Favorite hentai game?

Visual Novel Community Archive, 2000-2009
#21

Several years ago, I thought I had a working definition of ‘evil’. Deliberately choosing any course of action you know to help yourself, and harm others, is evil. A friend of mine pointed out that this definition is worthless, for it implies everyone is evil and that the word doesn’t mean anything; for by willfully abandoning all material wealth (say, donating all income to charity) a great many others would be immeasurably aided.

Moving to the current topic … The question is not only about “harming the market”. It cannot be, for then we end up at Dave E’s philosophy. I did not buy Water Closet. Does that mean I’m not a true fan? No. It means I didn’t buy Water Closet. The logical conclusion of the “such and such is bad because it harms the market” argument, is that I have harmed the market and this therefore somehow must be a bad thing. I do not think it is a bad thing that I haven’t bought WC. I don’t think I have some sort of obligation to the US market. I think any logic which implies otherwise, must be erroneous.

The sales numbers for the story-heavy games are so low right now that I could artificially inflate the sales number by plowing the money I’m putting in savings right now, into buying a tremendous number of copies of Bishoujo games that I already own and … doing whatever with them. Coasters, sell them at a loss, drop them off the Empire State Building and place bets on how many times I hit people; whatever. The sales figures are (I think) low enough that I could artificially boost apparent sales by a significant percentage with only hundreds of units per year (dispersed across multiple titles). This would undeniably help the market, in a sense. Sales figures would appear to be higher, the Japanese companies might like this and move into our market more.

Should I be condemned for deliberately choosing not to do this?

Other factors must be considered. The point was raised that “if big names are fannotated, they won’t be brought over not ever”. This may true; in a limited sense. Indeed if Kanon is successfully fannotated (as seems likely) then it is much less likely that it will be brought over. But I fail to see what effect this would have on FUTURE titles. If the Kanon fannotation proved popular enough it might raise peoples’ awareness about these titles. People might start making noise about wanting them. This is the whole idea of fansubbing and there’s no reason it can’t be applied here. Kanon might not ever be brought over. But Key might take notice, and other games may well be.

I personally feel that the goal isn’t “expanding the market”. Expansion for its own sake seems to me to be backward. Why do we care that the market expands? These games are an art form (… err, some of them are - and these are the ones we’re talking about). We wish to experience more of this art for ourselves; and we also wish this art to be more widely acknowledged and experienced by others. Ideally the creators should be compensated - piracy should never be openly condoned - but that is not the only goal here. At least it isn’t my only goal here.

[This message has been edited by Nandemonai (edited 06-13-2004).]

#22

I’ve actually bought every Bishojo game I own. Some I wish I hadn’t (Virgin Roster), but if every game could have a demo like the Little My Maid demo it would help me to make decisions on what to buy and more specifically, what not to.

But I also realize that it’s not practical to have a demo for every game out there to see if I like it. Still haven’t made up my mind on Slave Pageant, yet.

I also can see your point of view Nandemonai, even if I don’t necessarily agree with it.

#23

Most people here buy a game when it comes out. There’s the possibility of waiting a bit to hear other people’s views on the game and know what it’s about.

Just a thought…

#24
quote:
Originally posted by SCDawg:

That is comparing apples and oranges in my opinion because in one case you are buying something you can use and read, and in the other case buying something you know you cannot read then using something on it which helps you but also hinders the chance of a marketed translation.

First of all, I don't think you you saw what I meant about the difference between fanscans and text translations. Fanscans are scans of manga, usually stright from the original magazine and not the tankubon, that have been translated. They are image files with translated text. Text translations are just text, so you need the original manga to see the pictures. Even if there were a lot more text translations available, it would only benefit major fans of manga but it would have little to no effect on the whole English market? Why? Because most people don't have Japanese manga volumes. You can't buy them in stores. You have to specially import them or go to specialty stores to buy them, and most people aren't going to do that. If I bought the Japanese version and then found a text translation, would I buy an English version if it were released? No. I don't buy any translated manga, even if I don't have a text translation. That's because I like the original diolauge and it's lost in manga. In anime and games you still have the Japanese language audio track on the English versions but in manga it's lost so I don't buy them.
As for bishoujo games, patching a game like Kanon can't hurt anything. It's supposed to be an excellent game but I've never played it. So what would happen if a perfect patch for Kanon was created? Not many people would even play it because it requires the purchase of a Japanese game. If it were available for download then tons of people might play it. It would be treated as a "fansubbed" game and it could be easily downloaded on Bittorrent just like the partial game "Wind, a Breath of Heart." What would happen then? What's the worst that could happen? No market for Kanon in the US would be the worst thing that could happen. What could be the best thing? Well, since it's free a lot of people would be able to experience a bishoujo game that's probably a lot better than most of the games that are here now. Maybe they'd actually get some better reviews and more people would become interested in the games. There are always people who want something for nothing but then there are people who just need a chance to experience a really good game to become fans. Downloading already translated games clearly hurts the market, but no English-market money has been put into a game that hasn't been translated, obviously. How many games are NOT translated? Tons of them, that's for sure. So there's really not any harm in patching or downloading a translated game or two. Unlike fansubs, it's so hard to do and it takes so much time that there will never be very many translated games. Just making a few good titles available to everyone has a much greater potential for a positive impact than a negitive one. I do see your point about not buying something that you already own, for I know people who download fansubs that "support the industry by spreading anime" but then never buy the DVDs when they are licenced. Not that anyone can afford to buy DVDs all the time, but having spindle after spindle of fansubs burned to CD-R and less than 10 offical DVDs is kind of pathetic. And yet, even with tons of people like that, anime is still making profit. For games, there will be a lot less fan translation, that's for sure. And the few games that are translated, if good big name titles are chosen for translation, can only bring in more fans. So maybe not enough support would be left for Kanon because the bishoujo game industry is not as strong as the anime industry in America right now. So what. What about this game, and that game, and that game over there. There will be plenty of otheres, and with more fans that will mean more sales. I just don't see the threat, especially for translating games made by companies that have refused to give a licence for English distrobution.

#25

I think there’s in inherent flaw in the philosophy that buying a Japanese Game and downloading a translation patch will affect the English Translation Market: The people who are monitoring those trends are watching the way Translated games are selling, not the way Untranslated games are selling, for purposes of determining if they should broaden the overseas market. In other words: If they sell one more Japanese version, they will add it to their sales totals, and congratulate themselves when they tally up the quarter’s profits… but the game was never slotted for an English translation, and they won’t be considering whether or not it was bought by English-speaking buyers. They will only consider the profit margins on the English translation market for games that they actually translate and ship overseas for sale (or, in some cases, manufacture overseas in an English format). When they -do- make English translations, then, by all means, buy the English version, and support the market…

#26

What happens if I am right, you are all convinced I am wrong, but what if I am right? You all are willing to take a risk no matter how small or large it might be?

Yes but tell me this, how do they choose which games go for English translation? Is there one method, many? Can you say they don’t look at what I mentioned and be 100% correct?

They will look at a lot more then just profit margins, because what good is a profit margin on paper if you have not first looked at the odds of a sale? Profit margins could be meaningless in the early stages too, but monitoring other trends to help predict future profit margins is possible and that is where I think they do monitor this stuff.

Maybe I am wrong but what if I am right?

#27
quote:
Originally posted by Wolfson:
I think there's in inherent flaw in the philosophy that buying a Japanese Game and downloading a translation patch will affect the English Translation Market: The people who are monitoring those trends are watching the way Translated games are selling, not the way Untranslated games are selling, for purposes of determining if they should broaden the overseas market. In other words: If they sell one more Japanese version, they will add it to their sales totals, and congratulate themselves when they tally up the quarter's profits... but the game was never slotted for an English translation, and they won't be considering whether or not it was bought by English-speaking buyers. They will only consider the profit margins on the English translation market for games that they actually translate and ship overseas for sale (or, in some cases, manufacture overseas in an English format). When they -do- make English translations, then, by all means, buy the English version, and support the market...

This is very true. They don't track by shipping address or anything; and if they tried it'd still undercount because of resellers. B-game makers have no real gauge of how much is being imported. It certainly will simply disappear into their Japanese sales figures.

But that's not to say that such sales won't affect the market. They won't directly, but inasmuch as they compete for available funds from the truly hardcore it will affect it. Inasmuch as people get bootleg copies and play patches, and this gets them interested in the genre and they become fans - this will also affect it.

#28

In reference to the “fansub” thing on B-games that SC mentioned. I think that’d be a good idea because may get more people interested in B-games and bring out more business but on the other hand it may breed out more pirates because if they dl it on bittorrent or something they might have that same mindset and just dl instead of buying the game so its really a double-edged sword if you think about it.

My favourite english translated Bishoujo game is Tottemo Pheromone because it was the first new one made after 1997 or something like that and because I really liked it and it got me back into anime and B-gaming.

#29

The fansub thing (game + patch deal) will never work. If most people who download these games are already not buying it, what would be the difference if it’s a fansub or commercially translated game? None, I tell you. They will keep pirating it.

#30
quote:
Originally posted by Benoit:
The fansub thing (game + patch deal) will never work. If most people who download these games are already not buying it, what would be the difference if it's a fansub or commercially translated game? None, I tell you. They will keep pirating it.

I'm not sure if I'm following you here... I think the issue is not whether the player is buying the game, since--as I understand this thread--the player is actually buying the Japanese version. I think the idea you're raising, then, is: patching the Japanese version of the game with a fan generated English translation is the same is Piracy. Correct me if I'm misunderstanding... But as I intimated at the beginning of this post, I'm not sure that I agree with that, since the player actually -bought- his copy of the game, and I figure what he/she does with it--as long as he doesn't distribute it freely--is his/her business. I think a player that would buy a Japanese version of a game and then substitute an English patch would happily buy an English version of a game, since they obviously prefer to play in English.

#31
quote:
Originally posted by Benoit:
The fansub thing (game + patch deal) will never work. If most people who download these games are already not buying it, what would be the difference if it's a fansub or commercially translated game? None, I tell you. They will keep pirating it.

I didn't.

But aside from that. This is not the point. We need public awareness that these games are not just sex. The genre needs publicity. Not many games of this type have been brought over. Therefore a fan translation of a few titles will in fact increase piracy of those titles, almost assuredly. This is not the point. People will realize that there really IS more to this genre, and more of them will be willing to consider buying product.

#32
quote:
Originally posted by Nandemonai:
I didn't.

But aside from that. This is not the point. We need public awareness that these games are not just sex. The genre needs publicity. Not many games of this type have been brought over. Therefore a fan translation of a few titles will in fact increase piracy of those titles, almost assuredly. This is not the point. People will realize that there really IS more to this genre, and more of them will be willing to consider buying product.

Yes, this is exactly my point. That's the whole concept of fansubs. They're free, and technically illegal. BUT, they do help to increase the popularity of a certain product. Anime is a now strong enough to sell titles that have been fansubbed an earn a profit. Maybe bishoujo games can't do that, yet, but that's besides the point. Some of the really big name story based bishoujo games like Kanon and Air won't be released here because they are so popular. They don't want to have their good names ruined with low sales figures in the English market. It's not worth it, and they don't have much to gain. So there will either be a fan translated version, or no version at all. Period. If lots of people are able to play some of the big name games that aren't available here, it would generate more bishoujo game fans. Maybe there would be no market for the fansubbed game, but it would open the market up for lots of other games. Sure, there will be people who play it, like it, and still not want to pay for games in the future. But if those people can at least understand that some of these games are about more than sex, then the fansubbers would be winning the fight. Mass piracy of already translated sex-based games VS fan translations of Japanese-market-only story based games are totally different. They may seem the same, but it's totally different. One just steals to steal, and give things to people for "glory." The other tries to help the industry. It's like advertising. It worked for anime, too. Don't you know that AN decided to licence Risky Safty because of how popular the fansub was! And they their website says that it sold well. Fan translation could really help this industry grow.

#33

You misunderstood, Wolfson.

I was saying that if the game would be distributed with its English patch (which is not the case yet), no one would buy it.
Yes, Nandemonai, you are an exception, just like I am an exception, but we’re the vast minority here. They also say that exceptions define the rule…

I don’t believe the method is going to work, because people now who play pirated versions don’t buy games. It’s because they think that it’s wrong and/or would be considered perverts. Anime didn’t have that.

#34
quote:
Originally posted by Benoit:
You misunderstood, Wolfson.

I was saying that if the game would be distributed with its English patch (which is not the case yet), no one would buy it.
Yes, Nandemonai, you are an exception, just like I am an exception, but we're the vast minority here. They also say that exceptions define the rule...

I don't believe the method is going to work, because people now who play pirated versions don't buy games. It's because they think that it's wrong and/or would be considered perverts. Anime didn't have that.

Fair enough... I wasn't sure I understood [img]http://princess.cybrmall.net/ubb/wink.gif[/img]

There has got to be a way to educate and/or reprogram the thinking of people so that they understand that "bishoujo" does not equal "sex" per se, in order to try to banish a certain amount of stigma that might be attached to buying that type of game.

It might be equated to the type of stigma that anime used to have as "children's fare" in the beginning, because the American public tended to look at it as cartoons.

What I'm addressing here is the idea that some pirates may be operating because they are worried about being veiwed as perverts. I don't know--I find that -I- buy the games with an eye toward trying to find a good story, and when I find myself explaining to people that I'm playing a bishoujo game on the computer, I emphasize that fact that (at least in most of the cases that -I've- found) there is a plot. It's not like playing western adult "games," which (with the exception of "Days of Oblivion") are pretty much an excuse to wander from one sex scene to another.

But I digress... Sadly, in the end, we will always have pirates, but anything that could be done to reduce their number (and incidentally, boost the bishoujo market in America) would be a good and noble thing--at least in my perfect world [img]http://princess.cybrmall.net/ubb/smile.gif[/img]

#35

Yeah, I also emphasize the fact that I’m after good stories, preferable romantic ones. :slight_smile:
I’m such a sucker for that kind of story.
One reason is because I never had a girlfriend, or anyone in love with me for that matter… :’(

#36

Sorry to hear that. I’ve had plenty of tragic romances :stuck_out_tongue:

I was pleasantly surprised to find that bishoujo games offered (in most cases) a strong plot, rather than a continuous stream of sex. I -do- find, however, that a lot of the stories that I’ve encountered are rather dark, although most try to end on a light note (the exceptions being the dating sims, which usually are just a romp from one situation to the next, and making the decisions that affect which girl you end up with–assuming you don’t blow it and end up with no one).

#37
quote:
Originally posted by Wolfson:
It might be equated to the type of stigma that anime used to have as "children's fare" in the beginning, because the American public tended to look at it as cartoons.

Actually, interestingly enough, I was at an anime convention recently and one of the Japanese con guests said it was the same way in Japan too, until recently. So I guess it isn't just us ^_^.

quote:
Originally posted by Wolfson:
What I'm addressing here is the idea that some pirates may be operating because they are worried about being veiwed as perverts.

This is a large part of why I pirated them at first. In fact I guilt tripped myself out of piracy when a game whose CG set I had downloaded, was picked up. Fortunately the first game I decided to buy was Snow Drop; if it had been XChange I might have gone back to piracy.

#38

Yeah, XChange is not a good one to see first. That actually the first game I saw a long time ago when one of my friends downloaded it from Kazaa behind another one of my friend’s backs. (Nobody likes Kazaa because of viruses but nobody has a problem with it if it’s someone else’s computer and that person doesn’t know about it) My point about fansubbed games was about trying to get people to understand that many of these games are about more than just sex. People downloading Xchange won’t see that, and it takes away from the sales of the licenced product. That’s why games like Kanon, Air, or even CLANNAD should have a fan translation. With more people playing games like that, the mindset will be changed. Slowly but surely, it would change. That would open the market for future games. There would already be a lot of fan translated games if it were as simple as making a fansub. That’s the real problem here. Who can translate and edit the game, and spend months working on it to distrobute it for free in order to change people’s mindset about these games? Some people are trying, but I wish there were more. Maybe someday. It would be great if Kanon becomes fully translated someday. That would help. I’d like to see Something Aweful review it. yeah right, they’d pretend that it doesn’t exist. But many people would play it and it might change some people’s minds.

#39

I still don’t understand why that would work when people downloading pirated copies don’t understand that.

#40
quote:
Originally posted by Benoit:
I still don't understand why that would work when people downloading pirated copies don't understand that.

I think he (I'm assuming it's a he) is speaking from personal experience to some degree. And again, I think it goes back to the prevalent idea that (bishoujo = pervert). If one's exposure to bishoujo is a game like X-Change (which I haven't played, but I've got the gist of), which is more about the sex (and it's kind of kinky sex from the "demo" I saw in my copy of Tokimeki Check In), one is going to think, "Yep, this bishoujo thing is sure perverted." And if you're a pirate downloading the stuff, you're going to keep hiding in the closet for fear of being labeled. But if one's exposure to bishoujo is a game like Kanon (which I am thoroughly unfamiliar with, but I assume from conversation that it is heavily plot driven), which is more about the story (again, I assume), one is going to think, "Oh... this bishoujo thing isn't at all what I thought it was." And I think what he's driving at is that the self-imposed stigma will no longer be there, as well as the need to secretly acquire the games. Obviously, this won't change the mentality of the pirates who are simply downloading the games because they feel that they don't want to spend the money on them when they can get them for free.