Nandemonai

HEY! Get out of here!! Wimmin ain't allowed here during club meetings!!!
We're talking about dating dudes here!

 
On the subject at hand, I haven't played any Otomes yet because I got turned off by how much of a lame dame the protag in Yo Jin Bo was and I'm not used to playing vns on a vita(even though I have one) I do want to start eventually though

I've heard that "神ゲー" translates directly to "games that I really like and I'm going to shill for every opportunity I get".
At least, it's the only definition that matters.

Worry not, after you meet @VirginSmasher you will soon be free of your virginity. Report to Canada within 24 days, use the code-word "cuckJOP" when ordering your ticket so we can track you. Thank you for flying VirginSmasher airlines!

Is there actual evidence for this? If there is, please link the source. Otherwise, it's just a baseless accusation.
But yeah, Sony is definitely going too far with this. It is just borderline absurd, and it makes even their primary competitor Nintendo seem tame by comparison.

Do you think gamers should focus on finishing their pending games before purchasing more games? 

People need to be more hyped up about Nukitashi in here, seriously. I flipped my shit when they told me about the announcement.
Also, I hope all my fellow degenerates are looking forward to Onii-Kiss. I'm editing it.

i love how large parts of the VN fandom generally shits itself with rage any time a company comes in to legally release a a desired VN. 

??
Both Sol Press and NekoNyan have released two titles, and there haven't been many concerns over quality in either one (after the initial Newton demo which was reworked for the complete title).
It is true Sol Press has been delaying Sakura Sakura, but that's because they've had to practically make the engine from scratch (incidentally, they plan to release it around a month from now). They've been upscaling and porting higher resolution sprites into the game. Doddler's tweets on the subject were actually quite fun.
It's strange to think of going to conventions as 'showing off', but I'm willing to bet the main reason NekoNyan doesn't visit conventions is because they're based in Europe.

Doubt it. In every art form there is always a notion that the past was better than the present, but it's my firm belief that this is universally the effect of time making people remember only the better releases and forgetting how much other shit was released at the same time. A classic only becomes a classic because it's stood the test of time. A modern work cannot, by definition, be a classic till it has become old. We only remember the classics of the past and compare them to the broad landscape of the present.

Just to correct a slight (and common) misunderstanding: Steiner did work on Steins;Gate, but the lion's share of the translation was done by Blick Winkel. Also, the JAST release is very heavily edited versus the fan TL, to its benefit, which is in my experience the norm for when fan TLs get picked up for official release. The quality invariably rises because the people involved are more committed to it, and because more resources become available to the project, particularly on the QC and programming side, and often on the editing side. You certainly do see cases where the resulting official release of an acquired fan TL is bad... and in those cases, I tend to think the fan TL itself would likely have been even worse, though perhaps there are exceptions, where the project management of the official release is bungled or where certain licensing restrictions imposed by the Japanese license-holder tie the hands of the people responsible for the official release.

Just change it once

I would assume you are an English monolingual speaker? Correct me if I'm wrong, and I don't mean it as an offense, at all, if anything, I can perfectly relate. Unfortunately my Japanese is still not good enough to comfortably read VNs (nor it'll be any time soon if I don't get my shit together and start to take it seriously ), but I had a similar enough experience given that English is not my first language and there was a time when I couldn't read it fluently. My native languages would be Spanish and French, and for a very long time everything I consumed would be in one of those languages, especially Spanish. The thing is, the few translated VNs available would most of the time be a machine translation from English, which at the same time would usually be a pretty bad translation from Japanese. Just imagine how terrible that is. Needless to say, since I got my English up to par I completely stopped consuming this shitty translations, and I'm now a happier individual and the world is a better place.
And still, sometimes I replay VNs along with friends that can't speak English, so we download a Spanish patch... and I'm constantly thinking how much better those scenes were just by the way they were worded in English. The style and prose can definitely make or break a good scene. And before you retort that it's just because I've read the English translation first, nope, this goes both ways. I've checked the English translation of stuff I've originally read in Spanish/French and I still think it's way better. 
Either because you truly don't care or you are not yet aware that you do, I obviously won't try to force my view on you. I just wanted to let you know that I'm the farthest from a 'VN elitist' that you could get, and I still very much care for translation quality, as many others do.

No, it's the most under rated thing among the apologists for low quality work
I am convinced that Recettear took off because its localization is one of the best I've ever seen.  There were other, better, quirky Japanese games that could have been the one that opened the floodgates.  Why Recettear?  Because someone at Valve saw the demo and was immediately taken by it.  Well, why did that happen?  Recettear is a low budget game and even its merchant sim mechanics aren't THAT special.
Indeed, Recettear being a smash hit in the West surprised everybody; Japanese sales were so-so.  Why is that?  I'm pretty sure it's because Recettear's localized script is better than the Japanese script.  I haven't actually checked, but I'll bet Recettear in Japanese is a fine script, but nothing spectacular.  The English version, in comparison, cranks everything up to 11 and is a laugh riot.
I've been thinking about this for quite awhile.  When I look back at what I consider the best games I've ever played, there is a very high correlation with the best localization work I've ever seen.  Nearly all the best translated RPGs and VNs have really good localization work.  I have a very hard time thinking of any I'd hold up as an example of best-in-class despite having a bad localization.  Because a bad localization kills the script.
Many RPGs that I ultimately wasn't impressed with have bad localizations.  Some are probably just... bad games.  But I'm now convinced many would have ranked much higher had they been translated by competent folks who knew what they were doing, rather than by inept companies that didn't give a rat's ass.  The Atelier series, for instance, has consistently awful localizations, which - combined with the already-fairly-weak plots - really hurts the games.  I checked out entirely: I quit halfway through Atelier Shallie because I just didn't care, and haven't bothered looking at any released since.  I have it on fairly good authority the Ar Tonelico series is good in Japanese; I couldn't get more than a few hours into either of the ones I tried because the writing was so. awful.
RPGFan makes the point better than I ever could:  Here is a review of the Japanese PSP version of Legend of Heroes: Prophecy of the Moonlight Witch.  And here, of the English version.
Notice how every aspect of the game scored lower?  That's not only because it's a different reviewer.  That's because a good story does more than just hold your interest during the story segments.  It doesn't make the whole game better, but it makes it feel better.  It subconsciously makes people more willing to overlook flaws in the game as a whole.  People recognize this effect for graphics; they call it bling.  But they don't seem to acknowledge it's true for the text, as well.
Bad localizations destroy games.  They do it so effectively people don't even understand what happened, just that 'they didn't like the game'.  They think 'that game sucked' when the real problem was 'that game was translated by a company that cares so little that when one of its employees thought it would be funny to change a character's name to Esty Dee, they just left it in the game'.

No, it's the most under rated thing among the apologists for low quality work
I am convinced that Recettear took off because its localization is one of the best I've ever seen.  There were other, better, quirky Japanese games that could have been the one that opened the floodgates.  Why Recettear?  Because someone at Valve saw the demo and was immediately taken by it.  Well, why did that happen?  Recettear is a low budget game and even its merchant sim mechanics aren't THAT special.
Indeed, Recettear being a smash hit in the West surprised everybody; Japanese sales were so-so.  Why is that?  I'm pretty sure it's because Recettear's localized script is better than the Japanese script.  I haven't actually checked, but I'll bet Recettear in Japanese is a fine script, but nothing spectacular.  The English version, in comparison, cranks everything up to 11 and is a laugh riot.
I've been thinking about this for quite awhile.  When I look back at what I consider the best games I've ever played, there is a very high correlation with the best localization work I've ever seen.  Nearly all the best translated RPGs and VNs have really good localization work.  I have a very hard time thinking of any I'd hold up as an example of best-in-class despite having a bad localization.  Because a bad localization kills the script.
Many RPGs that I ultimately wasn't impressed with have bad localizations.  Some are probably just... bad games.  But I'm now convinced many would have ranked much higher had they been translated by competent folks who knew what they were doing, rather than by inept companies that didn't give a rat's ass.  The Atelier series, for instance, has consistently awful localizations, which - combined with the already-fairly-weak plots - really hurts the games.  I checked out entirely: I quit halfway through Atelier Shallie because I just didn't care, and haven't bothered looking at any released since.  I have it on fairly good authority the Ar Tonelico series is good in Japanese; I couldn't get more than a few hours into either of the ones I tried because the writing was so. awful.
RPGFan makes the point better than I ever could:  Here is a review of the Japanese PSP version of Legend of Heroes: Prophecy of the Moonlight Witch.  And here, of the English version.
Notice how every aspect of the game scored lower?  That's not only because it's a different reviewer.  That's because a good story does more than just hold your interest during the story segments.  It doesn't make the whole game better, but it makes it feel better.  It subconsciously makes people more willing to overlook flaws in the game as a whole.  People recognize this effect for graphics; they call it bling.  But they don't seem to acknowledge it's true for the text, as well.
Bad localizations destroy games.  They do it so effectively people don't even understand what happened, just that 'they didn't like the game'.  They think 'that game sucked' when the real problem was 'that game was translated by a company that cares so little that when one of its employees thought it would be funny to change a character's name to Esty Dee, they just left it in the game'.

No, it's the most under rated thing among the apologists for low quality work
I am convinced that Recettear took off because its localization is one of the best I've ever seen.  There were other, better, quirky Japanese games that could have been the one that opened the floodgates.  Why Recettear?  Because someone at Valve saw the demo and was immediately taken by it.  Well, why did that happen?  Recettear is a low budget game and even its merchant sim mechanics aren't THAT special.
Indeed, Recettear being a smash hit in the West surprised everybody; Japanese sales were so-so.  Why is that?  I'm pretty sure it's because Recettear's localized script is better than the Japanese script.  I haven't actually checked, but I'll bet Recettear in Japanese is a fine script, but nothing spectacular.  The English version, in comparison, cranks everything up to 11 and is a laugh riot.
I've been thinking about this for quite awhile.  When I look back at what I consider the best games I've ever played, there is a very high correlation with the best localization work I've ever seen.  Nearly all the best translated RPGs and VNs have really good localization work.  I have a very hard time thinking of any I'd hold up as an example of best-in-class despite having a bad localization.  Because a bad localization kills the script.
Many RPGs that I ultimately wasn't impressed with have bad localizations.  Some are probably just... bad games.  But I'm now convinced many would have ranked much higher had they been translated by competent folks who knew what they were doing, rather than by inept companies that didn't give a rat's ass.  The Atelier series, for instance, has consistently awful localizations, which - combined with the already-fairly-weak plots - really hurts the games.  I checked out entirely: I quit halfway through Atelier Shallie because I just didn't care, and haven't bothered looking at any released since.  I have it on fairly good authority the Ar Tonelico series is good in Japanese; I couldn't get more than a few hours into either of the ones I tried because the writing was so. awful.
RPGFan makes the point better than I ever could:  Here is a review of the Japanese PSP version of Legend of Heroes: Prophecy of the Moonlight Witch.  And here, of the English version.
Notice how every aspect of the game scored lower?  That's not only because it's a different reviewer.  That's because a good story does more than just hold your interest during the story segments.  It doesn't make the whole game better, but it makes it feel better.  It subconsciously makes people more willing to overlook flaws in the game as a whole.  People recognize this effect for graphics; they call it bling.  But they don't seem to acknowledge it's true for the text, as well.
Bad localizations destroy games.  They do it so effectively people don't even understand what happened, just that 'they didn't like the game'.  They think 'that game sucked' when the real problem was 'that game was translated by a company that cares so little that when one of its employees thought it would be funny to change a character's name to Esty Dee, they just left it in the game'.

No, it's the most under rated thing among the apologists for low quality work
I am convinced that Recettear took off because its localization is one of the best I've ever seen.  There were other, better, quirky Japanese games that could have been the one that opened the floodgates.  Why Recettear?  Because someone at Valve saw the demo and was immediately taken by it.  Well, why did that happen?  Recettear is a low budget game and even its merchant sim mechanics aren't THAT special.
Indeed, Recettear being a smash hit in the West surprised everybody; Japanese sales were so-so.  Why is that?  I'm pretty sure it's because Recettear's localized script is better than the Japanese script.  I haven't actually checked, but I'll bet Recettear in Japanese is a fine script, but nothing spectacular.  The English version, in comparison, cranks everything up to 11 and is a laugh riot.
I've been thinking about this for quite awhile.  When I look back at what I consider the best games I've ever played, there is a very high correlation with the best localization work I've ever seen.  Nearly all the best translated RPGs and VNs have really good localization work.  I have a very hard time thinking of any I'd hold up as an example of best-in-class despite having a bad localization.  Because a bad localization kills the script.
Many RPGs that I ultimately wasn't impressed with have bad localizations.  Some are probably just... bad games.  But I'm now convinced many would have ranked much higher had they been translated by competent folks who knew what they were doing, rather than by inept companies that didn't give a rat's ass.  The Atelier series, for instance, has consistently awful localizations, which - combined with the already-fairly-weak plots - really hurts the games.  I checked out entirely: I quit halfway through Atelier Shallie because I just didn't care, and haven't bothered looking at any released since.  I have it on fairly good authority the Ar Tonelico series is good in Japanese; I couldn't get more than a few hours into either of the ones I tried because the writing was so. awful.
RPGFan makes the point better than I ever could:  Here is a review of the Japanese PSP version of Legend of Heroes: Prophecy of the Moonlight Witch.  And here, of the English version.
Notice how every aspect of the game scored lower?  That's not only because it's a different reviewer.  That's because a good story does more than just hold your interest during the story segments.  It doesn't make the whole game better, but it makes it feel better.  It subconsciously makes people more willing to overlook flaws in the game as a whole.  People recognize this effect for graphics; they call it bling.  But they don't seem to acknowledge it's true for the text, as well.
Bad localizations destroy games.  They do it so effectively people don't even understand what happened, just that 'they didn't like the game'.  They think 'that game sucked' when the real problem was 'that game was translated by a company that cares so little that when one of its employees thought it would be funny to change a character's name to Esty Dee, they just left it in the game'.

No, it's the most under rated thing among the apologists for low quality work
I am convinced that Recettear took off because its localization is one of the best I've ever seen.  There were other, better, quirky Japanese games that could have been the one that opened the floodgates.  Why Recettear?  Because someone at Valve saw the demo and was immediately taken by it.  Well, why did that happen?  Recettear is a low budget game and even its merchant sim mechanics aren't THAT special.
Indeed, Recettear being a smash hit in the West surprised everybody; Japanese sales were so-so.  Why is that?  I'm pretty sure it's because Recettear's localized script is better than the Japanese script.  I haven't actually checked, but I'll bet Recettear in Japanese is a fine script, but nothing spectacular.  The English version, in comparison, cranks everything up to 11 and is a laugh riot.
I've been thinking about this for quite awhile.  When I look back at what I consider the best games I've ever played, there is a very high correlation with the best localization work I've ever seen.  Nearly all the best translated RPGs and VNs have really good localization work.  I have a very hard time thinking of any I'd hold up as an example of best-in-class despite having a bad localization.  Because a bad localization kills the script.
Many RPGs that I ultimately wasn't impressed with have bad localizations.  Some are probably just... bad games.  But I'm now convinced many would have ranked much higher had they been translated by competent folks who knew what they were doing, rather than by inept companies that didn't give a rat's ass.  The Atelier series, for instance, has consistently awful localizations, which - combined with the already-fairly-weak plots - really hurts the games.  I checked out entirely: I quit halfway through Atelier Shallie because I just didn't care, and haven't bothered looking at any released since.  I have it on fairly good authority the Ar Tonelico series is good in Japanese; I couldn't get more than a few hours into either of the ones I tried because the writing was so. awful.
RPGFan makes the point better than I ever could:  Here is a review of the Japanese PSP version of Legend of Heroes: Prophecy of the Moonlight Witch.  And here, of the English version.
Notice how every aspect of the game scored lower?  That's not only because it's a different reviewer.  That's because a good story does more than just hold your interest during the story segments.  It doesn't make the whole game better, but it makes it feel better.  It subconsciously makes people more willing to overlook flaws in the game as a whole.  People recognize this effect for graphics; they call it bling.  But they don't seem to acknowledge it's true for the text, as well.
Bad localizations destroy games.  They do it so effectively people don't even understand what happened, just that 'they didn't like the game'.  They think 'that game sucked' when the real problem was 'that game was translated by a company that cares so little that when one of its employees thought it would be funny to change a character's name to Esty Dee, they just left it in the game'.

No, it's the most under rated thing among the apologists for low quality work
I am convinced that Recettear took off because its localization is one of the best I've ever seen.  There were other, better, quirky Japanese games that could have been the one that opened the floodgates.  Why Recettear?  Because someone at Valve saw the demo and was immediately taken by it.  Well, why did that happen?  Recettear is a low budget game and even its merchant sim mechanics aren't THAT special.
Indeed, Recettear being a smash hit in the West surprised everybody; Japanese sales were so-so.  Why is that?  I'm pretty sure it's because Recettear's localized script is better than the Japanese script.  I haven't actually checked, but I'll bet Recettear in Japanese is a fine script, but nothing spectacular.  The English version, in comparison, cranks everything up to 11 and is a laugh riot.
I've been thinking about this for quite awhile.  When I look back at what I consider the best games I've ever played, there is a very high correlation with the best localization work I've ever seen.  Nearly all the best translated RPGs and VNs have really good localization work.  I have a very hard time thinking of any I'd hold up as an example of best-in-class despite having a bad localization.  Because a bad localization kills the script.
Many RPGs that I ultimately wasn't impressed with have bad localizations.  Some are probably just... bad games.  But I'm now convinced many would have ranked much higher had they been translated by competent folks who knew what they were doing, rather than by inept companies that didn't give a rat's ass.  The Atelier series, for instance, has consistently awful localizations, which - combined with the already-fairly-weak plots - really hurts the games.  I checked out entirely: I quit halfway through Atelier Shallie because I just didn't care, and haven't bothered looking at any released since.  I have it on fairly good authority the Ar Tonelico series is good in Japanese; I couldn't get more than a few hours into either of the ones I tried because the writing was so. awful.
RPGFan makes the point better than I ever could:  Here is a review of the Japanese PSP version of Legend of Heroes: Prophecy of the Moonlight Witch.  And here, of the English version.
Notice how every aspect of the game scored lower?  That's not only because it's a different reviewer.  That's because a good story does more than just hold your interest during the story segments.  It doesn't make the whole game better, but it makes it feel better.  It subconsciously makes people more willing to overlook flaws in the game as a whole.  People recognize this effect for graphics; they call it bling.  But they don't seem to acknowledge it's true for the text, as well.
Bad localizations destroy games.  They do it so effectively people don't even understand what happened, just that 'they didn't like the game'.  They think 'that game sucked' when the real problem was 'that game was translated by a company that cares so little that when one of its employees thought it would be funny to change a character's name to Esty Dee, they just left it in the game'.

Prose, overrated?  It's only the main point, and almost all of the content - it rather hope it'd be important!  Even ignoring the fact that "subtle details" are often fairly important (mysteries, anyone?), the straightforward text itself can save or ruin a story.
 
To give an example, would you enjoy reading a VN full of this:
That's the beginning of The Eye of Argon, one of the most legendary (-ily bad) books ever written.  Here's a fisking of Chapter 1.  Imagine reading a 60 hour VN of this.
 
Prose - the quality of the writing - matters.  A lot.  I guarantee you I can take a scene from your favorite game and ruin it, while still translating it 100% accurately.

I mean, that's a bunch of content at the beginning of the game with a pretty crappy enough translation that they had to replace the person doing it with someone good. I'm looking forward to this game, and I'm going to be annoyed if the intro, UI, etc., are all badly translated.

Pulltop did release one game under Jast USA.  They're a brand of Will, which for years was one of basically two brands Jast had access to, when they rebranded as Peach Princess.
Quick ancient history lession: Jast was a Japanese h-game maker.  Jast USA translated a bunch of their titles into English.  Then the founder got cancer or had a heart attack or something.  He died, company folded.  Jast USA wasn't sure what to do; it found new partnerships with Crowd and Will and rebranded itself Peach Princess.  Eventually Peter Payne decided Jast USA was the more well-known name and re-orged under it.
Well, Pulltop being a Will title, Jast USA released one of their games: Princess Waltz, in late 2008.  They never released any of Pulltop's other titles, and 5 years later Pulltop decided to launch Moenovel.  I think it is fairly safe to say that Pulltop probably wasn't impressed with Jast USA and is unlikely to work with them again.  Their experience with IMHHW probably 'taught' them that going it alone is a 'much better' way to go, since it sold a LOT more than any numbers Jast could have put up in 2008.

I don't think it's that toxic here on Fuwa compared to elsewhere. I have seen statements like "ïf you  aren't able to read the VN the way you are intended to read it, you have no business reading VNs" (essentially banning all translations). "VNs should all be rewritten to adapt into American culture because people don't get Japanese culture. Also non-Americans shouldn't read VNs if they can't accept American culture everywhere". "Doki should be banned from releasing anime subs. They use British English, which is unacceptable".
 
Fuwa bashing tend to be based closer to facts in the translations and generally more reasonable. If you release something, which breaks immersion and general readability, you essentially ruin the VN. People rightfully get upset when they pay for what should be a masterpiece and it's worse than just garbage: not only isn't it enjoyable, it spoils reading the VN in Japanese as well, meaning for a number of VN readers (the people who are most into VNs), reading the translation is much worse than not reading it. If you use a machine translation yourself, you know what you get (or should know). If you pay a human to do a proper job, you want a proper job. That is essentially what the translation bashing on Fuwa is all about.

I agree; toxic attitudes like yours that make people release shit translations definitely need to end.

It's okay if you want to eat crap, but don't go around preaching that it isn't unhealthy.