They’re not getting ‘none at all’. They’re getting MORE money by not making deals with English companies - so long as the things they do with their time instead are profitable.
If they’re just sitting on their thumbs doing nothing then sure, getting a small piece of the pie is better than nothing. But how many businesses are sitting on their thumbs doing nothing at all?
I still have hopes of finding some japanese game producers willing to make deals with me, but I need to make sure that THEIR time commitment is kept as low as possible and that they get good value in exchange for it. The sort of producer who’s very protective of their product and would want to check every detail of my translation and marketing to be sure it represented them well would be a bad match, because that would take up a lot more of their time, so it would require a lot more money to be worth it for them. I need to find someone willing to say ‘Yeah, sure, do whatever, just pay me.’ Hopefully one is out there somewhere.
With traditional econmics it certainly doesm’t, but it can if your idea is to generate hype. You have a quality game that’s so much and it generates hype that your company must make quality games.
I would view them as Limited Edition couterpats without a non-limited part.
Just was watching Wired for Sex on G4tv and they had an interview with a Japanese eroge artist. He said he has to draw monsters (his perfered censoring I suppose) as the Japanese government will punish him for breaking the law. So my guess is it’s more than just the EOCS or CSAI which is why censorship is done.
Just curious and I’m really not trying to be discriminatory or anything, so please forgive me… but I’ve heard that a few of the big VN/Eroge makers, Key/Visual Art’s, Nasu (Type-Moon), and Zun (Touhou) don’t want their games TL’d into Engrish b/c they are extremely racist and only want their stuff to be in Japanese. Is there any truth to this?
First off, one must know how someone would know they’re racists. I’ve never heard a press release claiming anyone in those companies are racist, or that they hate America/Europe/etc. If they did say it, then that would have caused a stir in the otaku news.
Its people just trying to spread dumb rumors. :roll:
Just because a company doesn’t deal with anyone outside of Japan, doesn’t mean they hate everyone outside of Japan. The logic is facetious.
Random though but: I guess the really big eroge companies might not want to lose control of their properties either. If their’s a chance of the game receiving a poor, or even a less than perfect localisation, it might damage the perception of quality associated with the original maker.
waste your time reading this post at your own risk :mrgreen:
how well known are bgames known in the west? The way it is, in Japan you have magazines that are dedicated to this type of games so it is hard for an anime fan not to know that this type of games exist. How about the west? Do PC Games magazines admit the fact that these games exist? If yes, then I must have missed it, since I am a pc gamer and a read many of those magazines over the years, and guess what, they never talked about this type of games as far as I know. (note: I’ve never read any of the anime magazines that are available in the west, do those magazines ever write about these games?)
I have been watching anime for years and have a large collection of imported anime (I live outside the USA), yet I never knew bgames existed!. I accidentally came across a number of MADs and some of them contained the word “kanon” in them. While searching for “kanon” in hope for more MADs I discovered a fansite talking about the “game” kanon. Couple of years later after hanging around their forum I found out that some of those “games” have been translated and released in English. Even though I am long anime fan, it toke me years to find out that bgames exist and that they are available in English!. Sorry, but I’ve never seen an ad banner in any anime site pointing to anime bgames! You do know that “word of mouth” can go so far, right? (offtopic, but are their any demos that new comers can try before they decide to taint their souls and join bgamers :twisted: ?)
Also, something else that I am wondering about, why the 2 extremes? The bgame can either be an adult-only bgame or all-ages bgame! Why isn’t there a mature rated game*? Something like Girls Bravo, that pushes the fanservice to it’s limits but not becoming an h-anime, which means it can be sold in normal stores that have issues with adults-only items. Mature rated games can be sold in digital stores like steampowered, direct2drive and gamestop, but I think they will have an issue with selling an adults-only game.
sorry for the rant, but the way I see it, it is not that the few English understanding anime fans do not like these game, it simply that they don’t know that these games exist. Well, in my view any way. :oops: (note, I am known for always being wrong)
(note: Hirameki games had section cut out to make the game mature, the game was NOT made mature. And I am going withhold my thoughts on their DVD Play releases).
For at least 10 years (1996-2007, approximately) Italy had 2 professional b-game magazines (my favored one, GX Magazine, was also directly connected with J-List) and 2-4 porn imitations of the same.
Italy has introduced the “Japanimation” world to Europe in 1977, and erogames followed 18-20 years later. However our market is SMALL, and even the ecchi fad passed after a few years, leaving only a few sites like http://henteye.everyeye.it/ (my beloved GX disappeared last year , turning to a different hobby).
My “historical notes” are here, but you can search the BBS for a few additional posts on the topic.
tips hat howdy, stranger! (Sorry, couldn’t resist!)
Well, part of the issue with gaming magazines (if you’ll excuse the pun) covering bgames is that the game genre has several factors against it from a reporting standpoint, at least in the US. Firstly, bgames don’t have uber graphics that run on ridiculously awesome hardware, so it is hard to try and wow audiences with screenshots (well, at least with any that they would publish :lol: ). US gaming magazines already don’t cover the whole adventure game genre pretty much at all (by “adventure game”, I mean “Western adventure game” a la Myst, The Longest Journey, Overclocked, etc, etc) because of their lack of “latest and greatest” in terms of interface, graphics, and the number of unique weapons one can pick up. (I understand that outside the US, the adventure game genre is a bit more respected, so I can’t really say if this applies there as well…)
Secondly, the characters in a bgame are all anime characters. So imagine if you have a small percentage of people who wouldn’t mind not having the latest graphics and interface, and would potentially play bgames. You now have to separate out all the people who don’t like or just don’t “get” anime. In a way, bgames are more than a niche market, there’s a niche’s niche market. Added on top of that the problem of lumping non-adult games under the same “category” as adult games and the game media clearly takes a pass on reporting it. This is even before factoring in the whole “sex/romance/dating as a game goal = what are you, some kind of a loser who can’t get dates?” thing.
Finally, the gaming industry is an industry, a business, and so is its reporting. Gaming magazines are going to report on games that, you know, make them money. So when Valve takes out a full-page ad in their magazine for their upcoming game, you can bet that game is going to get covered sometime, somewhere. Bgame developers, publishers, and distributors don’t have that kind of money, so in general, their ads aren’t going to show up in gaming magazines. Hence, they’re not likely to get story coverage. Not to say that gamer magazines don’t cover games that don’t take out ads with them, but it’s another strike against a game genre that’s already marginalized by the two points above.
As far as ads go, though, there is some news. ADV recently canceled NewType USA magazine and replaced it with PiQ magazine. To say I’m not thrilled with the new incarnation is an understatement, but that’s a story for another post. The important part is that PiQ, while it’s not PC Gamer or anything, does has greater game coverage than before. JList clearly took advantage of this coverage of gaming in an audience of anime fans to put in an ad for Lightning Warrior Raidy (brilliant move, btw). How do I know this? It’s the reason I found out about bgames. So, the coverage is getting out there in ad-space at least.
Will PiQ magazine eventually run a bgame story? Dunno. But I could see it happening there long before PC Gamer picks up the story.
While this is only anecdotal evidence, I’ve noticed significant aversion at places like the AnimeOnDVD and Anime News Network forums (where many hardcore anime fans gather). Many people have no interest in giving these things a chance, whether they feel the concepts are too effeminate (for sissies due to the romance), too exploitative (for pedophiles), or too loser-oriented (artificial consolation for lonely, desperate guys who can’t get any). Consequently, I doubt the market at large would feel differently.
Naturally, mainstream gamers are less accepting of even all-ages bishoujo games.
Adventure games actually get much respect in North America. They don’t do well enough justify on-going development, but the classics remain loved by both journalists and veteran gamers. Even now, I think Sam & Max is selling well in the episodic space (and good amateur efforts have gotten much attention because of free distribution).
With bishoujo games, subject matter and the walls of text are probably big strikes.
True that. Even not counting games that Peter’s company puts out, any attempt to bring over say the aquaplus stuff and the like would run right into the “anything moe” = kiddie porn attitude that can exist on both sites – and hell, on AoD you are talking membership that skews to an older, more knowledgeable fan.
I really thought Hirameki was on the right track in targeting a female audience. An underserved segement of gamers for whom story and drama heavy works like Ever17 should have had appeal. It didn’t work well enough for Hirameki to succeed and I can’t imagine such is lost on any further US attempts at all-age games.
One question: are those “hardcore” fans solely restricted to a few countries like Canada, America, etc. or do they belong to an international audience? Besides, just 'cos someone’s a hardcore anime fan doesn’t always mean the person will play an anime game. And some are hardcore anime fans but will only watch anime revolving around a certain subject/topic. Like how some will only watch horror but not sci-fi or fantasy, and some, only harem anime for females/males but not anything else.
So, I think it’s best to see what the reactions of various audiences from say, France, Germany, etc., are like, in respective to the various types of visual novel and to find out which fans are most open to the idea and which fans are not.
And perhaps visual novels could benefit from exposure like fan ezines, fan sites, etc., which reach out to an international audience. After all, didn’t that also partially contribute to the growing popularity of anime and manga? Perhaps some more stuff like True Remembrance and Narcissu(they’re on my “to try” list) so they’ve got an idea what they’re up for.
Yes…sadly eye candy (and not the eye candy in eroge here) is what sells games to most consumers. Even if they later toss the game, the company still sold it to them and is likely to sell more in the future to that same sucker of a customer in their hopes of getting a new game. About the only exception might be sports games which sell enough just on roster changes and minor tweaks.
Thus the drive for ever more flashier games that get continuously slashed in budgets elsewhere. Sometimes it can be a good, if painful, kick in the pants (i know one company who relucataly moved their franchise from 2D to 3D, but it made it easier on them and modders). However mostly it’s stuff like FF syndrome where things become sparklier with every new incarnation, but don’t really add much in substance…at least in recent years.
Actually…that’s not true anymore. These magazines target younger audiances because that’s where the best potential for long-term profit is and anime has become major influencing factor on younger audiance. Even if they don’t like it, the chances of finding someone who doesn’t know what anime is, is like finding someone who doesn’t know who the president of the United States is.
Does anyone know exactly what sunk Hirameki, though? And as for targeting the female audience, YoJinBo did sell out and is now annoyingly hard to find.
Which sucks, because I’m starting to see handfuls of girls popping up around the web who’ve played my game and want to find more games like it… and I could EASILY sell YJB to them if it were around!
, turning to a 
So, the coverage is getting out there in ad-space at least.