better. I still wouldn't call it very good and the direction the story headed in was painfully obvious at times, but overall it's at least not as horrible as the first few hours are and somewhat interesting. I still wouldn't recommend it though, mostly because of the general bad writing, and also because the first half is just absolutely awful in many ways.

ORIGINAL REVIEW:
After 3 hours, i have no idea where this game gets it's almost 90% rating.

The visuals are nice and that's about the only good thing i can say. Music is only intermittent, there will be a lot of silence. That could be better, but it also doesn't ruin this VN. I also don't mind not being able to make decisions.

What completely ruins this VN is that the writing is just horrible. It basically reads like some bad fanfic written by a teenage boy on a power trip without writing experience who still hasn't figured out that girls are people too. It's not good english and hard to understand at times, there are lots of repetitions, and the content of what's being said isn't any better either so far. The protagonist is unbearable. I like the overall scifi setting which is what drew me in in the first place, but it's just completely ruined by the bad writing, and things like all the weird sexual tension between teenagers and all the misogynistic comments (which could be funny with how over the top they are, if they maybe weren't so ubiquitous. As it is they're just annoying).

I haven't finished it yet, but i've already been pushing myself to continue in hopes it'll get better. At this point though, even if it does get better later, the first several hours at the very least are horrible and it's the worst thing i have read in quite a while. And even if the story itself gets more interesting, i highly doubt the general writing style will suddenly improve as well.

I absolutely do not recommend at this point. If you're not either a heterosexual teenage boy yourself, and/or don't mind low quality writing, anime-like slapstick humour and tsunderes, and you like scifi settings, then maybe this could be for you. I still wouldn't recommend it though.

Thought I was gonna read some sci-fi and chill, but instead, I got the best economics lesson I've received to date. Hal's low grav parkour inspired me to petition for an Assassin's Creed set on the moon. 10/10 would get drowned in the signature bittersweetness of Hasekura Isuna again.

The story is good. MC has an abrasive personality, to say the least.
Really want to like it, but the spelling and grammar of the English translation is subpar. The text does not have a natural flow.
The poorly looped, repetitive music and unimpressive effects (expect lots of black screens and ppt 2002 style animations) don't make the experience any better.
I've been a huge fan of the author for a decade, and I'm glad the developers ported the VN's first part to linux/mac, but I can't recommend it with so many flaws.

Amazing kinetic VN! Storyline was really good, full of details; characters had their own personalities (MC pissed me off a bit but it’s ok, that’s their personality. It was nicely written, it’s not that the character isn’t good — they can be quite annoying when they want, just that. And to be honest, I also disliked their weird thoughts/behavior towards Hagana at the beginning of the game). This is one of the best VNs on Steam, without a doubt.

The art style was good, BG was nicely done, BGM was awesome as well. The only little complaint that I have is that sometimes during the narration, the BG/sprites are not there… It’s a black screen. I don’t know if that was the author’s intention, but I thought that kinda “broke” the climax during certain parts. Despite that, it’s a wonderful work totally worth paying the full price since it’s quite of a long story for a kinetic VN. I can’t wait to play the next chapters!

8/10, because like I said, MC annoyed me. But well, it’s worth checking this VN if you wish to read a more complex story. The ending might piss you off tho, since it was quite different…

Well that..... was a interesting VN to read.

Pros

• Beginning is slow (almost fell asleep a few times) but it pays off towards the end.
  
• Big emphasis on economics and the stock market (felt like having an Economics 101 crash course).
  
• Characters are interesting enough to keep the reader interested.
  
• Was not expecting that type of ending.
  
• The music is relaxing and nice to listen to.
  

• A few written mistakes here and there but it is no big deal.
  
[*]Could of used a bit more background art in some scenes.

TLDR; this is an excellent visual novel, though if you're looking for a feel-good ending this is not where you should look for it.

Ok, for the detail:

Plot: Humanity has thoroughly colonized the moon and many people now live there. Our young male protagonist has run away from home and is trying to make it big in the stock market (on the moon, of course). Unlike other young male protagonists, he actually knows some stuff about the stock market and is doing alright for himself. However, after a close encounter with the police, he takes refuge with a young woman who is also caring for a girl about his age.

Pros:

+Great story, even with the esoteric vocabulary (in general, it's explained well)
+Good length, especially if you read out loud (You could probably do it in 15-20 if you're focused)
+Great art: all of the art is well drawn and the characters' looks suit them well (you'll find no exaggerated anatomy here)
+Dat OP
+Lots of feels

Cons:

-Minor typos usually do not detract from understanding but somewhat ruin immersion
-The descriptions given in the story do not always match the illustrations (HER EYES ARE RED JFC)
-Lots of feels

About the feels though, I think my partner said it best "Some stories tell you the story you want to hear. Others tell you what actually happened. This is a story about what actually happened."

Overall: 9/10 please release the rest of them.

Now let's see~. My very first visual novel. The very thought of it coming from the author of some renown, and music from group that's been doing some Touhou remixes made me think that it is fine specimen to introduce mine self to the wonderful world of visual novels.

It is a nice story with some merit to it, but not without faults. For instance there are some very fascinating dialogue with such a vivid scenery as empty black screen and some of the ... hmmh, translation choices seemed bit awkward and even coarse. I do want to believe that it is the handiwork of the translator(s), and not the intended meaning of the author.

However my greatest problem was with how the author presents the market. By the time I'm writing this I've been investing in a real market for well over 5 years. So most of the time when I am reading the protagonist going on about the market it made me want to slap him and yell " this is not how a real market works!". If things really worked like they are presented in the game I would be owner of the stock market in few years. But someone might argue that it's fictional market, so fictional rules apply. I'd say they are correct in that regard. However I was under impression that they were trying to make a serious financial "thriller" in sci-fi context.

Oh and lest we forget the juvenile approach with panty shots and whatnot.

Put those little jagged edges of literature aside. The art is guaranteed nice. I came for the market based story and stayed for the emo-tional drama. I enjoyed the senior investor character (can't remember the name) and the "new frontier" approach of the story with it's possibilities and implications. Also there's a nice twist I shan't ruin by mentioning it

In essence :
Flawed jewel. I wouldn't say flawed diamond because that would put it well over it's league, but valuable bauble none the less.

I will buy episode 2 if it ever reaches steam.

I enjoyed it despite the overly dry topics, if you don't like economics and finance you should stay far away because this gets sticky in the details of these respective fields. For those fascinated in these topics the game is an entertaining take on it and a decent intro primer you can take some information from. The character I see in a lot of negative reviews is has character flaws many readers aren't willing to put up with but I find such characters to be refreshing in that they are so convicing in their written convictions that to invoke an emotional response be it disgust is powerful. You absolutely want to loathe the protagonist but his character growth turns him into a likeable person much different from the brash childish character he is in the beginning. There are a couple odd quirks in how the music loops and the CG stutters in some transitions but nothing particularly irritating enough to make you stop reading. A great read for those who enjoy technical detail but a terrible read for those wanting something exciting.

This is easily one of the best visual novels I’ve played on Steam so far. Make no mistake though, it’s aimed at a tiny audience. The protagonist is a stock investor, and the writer went out of his way to make it authentic. It’s to the point where I imagine sections of the story will be impenetrable for those who haven’t read a course or two of economics. Terms like “short selling” are used without more than the briefest explanation.

It does a good job of portraying not just the appeal of the stock market, but also the absurdity, and the risks involved with it. Folks with modest aspirations have their dreams smashed by people in ivory towers, who view the economy as a game. The story conveys how stock trade happens, without dumbing it down in any way. Here’s where I think it’ll lose much of the audience. At the same time the story attempts to create a human connection to the people on the street. Those who just live their lives, making a meager wage, who have to go into debt just to pay for education and healthcare. It walked a precarious balance here. The two parts worked for me, but I’ve seen reviews that don’t agree at all. It revels in trading with such detail, that I can see all attachment being lost with many in the audience.

When I saw this was “Episode 1” I expected it to be 3-4 hours long or something. But instead it was around 8 hours long. It’s a complete story arc which stands on its own legs. I played it all in a single sitting without feeling the need to stop, which I can only take as a good sign. All the various story threads have good pay-offs in the end, and I felt the tug of wanting to see what happens next. My only problems with it were in the production values. The backgrounds were outstanding, and the music was good. But the engine was behaving strangely. The UI is way too big, and it often looped music incorrectly, and many image transitions were messed up. Apparently this was ported from one engine to another to allow cross platform support. Wouldn’t surprise me if this is the culprit, and that nobody has the will to patch it, as I’d guess it’s at least a hundred little polish problems littered across the game. These polishing issues didn’t ruin it for me or anything.

I’m impressed at the effort the author put into this. This was not aimed at a general audience. It’s definitely one of those stories that was written with no regard to mass market appeal at all. And that’s what makes it work! I’m kind of amazed it was made at all.

I was very reluctant to buy this game at first, it says episode 01 and I know there are more to follow. I was not sure how long it would be and if the story will end or just leave me hanging for a sequel that might or might not ever happen (been there, done that in the past).

However, I ended up buying it because of steam sales and oh boy was I wrong. Why did I not play this before?
The story is great, the artwork is amazing (aside for some secondary areas and backgrounds). This is not a "choose your own story" visual novel with multiple choices and paths, this is just a story. Do you like reading books? Do you like getting immersed in good stories? Then you will like this.

Do you play dating sims and visual novels with "routes" and choices? Do you just want some h-scenes? Then I'm sorry this is probably not to your linking.

The story is long enough to keep you entertained (I clocked 13-14 hours), it is very interesting and at times not so easy to follow so it will require your attention most of the time. If you think you might not like economics and stock trading... well, you might be surprised because this story really makes you want to get more into it. I myself do not really enjoy stock trading but this story almost made me want to get out of my way try my hand at being an investor,it really is that interesting.

The ending fits well with the story and provides somewhat of a closure so you won't be left hanging in the middle of the plot only to be told "yo sorry, go buy the other episodes". Without spoiling anything, it leaves enough space for the following episodes, but at the same time you will feel content with what you have. Just like reading a good book of a trilogy, so do not be afraid to give this game a go. It is totally worth the money in my opinion.

My god. My heart after playing this game. This is coming from a man who has watched & played multiple Urobochi works.

The story is about a kid who is attempting to enact his dream - to explore Mars - through rapid accumulation of wealth utilizing the stock market. At age 16 he ran away from home, earned 1,000 mools (appears to have 1/1 exchange rate with USD) working, then multiplied it to 72,000 mools through margin trading.

While starting off slow - perhaps even painfully so, the story moves towards a powerful, deeply moving (and terrible) conclusion. I don't want to spoil more, so I'll end by saying World's End Economica (in Volume 1, at least) is the definition of the Linear VN archtype, unlike Fate/Stay Night you don't even get to make choices.

For those who want some action in their VN, Sunrider (a free game, and on Steam) plays very much like Fire Emblem with a dash of Mass Effect style morality choices.

Although I am recommending World's End Economica, it is emotionally traumatizing. Definitely not for everyone.

The good:

The bad:

The ugly?

tl;dr: 4/10, nothing amazing, but not terrible. Cool concept, poor execution - I wouldn't buy it if it's not on sale.

Full review:

World End Economica. Is a visual novel. And by that, the type of linear, no-choice novel. It is by all practical means a book. A digital book with music and linear storyline.
If you thought you'd get to play your hands on the stock exchange, or remembering the words:
"The first rule: Never take a loss.
The second rule: Never forget the first."
Then you'll be disappointed, there are no "Choices" for you to make.

So why do I recommend this?

Story - In keeping with Hasekura's arguably more famous work of Spice and Wolf which is a series of books and manga I wholeheartedly would recommend to you, the reader. It's as it says on the tin, about economy.
But in all the numbers and logics, there's a story. And what a story! It's in this sense, not a game. It is a story, a well-built story with its natural plot twists and moments where you'd want to cheer, and moments you'd be stuck in a well of sympathy or spite depending on your own evaluation.

Music - It's got music, and to me i do feel it quite surely fits to the whole setting. Sound really makes a scene deeper, if the music is quite right. This one Is just that. Quite right.

Graphics and visuals - As to be expected, there's CGI's which themselves are quite well made. The general playing scenes might be described as if ever so slightly bland. Stemming from the fact that the characters themselves seem a bit bereft of emotions for reasons i'll let you discover yourselves.
It is a book, and a quite fine book.
But as a game, no it's not so much a game, there's no interaction you do as the "player" You are the reader, so in this sense, advertising as a game might be misleading. But nontheless. I do recommend this game to you all, for those rainy days when you'd get a headache playing RTS or FPS games, don't feel like going outside, and just want to sit back and, read something. Good.

NOTE: This review will only cover episode 01 and therefore contains no spoiler of later episodes. Spoiler of episode 01 is not guaranteed. This review is written from my experience playing the first English version of the game and after a quick technical test of the Steam version.

Quick story summary: In the far future, the Moon has been conquered and turned into a self-sustained colony. It quickly gathered wealth and became a capitalist haven. Haru/Hal wants to get rich quick in this Luna colony, so he does so by gaming the system through stock market trading, Episode 01 of this game follows his teenage years, accumulating his first successes at stock trading.

My view: The premise may make you think this story is gonna be like a boring Wall Street Journal article, but it really is not. This is really a drama. The game spends a lot more time with the relationships between Hal and the people around him, how they live their poor lives outside the center of wealth of the world, how capitalism affect their lives, how the pressure of a materialistic society pushes them into dark corners, and how the dream to get rich made Hal cynical of his circumstance. This is less Capitalism: A Love Story and more Wall Street (the Oliver Stone movie).

I like the character development a lot, although the game takes its time to play this out. I like the relationship between Hal and Hagana, they started out with a misunderstanding (to the point of physical violence) and remained hostile toward each other in the first part of the game. But as it goes along, both of them slowly softens up to each other, and it's pleasant to see this gradual shift in their relationship. I like how beneath the surface, our protagonist is not really greedy as the capitalist bosses that he resents so much. He actually has a noble purpose by getting rich which is revealed in the last part of episode 01. To many, money is their goal, to Hal, money is a tool to serve his higher purpose. I like Lisa and how she acted like a mother/older sister figure to the protagonist. I even like the money lender Toyama in this game, the game portrayed him as less of an one-dimensional loan shark, and more as just another victim of capitalism.

Another thing this game really succeeded at is how it engages you into stock market trading, which should have been dry and boring. Even if you don't understand any financial terms, the game explained all of them in a layman's language, from the basic terms to advanced trading and analyzing technique. And it goes really deep, explaining how the market is influenced, how the stock numbers form a pattern and how the common mentality is taken advantage of (the mentality to always bid at 10-rounded price marks, for instance). This game made me really get it, that thrill of trading stocks and taking risks that might give a big payoff. This is why people are obsessed with stock trading, I really get it now.

Yet despite indulging in the stock market theme, this game does not glamorize it. This is ultimately a cynical social commentary about capitalism. We have all seen this before in real life. The stock market ruins as much lives as the lives it paid off big. In this game, it ruins not only lives, but relationships as well. Without spoiling the specifics, episode 01 ends on a bitter note, prompting the next phase in Hal's life in his adult years in episode 02.

Graphics: The game runs in glorious 720p resolution by default, but you can resize the the window of the game on smaller screens. As a result, art assets in the game are made in native 1280x720 resolution. The backgrounds benefit from this the most. They look gorgeous, especially the views of Newton City, it's as much of a sight to behold as the narrative described it to be. There is not much variety in the scenes so you will end up getting the same backgrounds a lot of time, but considering this is an independent game, it's still quite impressive. The character sprites look okay if a bit lacking in poses, but they have some weird pencil sketch lines on their neck shadows. If you're bothered by this, do be noted that episode 02 onward no longer have these weird pencil sketches.

Audio: There is no voice acting. The soundtrack have some scifi bleeps mixed in here and there. For the rest of the time, they are mostly calming and not very memorable.

Technical report: I'll be commenting on technical aspects of this particular version in this segment. This is the 2nd English version of the game. And here are the differences:
- Config menu and pop-up messages in the first English version was in Japanese. The whole interface is now in English.
- The game now allows you to pick a much wider range of text font. The default font (Times New Roman) looks quite unpleasant. I recommend the font Flamenco for this game, it looks really nice.
- The original version had some game crashing bugs that occur when you open the About window or try to play a track in the music mode. Also, the gallery and the music mode are bugged in the original version (no images and tracks unlocked when you finished the game). All of these bugs have been fixed in this version.
- A slightly new translation. I can't comment on the translation quality, but I can only hope it would be better then the first English script. My experience of the game was from before it received a translation patch and an edit pass by sekaiproject.
Also do note that the game is bilingual. The original Japanese script is included, a great resource for language students.

Early Access status: Steam integration is incomplete. Steam overlay is not working in windowed mode right now and features like Screenshot is not working either.
Release version status: Not much different from the Early Access version. The same issues are still here and the game still uses the same engine. A bit disappointing, but at least the meat of the game is still intact.

I hope my review helps you making a decision whether to purchase this game.