Little Busters! (リトルバスターズ! Ritoru Basutāzu!) is a Japanese visual novel developed by Key. It was released on July 27, 2007 playable on 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 the PlayStation 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 of Ecstasy called Kud Wafter in June 2010, which expanded on the scenario of Kudryavka 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 Shoten and 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 anime TV series adaptation, produced by J.C.Staff and directed by Yoshiki Yamakawa, began airing in October 2012.
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