Megatokyo

Visual Novel Community Archive, 2000-2009
#1

I just wanted to say that you should go to the Dating sim FAQ: http://www.megatokyo.com/extra/dating_sim_faq-ver1.htm
At Megatokyo. If you read it, you’ll notice that they seems to be heavy misinformed about bishoujo games, sadly enough -_-. I’m currently working on writing a very polite mail where I explains some facts about bishoujo games to them there¬Ö Not that they’re entirely wrong, of course, but they just seem to choose to see things from the very worst side, and by doing so they’re misinforming people about various facts about bishoujo games¬Ö Also, they’re very wrong about some things they say there¬Ö for example, they mentions Peach Princess and say kind of like this “Peach Princess carries on Crowds and Will’s games. While Crowds games are just mindless sex-fests (he’s not entirely wrong at this point, since Crowds games does contain a lot of sex, but so does many of Will’s games too and he’s not thinking of that there’s reasons behind almost all of the sexual acts as well), Will have some decent dating sims like Snow Drop (he spells it wrong here ^^ and Little My Maid” (he apparently forgets to mention that the games have their darker sides as well, darker sides he seems to dislike when they speak of those darker sides at an earlier point)¬Ö He (or they) seems also to only think of the “darker” sides of bishoujo games as “worst case scenarios”, if you understand what I mean… In other words, he never even once mentions that games with “dark elements” may also have, for example, a very romantic storyline or that there also may be completely logic reasons behind those darker elements.

The thought also struck me that there is many sites who’re misinformed (or using misinforming information like this) across the Net; sites where webmasters using this type of misinformation calls themselves “experienced” at this sort of things, when they’re actually very wrong about many of the things they’re calling themselves experienced on, (and it’s not easy to convince guys like this that they’re wrong, but then again, why would it be easy, since most of them have believed that they’re right for many years and then they suddenly hear someone saying that they’re wrong¬Ö that’s not something that people accepts THAT easy, no¬Ö) and people who call themselves things like “hentaiveterans” and things like that¬Ö There’s many misinformed people out there, and there’ll take quite some time to “correct” that misinformation ^^;;.

Back to Megatokyo¬Ö Even if they are more than little wrong about bishoujo games (and it’s not the creators of the site who are responsible for the FAQ anyway, so I’ll not bother them about this, unless I really have to), I have to give them credit for their total stand-of of piraticy. They’re VERY strict when it comes to that; it’s strictly forbidden to post anything that has to do with piraticy (links to pirated sites and things like that) at their forum and people who asks for pirated material at the forum are quickly recommended to go and buy whatever they’ve asked for. Great, don’t you think

Anyway, I’ll start working on that mail as soon as I’ve taken a nap¬Ö didn’t sleep well this night for some reason (Maybe I should buy lots of LMM cards (ando other cards, of course) and cover my bedroom walls with them? In that way, I might sleep much better )

#2

Very interesting reading. Though I still like his response in 2-1:

quote:
2-1. Where can I get them for free?

Are you stupid? Stop pirating.

Well, actually a lot of that section is like that. And I am wondering why a FAQ on Dating sims includes topics like travelling to and working in Japan. (I mean at that point, you’re not siming any more are you?)

Hmm, and I don’t think covering your walls with the cards will make you sleep better. You’d probably stay up all night staring at them!

#3

I read that FAQ just now, I don’t see any problems with it. It IS written by a japanese person after all, so he probably knows what he’s talking about. The part that you took issue with was written by WooJin Lee, and he actually posts here once in a while, so you might get his attention with your complaint…

#4
quote:
Originally posted by Goobersnotch:
I read that FAQ just now, I don't see any problems with it. It IS written by a japanese person after all, so he probably knows what he's talking about. The part that you took issue with was written by WooJin Lee, and he actually posts here once in a while, so you might get his attention with your complaint...

Well, just because someone's born as a Japan, He/she might not know all the facts... and also, the fact that he/she is japanese doesn't necressary mean that that person lives in japan, it may mean that that person was born in Japan, but was raised in the US or something like that, you know [img]http://princess.cybrmall.net/ubb/wink.gif[/img].

#5

Well then can you point out what you felt was incorrect about the FAQ? And if it’s due to the generalization that all H games are violent and stuff like that, well, I was under the impression that not all H games are bishoujo - some of the games that do focus on rape and sexual violence and tentacle sex don’t seem to be very bishoujo to me (where is the beauty of women and coming of age themes in that?! It’s just male domination fantasies). To me, bishoujo is something like Pia Carrot, not Urotsukidoji.

#6

Spec,

If you need some help with the essay, let me know.

Mike

#7

Well, just because someone’s born as a Japan, >He/she might not know all the facts… and >also, the fact that he/she is japanese doesn’t >necressary mean that that person lives in >japan, it may mean that that person was born in >Japan, but was raised in the US or something >like that, you know.

The guy you mean, Tsubasa, does indeed live in Japan.

#8
quote:
Originally posted by Goobersnotch:
Well then can you point out what you felt was incorrect about the FAQ? And if it's due to the generalization that all H games are violent and stuff like that, well, I was under the impression that not all H games are bishoujo - some of the games that do focus on rape and sexual violence and tentacle sex don't seem to be very bishoujo to me (where is the beauty of women and coming of age themes in that?! It's just male domination fantasies). To me, bishoujo is something like Pia Carrot, not Urotsukidoji.

Well, what can I say, aside from what Kumiko already has said? But let me ask you something: do you judge a book by it's cover?
If you thinks that a game, a movie or a book is bad just because that it has some "dark" elements in it? If people just judged things by the cover, then most "normal" games (as some people call them when they compare them to bishoujo games) out there, no matter what genre they belonged to, would be classed at "killing games", because that's mainly what you do in many games: you kill other people or living beings. Strangely enough, most people seems to think of things like rape as more serious than killing, and I suppose that it's true in some ways, but... in reality, rape is something you can recover from, but you can't recover from death (if you're dead, you're dead and that's it). And yet, when it comes to killing someone in games, people speak if it as an "entertaining experience", because that when you kill someone in a game you does something you can't do in real life.

So what I want to point out is that I think that it's wrong that some people points at the bishoujo game genre and says something like: "Most of the games in that genre are bad, because that they contains bad things, the only good games in that genre are the love games", (here they often forgets that many games categorized as love stories, like Dokusen or Little My Maid may contain some of those "dark elements" they speak of) when most of the newer "normal" games out there nowadays have some dark elements or dark paths that you can choose to walk on (some examples: in Fallout 2, you could choose to sell your comrades or your own wife as slaves or sell your body and use the money to buy drugs and use them, in Baldurs Gate 2 you could even kill children if you wanted to, you could buy prostitutes if you wanted to do so and on the top of it, the story also contained things like torture and rape and in one of the games planed for this year, Morrowind, you can also do nearly "anything you like" like be an Assasin and kill people for money).

In short, what I'm telling you is that people shouldn't assume that other things they play, reads or watch are much less "dark" than most bishoujo games are. and also, people does sadly enough forget or doesn't know that when it comes to bishoujo games, there's always a story behind the whole thing, it isn't just about "rape"... as I said in another thread, most people who encounters the genre of bishoujo games does sadly enough think that "bishoujo games" means porn, and ignore's the whole thing without even thinking that there is a story in it, not just sex. and it's because of the story that people like those games, right? (as one of the women in the article said... "The men may buy those games just because of the sex, but we women buys it for the story"... quite naturally, I think... who would want to read/play something where one or more rapes occurred if there wasn't a good story in it?

I mean, think of "Berserk" by Miura Kentarou... It's one of the darkest stories I've ever read/seen... just think of what the story contains if you look at it; The story contains things like: various nude children, rapes of children, "monster rapes", rapes, various physic traumas, massacres and much more ^^;;;. Yet, Berserk is a serie with lots of fans... and why does the serie have that many fans, since it's so dark and touches so many "forbidden themes"? Because that Berserk has a good story and it's also popular because of the various complicated relationships between the various characters. In the case of bishoujo games with dark elements it's no different; people buy the games because of the story, not just because of the sex, as is the case with "american porn". Even a game or a story focused on rape may still have a very good story.

Also, you mentioned that you think that it's only a "male dominating fantasy", then you're very wrong [img]http://princess.cybrmall.net/ubb/biggrin.gif[/img]. As Kumiko has told us before (and as I've figured out by talking to some people at the net), women may also fantasize of being dominated or raped, just as there is guys out there who fantasizes about being dominated by women or "raped" by them ^^;;; Both of those fantasies are shown in the bishoujo game genre; games like Dokusen may be more directed to those who like the thought of dominate (male) or being dominated (female) while games like Ruf's newest game, "the new english teacher" is more directed towards those who like the thought of dominate (female) and those who likes the thought of being dominated (male), since the story begins with that the english teacher forces the main male character into becoming her sex slave, since he did a VERY bad thing [img]http://princess.cybrmall.net/ubb/biggrin.gif[/img].

Also, you're right about that not the WHOLE genre is bishoujo - some games are more "girl-chasing" games than anything else and there's also bishonen games too, of course, but by placing all games in a single category - and a category whose name is wrong, to make things worse - you creates a lot of misunderstandings by doing so. I just want to correct those mistakes (well, they're mistakes from my point of view, at last) he's doing now. Maybe i can't change his mind about this - you can't convince the whole world, after all ^^;;, but I might at least make sure of that he tries to correct his mistakes and not makes people think about bishoujo games in the "bad way" his way of telling people about the genre is doing now.

And Mike... No I don't think I need any help for now ^^;;. I haven't started writing that mail yet, so I'll have to do it tomorrow, but I have at least a rough idea of what I'm going to say [img]http://princess.cybrmall.net/ubb/smile.gif[/img]

#9

If you don’t like the Megatokyo board join the Dating Sims Mailing List. I’m a member and we’ve talked about games with hentai content several times without anyone getting bent out of shape. It’s on yahoogroups.

#10
quote:
Originally posted by Skyrocket:
If you don't like the Megatokyo board join the Dating Sims Mailing List. I'm a member and we've talked about games with hentai content several times without anyone getting bent out of shape. It's on yahoogroups.

Well, don't misunderstand me or the other here ^^;;;. It's not like we dislike Megatokyo itself... rather, we praise it for their efforts when it comes to debating and inform people about the non-adult kind of bishoujo games, but what makes us a little irritated about Megatokyo is as Kagami said, their attitude towards adult bishoujo games... often, those who speak there have not too much knowledge about the genre... most of them doesn't even seem to know about the non-adult bishoujo game genre being originally created out of the adult bishoujo games, like To Heart... and also, as soon as you post a topic about the subject there, it seem like people basically ignores you, throws insults at you or simply doesn't want to belive what you're telling them, since they from their point of view has enough knowledge of the genre (and they often say this while speaking of True Love or Season of the Sakura as the "best hentai games of all time!" ^^;; [img]http://princess.cybrmall.net/ubb/wink.gif[/img].

Hmm, this group you speak of sounds kind of interesting [img]http://princess.cybrmall.net/ubb/smile.gif[/img]. Maybe I should take a closer look at it...

#11

I hang at Megatokyo and from where I sit it seems that some people like adult games and some don’t. I haven’t observed any huge amount of friction between the two groups.

The URL for the list is http://groups.yahoo.com/group/datingsims/
It had fourty something memebers last time I checked.

#12

Well, Spectator, my point was that he wasn’t targeting bishoujo games in general, but rather H games, which would mean all adult-rated games. I wasn’t aware that bishoujo games consistute the overwhelming majority of H games.

if Tsubasa doesn’t like H games, he probably doesn’t play them, so he’s only going by the works he’s heard of, and those would probably be mainstream sexual violence works that aren’t bishoujo or if they’re bishoujo, they’re pretty terrible in content. (That’s not to say that some good bishoujo works don’t contain rape elements, just that the more prominent ones would probably be about a guy who gets to rape and torture a bunch of girls, like those Isaku/Shuusaku games).

My point was i’d only take offense if you knew he was targeting bishoujo games specifically. However the fact that he brings up sexual violence indicates that he’s not talking about charming games like Snow Drop.

#13

I’d agree with Skyrocket. I hang at MT for some months now, and I’d say that there’s NO friction between the h-games loving ones and non-loving ones. You can talk about h-games just fine (there was a recent thread about Pia3 for instance); you just can’t have a discussion with blatant sex content.
About the FAQ, Spectator, you need to understand it was done mostly by people who don’t like/play h-games and is mostly outdated. Suggestions have been made about a more recent FAQ, but I don’t know how much of this one was done…
At last, IMHO, very few at MT “pretend” to have extensive knowledge about bishoujo games… and those ones mostly stopped answering newbies about questions on “the best hentai games in English”. So you end up having newbies answering newbies.
You know, the best way to change that is to hang at MT and inform people…
That’s what I’m trying to do, though my last “discussion” with a pirate somewhat made me tired… (and thanks for stepping in and helping me, Spectator )

#14
quote:
Originally posted by Kumiko Kamiyama:
(...)
Sometimes, though (actually, quite often) bilingual people forget that 99.9% of the English market has no clue what the heck they are talking about or thinking of. A lot of those people don't pay attention to the English market very much - instead, they enjoy playing the Japanese games, and the fact that the English market misses out is something that they don't tend to concern themselves too much about.

Though I'm not bilingual, I know Japanese enough to play the Japanese games and have to confess I'm in that case...
Strictly speaking, I don't care (much) about the English market; I'm more fluent at English but, well, I can still play the Japanese ones...
The [b]only[/b] reason I buy English games/DVDs is... the price. They're usually cheaper than the Japanese version. But then, I usually expect the same cover design (reason why I won't even buy the Nutech DVD; while I agree putting the Adult industry VAs IS a good idea, I don't want them to "pollute" my bishoujo DVD covers... [img]http://princess.cybrmall.net/ubb/smile.gif[/img] )

#15