I got mine in the mail yesterday and played a little of it this morning before work. Hard to make any sensible comments at this point, other than it seems to be exactly the same game as the original. I miss some aspects of the old art (in particular, the way Yumi was drawn), but I expect I’ll adapt. Does anyone else have theirs yet?
Not yet.
Don't know where you live, but I'm from Germany, and so far, it hasn't arrived yet.
I can wait though, I don't like rushing things anyways, and I'm currently busy with RL stuff anyways.
I wished I could buy an English hardcopy of the original though, but I doubt things this old will circulate so casually on eBay. :/
Not from J-List? They didn't stop carrying it, did they? I'd check, but I'm at work.
Well, Jlist distributed Kana - Little Sister still in digital form, but not in physical. I'm sure they won't do so anyways, since the remake is being sold right now.
I just got with the remake of Kana - Little Sister here, but having the original would be nice as well. :)
Not gonna buy digitally, then I could search for a torrent anyways, and I don't want that.
J-List sells the package version, and JAST USA does the digital version only, at present. We hope you'll buy the 2-in-1 package we have at http://www.jlist.com/search/all/hset013 . Anyone who torrents a game a bunch of people worked on for 6 months should go find another thing to be a fan of -_-
Yes, the art is new and better in some ways, the old aren't wasn't bad of course. The main thing was to refresh things and also make it larger because the game also got a PS2 release. I love it and am glad we have it out for fans.
"Not gonna buy digitally, then I could search for a torrent anyways, and I don't want that."
You should really consider where you're posting before you make a comment like that. Peter was rather coy about it, but on most company message boards you'll get slapped by a moderator for saying something like that.
Doesn't Okaeri have the original art + the new art? As in it's toggleable? And it has voices (the old version didn't). As far as I can tell there's no reason to buy the old version anymore unless you can find it for a cheaper price.
"We hope you'll buy the 2-in-1 package we have at http://www.jlist.com/search/all/hset013 "
I just have to ask...what were you thinking bundling Kana with Sensei 2??? o.O
The overlap in fanbase is probably miniscule. In fact, some people might even be offended enough to avoid the purchase altogether simply by association with a hardcore rape fetish game.
If you're going to bundle Kana with something, bundle it with a title that actually makes sense, like Crescendo!
@Dark_Shiki
I'm well aware of that, and don't care the slightest bit.
I even said that I don't want to do that, but that a digital purchase and downloading it for free somewhere wouldn't make a difference to me.
Quite frankly, most people do that and will most likely keep doing that.
There are titles I got so thrilled about that I didn't even bothered looking for a download and simply waited in anticipation for the release.
Littlewitch Romanesque is such a title.
The games I downloaded and played in the past and that I actually liked are now in my shelves, so I don't really see a problem here on my side.
What I like is what I support, so I buy it. My statement is simply how most people in general will think; that's why I didn't want that, I want to support the developers, but just the games I enjoyed. I a publisher releases a game I don't like, then chances are I won't even bother wanting to play it, so not gonna download.
I didn't mean to sound rude or unsupportive, but that's pretty much how things work.
I even told Mangagamer about a site where I've downloaded such games before (which a few of them where also from them), telling them that Imouto Paradise has leaked there, and that they might want to know about other people distributing their work for free.
They said that they tried to delete such sites in the past, but the people behind them always creep up again, so it wouldn't make any use (in their opinion) to complain about it.
As for Okaeri, does it really include the old artwork, too?
I didn't know that... well, I'm glad I pre-ordered it some time ago anyways, so I'm curious what this game will be like. :)
I'm just a completionist, that's why I asked about the original release.
''I just have to ask...what were you thinking bundling Kana with Sensei 2??? o.O''
Pretty much what I was wondering, too.
I didn't consider it a bad thing, since I like contrasts and I considered it as a variety in expanding the genres I can play, but the choice to bundle it with this specific title surprised me, too.
''Surprised'', but not necessarily in a bad way.
The more content the better, so I see no reason in denying a purchase, if someone would be interested in buying Kana Okaeri anyways to begin with.
If people are picky about this... well, let them be, it's their loss after all.
Eh, did my comment not be approved?
Weird...
Well, to repeat the gist of it:
@Dark_Shiki
I'm aware of that, and not caring the slightest bit.
The games I like are games that I support. If a publisher brings out a title that doesn't pique my interests, then chances are I won't even bother downloading said title.
The VN's I've been downloading in the past are by now in my shelves, since I wanted to actually support the developers.
If a game is even incredibly outstanding, I even refrain from downloading it from somewhere else and wait in anticipation for my parcel to arrive. :)
Littlewitch Romanesque was such a title.
What I'm trying to say is, that people will most likely download these games anyways for free, I just spoke out what everyone else already knows. People actually writing in the forums probably won't be these kinds of people, but if one could download something for free, why would he/she spent money for it?
That's unfortunately what most people will be like.
My point was that, from my point of view, digital distribution means nothing to myself. If I buy something or download something for free in digital form, it doesn't mean anything.
Sure, I would actually support the developers this way - but I wouldn't be happy with a digital download.
Therefore, I just buy hardcopy versions. I don't always have internet after all.
I'm atleast having the courtesy to pay for what I enjoy, so there is no problem from my side here, and I didn't intend to sound rude or ungrateful, but it's the simple truth that people would rather download something for free rather than having to pay for something that is basically the same thing.
I even told Mangagamer about a certain site that distributes a ton of these games for free (even though they atleast mention, that people should ''support the publishers'') and they said that they were trying to accomplish the deletion of such sites, but the people behind them always re-appear, so there wouldn't be any use in trying that, from their point of view.
They do have a point after all. :/
As for Kana Okaeri, it does have both artwork?
That's pretty neat, I didn't know that!
I just asked about the original release because I'm a completionist, and love to collect videogames, including Visual Novels. ^-^
I'm surprised about it being bundled with Sensei 2 though.
I don't think it's a bad thing, I was just surprised about the title choice (and that it got bundled to beging with; I pre-ordered it when it hasn't even been mentioned before that it will be bundled with another title).
I consider it a nice move.
Why would I complain about getting more?
If people are all whiny about it, their problem.
It's their loss after all; I can see why some people would be slightly ''offended'' by it, but the reason behind it is a trivial and just speculation. People would probably be like ''Such a great, touchy title, and it gets bundled with a rape fest, how dare them!!1 D:'', but in the end, who cares?
It's not up to the consumer to decide what gets bundled (or IF anything gets bundled to begin with).
I personally love contrasts, so I think it's a rather interesting choice. It also leaves the possibility to experience two different genres - maybe you don't like the first one, but the other one appeals to you much more.
I consider it to be a good decision, to be honest.
If people complain about such a trivial thing, they might consider to grow up.
(If anyone feels ''offended'' by that, I don't really mind. It's just a game after all, people should take such things with a grain of salt. My comments too, btw., why being harsh, I just talk what I have on my mind, it's not worth to feel offended by the opinion of a single individual, right? :/)
If you're going to bundle Kana with something, bundle it with a title that actually makes sense, like Crescendo!
Yeah, that would have been better, I think. But what 's done is done. From its description, I don't know if I'll ever get motivated to play Sensei. But, then, I was doubtful about Tsuki Possession and it turned out to be not that bad. Then there's Bible Black--I really got hooked on that one. So how does one reconcile one's sentimental desire to care for one's little sister and one's dark obsession with evil witch/school nurses? What can I say? It's yin-yang.
@Bamboo, Crescendo was already bundled with another game.
@animeloverxX93, thanks for your comments. Yes, we know that something like 95% of fans pirate everything, and with a hard drive of |<00l warez they likely have no time to play any single game. The joke is on them -- they're missing out on some really amazing games and on the chance to support a tiny indies software movement that sticks it to The Man (society at large), who doesn't want us to be immoral and fap. Like MangaGamer, we can't do anything about this so we do what we hope fans will want, make Limited Edition games and control our costs. We are always trying to be worthy of fans' support, hoping to convert pirates into fans who will cast their "dollar votes" to support us.
(With Steam on the horizon, there's a chance that all games will go to this platform. If 90% of all licensors' money comes from Steam and there's the risk of fans pirating our adult games anyway, it may make it hard to do adult games at some theoretical point in the future. This is why Steam is really dangerous for the industry...every company is expecting a big payday, as long as they censor their games or make them all ages from the start.)
Kana does not have the old artwork, mainly because the guy who promised to make a patch for us bugged out and stopped replying to our emails. We can't do an official art restoration patch (due to licensing issues), but we'd help make one at some point in the future.
We bundled Sensei 2 with it because it was by the same company (G-Collections), although they're different games. Mainly, fans like bundles because it keeps the games in print longer. We have a few other bundles that are a little odd, but they're free so...
"(With Steam on the horizon, there's a chance that all games will go to this platform. If 90% of all licensors' money comes from Steam and there's the risk of fans pirating our adult games anyway, it may make it hard to do adult games at some theoretical point in the future. This is why Steam is really dangerous for the industry...every company is expecting a big payday, as long as they censor their games or make them all ages from the start.)"
My conspiracy theory has been validated! I've been warning people for a while that success of all-ages VNs, coupled with continued poor sales of story-focused eroge which take a lot of resources to work on, could lead to a polarization of the English market between nukige and all-ages titles. In such a scenario, the unprofitable story-driven eroge segment would stagnate or possibly wither and die. Story-focused eroge sales are largely driven by fans because they lack the porn appeal yet can't get mainstream attention because they're seen as porn. If fans don't support these titles, they don't have much of a future.
Definitely. I can see a world where only good story based games coexist with tentacle Imouto trap nukige, and there’d be nothing in between. For our part, though we plan more Steam games, we will always make proper versions for people to buy, and also package versions for people who prefer those.
@Peter Payne
Sorry for the double post, I thought I got banned for my remark...
I'm sorry if I came off as ''rude'', that wasn't my intention.
My point was that people will most likely pirate games, if they are offered the chance to get what they like for free, instead of having to pay 40 bucks for a nice game.
I for one did that stuff too in the past, back when I was newly introduced to the genre, around 2009/2010.
The games I highly enjoyed playing are by now in my shelves.
To me, there is no such a thing as to having to ''proof'' me anything. Well, atleast not to myself.
I enjoy Visual Novels; while I admittedly rarely play them by now due to real-life stuff and lack of motivation to start with a bigger title, I occasionally still play games with an emphasis on gameplay and being light on the story.
I finished Demon Master Chris yesterday, for example - a title I could easily have picked up else, but which I ordered from Jlist. :P
Like I said - I pay for what I buy, but I can see that the big majority of fans won't do that.
The fun thing is, I consider pirating VN's, in a twisted way, a good thing to raise popularity of these titles, since they are still somewhat unheard of in the west.
But lately, seeing you and Mangagamer releasing more and more stuff on Steam, it seems like general interest seems to prosper.
Of course, pirating stuff in general is a bad thing, and I agree that people should rather show their support instead of being selfish and enjoying the game for their own without giving something back.
But, how would one go to make Visual Novels appeal to the west... I tried it myself with friends and as far as I know, nobody except one person started playing these games, and the game she started with was the first installment of the Monster Girl Quest franchise.
Well, I hope people will refrain from downloading these games for free in the future. :/
I for one enjoy you guys being willed to even make limited editions of these games - it's something that really animates me to purchase it, once I have the money (which is always a bit troublesome for me ^-^'').
I still want to pick up Imouto paradise and the limited edition of Da Capo I at a point. I heard you are running low on the latter, hopefully I can still snatch a copy in time. >.<
A shame about the older artwork for Kana Okaeri.
To be honest, I prefer the older one. It shouldn't stop me from playing it though.
I guess these bundles are a bit experimental then.
They seem to contain titles differing in the genre, but like mentioned before, this shouldn't be a thing, really.
After all, you get more for around the same price, I see no problem in that choice.
But, judging from your comment, if you would bundle, say, two titles from different developers/publishers, would you have to pay a fee for that?
It seems a little odd that things like this cost money, too, I'm surprised. :/
"But, how would one go to make Visual Novels appeal to the west... I tried it myself with friends and as far as I know, nobody except one person started playing these games, and the game she started with was the first installment of the Monster Girl Quest franchise."
Maybe I'm just really persuasive, but I've gotten a number of my friends interested in VNs. One went on to become one of the most prolific players of Japanese VNs the English Internet has ever seen. I turned a girl into a lolicon. My brother hates reading, but I got him hooked on subbed anime and he liked School Days because it was animated and had lots of choices. The trick is identifying someone's latent interest and continually reminding them of it in a non-pushy way.
I think it's rather easy getting people interested in VNs. Getting them to pay for them is what's hard.
''I turned a girl into a lolicon.''
I have no idea how you made it, but you sir deserve a cookie, for real.
And I thought being a lolicon would be more of a male thing... well, I still think it is, but there are obviously exceptions.
I told some of the people I have on Skype about some of the titles I liked, and even wrote a short review about them (in German, mind you) in a German VN forum.
One guy just came up, recited me, and when I brought up games like Fukai ni Nemuru Oujo no Abaddon, he just answered with ''Gay!'', rendering my opinion useless.
I don't know, I've sent this link also to my friends, seeing as some douche comes there, acting all haughty, the self-proclaimed critique he is, I wouldn't be surprised if some people would have refused to give these games a try after that.
This forum is somewhat small and very inactive; one, two people disagreeing with you there could already be enough to scare away potential customers of these games.
Maybe, it was because of that...?
I don't know, I wrote a load of text (to the games I've actually played by now and/or read about more than the VNDB entries), I really wonder why nobody, liking these games or not, atleast told me more direct about this nichÈ genre or rather, what they think about it.
It comes of as sort of disingenious.
Oh well, nothing I can do about it. It just seems like I'm the only one in my syrcle of friends who likes these kinds of games. There are in total just three people that I know of having played a VN before or are in the process of doing so, so there is that.
I've talked openly about my interest in eroge even in relatively mainstream forums like NISA. Subsequently I was contacted by people who were willing to discuss privately, but who were too fearful of being branded a pervert to talk about them in the open. Some of these people went on to openly proclaim their interest. There's a lot of latent interest in eroge; people just need a supportive, nonjudgmental environment to cultivate that interest.
Reading this, humanity is a bunch of hypocrites.
They point with their fingers at you, ridiculing you, but are too afraid to admit their own ''flaws'' in public.
While I obviously don't consider interest in porn games a flaw, I never cared about what others thought about me. In fact, I often tend to talk about VN's and Eroge with others. Right now, it even seems like a person is taking their distance from me because of that, and I feel like she's simply not telling me about feeling uneasy about this sort of stuff. I really don't care about this, as sex in general seems like a perfectly normal thing to me. And if it's of fictional origin, who cares?
Anime porn has to be taken with a grain of salt anyways; the situations in these kinds of games don't even reflect serious, realistic situations (most of the time) how they would happen in real-life.
I myself am a Lolicon (I guess? Let's say, that I would prefer this over the mash of big-breasted oppai heroines), but don't necessarily have to buy Eroge with loli characters. For example, in Littlewitch Romanesque's case, while being absolutely against censorship, I would have prefered a censored version, because the H-scenes feel very forced most of the time, in my opinion. I absolutely love the artwork of Oyari-san, but not particularly in relation to pornografic aspects. It just catches ''beauty'' with ''girlish innocence'' in my opinion, I don't really want this to be in relation with naughty content.
Not that I hated it in the game, but oh well... wasn't my cup of tea.
But, I disgress yet again.
What if people would ''judge'' themselves? Maybe they would feel uneasy regardless of the magnitude of such content, what if they would feel pressured anyways, because ''society doesn't like it''?
Implying a neutral place to discuss this kind of content would be a great idea, but what about the mentality of these people? Can this really be changed into something they would approve of themselves?
Who knows how the demographic in itself is. So far, most people I've seen didn't like VN's and Eroge, especially the latter.
And also, what about the standards of Visual Novels in itself?
Interest in VN's stoked since several titles have been released on Steam, but what if exactly these titles become a standard?
I don't want to see a bunch of mainstream games released on this platform and therefore implying how a ''good'' Visual Novel has to be like from a big mass of people unfamiliar with the entire genre. :/
@Peter Payne
"(With Steam on the horizon, there's a chance that all games will go to this platform. If 90% of all licensors' money comes from Steam and there's the risk of fans pirating our adult games anyway, it may make it hard to do adult games at some theoretical point in the future. This is why Steam is really dangerous for the industry...every company is expecting a big payday, as long as they censor their games or make them all ages from the start.)"
My two cents on this, why stop releasing eroge? As someone who has been observing the industry for a while now but not actively participating in it, my perspective might be a bit skewed. But there isn't enough Japanese-produced all-ages titles of high quality to support JAST, MangaGamer, and everyone else on that alone. Which means that even if Steam becomes the primary source of revenue for everyone involved, you'll still be mainly taking and censoring 18+ eroge into all-ages releases. How much more would it cost to translate the cut h-scenes and release an 18+ version on the side? How much extra return do you think you'd see for doing so? From my perspective, I don't see how this would ever stop being a worthwhile endeavor for all companies involved. Even if Steam gets even bigger for VNs, new customers who are aware of and desire the 18+ versions will enter the market, ensuring that well never runs dry. So I think we'll continue seeing dual all-ages and 18+ releases of most titles for as long as Japan continues releasing eroge. The one thing I worry about are the titles that can't be cut down for a Steam release, like Starless and Euphoria. If all steam releases become much more successful than even the previously top-selling nukige (the Steam version of Cho Dengeki Stryker of all games outsold Imouto Paradise), then at some point you're going to ask "why bother with anything that can't be on Steam?" Why waste resources localizing Starless if you can't get dem steam bucks. Well, it's not a huge concern for me since I'm not part of the audience who buys those particular titles, but I could see a lot of people being bothered by that.
@Decay, we certainly would never willingly do this, since we love the genre and and the fans. My point is, if market forces cause non-adult games to be the main source of profit in the future, it will affect things in various ways, e.g. the way If My Heart Had Wings was released, which was frustrating for fans but overall important for that company. We intend to use any profits we get from Steam to do more interesting games, both adult and non adult. But if we were on the ropes, just hanging on by our fingertips like a lot of the J-companies are, we might say "no more fapping, Steam all the way." Well, we wouldn't, but another company in our place might.
I'm always glad that J-List has such a mixed business. Our candy and import games and T-shirts all support the eroge side, and vice versa. Companies that do only games have more stress, because if the next game doesn't sell above X units, they don't get their paycheck.
If My Heart Had Wings is a great example. WILL previously partnered with J-List to release their games uncensored. But for reasons that maybe only WILL knows, they decided to branch off and release Pulltop games independently as all-ages versions. Let me propose a hypothesis: they didn't want their games associated with pornographic content, so they decided a completely new company that only did all-ages releases releasing a title that would only see a censored all-ages release was the best way to reach a mainstream audience overseas. As a result, JAST didn't get to work on the 18+ version I'm sure they would have loved to work on.
This is one concrete example where the perceived importance of the mainstream market (including Steam) led to licensing doors being closed.