Nakige
noun ·Rare ·Advanced level
Definitions
- 1 A Japanese visual novel of a genre characterized by melodramatic plots intended to move the player to tears.
"Nakige are known for their sense of melancholy. Take 2001's Kimi ga Nozomu Eien (The Eternity You Desire), for example, which was released by eroge label âge, a division of ACID. Soon after high school student Takayuki Narumi falls for his classmate Haruka Suzumiya, she goes into a coma after a car accident. Depressed and shocked, Takayuki develops post-traumatic stress disorder and becomes involved with Haruka's best friend, Mitsuki. "To put it simply, a nakige brings players to tears as they read the in-game text," says [ACID CEO Hirohiko] Yoshida."
Example
More examples"Nakige are known for their sense of melancholy. Take 2001's Kimi ga Nozomu Eien (The Eternity You Desire), for example, which was released by eroge label âge, a division of ACID. Soon after high school student Takayuki Narumi falls for his classmate Haruka Suzumiya, she goes into a coma after a car accident. Depressed and shocked, Takayuki develops post-traumatic stress disorder and becomes involved with Haruka's best friend, Mitsuki. "To put it simply, a nakige brings players to tears as they read the in-game text," says [ACID CEO Hirohiko] Yoshida."
Etymology
Borrowed from Japanese 泣きゲー (nakige, “crying game”), a combination of なき (naki, “crying”) and ゲー (gē), a shortening of ゲーム (gēmu, “game”), itself from English game. Compare tearjerker.
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Data sourced from Wiktionary, WordNet, CMU, and other open linguistic databases. Updated March 2026.