sanahtlig

In most cases I'd rather have mosaics than poor redraws.

So you believe it's alright to profit off another's work (both your own and the developer's), but not to claim it as one's own? That's an interesting twist. I'd argue that the concept of plagiarism is necessarily tied to the concept of intellectual property. But I suppose that's not irrefutable.

Your response is intriguing. Let me add some additional information to the scenario. Upon further investigation, you discover that the version of the game they're selling has been edited. Claiming they translated the game, they've stripped out all credits to the fan translator (you) and have replaced them with their own credit roll. It's quite clear to you however that your translation was used, verbatim. In addition, they sell the game at a hefty profit, well beyond the cost of the media used for distribution. Would this new information change your reaction at all?

My guess is that game OST links to sites like MediaFire would quickly break due to terms violations. Including such files in future game torrents would be a more permanent solution.

I'm rather obsessive-compulsive and have trouble skipping text. If a game has too much fluff dialogue, I'll drop it. That indicates poor writing to me. The closest I typically come to skipping text is skimming very quickly through machine translated gibberish. I'll do this for H-scenes sometimes.

This isn't a gender issue. Although, it's not inconceivable that a perceived attack on a small tightly knit community (such as female VN players in a fandom dominated by males) would provoke a more aggressive response. From my point of view, it's not useful to point fingers at people striving towards the same goal: bringing VNs to English speakers. Your methods may be different, but this goal should be the same. What you may find is that debunking intellectual property and promoting the spread of VNs are two goals that are not always in alignment. At times, you may be forced to choose between the two to promote one at the expense of the other. Luckily, the scope of the intellectual property debate extends far beyond VNs. You can drive that point home in other contexts, and rely on cultural shifts to trickle back down into the VN arena without fighting a 2-front war that'll just dilute your message about VNs. If you're going to take a stand, at least make it a meaningful one. For example, imagine that group released their translation, then a second group made a patch using that translation against the wishes of the first group. Make your stand by hosting that patch on your site--not by throwing ideological abuses at them when the translation effort has barely started. When they protest, that's your cue to justify your position where it actually counts, and where it'll draw broader attention.

Right, the issue is the disrespect for people that don't agree with you. It's not so much your opinions that rile people up. It's the blatant disrespect with which you express them. If you could tone that down you could get your ideas across without angering vast swathes of the community. Sure. Baiting people has its benefits. But you have take the good with the bad--you can't really complain later when people respond to your disrespect with more disrespect. I've been accused of many things, but that one is a first. In any case, the "discussions" you're provoking seem to be of the quarreling and bickering type (like debates between political candidates), not the constructive type.

@Aaeru: I'm curious what your response would be, so let me pose a hypothetical scenario. Suppose you released your finished translation patch, and you found out that the patched game was being sold by pirates in some backwater out of the reach of the law (as we know it). For the sake of argument, let's say that the targeted "audience" had poor or no Internet access (maybe even heavily censored Internet access), and perhaps didn't even realize that the patched game could be obtained for free. How would you feel about this situation?

Aaeru seems to have a public relations issue. I'm not sure what else she expects except a flame war when she openly baits people into arguments like this...

My first VN was a terrible nukige called Love Potion. I went through a few more of these until I happened upon better games like True Love and Season of the Sakura. VNs for me have always been about "story with ero"--something that doesn't otherwise exist in the US. I consume them much like mainstreamers around me consume Danielle Steele novels. The ero draws me in, and the story keeps me playing. For someone who'd always appreciated games with romance options (e.g., Baldur's Gate 2, Star Ocean 2), VNs were a natural progression. That said, with so many more choices I don't typically play nukige these days.

For those living in a country where English isn't your native language: In the age 18-30 crowd (the age group most likely to play VNs), what percentage of people would you say are fluent enough in English to play text games like VNs?

The Interal Service Error caused me to double post in the last thread I posted in.

Also, there's a much longer thread discussing the Family Project changes (created after the previous thread was closed): http://www.jastusa.com/forums/viewtopic.php?f=14&t=6199 The debate is considerably more heated in this thread, and highlights the differences in viewpoint between those that are merely anti-censorship and those that like loli content. The former demand games not be altered; the latter want to minimize loss of loli content. Believe it or not, these viewpoints are not particularly compatible.

The changes JAST made were pretty minor--they just censored 3 HCGs I believe. There's a decensor patch on the net that restores them. Their decision is somewhat justified by the implied theme that Matsuri was too immature for a sexual relationship when the initial scenes happened. More serious than this, in my opinion, was their decision to not localize the 18+ version of Eien no Aselia due to the loli content. Also, School Days doesn't really have loli ero content. From what I can tell, JAST has issues with content that is graphically very loli, or where character attributes or story imply the character is a child. Demonbane and My Girlfriend is the President have pseudo-lolis, and the content wasn't altered. Sumaga has a pretty definite loli, and JAST seems fine with that. I'm annoyed by their obsession with loli content, but for the most part it doesn't seem to have prevented them from bringing over games with loli characters I like. As long as this continues to be true, I won't be terribly upset. JAST operates out of California, so unfortunately they have to pay attention to US law regarding obscenity. There's been a few low profile prosecutions against people possessing loli ero doujinshi and manga, but no convictions (the defendants plead guilty). Therefore it's quite unclear at present whether loli content is prohibited by US law, and exactly what constitutes prohibited loli content.

That's going to create a firestorm. Uh...good luck. But if that's your position then I really don't have much else to say.

Fair enough. But reputation capital is based on "creating good" (tentatively defined in the discussion above as maximizing the number of translated VNs). Feats of effort typically only matter to people if they produce results that people care about (in this case, producing translations of VNs that people want to read). Conversely, feats of effort that run contrary to the public good earn (net) scorn. Thus reputation capital is maximized by translating VNs that people want to read, and avoiding unnecessary conflict (e.g., by not respecting the wishes of creators). Admittedly, from the perspective of the translator reputation capital is only one factor in the equation, although it's an important one. Regarding comparisons to anime fansubbing: In the interests of avoiding a moralistic argument, I'm going to refrain from commenting. Suffice to say, there are important differences between VN fan translation and anime fansubbing, although there are extreme elements on both sides of the intellectual property debate that would argue otherwise.

I'm probably not going to argue this much more because I don't have much more to say (and the reaction has been overwhelmingly hostile). Aaeru is making an ideological argument based on the premise that intellectual property should not exist (try as I might to shift away from that). Arguing that premise philosophically would be like arguing that communism is wrong philosophically. It's futile and impossible to prove either way. We know communism doesn't work because various implementations of it were tried and did not succeed. We have no such experience with freedom from intellectual property (that I know of). Even government-funded academic research utilizes intellectual property (patents). All we know is that shifting to an economy without intellectual property would shake the very foundations of capitalism as we know it. That's not something you want to do unless you're damn sure it's going to work. I'm not convinced. But I admit that I can't logically refute the idea. Also, you need to cool down Aaeru. I'm not sure why you seem to take everything I say as a personal attack. I'm expressing my viewpoints as objectively and nonjudgmentally as I can manage. A valid point. At the moment there's no direct competition. But they've localized the previous two games in the series and they've expressed interest in localizing the third. It's likely Da Capo 3 would be localized in a reasonable amount of time (say, <5 years) in the absence of fan translator involvement. To a large extent, I'm anticipating a problem that hasn't yet arisen, because when it actually happens it'll be too late. The further a fan translation progresses, the more likely the translation group will refuse to comply with a C&D when localization does begin, and the greater the potential loss of effort if the translation group does comply. Of course, that begs the question: why should Mangagamer be given any deference at all? Why should fan translators work around them instead of the other away around? One response to that is that localization choices (the list of VNs a given localization group can choose to localize) are limited, much more limited than fan translation choices. They're limited by licensing issues. They have a limited number companies that are willing to work with them. There's a host of other issues that can prevent localization of specific titles as well. To the argument that the creator's (Circus's) wishes regarding its creations (Da capo 3) are irrelevant and should be ignored: I'm a bit taken aback. But I should point out that the creation of Da capo 3 was funded by a system based on intellectual property. Circus had the expectation at the time of creation that they would be able to exercise property rights in order to achieve a return on their investment (by selling the title in Japan). In teaming up with Mangagamer, they expected to be able to exercise property rights on a modified version of their title to achieve an additional return on their investment (by selling the title outside of Japan). Under the current system, this money funds the creation of additional titles. To suddenly change the rules and say "Sorry, your intellectual property rights are forfeit because I disagree with them and we're better off without them" seems a bit off. Ideals about intellectual property reform should be applied prospectively, not retrospectively. Otherwise the reform would break a fundamental tenet of legal theory. And such reform should be enacted by public agreement, not individuals. Otherwise it's just vigilantism. Also, Fuwanovel doesn't host localized VNs. That IS a tacit acknowledgment of intellectual property rights. Downy expressed my view on this matter. I see little added value in having choice of translation, assuming the original translation isn't terrible. P.S. I hadn't read Aaeru's previous post when I wrote this.

I don't like enforced play order because I'm picky about heroines. But it sort of depends how the story is structured. Is the game about the plot, or the characters / romance? If the former (e.g., FSN), then enforced playing order can be acceptable. If the latter, it's really annoying. And yes, I downloaded a 100% save file for Duel Savior to avoid OP's problem.

We have a university anime club where I live in the US. From what I've gathered, there's a decent number of people that play VNs, but not many that admit to playing VNs. A good strategy to uncover this silent minority is to throw VN references (code-speak) into casual conversation. Those in the know will understand and will migrate into the conversation, while those that don't will simply ignore the references. I post on the NISA forums occasionally using this method. I'm sometimes surprised how many people take the "bait". I also have a real-life friend that I've not only introduced to VNs, but have lured into machine translated Japanese VNs.

Obviously it would be rather arrogant of me to think I alone could change Aaeru's mind. I simply wanted to pose a more nuanced argument from the perspective of someone that shares many of Fuwanovel's stated ideals. It's up to the community here (and Aaeru) if you want to continue to discuss my points. If no one responds to my posts, then I'll have nothing more to say. However, I get the impression that Aaeru actually enjoys such debate; if she didn't, she wouldn't go posting her ideals all over the Internet (and she wouldn't have bothered responding to me).

I should reiterate that the debate over intellectual property is outside the scope of my original argument. However, your view of property is very black and white. What about rentals (e.g., a rented DVD)? Services (e.g., antivirus software)? You don't "own" either of these, and you're not free to do with them as you wish. A rental has to be returned (or in some cases, destroyed). Paid antivirus software requires a subscription. These don't neatly fall into the black and white property categories that you've described. There's also entire industries that would collapse without intellectual property protection, such as drug development (I'm somewhat skeptical that a Kickstarter paradigm would be able to fund research and development of the next anti-cancer drug). And what about unlawfully accessed information (e.g., identity theft)? Don't you have a right to your own personal information (i.e., a right to privacy)? If so, do you have the right to sell it (e.g., data collection for marketing, which funds the Internet as we know it)? If so, do you have the right to sell it for specific uses only (e.g., it can be used for marketing, but not shared with the government in order to spy on you)? There's so many shades of grey that an absolutist argument on property rights ignores or forbids. Competition is inherently wasteful. But yes, you get the best one of two VN translations. The other translation effort is essentially "wasted". Competition can be good or bad; it depends on context as I explained before. I actually never claimed the moral high ground (i.e., claiming that what you're doing is objectively and irrefutably wrong). I specifically stated this in an earlier post in this thread, but that post mysteriously disappeared. You are indeed free to do as you wish so long as no one takes you to court. But it seemed to me like your decision to translate Da Capo 3 (and host Fuwanovel) was fundamentally based on promoting VNs in the best and most efficient way possible, not simply doing it because you could. Forgive me if I was mistaken. (Also, it's rather uncalled for to misrepresent my argument in order to criticize my motives. That's in rather poor taste.) Against the "I'm doing it because I want to" argument, I pose this question. I'm sitting in a small room with 10 other people at work. I start humming, which irritates some of the others in the room. 5 of them ask me to stop. 3 don't care. 1 asks me to continue. Should I keep humming? Humming is not illegal. It's not even wrong. But I'll probably stop because I want to be courteous to those around me. In some ways, this analogy is similar to the current situation with Da capo 3. Are you morally obligated to cease your translation if Circus / Mangagamer were to ask you to stop? Maybe not. Would it be rather rude to not comply? I think so. Would continuing to hum / translate cause unnecessary strife within the office / VN community? I think so. I could argue this point further, but you rejected the idea that fan translation should seek to maximize the number of translated VNs (which promotes the spread of VNs and creates new fans). As that was the foundation of the argument you're responding to here, that essentially kills this line of discussion.

What you bought is actually a limited-use license, which does not include the right to modify the game. But that's outside the scope of my argument. I'm more concerned with "creating the most good" than technicalities. This argument only applies if saturation has been reached--if all the worthwhile titles are already being translated. This may be the case in the anime market, but it isn't true in the VN market. Think about it. Group A and group B want to independently translate a VN. They have 10,000 VNs to choose from. Obviously more VNs get translated if they work on different VNs. Working on the same VN independently would mean only 1 VN gets translated. It's unlikely competition in this instance is to the readers' benefit. VN fan translators generally try to avoid competing with each other for this very reason, even though there is no "establishment" preventing them from doing so. I agree with your stated intent, but I don't see how competing with localization groups expands the audience when there's so many untranslated VNs to choose from.

I would tend to agree that if Mangagamer has interest in this title (which it does), then Aaeru should consider backing off. Like it or not, Circus has chosen Mangagamer as their overseas distributor. Unless permission is obtained from Circus to do a fan translation, their choice should be respected. There's so many great VNs out there that have almost 0 chance of being translated. There's really no need to "compete" with Mangagamer. On top of that, fan translators competing with licensed translators tends to anger the original developers, who then become less willing to work with the licensed translators. All that does is damage the likelihood of seeing more titles from that developer localized. Now if Circus completely refused to allow any translations of its works at all, that would be a different matter. I don't have much respect for intellectual property hoarding.

Thanks for reposting the missing Windows 8 post. "Click-less" browsing seems great in theory...but your posts are ordered on separate pages, which means we have to click anyway--and the more posts you can fit on a page, the less pages you need = less clicks required. Another problem with the current format is that you have many posts that are really long and have many images. This increases page load times. Assigning a fixed amount of space to each post on the front page also makes it easier to locate posts / topics of interest, similar to how a table of contents functions. Finally, I think most people would rather click than scroll--and scrolling is harder mechanically on the hand (I'm more aware of this than most due to my bouts with wrist / tendon problems). There's a lot of advantages to condensing posts for display on front pages--which is why most of the Web does it. The current layout is optimized for reading from "front to cover"--but that's not how most people consume blogs. Most people want to sift through and read a few particular posts. I'm a fan of the previous layout as it was on Wordpress (which included condensed post display). But if you're still not convinced, try polling your users.

Hello, I've been lurking around Aaeru's blog for a while now, and I thought I'd come out of the shadows to comment on the recent changes. I was looking around for Aaeru's useful post about VN compatibility with Windows 8, and after a while of failed searching realized that the old blog had disappeared into the void of Wordpress. My difficulty finding the post I was searching for points to one of two problems: either the post is gone (recovery failed), or it's just unexpectedly hard to find using the new layout / search functions. I also wanted to provide some constructive criticism on the new blog layout. I hate it. Just kidding. But seriously, the blog is really tough to browse in its current state. A blog is a database. While it should ideally be attractive, more importantly essential features need to be prominently located, and browsing posts should be quick and efficient. The search bar should be at the top of the page, not the bottom. Consecutive posts should be abbreviated by default to headlines or small blurbs (which are clicked on to see the full post); this conserves spatial real estate. These are the problems that jump out at me right now. Going beyond basic functionality, a tag system and word cloud would be nice.