I agree with the OP. I also would LOVE to see an otome game translated. The will games branch “Sugar Beans” seem to be a good start. ??? My Master. The recent title and Under the Moon and it’s fandisk. If those can be translated that would be darn awesome. Love?Drops???…I don’t find the art style appealing…I think the three games I listed above from Sugar Beans may appeal to a somewhat broader audience.
That because people don’t know how to use the term. 
Generally speaking, milking is when a property creates a spinoff that is perceived to do nothing in improving the original property it’s connected to. Generally an insulting term of course. For example Dragon Quest 1 thru Dragon Quest 3, while connected, are not seen milking because they gradually altered and improved the gameplay mechanics of DQ. Each title was also released with a significant period of time between them. However Dragon Quest Yangus is seen as a milking of Dragon Quest 8, because it’s a piss poor title that only tries to sell itself off the name of DQ8, as well as released and developed rather quickly on the heels of DQ8.
However on the whole, milking is a perception: what I might call a milked title, someone else might not. So can the FF7 thing be milking? Sure. Just like Street Fighter Alpha incarnations can be seen as milking by CAPCOM, and the endless Mario and Pokemon franchise is seen as milking by Nintendo.
However the term itself refers more to cash cow. Perfect example of this is The SIMS 2.
By definition, the Final Fantasy 7 spinoffs are not cash cows, because each of them required Square-Enix to invest massive funds in their individual development. FF7 for the PS1 and the Advent Children movie might have the same background setting, but the two have nothing in common with the production process. However in the case of the aforementioned The SIMS 2: some expansions (the Stuff Packs specifically) merely build on the core ground work that the original game created. Thus the time and money needed to develop the expansion, is greatly reduced in comparison: that’s cash cowing. Another example of this would be Guilty Gear XX and a butt ton of the Neo-Geo fighters.
So FF7 is not guilty of cash cowing… but it still allows it to be guilty of milking. Crazy world, no? :lol:
i partly agree. in my opinion, the street fighter games are hugely milking. like street fighter, street fight alpha, street fighter turbo and things like that. that’s almost as ridiculous as them trying to replace ken with dan. but as to pokemon and mario, other than the pokemon dungeon games (which i don’t know much about so my opinion is a lil flawed), those games aren’t milked at all. mario sure as heck isn’t. i know there’s games like mario basketball, mario party and mario kart etc, most of those games have a lot of work put into them and are very good. so they aren’t JUST using the mario name to get cash, which would be milking. as long as the game has had some work put into it, any effort at all, i don’t see it as a cash cow. whereas something like madden is definately. that game never has any new elements, just roster changes.
I’ve already posted a few times in the past about wanting to see Otome games released here, but doesn’t hurt to post some more! I’m glad to see there’s still interest. I don’t like yaoi as much but I still got Enzai and Zettai. It’s just, after playing Yo-Jin-Bo and other games I felt really spoiled, haha. So I definitely like that kind of game more.
Also, here’s something you might be interested in. There’s a translation group working on Princess Nightmare, an Otome game that Hirameki was rumoured to be mulling over before they bowed out.
First off, 99% of realistic sports games are milking mostly because they just have roster changes and maybe slightly better graphics or slightly better gameplay (although the latter often is not the case). Occasionally, usually when a new system comes out or when they think they’re hitting a slump, a realistic-based sports game comes out that could said to be not milking.
As for Mario and pokemon, most of the games are milking (though SMB2 could said to be). However Mario (the persona) and Pikachu could be considered to be milked, or the more wildely used more derogatory name is whored. Cloud from FF7 was moderately used this way to sell Final Fantasy Tactics (and yes he was put in there just to sell the game to all those fanboys). The difference between that an a Cameo appearance, like Lucca in Xenogears, is that the character is purposefully used with the intent to increase sales.
And yes, none of the stuff made around FF7 is cash-cowing. They all have tremdeous budgets, but the games are all sub-par and rely on FF7 lore to play. Advent Children, the movie, cannot even stand on its own without this knowledge. The games atleast try to throw a bone to independant standing, but that’s it.
The difference between them as say the .hack/G.U. series is that the games advance plot and add stuff to the gameplay of the original. While like the FF game it does rely on the lore from the original, it does not alter gameplay style (which FE Derge of Serberus did massively) and rather builds upon the blocks of the previous one to continue telling a story and does not nessarily rely on centering around one character (other than the main character you play throughout the game).
Basically the games are equivalent to Dragon Quest: Yangus in their underlying purpose, but with higher budget.
crisis core is easily a stand alone game. but that’s just one example >_> i don’t like the term “cash cow” or “milking” because it’s so negative. when like i’ve been saying, if the game is good, it doesn’t need a negative label like that.
My main point in starting this thread, was to point out that currently, there are all types of games out there. Rapefests, Yaoi for those who like that, and the standard ero game. It would be nice if there was a game played from the female perspective, where your character is frankly not repeatedly raped. Essentially, an Otome game. Just one would be enough to test the waters so to speak. Once its done, anyone who is interested, or who might be, will then buy it, and you can gauge a bit more effectively whether or not to do a second.