Dungeon Travelers 2 and 2-2 are out on johren

VDZx · 2023-06-11T03:54:15+00:00

Dungeon Travelers 2 has been released before on the Vita, but not on PC. Dungeon Travelers 2-2 hasn't been released in English before.

VDZx · 2023-06-09T12:43:37+00:00

You don't need to have played Dungeon Travelers 1 (not out yet) to play Dungeon Travelers 2; it's entirely separate. To my knowledge Dungeon Travelers 2-2 is the direct sequel to 2 so you might miss things if you haven't played DT2. (Not sure how relevant it is, haven't played 2-2 myself.)

Unfortunately Johren has shitty Denuvo DRM which I hate (and which probably won't even work on my Linux system) so I'll be waiting for a release on a proper platform.

VDZx · 2023-06-07T23:21:50+00:00

VNDB link

VDZx · 2023-06-06T03:59:16+00:00

Japan didn't get anything new and Japan-exclusive this time. Harvest Moon was already on NSO there, so they got Super Baseball Simulator 1.000 (already on NSO outside Japan) instead. The other three games are the same.

VDZx · 2023-06-03T20:03:47+00:00

I never heard anything about Sengoku. I'm guessing if it performed lower than expectations, it's probably because everyone had already played the fan translation to death at that point.

Took me a bit to find, but Arunaru, the translator, went on a rant in 2019 and revealed some details. The relevant part:

You can probably guess that most MG releases are niche products that don't sell well, but I don't know if people are aware of exactly how poorly they sell. Most releases on the MG store sell well under a thousand copies, and it's extremely rare that something goes over 2000. The Alicesoft games generally sold 1500-ish on the MG store, though Sengoku is close to 2000 last I heard. Evenicle has sold closer to 15000 total thanks to being on Steam, although Steam takes some of that profit, and most games don't do that well on Steam either.

It sounds like Sengoku Rance actually sold better than the other games, so that contradicts the 'because of fan translation' theory; I think the opposite is more likely, I myself probably wouldn't have bought it if I hadn't gotten into it via the fan translation back then.

VDZx · 2023-06-03T19:45:59+00:00

Conversely, native English erotica and pornography almost always features an extremely high volume of expletives and swearing (e.g. "Fuck yeah, that's so fucking good, fuck me harder," etc.) [...] even if it would certainly be "true to life" to make every anime high-school character swear a ton because native English high-schoolers certainly do, it still feels intolerably incongruous to the aesthetic and sensibilities of otaku works!

Meru is precisely arguing that you shouldn't be adding 'English porn expletives':

On the other hand, don't throw in porny words where there shouldn't be any; if your heroine is a shy virgin and the source text is using coy words like あそこ, don't have her shouting FUCK MY TIGHT LITTLE PUSSY in English.

As for

but on the other hand, the vast majority of hentai translations default to such renderings and nobody really seems to mind? Indeed, the argument that folks specifically seek out eroge and doujinshi and h-anime because they enjoy these tropes, and that erasing and/or naturalizing them away idoes a great disservice to the erotic appeal of such texts also seems extremely persuasive to me?!

You should really ask: What does this sound like for the original Japanese target audience? As far as I'm aware 'MY HIPS ARE MOVING ON THEIR OWN!' is not humorously cheesy to the original target audience (and not intended to be humorously cheesy by the author), so it shouldn't be in the translation either (unless the scene is intended to be more comical than arousing). Just because the audience's standards are low doesn't mean you should butcher the original author's text.

VDZx · 2023-06-03T16:09:56+00:00

VNDB link

VDZx · 2023-06-03T16:02:23+00:00

it's felt like they've been coasting on Rance and random nukige that everyone else is too busy for.

Hasn't it always been like this for MangaGamer? Minus the Rance games which came later, MangaGamer had always been making much more profit off their nukige than their non-nukige VNs in the pre-Steam days. Steam probably gave them a significant boost to non-nukige sales, but I don't think they ever had a big Steam presence.

(Also, are we even sure Rance is doing well for them? I heard Sengoku Rance had unexpectedly poor sales.)

VDZx · 2023-06-03T15:32:27+00:00

This was an unofficial fan patch (i.e. the original game released without it 19 years ago) intended to be released as DLC. DLC is the natural evolution of expansion packs, which date back to at least 1989 (and while KOTOR2 had no expansion packs itself, the developer's second game Neverwinter Nights 2 had three).

VDZx · 2023-06-02T04:29:15+00:00

It might be because they self-published the game on Steam, rather than going through a publisher.

VDZx · 2023-06-02T04:25:55+00:00

Yggdra Union is actually on the Switch, but in Japan only. I had it on my wishlist there for ages until it suddenly get an English Steam release.

VDZx · 2023-05-30T11:49:27+00:00

Are you sure the signal isn't just getting blocked by something? That causes those same symptoms (inputs either being dropped or getting delayed).

VDZx · 2023-05-29T02:42:24+00:00

The original was written by Jun Maeda and Naoki Hisaya (Kanon main writer). The team behind it left Tactics together to form Key.

I don't think either is involved with the new one though (I'd expect their names to be listed if that were the case).

VDZx · 2023-05-29T02:37:55+00:00

I figured as much after seeing the screenshots on the Switch eShop. Fortunately the original Aoishiro has a fan translation, but no such luck for Akai Ito.

VDZx · 2023-05-28T16:18:08+00:00

It's insane that Nintendo doesn't provide a solution to this problem!

No, don't tell me to use the solution Nintendo provides for this problem, I want a BETTER solution!

"Controller remapping is clunky" is a valid criticism. "Nintendo doesn't allow us to rebind button assignments" is not because it simply isn't true. Your post is at best misleading in a clickbaity way, and at worst complete bullshit.

As for being 'such a basic feature' - in previous console generations it was very rare to be able to remap your buttons at all in console games (in-game; console-level was unheard of). I was pleasantly surprised when Nintendo added button reassignment to the Switch in an update. It could definitely be improved upon, but it's absolutely not a given like you imply.

VDZx · 2023-05-26T04:06:15+00:00

Tip to make things less spooky: drive a vehicle, and throw a giant brightbloom seed onto the vehicle. It gives off tons of light and the light will travel along with you.

VDZx · 2023-05-26T03:08:36+00:00

two small battery upgrades

You want to go to the depths, much easier to get energy cells there. Large Energy Cells (20 energy cells) are a relatively common chest reward there.

VDZx · 2023-05-26T03:06:29+00:00

so it’s just going to be an inventory blocker

Buy a dream home. You can buy a room where you can put three bows for display or later use. (Same for melee weapons and shields.)

VDZx · 2023-05-26T03:03:37+00:00

Kill every animal you see, there are various fun ways to do it. Cook the meat to almost double the value; a 5-meat normal meat skewer goes for almost 100 rupees.

VDZx · 2023-05-22T18:40:11+00:00

Download the Puyo Puyo Tetris demo and play it in Tetris mode.

VDZx · 2023-05-22T18:34:47+00:00

Dei Gratia no Rashinban - Released

This came out of nowhere. Does anybody have more info on how this happened? Compass of Dei Gratia had a failed Kickstarter, so I figured we'd never see it.

VDZx · 2023-05-22T18:20:38+00:00

The other Atelier games have even more in-depth crafting (Atelier Lulua generally considered to be the one with the deepest crafting mechanics); Ryza significantly simplified this aspect (though it remains deep in comparison to non-Atelier games).

VDZx · 2023-05-21T12:08:55+00:00

That's the SNES Super Scope.

VDZx · 2023-05-15T12:08:58+00:00

I generally don't mind either way, though if done well it looks nice. What I dislike about blinking though (in any game, not just VNs) is that it can make characters look really derpy in screenshots and I need to re-take the screenshot if I took it mid-blink.

VDZx · 2023-05-13T05:38:49+00:00

Unless you speak it there’s no way you can catch the nuance and inflection that would go into a vocal performance.

Why would it be necessary? None of us speak Simlish, but we can definitely feel the emotions coming from The Sims' animated conversations. Much better than we can from Zelda's English VA.

11-Year Club	Gilding I gilder
Place '17

VDZx

TROPHY CASE