Little Busters! is a Japanese visual novel developed by Key. It was released on July 27, 2007 for Windows PCs and is rated for all ages. Little Busters! is Key's sixth game, along with other titles such as Kanon, Air, and Clannad. An adult version of the game titled Little Busters! Ecstasy was released on July 25, 2008 for Windows, unlike Kanon and Air, which were first released with adult content and then had later versions with such content removed. Ecstasy was later ported to thePlayStation 2, PlayStation Portable, PlayStation Vita, and PlayStation 3. The story follows the life of Riki Naoe, a high school student who has been a member of a group of friends named the Little Busters since childhood. Riki brings multiple girls at his school into the Little Busters to have enough people to play a baseball game.
The gameplay in Little Busters! follows a branching plot line which offers pre-determined scenarios with courses of interaction, and focuses on the appeal of the six female main characters by the player character, which increases to nine in Ecstasy. There are additional minigames added into the gameplay, such as battle sequences that resemble fighting games or baseball batting practice, which serve to give the characters experience, obtain accessories to use during battle, and improve their statistics. Both Little Busters! and Ecstasy ranked as the best-selling PC game sold in Japan for the time of their release, and Ecstasy would go on to sell over 100,000 units. Key went on to produce an adult spin-off called Kud Wafter in June 2010, which expanded on the scenario ofKudryavka Noumi, one of the heroines from Little Busters! and Ecstasy.
There have been 13 manga adaptations based on Little Busters! and Ecstasy published by ASCII Media Works, Kadokawa Shotenand Ichijinsha. Comic anthologies, light novels and art books were also published, as were several music albums. There have been two Internet radio shows hosted by the voice actors of Rin and Kyousuke Natsume and Kudryavka Noumi. A 26-episode animetelevision series adaptation, produced by J.C.Staff and directed by Yoshiki Yamakawa, aired between October 2012 and April 2013, and an additional original video animation (OVA) episode was released in December 2013. A 13-episode second season produced by the same staff titled Little Busters! Refrain aired between October and December 2013. An eight-episode OVA series titled Little Busters! EX is being released between January and July 2014.
Main characters
The player assumes the role of Riki Naoe, the protagonist of Little Busters!. He is seen as weak due to his girlish appearance and physical build but is very straightforward and has more common sense than most of his friends. He is a member of a group of friends called the Little Busters, which originally consisted of four members, but expanded to five with Riki during his childhood. The leader of the Little Busters is Kyousuke Natsume, who is the eldest member. He often comes up with absurd ideas, but almost always follows up with a reasonable explanation along with it.
Kyousuke's younger sister is Rin Natsume, the main heroine of Little Busters!, and is initially the only female member of the Little Busters. She does not communicate well with others due to her poor social skills and can be seen as inarticulate. Due to this, she is shy, and is usually seen alone. Rin loves cats and at school takes care of several strays. Riki's roommate and fellow member of the Little Busters is Masato Inohara who loves to work out and improve his muscle mass. He has a particular fondness for Riki, which he is more than willing to express out aloud. Masato's rival and fellow member of the Little Busters is Kengo Miyazawa who is skilled in the art of kendo and seemingly has a cynical personality, but his passion for the Little Busters is unmatched by any of the other members.
In Little Busters!, Riki meets five other girls attending his high school who later become members of the Little Busters, in addition to three more girls in Ecstasy; all eight are heroines in the game. The first is Komari Kamikita, a childish girl who takes great interest in fairy-tales, picture books, candy, and clothing with many layers of frills. She is very clumsy, though athletic, and will often not think before she acts. Haruka Saigusa is a schoolmate of Riki's from a different class, but always finds time to hang around in Riki's classroom. She incites uproars for her own personal enjoyment, which causes her twin sister, the public morals chairman Kanata Futaki, to chase after her. Kanata generally acts cold towards her sister, though gets annoyed when Riki gets close to Haruka. Kudryavka Noumi, known as "Kud" (クド Kudo) for short, is a girl who is one quarter Japanese, and three-quarters Russian. Despite having a poor handle on the English language, she was able to skip a year in school due to credits obtained through studying abroad, making her the youngest member of the Little Busters. Kudryavka appears in Key's eighth game, Kud Wafter, as the main heroine.
Yuiko Kurugaya is Riki's classmate who has a self-sufficient personality, and is sometimes seen carrying a replica of a katana called Muramasa. She is seen as an older sister to everyone despite being the same age of almost the entire cast, and is fond of things or people she considers to be cute. Mio Nishizono is a calm girl who is very diligent. Due to having weak health, she is always seen with a parasol when outside. She enjoys reading, especially when the story contains boys love elements, and her room is filled with books. Sasami Sasasegawa is the captain of the girl's softball team and is Rin's rival; while Rin loves cats, Sasami is a devoted dog lover. Saya Tokido, who only appeared in Ecstasy, is a popular girl at Riki's school, though she is known to be ditzy. At night, she wanders around the school to protect a "treasure" from those she calls the "darkness executives" and even has to fight them for it.
Story
Little Busters!' story revolves around the main protagonist Riki Naoe, a young male high school student. When Riki was a child, his parents died, leaving him hopeless and depressed. He was saved by a group—three boys and a girl, all his age—who referred to themselves as the Little Busters, a group dedicated to fighting evil and preserving justice. The leader of the group was Kyousuke Natsume who had a younger sister named Rin. The other two members were Masato Inohara and Kengo Miyazawa, who were friends despite being rivals. They took Riki out and played together with him during his time of need, making him the fifth Little Busters member. In time, Riki enjoyed playing with them, and his grief over his parents gradually faded away. When the story begins, Riki and his friends are seemingly in their second year of high school, except for Kyousuke who is in his third year. They still hang out together, and enjoy their school life.
The story opens on Sunday May 13, 2007, and the next day at school, Kyousuke decides that the Little Busters are going to play a baseball game, except they do not have enough members to have a complete team. Kyousuke gives Riki and Rin the task of going around school to find more members to join, preferably girls so as not to leave Rin the lone girl. Riki finds five girls his age willing to help him out: Komari Kamikita, Haruka Saigusa, Kudryavka Noumi, Yuiko Kurugaya, and Mio Nishizono; three other girls Riki meets are Kanata Futaki, Sasami Sasasegawa, and Saya Tokido. Throughout the game, Riki hangs out with these girls and learns more about them.
The story's main part takes place in what seems to be a normal high school, but in fact all took place in the school term previous to Little Busters!, and Riki and Rin are reliving it in an artificial world created by the other members of the Little Busters. They, and the other main characters, were involved in a bus accident during a field trip, and only the two of them will survive. Kyousuke and the others created the artificial world to make them strong enough to deal with what will happen when they awaken in the real world. This was caused by a ripple effect based on all of their desires to save Riki and Rin. The world loops, but though they forget what happens, Riki and Rin do grow stronger, and Kyousuke hopes that they will eventually be strong enough to leave the world. They do manage to survive and get away from the crash site before Riki collapses because he has narcolepsy. Riki vows to fight against his narcoleptic condition, which was the reason why he was only able to save Rin and merely get away from the explosion before collapsing.
Rejecting this turn of events, Rin travels back into the artificial world again (this time created by Riki and Rin) and helps Riki overcome his weakness. Afterwards, the two of them go back to waking up at the crash site. This time, Riki and Rin work together to save everyone at the crash scene. Kyousuke, who sneaked onto the bus (as a third year he was not allowed to go), managed to block the leak hole on the gas tank to delay the explosion, despite his injuries being far greater than anyone else. Everyone in the bus recovers from their injuries, although Kyousuke's recovery takes longer due to extensive injuries. Finally, after Kyousuke returns, he rents a minibus, and the members of the Little Busters set out for a trip to the ocean.
Anime
A 26-episode anime TV series adaptation, directed by Yoshiki Yamakawa and produced by J.C.Staff, aired in Japan between October 6, 2012 and April 6, 2013 onTokyo MX. The series was also streamed by Crunchyroll with English subtitles.[ The screenplay was written by Michiru Shimada, and chief animator Haruko Iizuka based the character design used in the anime on Itaru Hinoue's and Na-Ga's original designs. The anime series was released on nine BD/DVD compilation volumes between December 26, 2012 and August 28, 2013 by Warner Home Video in limited and regular editions. A BD containing an original video animation (OVA) episode was available for mail order to those who bought all nine limited edition BD/DVD volumes. The anime has been licensed by Sentai Filmworks for release in North America. Section23 Filmsreleased the first BD/DVD collection on November 19, 2013. Hanabee Entertainment has licensed the series in Australia and New Zealand for a January 2014 release on BD and DVD.
The staff and cast from the anime returned for a 13-episode second season titled Little Busters! Refrain, which mainly covers the final scenario in the visual novel. It aired between October 5 and December 28, 2013 on AT-X. The episodes are being released on seven BD/DVD compilation volumes between January 29 and July 30, 2014 by Warner Home Video in limited and regular editions. Refrain has also been licensed by Sentai Filmworks for release on home video in 2014. A series of eight OVA episodes titled Little Busters! EX, based on the Ecstasy version of the game, are included on the BD/DVD releases of Refrain.
For the first season, the opening theme is "Little Busters! (TV animation ver.)" and the ending theme is "Alicemagic (TV animation ver.)". Both songs are sung by Rita and areremixes of the theme songs featured in the original visual novel. For Refrain, the opening theme is "Boys be Smile" by Suzuyu and the ending theme is "Kimi to no Nakushi Mono"(君とのなくしもの?) by Ayaka Kitazawa. For Little Busters! EX, the opening theme is "Little Busters! EX" by Rita and the ending theme "Mezameta Asa ni wa Kimi ga Tonari ni"(目覚めた朝にはきみが隣に?) by Suzuyu. The rest of the soundtrack for both anime series is sampled from albums released for the visual novels, Little Busters! Original Soundtrackand Little Busters! Ecstasy Tracks, and the Little Busters! Refrain Original Soundtrack.
Little Busters! is a Japanese visual novel developed by Key. It was released on July 27, 2007 for Windows PCs and is rated for all ages. Little Busters! is Key's sixth game, along with other titles such as Kanon, Air, and Clannad. An adult version of the game titled Little Busters! Ecstasy was released on July 25, 2008 for Windows, unlike Kanon and Air, which were first released with adult content and then had later versions with such content removed. Ecstasy was later ported to thePlayStation 2, PlayStation Portable, PlayStation Vita, and PlayStation 3. The story follows the life of Riki Naoe, a high school student who has been a member of a group of friends named the Little Busters since childhood. Riki brings multiple girls at his school into the Little Busters to have enough people to play a baseball game.
The player assumes the role of Riki Naoe, the protagonist of Little Busters!. He is seen as weak due to his girlish appearance and physical build but is very straightforward and has more common sense than most of his friends. He is a member of a group of friends called the Little Busters, which originally consisted of four members, but expanded to five with Riki during his childhood. The leader of the Little Busters is Kyousuke Natsume, who is the eldest member. He often comes up with absurd ideas, but almost always follows up with a reasonable explanation along with it.
Story
Anime
Little Busters! is a Japanese visual novel developed by Key. It was released on July 27, 2007 for Windows PCs and is rated for all ages. Little Busters! is Key's sixth game, along with other titles such as Kanon, Air, and Clannad. An adult version of the game titled Little Busters! Ecstasy was released on July 25, 2008 for Windows, unlike Kanon and Air, which were first released with adult content and then had later versions with such content removed. Ecstasy was later ported to thePlayStation 2, PlayStation Portable, PlayStation Vita, and PlayStation 3. The story follows the life of Riki Naoe, a high school student who has been a member of a group of friends named the Little Busters since childhood. Riki brings multiple girls at his school into the Little Busters to have enough people to play a baseball game.
The gameplay in Little Busters! follows a branching plot line which offers pre-determined scenarios with courses of interaction, and focuses on the appeal of the six female main characters by the player character, which increases to nine in Ecstasy. There are additional minigames added into the gameplay, such as battle sequences that resemble fighting games or baseball batting practice, which serve to give the characters experience, obtain accessories to use during battle, and improve their statistics. Both Little Busters! and Ecstasy ranked as the best-selling PC game sold in Japan for the time of their release, and Ecstasy would go on to sell over 100,000 units. Key went on to produce an adult spin-off called Kud Wafter in June 2010, which expanded on the scenario ofKudryavka Noumi, one of the heroines from Little Busters! and Ecstasy.
There have been 13 manga adaptations based on Little Busters! and Ecstasy published by ASCII Media Works, Kadokawa Shotenand Ichijinsha. Comic anthologies, light novels and art books were also published, as were several music albums. There have been two Internet radio shows hosted by the voice actors of Rin and Kyousuke Natsume and Kudryavka Noumi. A 26-episode animetelevision series adaptation, produced by J.C.Staff and directed by Yoshiki Yamakawa, aired between October 2012 and April 2013, and an additional original video animation (OVA) episode was released in December 2013. A 13-episode second season produced by the same staff titled Little Busters! Refrain aired between October and December 2013. An eight-episode OVA series titled Little Busters! EX is being released between January and July 2014.
Main characters
The player assumes the role of Riki Naoe, the protagonist of Little Busters!. He is seen as weak due to his girlish appearance and physical build but is very straightforward and has more common sense than most of his friends. He is a member of a group of friends called the Little Busters, which originally consisted of four members, but expanded to five with Riki during his childhood. The leader of the Little Busters is Kyousuke Natsume, who is the eldest member. He often comes up with absurd ideas, but almost always follows up with a reasonable explanation along with it.
Kyousuke's younger sister is Rin Natsume, the main heroine of Little Busters!, and is initially the only female member of the Little Busters. She does not communicate well with others due to her poor social skills and can be seen as inarticulate. Due to this, she is shy, and is usually seen alone. Rin loves cats and at school takes care of several strays. Riki's roommate and fellow member of the Little Busters is Masato Inohara who loves to work out and improve his muscle mass. He has a particular fondness for Riki, which he is more than willing to express out aloud. Masato's rival and fellow member of the Little Busters is Kengo Miyazawa who is skilled in the art of kendo and seemingly has a cynical personality, but his passion for the Little Busters is unmatched by any of the other members.
In Little Busters!, Riki meets five other girls attending his high school who later become members of the Little Busters, in addition to three more girls in Ecstasy; all eight are heroines in the game. The first is Komari Kamikita, a childish girl who takes great interest in fairy-tales, picture books, candy, and clothing with many layers of frills. She is very clumsy, though athletic, and will often not think before she acts. Haruka Saigusa is a schoolmate of Riki's from a different class, but always finds time to hang around in Riki's classroom. She incites uproars for her own personal enjoyment, which causes her twin sister, the public morals chairman Kanata Futaki, to chase after her. Kanata generally acts cold towards her sister, though gets annoyed when Riki gets close to Haruka. Kudryavka Noumi, known as "Kud" (クド Kudo) for short, is a girl who is one quarter Japanese, and three-quarters Russian. Despite having a poor handle on the English language, she was able to skip a year in school due to credits obtained through studying abroad, making her the youngest member of the Little Busters. Kudryavka appears in Key's eighth game, Kud Wafter, as the main heroine.
Yuiko Kurugaya is Riki's classmate who has a self-sufficient personality, and is sometimes seen carrying a replica of a katana called Muramasa. She is seen as an older sister to everyone despite being the same age of almost the entire cast, and is fond of things or people she considers to be cute. Mio Nishizono is a calm girl who is very diligent. Due to having weak health, she is always seen with a parasol when outside. She enjoys reading, especially when the story contains boys love elements, and her room is filled with books. Sasami Sasasegawa is the captain of the girl's softball team and is Rin's rival; while Rin loves cats, Sasami is a devoted dog lover. Saya Tokido, who only appeared in Ecstasy, is a popular girl at Riki's school, though she is known to be ditzy. At night, she wanders around the school to protect a "treasure" from those she calls the "darkness executives" and even has to fight them for it.
Story
Little Busters!' story revolves around the main protagonist Riki Naoe, a young male high school student. When Riki was a child, his parents died, leaving him hopeless and depressed. He was saved by a group—three boys and a girl, all his age—who referred to themselves as the Little Busters, a group dedicated to fighting evil and preserving justice. The leader of the group was Kyousuke Natsume who had a younger sister named Rin. The other two members were Masato Inohara and Kengo Miyazawa, who were friends despite being rivals. They took Riki out and played together with him during his time of need, making him the fifth Little Busters member. In time, Riki enjoyed playing with them, and his grief over his parents gradually faded away. When the story begins, Riki and his friends are seemingly in their second year of high school, except for Kyousuke who is in his third year. They still hang out together, and enjoy their school life.
The story opens on Sunday May 13, 2007, and the next day at school, Kyousuke decides that the Little Busters are going to play a baseball game, except they do not have enough members to have a complete team. Kyousuke gives Riki and Rin the task of going around school to find more members to join, preferably girls so as not to leave Rin the lone girl. Riki finds five girls his age willing to help him out: Komari Kamikita, Haruka Saigusa, Kudryavka Noumi, Yuiko Kurugaya, and Mio Nishizono; three other girls Riki meets are Kanata Futaki, Sasami Sasasegawa, and Saya Tokido. Throughout the game, Riki hangs out with these girls and learns more about them.
The story's main part takes place in what seems to be a normal high school, but in fact all took place in the school term previous to Little Busters!, and Riki and Rin are reliving it in an artificial world created by the other members of the Little Busters. They, and the other main characters, were involved in a bus accident during a field trip, and only the two of them will survive. Kyousuke and the others created the artificial world to make them strong enough to deal with what will happen when they awaken in the real world. This was caused by a ripple effect based on all of their desires to save Riki and Rin. The world loops, but though they forget what happens, Riki and Rin do grow stronger, and Kyousuke hopes that they will eventually be strong enough to leave the world. They do manage to survive and get away from the crash site before Riki collapses because he has narcolepsy. Riki vows to fight against his narcoleptic condition, which was the reason why he was only able to save Rin and merely get away from the explosion before collapsing.
Rejecting this turn of events, Rin travels back into the artificial world again (this time created by Riki and Rin) and helps Riki overcome his weakness. Afterwards, the two of them go back to waking up at the crash site. This time, Riki and Rin work together to save everyone at the crash scene. Kyousuke, who sneaked onto the bus (as a third year he was not allowed to go), managed to block the leak hole on the gas tank to delay the explosion, despite his injuries being far greater than anyone else. Everyone in the bus recovers from their injuries, although Kyousuke's recovery takes longer due to extensive injuries. Finally, after Kyousuke returns, he rents a minibus, and the members of the Little Busters set out for a trip to the ocean.
Anime
A 26-episode anime TV series adaptation, directed by Yoshiki Yamakawa and produced by J.C.Staff, aired in Japan between October 6, 2012 and April 6, 2013 onTokyo MX. The series was also streamed by Crunchyroll with English subtitles.[ The screenplay was written by Michiru Shimada, and chief animator Haruko Iizuka based the character design used in the anime on Itaru Hinoue's and Na-Ga's original designs. The anime series was released on nine BD/DVD compilation volumes between December 26, 2012 and August 28, 2013 by Warner Home Video in limited and regular editions. A BD containing an original video animation (OVA) episode was available for mail order to those who bought all nine limited edition BD/DVD volumes. The anime has been licensed by Sentai Filmworks for release in North America. Section23 Filmsreleased the first BD/DVD collection on November 19, 2013. Hanabee Entertainment has licensed the series in Australia and New Zealand for a January 2014 release on BD and DVD.
The staff and cast from the anime returned for a 13-episode second season titled Little Busters! Refrain, which mainly covers the final scenario in the visual novel. It aired between October 5 and December 28, 2013 on AT-X. The episodes are being released on seven BD/DVD compilation volumes between January 29 and July 30, 2014 by Warner Home Video in limited and regular editions. Refrain has also been licensed by Sentai Filmworks for release on home video in 2014. A series of eight OVA episodes titled Little Busters! EX, based on the Ecstasy version of the game, are included on the BD/DVD releases of Refrain.
For the first season, the opening theme is "Little Busters! (TV animation ver.)" and the ending theme is "Alicemagic (TV animation ver.)". Both songs are sung by Rita and areremixes of the theme songs featured in the original visual novel. For Refrain, the opening theme is "Boys be Smile" by Suzuyu and the ending theme is "Kimi to no Nakushi Mono"(君とのなくしもの?) by Ayaka Kitazawa. For Little Busters! EX, the opening theme is "Little Busters! EX" by Rita and the ending theme "Mezameta Asa ni wa Kimi ga Tonari ni"(目覚めた朝にはきみが隣に?) by Suzuyu. The rest of the soundtrack for both anime series is sampled from albums released for the visual novels, Little Busters! Original Soundtrackand Little Busters! Ecstasy Tracks, and the Little Busters! Refrain Original Soundtrack.
