Clannad (video game)
Clannad is a Japanese visual novel developed by Key and released on April 28, 2004, for Windows. While both of Key's first two previous works, Kanon and Air, had been released first as adult games and then censored for the younger market, Clannad was specifically made for all ages. It was later ported to the PlayStation 2, PlayStation Portable, Xbox 360, PlayStation 3, PlayStation Vita, PlayStation 4 and Nintendo Switch consoles. An English version for Windows was released on Steam by Sekai Project in 2015.
The story follows the life of Tomoya Okazaki, from adolescence to adulthood. As an average high school student, he meets many people in his last year at school, including five girls, whose individual problems he helps resolve, and his life is further detailed after graduating from high school. The gameplay of Clannad follows a plot that branches into different scenarios based on various courses of interaction by the player character. The game was ranked as the best-selling PC game sold in Japan for the time of its release, and charted in the national top 50 several more times afterwards. Key went on to produce an adult spin-off titled Tomoyo After: It's a Wonderful Life in November 2005, which expanded on the scenario of Tomoyo Sakagami, one of the five heroines from Clannad.
Clannad has made several transitions to other media. There have been four manga adaptations published by ASCII Media Works, Flex Comix, Fujimi Shobo and Jive. Comic anthologies, light novels and art books have also been published, as have audio dramas and several albums of music. An animated film adaptation by Toei Animation was released in September 2007, followed by two anime television series including two original video animation episodes by Kyoto Animation produced between 2007 and 2009. Both anime series and their accompanying OVAs are licensed by Sentai Filmworks and were released in North America in 2009. The animated adaptations have received high sales figures in Japan as well as critical acclaim abroad.
Gameplay
Clannad is a drama and romance visual novel in which the player assumes the role of Tomoya Okazaki. Much of its gameplay is spent on reading the story's narrative and dialogue. Clannad follows a branching plot line with multiple paths and endings. There are six main plotlines that the player can experience, five which are initially available. At various points during gameplay, the player is given a dialog choice that can influence the progression of the story.When first playing the game, the scenarios for all five heroines and additional smaller scenarios are available in what is called the School Life story arc. When the player completes a character's scenario, he or she receives an orb of light. When eight of these lights are obtained, the game's second story arc, called After Story, is made available. One of the lights disappears during School Life, but reappears in After Story. To view the true ending of Clannad, all 13 lights must be obtained. Originally, the lights were meant to be items that players could use in the game, but since this increased the game's complexity, and detracted from the storyline, the function of the lights was simplified and made less intrusive.
Story
Setting and themes
The first half of the story takes place primarily at Hikarizaka Private High School, a fictional school located in Japan. Outside of the school, frequented locations include the bakery run by Nagisa's parents, and the dormitory where Youhei Sunohara lives. Throughout the story, glimpses into an Illusionary World are shown. This world is devoid of all life except for a young girl, though she later makes a body out of junk pieces through which the player can interact with her. The remaining half of the story takes place in the same city, after the conclusion of the first half.There are recurring themes that appear throughout the story. The main theme is the value of having a family, as the title of the series implies because the main scenario writer Jun Maeda mistakenly thought the name of the Irish band Clannad meant "clan" or "family" in Irish, which is just "clann". Of the six main characters, Tomoya, Nagisa, and Kotomi have no siblings, though their parents are major factors in their stories. Nagisa's story was written to incorporate what Maeda described as a "perfect family" with a focus on mental consciousness. In Nagisa's story, there is a recurring appearance of "The Big Dango Family" that Nagisa is fond of. Tomoya's and Nagisa's characters were written in a style to exemplify a "growth to adulthood" by the end of the story. Fuko's and Kyou's stories have their sisters playing an integral part, and Tomoyo's story is influenced by her entire family. A minor motif of Irish words continues with the opening theme of the game, "Mag Mell", which means roughly "plain of joy" and is connected with Irish mythology. The arrange album, a short music CD that contained remixed versions of songs in the game, that was bundled with the original game release was titled Mabinogi, which was a collection of prose stories from medieval Welsh manuscripts.
Main characters
The player assumes the role of Tomoya Okazaki, the protagonist of Clannad. Tomoya has been labeled a delinquent; at the beginning of the story, he expresses hatred toward the city he has lived in all his life where Clannad is set. He is straightforward in his comments to others and will not hesitate to speak his mind, even if he comes off as rude during such times. Despite this, Tomoya is loyal to his friends, and has been known to dedicate himself for those around him in need of help or support. He generally has a selfless personality and does not ask much from others in return for what he does for them.Tomoya meets Nagisa Furukawa, the main heroine of Clannad, at the onset of the story. Nagisa is a shy, lonely girl who has an illness which causes her to rely on those around her for support. Bullied by her schoolmates, she lacks the courage to make new friends. She has developed the strange habit of muttering the names of favorite foods that she plans to eat as a way to motivate herself, such as anpan. Kyou Fujibayashi, another of Clannad heroines, is an aggressive girl well known as a good cook among her friends and family. When angered, she does not hesitate to throw a dictionary at people that she often carries around for such purposes. Despite this attitude, she also has a more subdued side, especially towards her younger fraternal twin sister Ryou Fujibayashi.
Tomoya meets a genius girl named Kotomi Ichinose, one day in the school library. She is ranked in the top 10 throughout the whole country in standardized exam results of every subject—she always goes to library to read extra materials, especially books in foreign languages. Kotomi is a tacit girl with poor social skills and it is quite difficult to communicate with her; Kotomi can even completely ignore someone when reading, even if they make loud disturbances around her. Clannad fourth heroine is a second-year student named Tomoyo Sakagami who transfers into Tomoya's school. Tomoyo is known to be a strong fighter, preferring to use kicking over punching, and is athletic. Although Tomoya is older than her, Tomoyo does not show him respect as a senior student. Tomoyo appears in Key's fifth game, Tomoyo After: It's a Wonderful Life, as the main heroine.
The last heroine in Clannad is a first-year student named Fuko Ibuki who is hyperactive and childish, before she met Tomoya, was generally seen alone by herself making wood carvings of starfish with a small knife to give to others as presents. Fuko is extremely enthralled by starfish, or things that are star-shaped, and will often go into short euphoric bouts where her awareness of her surroundings is completely overtaken.
Plot
Clannad story revolves around Tomoya Okazaki, a third year high school student who dislikes his life. Tomoya's mother died when Tomoya was young, leaving his father to raise him. After the accident, Tomoya's father turned to alcohol and gambling, and had frequent fights with his son. One day, Naoyuki, while arguing with his son, slammed Tomoya against the window, dislocating Tomoya's shoulder. This injury prevents Tomoya from playing on the basketball team, and causes him to distance himself from others. Ever since then, his father has treated Tomoya nicely, but distantly, as if Tomoya and he were strangers rather than a family. This hurts Tomoya more than his previous relationship with his father, and the awkwardness of returning home leads Tomoya to constantly stay out all night. Thus his delinquent life begins. Tomoya's good friend Youhei Sunohara, who was thrown out of the soccer club over a dispute with his seniors, is also a delinquent and often hangs out in his dorm room with Tomoya doing nothing much.The story opens on Monday April 14, 2003, at the beginning of the school year, when Tomoya meets Nagisa Furukawa, a strange girl who is one year older than he is and is repeating her last year in high school due to being sick much of the previous year. Her goal is to join the drama club which she was unable to do due to her sickness, but they find that the drama club was disbanded after the few remaining members graduated. Since Tomoya has a lot of time to kill, he helps Nagisa in reforming the drama club. During this period, Tomoya meets and hangs out with several other girls whom he gets to know well and help with their individual problems.
After Story
In the second part of the story, which starts immediately after the end of the first part but extends into the next seven years, Tomoya and Nagisa start living together, and eventually get married. Tomoya has to endure several hardships that the family has been suffering from, especially Nagisa's illness. Just after Nagisa gives birth to their daughter Ushio, she dies, which causes Tomoya to become severely depressed. He is barely able to function, let alone look after an infant. As a result, Nagisa's parents, Akio and Sanae, take care of their granddaughter. Five years later, Tomoya meets with Shino Okazaki, his paternal grandmother. Shino tells Tomoya of his father's traumatic past, which is eerily similar to Tomoya's current situation. Afterwards, Tomoya resolves to raise Ushio and acknowledges Naoyuki as his father. Shortly after Tomoya overcomes his depression, Ushio is stricken with the same disease that Nagisa had. Tomoya, Sanae and Akio struggle to save her—Tomoya even quits his job—but all of their efforts turn out to be in vain. In the coming winter, wanting to do anything for his daughter, Tomoya takes her on a trip, but she dies shortly after.Tomoya's psychology is developed in his dreams of a bleak world, called the Illusionary World, where small orbs of light float around. In the first few dreams, he sees a world devoid of all life, except for one girl. Each time he dreams, he finds out more about the world. Tomoya discovers that the girl has a special ability to fuse junk together to create new things, which she uses to create a body for him. Over time, Tomoya comes to the conclusion that only the two of them are "alive". To pass time, Tomoya and the girl try to build another doll with more junk they find, but as it has no soul, it fails to come to life. Remembering the distant world where he came from, Tomoya convinces the girl to build a ship so that the two can escape the approaching winter and continue to live a happy life. Eventually, winter sets in, and the girl becomes cold to the point where she cannot move any more. The girl tells Tomoya that he has another chance to go back and make things right. To do so, he must collect certain "lights" similar to those floating around in the Illusionary World. If all the "lights" are collected throughout both story parts, a chance to save Nagisa from dying will become available, as well as the true ending, where she survives and lives with Tomoya and Ushio.