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Kouryuu (Mangagamer.com)

Kouryuu
Mangagamer.com

Aaeru

Foreword Originally I wrote a nice and neat little intro to Kouryuu and Kouryuu’s interview right here. But I decided to remove all of that and focus on promoting Da Capo II.

Da Capo II is an upcoming release of Mangagamer‘s. The events in Da Capo II takes place roughly 50 years after the first game. If you watched the Anime and got put off by it (The anime was not that good), you should think again. The visual novel is completely different, and completely better.

Probably the most striking feature of Da Capo II is its extreme attention to character design. These are stereotypes (I will not lie). But they are moe-archetypes that have been carved to perfection. That is to say, they were designed specifically for you to like them. Anyone who has played Da Capo II could tell you about the number of times Otome would shout, おとうとくん!(Otouto-kun), in the middle of school, across the hallway, ignoring all the crowds, and it happens every time she spots you. In fact, I don’t think there is ever a single time in the game she doesn’t shout Otouto-kun when she sees you. Because of her infatuation with the protagonist, she disregards all sense of self-image. All she wants to do is to hang out with her little brother, and without exception. She couldn’t give a care for her role as student council president. That is why she is so adorable. That is why this game is so awesome. I don’t think there is a single game in the world that makes you feel more loved than when you play Da Capo II.
<Kouryuu> the game is absolutely gorgeous
<Kouryuu> it does a very good job creating a nice atmosphere


Please look forward to Da Capo II from Mangagamer.com, scheduled for release at the end of the 2010 (I believe).

Interesting Tidbits
None

Kouryuu Contact Details

http://www.mangagamer.com/

http://twitter.com/MangaGamer
Look for kouryuu on IRC
irc://irc.synirc.net/mangagamer
OR use the forums http://mangagamer.site11.com/

The Interview

Kouryuu

<Aaerul> Question 1.
<Aaerul> Following the 2000 sales or no voice incident with Koihime, the general mood of our community is mostly ‘gloom and doom’. Should fans of Mangagamer be worried? What is your personal opinion?

<Kouryuu> Yeah, the way MangaGamer works and is a bit unique. Or perhaps one could say a bit Japanese?
<Kouryuu> I don’t see it going away anytime soon.
<Kouryuu> On the contrary, we have new groups and people joining us in the near future, so I’d say there’s no reason to worry about us disappearing.
<Kouryuu> Though, it is admittedly a little irritating to hear 2,000 copies be considered an ‘unreasonably high benchmark’.
<Kouryuu> There’s nothing unreasonable about it: that’s the minimum for Nexton to break even if they were to include the voices.


Could Mangagamer benefit from more sex, rather than less sex in their image?
<Kouryuu> Hrmm, more sex or less sex. That’s a tough question indeed.
<Kouryuu> Currently our games seem to be reaching the pre-existing visual novel scene right now–the same one all the fan translators are involved in–and so our ‘less sex’ story titles have been faring better
<Kouryuu> and admittedly, without sex we can sell to underaged customers

<Kouryuu> however, going around the conventions that I usually frequent anyways, I’ve noticed there are a few different types of buyers
<Kouryuu> first there are your anime fans, who want the game because it’s the original game the anime was based off of
<Kouryuu> like the visual novel scene, they want the games for the story
<Kouryuu> for some of them the sex is a minus, for others its a plus, a lot don’t seem to mind too much either way
<Aaerul> ok
<Kouryuu> the only time having sex in the games seems to really hurt when trying to sell to those in that group is…well, when they’re underaged, lol
<Kouryuu> that group also has another problem though–they only want games with name recognition.
<Kouryuu> They want Higurashi, Shuffle, Fate Stay
<Kouryuu> big titles they can recognize from anime, or from companies who made those games
<Kouryuu> like, a lot of the members in this crowd who ask us for 俺達には翼はない (Oretachi ni Tsubasa wa Nai) don’t necessarily want that specific game
<Kouryuu> they want the next game made by the people who made Shuffle
<Aaerul> but oretachi IS Navel’s next game,
<Kouryuu> exactly.
<Kouryuu> but they know nothing about oretachi other than it’s Navel’s
<Kouryuu> and that’s all that matters to them
<Kouryuu> they come asking us for the game, knowing only the title and that Navel made it
<Kouryuu> that’s their motivation for asking for it


<Kouryuu> Because on the other side, you have the group of people who want their sex, lol.
<Kouryuu> They want the game for the porn.

<Kouryuu> Sure, they may want more than just porn… but without the porn they’re not really interested
<Kouryuu> the ‘bishoujo game’ as porn or ‘hentai game’ is firmly in many people’s minds already dude to their history in the states
<Kouryuu> heck, enough so that those terms made their way into the jargon used by fans
<Kouryuu> These are the people who wants games like ‘Suck my dick or die’ ‘Cosplay Alien’ and ‘My Classmate is a Sex Slave’
<Kouryuu> they want to be able to drop their $20-30 and get a few satisfying nights
<Kouryuu> and these kind of people tend to buy quite a bit of it–but they rarely go out of their way for it
<Kouryuu> like, they’ll pick it up at conventions, or anywhere else where they can impulse buy a title that looks okay
<Kouryuu> but they rarely go and actually seek them out
<Aaerul> that’s a bit of a problem.
<Kouryuu> which is why I would say our sales of those games are lower than JASTs
<Kouryuu> though we are working towards solving the issue of reaching them, but that will have to wait until a later time.

<Kouryuu> The real problem, lies with games that don’t fall into either category
<Kouryuu> like Kira Kira
<Kouryuu> Games that have no anime, and thereby no name-recognition, but are not sex-driven either
<Kouryuu> With our sales at Otakon, I noticed it was still very possible to sell Kira Kira to the anime group
<Kouryuu> but it required a great deal of getting them to actually stop, show interest, listen to me actually talk about the game, and I even used other anime with more name-recognition in comparission
<Kouryuu> to finally get them to move
<Kouryuu> We still managed to move a lot for one convention, but it took that extra effort for nearly every one.
<Kouryuu> where as mentioning Higurashi was pretty much enough to get that to move if the person recognized it


<Aaerul> and do you see the majority of mangagamer’s potential customers from the anime market?
<Kouryuu> yes and no
<Kouryuu> just as we have games that target the two different groups, I feel the difference should be able to cover itself.
<Kouryuu> like, the potentials anime group who wouldn’t buy the sex games, is probably easily covered by the potentials in the hentai game group who would
<Kouryuu> and vice versa
<Kouryuu> We do need to move more towards getting our company recognized by both groups though

<Aaerul> and where does mangagamer’s advertising budget go towards?
<Kouryuu> in short we need to do more advertising, but I’ll explain.
<Kouryuu> Basically, around the time our ads with Sankaku and so forth stopped, is when we started discussing advertising
<Kouryuu> and as you may or may not know, our reputation back then was not the greatest one around, because of the rather lackluster translations for some releases
<Kouryuu> which is why I, and one of our other staff advocated for the redirection of the advertising budget for a while.
<Kouryuu> It was thanks to this that our games like Koihime Musou, Guilty the Sin, Edelweiss, and 4 others which haven’t been announced were able to get the translation checks they needed to bring the quality back up
<Kouryuu> I know for Koihime, the work ended up being far more than I thought when I accepted the job, so I really hope people will enjoy and appreciate the effort we put into getting that presentable
<Kouryuu> and my reason behind redirecting the advertising at the time was rather simple:
<Kouryuu> advertising our company while lackluster translations were being released would only spread a bad image
<Kouryuu> something I most certainly didn’t want, and that they agreed with

<Aaerul> so mangagamer’s ads are back in full force now
<Kouryuu> Well, not in full force yet, but we are shifting back into advertising now.
<Kouryuu> We have a couple magazine advertisements lined up, and another part of the advertising budget was redirected into developing an affiliates system.
<Aaerul> affilliates system?
<Kouryuu> well, a general system like you see Amazon or Play Asia using
<Kouryuu> where any user can host our ad on their site, and they’ll get a cut of the sales it brings in return for promoting us
<Kouryuu> We’re hoping to have it up within the next month, but its been hit with delays before
<Kouryuu> I do hope anyone with a site who wants to help spread the word about us, will considering participating when it’s up.


<Aaerul> I might be one of a dying example of fan translators who work to bring in more fans so that a market for these games can flourish. Why do you think our attitudes have shifted so much since the days of VHS fansubbing?
<Kouryuu> two words, the internet
<Kouryuu> or to be more precise, high-speed internet capable of sending GBs of data within a few
<Kouryuu> back before the internet, or even during the days of unstable 56k dial up, getting a publisher to localize was important
<Kouryuu> because the only other way to get it, was to import it and wait for it to ship
<Kouryuu> yet at the same time importing sites rarely existed because there was no internet form which to place an order
<Kouryuu> so you had to have a friend, or a friend of a friend, who made the trek foryou

<Kouryuu> and this was the case for just about anything
<Kouryuu> be it anime, games, visual novels
<Kouryuu> if it wasn’t localized by an american company, obtaining it was HARD
<Kouryuu> and involved plane flights
<Kouryuu> Even with VHS fansubs
<Kouryuu> someone generally had to go to Japan to record or buy the original ‘master tape’
<Kouryuu> which would then be recorded to a ‘pressing tape’ which was then used for mass recording of tapes that would be distributed
<Kouryuu> and of course, the recording process generally took as long as the tape ran just to press one copy for distro
<Kouryuu> so fansubs required at least 9 hours of recording, and a plane flight in addition to the standard time for translating, editing and so on
<Kouryuu> for 6 episodes
<Kouryuu> and the reason behind the whole ‘master tape’ ‘pressing tape’ system was because the VHSs would frequently degrade the more they were used to record
<Kouryuu> so having a company legitimately release a series was a BIG deal
<Aaerul> and you feel that fans have lost that respect now. they do not understand nor appreciate what publishers do.
<Kouryuu> exactly, because with high-speed internet it becomes irrelevant to them.
<Kouryuu> ‘Why should I have to wait?’ becomes the call when they don’t realize the amount of time and effort it takes publishers to negotiate rights, arrange the deals and get everything set to go
<Kouryuu> and then after they’ve seen or played it ‘Why should I pay when I already have it?’ becomes the next call

<Aaerul> I don’t feel that fans of visual novels are spoilt on selection. Translated visual novels are still quite a rarity.
<Kouryuu> Comparitively, they do.
<Kouryuu> In the past two years, the amount of visual novels available through publishers has nearly doubled. So if you include fan-translation patches, it’s nearly tripled
<Kouryuu> and that’s compared to the 10 years prior
<Kouryuu> the output rate certainly skyrocketed

<Aaerul> and so you feel that the general snobbery of fan translators is just a flow-on from fans who are used to getting everything and getting it easy.
<Kouryuu> I’d say the types of fan-translators easily vary just as much. I wouldn’t call all of them snobby at all.
<Kouryuu> I’m sure a lot of the older ones are spread between feeling jaded and being very happy.
<Kouryuu> I know I’ve been very happy to see the community grow and see releases expand the way they have
<Kouryuu> with the advent of high-speed internet, the distribution of games is very fast, and very easy
<Kouryuu> but I also feel jaded at how many refuse to support the publishers now a days as well


<Kouryuu> they’re of the opinion that ‘I’ll always have anime cuz someone else is paying for it’ or ‘I’ll always have anime cuz fansubs of the japanese runs will continue even if the american company dies’

<Kouryuu> and the same goes for visual novels


<Kouryuu> a lot of ‘fans’ are starting to really take for granted the existence of fan-translators

<Kouryuu> I say ‘fans’ in quotes to differentiate them from real fans
<Kouryuu> it’s the typical play of ‘why should I support Jast or MangaGamer, when with so-and-so’s fan-translation patch, I can just have the game for free?’

<Aaerul> and so do you believe that fan translations and commercial businesses like mangagamer can co-exist in this industry?
<Kouryuu> yes, I do. Or at least I would like to.
<Kouryuu> Namely, because the Japanese eroge market is currently saturated
<Kouryuu> so it *is* impossible for legitimate publishers to release everything and it’s sister
<Kouryuu> I think there’s plenty of options for ways in which we can coexist
<Kouryuu> for example, I’ve done some work in the past for a fansubbing group called ‘Anime-Classic’ (though I haven’t had any time away from work lately to work on any for them)
<Kouryuu> the basic idea behind anime classic is the transation of anime released prior to 1990
<Kouryuu> Simply put, anime that’s very old–old enough to the point the legitimate publishers no longer consider it an option
<Kouryuu> I think this is possible with fan-translations of visual novels as well.
<Kouryuu> I would be rather shocked if we or JAST ever released another visual novel that was on the PC-98


What would you license for mangagamer if you had unlimited licensing power?
<Kouryuu> Well, my instictive response would be Type-Moon,
<Kouryuu> but that’s extremely difficult now that the fan-translations are so prevelant for them.
<Aaerul> what about KEY stuff?
<Kouryuu> from my experience, companies generally want a say in which of their games is localized.
<Kouryuu> so for example, I suspect Type Moon would want to start with Fate/Stay Night before moving on to localizing any other game
<Kouryuu> or that Key would want to start with Kanon
<Kouryuu> and this is where the fan-translation’s double edge deals its blow

Kouryuu> I’m honestly not sure.

Left: Otome, Right: Yume (Da Capo II)

<Aaerul> I am really happy about Mangagamer bringing us Da Capo 2.
<Aaerul> can you say a word to fans of visual novels but perhaps theyre not convinced about buying da capo 2
<Aaerul> why is da capo 2 worth playing for these people?

<Kouryuu> Well, it’s a little hard for me to say much myself, since I’ve only worked on the opening part
<Kouryuu> this part being the everday-life section before the story brances into the character routes with their individual stories and unique plotlines
<Kouryuu> the game is absolutely gorgeous

<Kouryuu> it does a very good job creating a nice atmosphere
<Kouryuu> The text itself is rather simple for the most part, but then again so was Clannad if I’m not mistaken
<Kouryuu> there’s a wide variety of character sprites in different angles, expressions and such
<Kouryuu> and is put to very good use in the game
<Aaerul> makes the whole thing more immersive

<Kouryuu> Oh, and I guess one more word for fan-translators?
<Kouryuu> I know none of them want to see their work go to waste, but it really is worth it to actually talk to the game company about the game your translating
<Kouryuu> and share options with them.
<Aaerul> big call.
<Kouryuu> I’ve seen a lot of companies who are more than willing to see their games in English
<Kouryuu> they just want it done legitimately
<Kouryuu> the precedents are already falling in place.
<Kouryuu> Overflow is making strides to work with them,
<Kouryuu> Nitro+ is working with them and JAST
<Aaerul> And there is NNL
<Kouryuu> I know people have gotten worked up with all the recent C&Ds
<Kouryuu> but I think a lot of it is that the companies are paying more attention to the western market now
<Kouryuu> and since fan-translations can be a double edged sword when the potential for a legitimate release is there,
<Kouryuu> they don’t want to see the chances ruined
<Aaerul> and that is completely reasonable on their part


<Aaerul> and are you against fan translators who release despite C&D?
<Kouryuu> officialy, I would probably have to say yes.
<Kouryuu> but personally, I’m more concerned about whether or not they took the time and effort to approach the company issuing the C&D prior to doing so
<Kouryuu> if they get a C&D, and then release without even trying to contact the company, inform them of potential opportunities, and work with them
<Kouryuu> then they’re not being very mature.

<Aaerul>but the problem I see is, a lot of these groups do not have good enough japanese to speak to the companies

<Aaerul> theyve only got enough to translate
<Kouryuu> I think they should still try. If they’re not confident enough in their Japanese, show the effort, by writing as best they can, and include their english with it
<Aaerul> interesting
<Aaerul> I suppose it is just as hard for the japanese companies to initiate contact with us
<Kouryuu> exactly.
<Kouryuu> it’s important to show the effort
<Kouryuu> and demonstrate sincerity
<Kouryuu> think of it from their perspective, lol
<Kouryuu> you have a work you spent years on making
<Kouryuu> you have the opportunity to sell it in a new location and make more for the work you’ve done
<Kouryuu> would you want to see that chance go to waste?
<Kouryuu> how offended would you be if the person who was potentially ruining that chance ignored your requests and didn’t bother to even reply
<Kouryuu> or replied angrily at you for telling them to stop
<Aaerul> lol

<Kouryuu> (Also) it seems very few fan-translators care about ‘how one gets the game’ anymore
<Kouryuu> instead of actively promoting the legitimate purchase and import of the game
<Aaerul> yes it’s true
<Kouryuu> I know back in the early days, that was a key element of fan-translation groups.
<Kouryuu> with insani giving detailed directions on how to buy Planetarian
<Kouryuu> or Haleath’s constant reiteration that Kanon should be bought
<Kouryuu> and I do think it would help to have that again.
<Aaerul> actually, they think they are doing a favour to the companies because they feel they are helping out with ‘expanding the userbase’
<Aaerul> albeit extremely questionable.
<Kouryuu> I realize changing this generations opinions on the value of actually purchasing a product is a task as great as that of Atlas, but it has to start somewhere
<Kouryuu> andyeah
<Kouryuu> ‘expanding the userbase’ is no help at all if that ‘userbase’ does not purchase the products
<Aaerul> lol
<Kouryuu> because it’s only once they pay for the product that they actually become part of the userbase
<Aaerul> but we do it in the hopes that 10%. or even 5% become paying customers
<Kouryuu> you won’t even get that 10% turnover if you don’t encourage them to buy
<Kouryuu> or help introduce them to how they can buy it

Thank you Kouryuu for this wonderful 2.5 hour interview. I made massive edits everywhere for the sake of readability. I hope you do not mind.

Tay

I'm the Fuwanovel community admin and a big fan of Visual Novels. The easiest way to get a hold of me is via a PM on the Fuwanovel Forums, by twitter (@ArchmageTay), or by email.

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foopoo
foopoo
13 years ago

I know none of them want to see their work go to waste, but it really is worth it to actually talk to the game company about the game your translating.

If that was the case we would never have ANY fan translations and just
Regular sex romps and crap from JAST.

And for the anime classic thing..
Are you suggesting fan translators translate OLD games?
Because honestly no ones wants to see that.

And for “Well I can get it free if a fan translation exist”
Wut? They only PROVIDE the patch not the game
So its up to the person who download the patch Buy it> Pirate it.

Asceai
Reply to  foopoo
13 years ago

>And for the anime classic thing..
>Are you suggesting fan translators translate OLD games?
>Because honestly no ones wants to see that.

Hear that, guys? Cancel the YU-NO project, nobody wants it!

foopoo
foopoo
13 years ago

And of course I get a wise guy answer excuse me for forgetting Yu-no.

=)

Raide
13 years ago

Sometimes translator just want to simply translate and release patches, not to play salesman by selling the game overseas for the Japanese developer companies. Commercial translation with publishing, marketing, legal stuff/licensing, business and the necessary infrastructure are alien concept to these rogue fan-translators who might already very busy with their education.

Yeah, I assumed they’re young and don’t think too much about getting monies. That’s why they translate without thinking too much about the impact for other parties involved.

I believe it should be publishers like JAST and MangaGamer who need to contact these rogue fan-translators and act as middlemen to help them negotiate business with the Japanese companies. I’m betting they don’t want more competitors in this niche market, so it’s better to recruit them.

AntiAnin
AntiAnin
Reply to  Raide
13 years ago

I actually agree with this idea very strongly. The translations are a mass of unmitigated energy pouring in every which way. Many just don’t care about the business side, they just want to show off a story to the world. It should be the burden of the businessmen to capitalize on their efforts and make it into something that profits the original companies and the localizing company as a whole.

Otherwise it’s just wasted potential.

Anemoscope
Anemoscope
13 years ago

I am just amused that the people who like Shuffle! would like to buy Oretsuba. I mean, that’s like an Anne Rice fan saying he’s going to watch Murnau’s Nosferatu because it’s about a vampire too!

kidlat020
kidlat020
13 years ago

About advertising:

So it’s not because MG don’t want to advertise their games, but because they can’t. It’d be a bad image for them in general if they advertise a game with “Ughh!” translation.

About rouge fan TL’s:

Can’t argue on this one. And I must say the VHS thing was a very nice reference. At least TLwiki is still “advertising” on how to actually buy the game, not just leaving it in thin air.

trackback
13 years ago

[…] 23, 2010 by Choux I was just reading an interview for Kouryuu from Mangagamer, and I have to say that I’m quite curious about the “4 […]

Amoirsp
Amoirsp
13 years ago

I find the Kira Kira point most interesting for the simple fact that it possesses what the VN market should be looking for. However, it’s lower familiarity also makes it harder to try out. That and having Overdrive’s releases possesses the advantages of not only its earlier releases, but also it’s recent releases.

Since Kira Kira is music oriented it’s kind of ironic if one had to mention say k-on to do an anime comparison because the two base works (4koma, that is) both came out in 2007 and using a 2009 anime release to relate to a 2007 release is odd backtracking.

Well I simply think the Overdrive aspect is the most interesting one, as it’s fulfilling a VN definition as itself. This is different than Shuffle or Da Capo, which feels like backtracking, playing the game because of previously enjoying the anime. The anime spawned because people enjoyed the game …. Of course said games had been much more effective in recognizing initially.

Well my point is moot because you can say the same thing about anime/light novel and anime/manga (not sure how correlation between light novel and manga or manga and visual novel do, because manga versions of the novels you likely don’t encounter). I was going to mention filler effects, but really the major difference is the branching.

People who aren’t as aware of VNs will likely know there exists H and perhaps plot, but do they know it’s branching? Or better yet, branching but after the full effect, you get a true cohesion?

When I got into VNs in 2006 I personally thought it was the newness effect of an otherworldly feeling that was appealing. Definitely not off the basis of the anime, initially at least. (Though the reality is the recognition of the anime does lead to the extra preference of playing the original game, such as the case of shuffle.)

I just hope it’s not the anime link that VNs have to run on. If that’s the case, the pool of VNs would get severely narrow.

dork at large
dork at large
13 years ago

Late last year, I realized that my interests were leaning towards translated comics and visual novels, and that I was ready to try paid-download services. So I’ve purchased several of Mangagamer’s products over the last year, and only one J-List game. I enjoyed Edelweiss and Da Capo (slightly more than its anime spinoff). In the meantime, I’ve had a great deal of trouble finding a legit copy of the fan translated version of Galaxy Angel, and I had trouble justifying the cost for an untranslated DS cart of Tokimemo Girl’s Side.

If Mangagamer and JAST continue to release stories and games that appeal to my interests, I’ll be willing to buy them. And I’ll be willing to purchase fan translated games if they appeal to my interests and are reasonably priced/easy to find.

It’s awkward to say this, but I’m starting to prefer VNs/romance games originally written in English. I was really impressed by freeware titles like Daemonophilia, RE: Alistair, and Project Nattsu. And I’ve liked most of indie visual novels that I’ve purchased, especially Summer Session and Spirited Heart. Now don’t get me wrong — Sturgeon’s Law definitely holds true, and ninety percent of OEL VNs are crud. But the same can be said for any genre or media form.

pondrthis
pondrthis
13 years ago

Well, I’ll be sure never to click on a MangaGamer banner anywhere ever, if they get a percent of sales based on their advertising success. I want my money to go to the English language publisher and original creators, not some hentai repository.

Keep up the good work MG, we all love you.

Equa
Equa
13 years ago

The reference to FSN, with its high quality fan-translation, got me thinking about the Anderson v. Stallone case. I wonder if a copyright owner like Typemoon can just gank the fan translation and put it on the market?

skycat
skycat
Reply to  Equa
13 years ago

Even if they were in the clear legally, doing something like that sounds like an excellent way to destroy the meager amount of fan goodwill that is the only reason overseas VN publishers can make any sales at all. People are already unreasonably irritated enough when fan translations go ‘pro’ through amiable negotiations with the translator.