I don’t mean this to be rude, so please don’t take it that way. I’m not entirely comfortable with discussing this MangaGamer stuff on the Otakuism boards. To me it kind of feels like I’m logging into an nVidia forum to talk about a new ATI product. Couldn’t MG kind of be seen as a competitor? Is it just me?
Well, the description for this forum is, “Discussion of English translated bishoujo games released by Peach Princess, G-Collections and other companies.” The community for these games in English is already small enough, and it doesn’t need to be divided further with more specific forums.
There is an unofficial MangaGamer forum here, moderated by EvoSpace. From my perspective, I don’t see the two companies as being in competition at all, as only a small number of games get translated each year, and their product ranges complement each other fairly well.
People talk about non-Konami games on the Konami boards. People talk about non-City of Hero MMO on the City of Hero boards. It’s just the way of things. I think you do more damage by telling visitors they CAN’T talk about “rivals” because it stinks of censorship (valid or not). In any case, the future of MG isn’t certain by far… they may very well die off in the next 12 months. Or perhaps they will eclipse PP.
For the moment however, PP and MG aren’t exactly trying to “buy out” the other. It’s probably too early to guess if their sales even effect each other.
Ah, I guess it IS just me then. Then I will say nothing further on the subject.
No problem, it doesn’t hurt anything to ask such questions.
In which case they could very well be bought up and become part of Peter’s mini-zaibatsu of eroge.
Okay, I wasn’t sure where to post this so I decided to do it here. I kept on wondering what all this talk about Edelweiss and such was, since I thought that I kept up with the English-translated eroge market. Apparently I didn’t realize that MangaGamer is a new company trying to release titles.
But I don’t recognize almost half of the titles. Are any of the titles in their lineup actually any good? A few of the games are relatively famous (and are priced rather stiff as a result). I don’t mind sex romps in my games, but a few of those titles seem pretty rough in theme. “My Sex Slave Is a Classmate”? I guess there’s not a lot of romance in that one.
Well, some people like dark games like that, and companies like Liquid produce such games for them. For now let’s just hope for the light title Edelweiss.
Ironical fact: price for a dark game (MSSIAC) is higher than a light game (WGSIC - HinataBokko), not sure if it’s a good fact or a bad one though
Well the general rule of thumb with “dark” titles is there’s zero “romance.” Romance detracts from the dark intentions of the protagonist, hence romance is for the weak! The only right way to treat a girl is to put a collar around her neck and discipline her (or so I’ve been told). “My Sex Slave is a Classmate” is no exception, although the main protagonist has a bit of a conscious, so he’s not as big of a jerk as, say… the protagonist in Virgin Roster.
“My Sex Slave is a Classmate,” from what I’ve been told, is actually a great game. Not the best Liquid has to offer, but good nonetheless. It’s not for everyone, so if you’re squeamish about mistreating women, then play something on the lighter side.
Do you mean based on MangaGamer price? If so, then MangaGamer would disagree, since they price Da Capo up the wazoo and it sure isn’t what I’d consider dark.
Are ‘dark’ games really categorised only by the protagonist being a horrible person, though? See, that’s one genre of game I just can’t STAND. I’m fine with Black Cyc’s titles because you generally don’t play that person (in fact, I’m really liking EXTRAVAGANZA so far. This thing’s gonna go on my top 25 list for sure.). Does this mean Black Cyc’s titles aren’t ‘dark-side’? =P
I believe it has more to do with game size. For example Da Capo is one of their highest priced games and it’s not dark.
HinataBokko was a rather short game.
You need to consider the licensor too. Given their high profile, you can bet that CIRCUS values their IP a lot, so they might resist lower prices. There’s always some fear that low prices mean property devaluation/depreciation (and in truth, most western games become valueless in a year or two, due to the price down system at retail. Even games like Company of Heroes and S.T.A.L.K.E.R. are already slated for Gametap release), so that could be one incentive to adhere closer to Japanese MSRPs.
And Tarte gone bankrupt last year, so i guess there wouldn’t be anyone to “resist lower price”, maybe that’s a good thing? :lol:
About dark games, they often put me off by making the player feel like a villain or something (feel guilty) BUT i’d love a game that let the player choose to be the bad guy or a good guy, that has a lot RPG feel in the game.
I know what you mean. I have a hell of a time playing KOTOR as Dark Jedi. Is there really no happy medium between ultimate pansy and baby eating?
Yeah, KOTOR was great eh? Oh and don’t forget Black & White, being a tyrant god does feel good at times 
Glad to see I’m not the only one. I still haven’t managed to completely get through the dark side route because of how you act. Due to this fact, KotOR2 still remains sealed in its package. Hmmm, I think as soon as I finish going through the Freespace series on GameTap (something that has been keeping me occupied lately), I’ll try again to go through the dark side route. After all, if I can manage to get through every route in Hitomi: My Stepsister…
What got to me wasn’t so much the evil route – although that did get to me, don’t get me wrong, I’m a light sider deep down – but the fact that most of the Dark Side choices were just stupid. You never got to do any interesting, devious, tricks. It was all “screw over widows and orphans! Then level the building!” Even the Sith didn’t go round massacring everything just cause they could.
nod my husband was noticing what a braindead kill-happy moron the darkside choices seemed to be… and pondered that it could be a more interesting plotline if taking those choices slowly morphed you into a powerful but bestial character, barely capable of reasoning, who had to be chained in the back of the spaceship while the NPCs drove the plot and only let you out to do the fighty bits… 
Actually - no! But it works pretty well the other way round: if the player’s character is a horrible person, then you can safely assume the game to be “dark”.
After all, just as your example “EXTRAVAGANZA”, I also have to bring up my dear “GORE SCREAMING SHOW” in which the player’s character definitely isn’t a bad guy - quite the opposite actually! And that goes even twice for the final ending!
And then, there are games in which the player’s character isn’t actually a horrible person, but he has a reason for doing horrible things. For example Makoto in Tacchi’s “Saigo ni Kanaderu Kyousoukyoku”: He wants to know why his little sister had to die a year ago! He actually finds some traces, but nobody wants to tell him the truth, so he instead resorts to imprisoning and torture! Not really a nice thing to do, but he is desperate because he always cared a lot for his little sister and still she died at an highly respectable elite school and her death is intentionally shrouded in mystery - obviously a conspiracy in which most people at that school are involved.
Does that make him a “horrible person”?
I’m beginning to get confused, if the protagonist must be a bad guy for the game to be dark, then does School Days count as dark? 'cause i can hardly say Makoto Ito is a good guy (well, in most of the endings, at least)