BoardGameGeek vs The Visual Novel Database

BoardGameGeek is a free online resource and community for board game and card game content, available on the web and through official iOS and Android apps. Game entries combine information, user ratings, forums, and related material. Members can browse reviews, images, play aids, translations, session reports, and live discussion forums. They can maintain virtual collections of games they own, play, rate, comment on, or follow, and account holders can log plays from a collection or game entry. The site also includes a Geek Market and game trading between members. Core site access and registered membership are free, and there is no free trial. Annual supporter levels of $15 or more include a supporter icon; levels of $25 or more add ad blocking, a read feed for past subscriptions, and historical gaming trends. BoardGameGeek says it relies on community support and advertisements to cover expenses such as servers, bandwidth, and employees. Users must be at least 18 to have an account.

The Visual Novel Database (VNDB) is a free resource for information about visual novels and eroge, available on the web and through an API. Its wiki lets people add and contribute information, including general details and practical coverage of releases, localisations and producers. Registered users can vote on visual novels and maintain lists of games they want to play or have finished. VNDB also aims to introduce visual novels to a broader audience across geographic and cultural differences. The Kana HTTPS API can query the database and manage user lists. Non-commercial API access costs nothing and is subject to limits: 200 requests per 5 minutes, one second of execution time per minute, and automatic abortion of requests exceeding three seconds. API availability is best-effort, with no guarantees about stability or applicability. It does not provide some site functions, including forums, database editing and account creation. Users can obtain API tokens from the Applications tab in My Profile, and a sandbox endpoint at beta.vndb.org/api/kana is available for testing and development. VNDB's first version went live in September 2007.