Genre

Visual novels can be categorized into groups based on the theme and content of the game. In addition to traditional literary genres, these visual novel categories make it easy for readers to understand what the game is about and see if it may interest them.

Structural

Kinetic Novel

A kinetic novel (KN) is a visual novel with no choices, routes or paths.

Characters

Charage

A charage (キャラゲー, lit. "character game") visual novel that is usually focused on character interactions rather than deep, fleshed-out plot.

Bishoujo / Bishounen Games‎

Bishoujo games (Japanese: 美少年ゲーム, lit. "pretty girl game") or bishounen games (Japanese: 美少年ゲーム, lit. "pretty boy game") are games that generally revolve around interactions with attractive girls/boys.

Moege

A visual novel that focuses on moe characters, usually girls. Moege can often be summarized as "cute girls doing cute things".

Otome Game / Otoge

An otome game (Japanese: 乙女ゲーム, lit. "maiden game") is a story-based video game that is targeted towards women. Generally one of the goals, besides the main plot goal, is to develop a romantic relationship between the female player character and one of several male characters.

An otoge (Japanese: 乙女ゲー) is an abbreviation of otome game. Ostensibly, is the same as an otome game, but in the West there is some degree of push to have it refer to VNs with female protagonists, marketed to a female audience which do not include romance as a main plot point.

Another term that’s useful for this purpose may be ‘josei-muke’ which means a piece of media that is aimed at women (any media - not necessarily only VNs or even just video games).

Emotional Content

Nakige

A nakige (Japanese: 泣きゲー, lit. "crying game") is a visual novel that attempts to create an emotional response in the reader, but usually contains an uplifting message or ending (generally after significant hardships).

Utsuge

An utsuge (Japanese: 鬱ゲー, lit. "depressing game") is a visual novel that attempts to depress the player and create an atmosphere that leaves them in low spirits. Unlike nakige, utsuge often lack happy endings or hope.

Sexual Content

All Ages

All ages (translated literally from 全年齢, Hepburn: zen nenrei) is a term that describes a visual novel that doesn’t contain sexually explicit material. This term, while it is easy to misunderstand it, does not mean the content is suitable for audiences of all ages, as it does not exclude graphic violence, profanity, or other rating-impacting content types.

Eroge

Eroge (Japanese: エロゲー, lit. "erotic game.") refers to any game or visual novel that heavily emphasizes erotic content as its main appeal. Not to be confused with a nukige.

Nukige

A nukige (Japanese: 抜きゲー, lit. "ejaculating game") is a visual novel that is focused on sexual content or the player's fetishes rather than plot.

Quality

The following terms are used by the community to judge the quality of a game. These categories are very subjective and are often jokes.

Kamige

A kamige (Japanese: 神ゲー, lit. "god/divine game") is a visual novel that is considered to be the pinnacle of the medium. Mostly used sarcastically or as a meme.

Kusoge

A kusoge (Japanese: クソゲー, lit. "shit game") is a derogatory term for a visual novel considered to be poor quality. Mostly used sarcastically or as a meme.

Gameplay

Dating Sim

A dating sim is a type of game where the objective is to get into a romantic or sexual relationship with one (or more) of the characters. Any gameplay will reflect that goal. The line between dating sim and a romantic visual novel can sometimes be blurry or confused, but usually the differences come from the emphasis on gameplay as a method to woo a prospective partner, as opposed to solely dialogue choices.

Examples: the Tokimeki Memorial and Tokimeki Memorial: Girl’s Side series, Huniepop, Love Plus, Girlish Love Revolution Love Revo!!.

Gege‎

A gege (pronounced "gei-gei" in reference to the Japanese suffix -gē/-ゲー to mean “game”) is a joking (somewhat derogatory) term to refer to non-visual novels. As an example, Persona 5 may have portraits, text boxes, and relationship parameters, but it is not generally considered a visual novel. If someone were to try to claim Persona 5 is a visual novel/rpg hybrid, someone might say, "No, it’s a gege."

Language

EVN

An English Visual Novel. This refers to the language the visual novel was originally produced in.

JVN

A visual novel originally created in Japanese, or more precisely, by Japanese developers.

RVN

A visual novel created originally in Russian.

Platform

Mobage

A mobile game.