Kanon Reviews

it's peak i'm afraid

yes, would read again, SAYURI BEST GIRL RAHHH

A story that will pull on your heart strings with great music. Highly recommend this.

Amazing visual novel. Surprised its not more popular like Clannad. The story seemed very simple at first, but eventually becomes more unconventional and caught me by surprise. Putting all the pieces of the plot together and seeing the bigger picture felt great. The game evokes a big sense of melancholy and bittersweet feelings troughout the whole story, specially with its winter setting. It doesnt have the emotional highs of Clannad but its close and more spread out trough the whole story. The Soundtrack is rally amazing. Every time I started a new route I just let the opening just play out. The character designs are really good, very unique and cute. The artstyle is a sticking point for some. Maybe it doesnt seem like much nowadays, but this artstyle set the trend for cute female designs. In short, the artstyle is very girly which fits perfectly. The VN is half as long as Clannad (60 hours, so Kanon is around 30) As for criticisms, I would say that one route has pacing issues, going on for a long time. Other thing to note is that despite being able to freely choose which route to go for, theres a recommended route, which would be how the characters are ordered in the CG gallery. At the very least its best to follow the pirst and last route in the list, then pick wathever for the routes inbetween. Lastly, the CGs are cropped, but hopefully if you hide the text with spacebar you can zoom them out to see them fully. Overall I can say that Kanon is an amazing VN, and its characters and story will stay in my mind for a long time. If you still never played any VN by Key, this is a great first pick, specially since its the first one by the studio chronologically. HIGHLY RECOMMENDED

after having played CLANNAD, i decided to look into Key's previous works. i was really happy when this Steam version of Kanon came out and bought it on release. they have many similarities, and are both really amazing, however, i think CLANNAD still hits harder. also, the overall build of the game felt extremely polished; probably the most polished visual novel i've ever played. played this on Linux and had zero issues.

A classic I feel any fan of VNs should experience. Being Key's first lone work, it holds up well 20 years later as a wonderful viewing lens back into the late 90s when these games were at their prime. With its atmosphere, graphics, even though the upscale is very sloppy, the writing holds up. With characters, storytelling, and powerful messages that hold warmth even in the coldest of winters, I believe Kanon represents the standard each Key work should aim to be like, a nostalgic, emotional story that I'll always hold in high regard.