I'm actually having a ton of difficulty understanding this. Could you give a few examples? I just can't remember a time when I thought the same thing. There's been plenty of times where i've thought the opposite instead, never once thinking that a character was some sort of cliche in the way that there's your typical tsundere in anime or your every day Mary Sue in books. There's a certain scenario that I thought of as cliche, but even then, I figured that it was only cliche because there was no other way that scenario could've, or should've, gone. The scenario that I'm think about is from Gil's route, where Walter gets frusterated from practicing at the park. I'll have to play through the routes again to get a better analysis, but I'd love to hear further explanation.
I can't really explain it very clearly but here's goes there's a lot of moments where there should be like a conversation to help flesh put the character make them seem more realistic but then it just said "we talked a little and go", that frustrates me because of how much of them there are and I just feels like lazy writing. The characters are interesting why not take time to make the player understand and like them more.
The dialogue is also every lackluster and definitely needs that extra twerking.
I don't hate the game I just don't like the writing which makes it hard to like the characters.
I feel like that might be because the routes only have about 5-7 days in them (depending on patreon or not). This is technically Walter's first time meeting all of them, where as most visual novels have their characters as already established friends, or just have a lot of time skipped (Adastra), so they have a lot more groundwork to do for themselves. The only one that isn't a complete stranger is Gil, who Walter had actively avoided for the most part in highschool anyways. What character developement there is are more like hints, not life changing revelations. It's waaay too soon for that anyways. Gotta get invested in the characters before they start talking about their childhood traumas.
I feel like it also might be dependant on just how into the story you can get. Which depends on personal opinion.
I'm curious as to whether or not you have a specific visual novel in mind when you talk about good dialogue. What would you say is a good example of a game who does dialogue well?
Those were the ones I had in mind too actually. I think it might have to do with how the other characters actively interact with eachother rather than just talking to the protagonist. Allows a lot more options and opportunities to show different sides of characters. Even after Tennis Ace's prologue/Yuuchi route, the dialogue between just Yuuichi and whoever you pick is still pretty good (although I still struggle to play any route other than Shuichi's. Guilt intensifies every time he comes on screen.)
I very much look forward to Password's development. Murder mysteries are my favorite genre and I went three days doing nothing but just playing Password.
I think Repeat also does fairly well, although it IS a bit of a mess. It's not so much consistent as much as it's funny and interesting to me. I love the concept of the wishes and what type of tragic back stories the characters have.