Jump to content

Arunaru not working anymore with mangagamer


Cardinal

Recommended Posts

8 minutes ago, kokoro said:

It's kinda funny how former fan-tls want more money even though they used to 'work' for free.

It is funny, but it is a true phenomenon.

If you do something enough, the magic of it will disappear or lessen. And then something else needs to make up for the difference. This is the reason I don't consider cases like this "exploitation", exactly. As fans, people are willing to take on bad deals or volunteer for things. But this spirit will not remain forever. Once the magic is gone, they might end up feeling like they let themselves be exploited, but at the time they did not feel as such.

Regardless, fans that work for free enough will generally start to feel like that isn't enough anymore. Not out of greed or any such thing. It's not the desire for money that increases, it's the will to work hard for their hobby with no recompense that decreases.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

3 hours ago, Plk_Lesiak said:

Like, really? Give me the proof that the global histeria about child porn is a leftist idea.

Examples? Majority of the global IT/internet tech/media businesses operate from the Eastern US, Steam included and they're all currently under the influence of left-wing American activists who aim to pigeonhole people in order to control their speech. In truth, it's not really even as much of an left-wing ideology being the culprit, but social justice narrative that comes with it to scrub all the content deemed as "offensive" and "hurtful" off the internet and it varies from party to party; a trend, that surfaced lately to score points with various groups of people to win them over. Straight from Google's social engineering, Sony's ubiquitous "censorship of the lewds" to certain third wave feminist groups literally attacking everything I and people similar to me hold dear; what these companies do is pander to a fringe minority of complete screwballs, lately going amok to try and restructure the entire world to fit their viewpoint. Certain communities - including those of gamers, old-time hobbyists and anime/manga/pop culture fans - are considered by them to be the last bastions of everything that's oppressive, which must fall in order to make place for their ideal interpretation of a brave new world. Why is this so unnerving to many people in the first place? Because a business should aim to deliver products to people, not advocate for sociopolitical viewpoints and it's been something that has been predicted by many of the outstanding sci-fi writers of the past century as the rise of collective corporatocracy.

It's clearly an ideological issue that has its roots in politics; how much of a threat you consider it to be to your own hobbies and your own well-being is up to you. To those social collectivists, Japanese pop culture in general is considered to be deeply rooted in "patriarchal" and "misogynist" ideologies and as such, it needs to be eradicated before it causes more harm; nothing else but buzzwords for being unable to mind your own business. Their self-need to validate their own moral superiority is slowly leading them to the point where they want to dismantle the entire system we built so far - one that gave us relative peace and prosperity for the last 75 years or so - in order to build their beautiful communist utopia. All under the guise of "compassion" and "mutual understanding".

As for your previous remarks - censorship in general is neither left or right wing; it's a tool to subdue people. There are certain right-wing christian activists advocating for the ban of porn who did meddle with gamers, but let's be honest - they've been making fools of themselves for the past 15 years or so and many of their latest claims on successful censorship have been debunked as well. If it comes to myself, I'd gladly prefer these old boomers over the social justice activists; the former are just religious lunatics, the latter are insanely dangerous people who justify and advocate for physical violence as an accepted tool in conversation.

It's slightly amusing to see such a train of thought coming from a fellow countryman, but who am I to judge.

3 hours ago, Plk_Lesiak said:

You can hardly separate the two outside of literally a few franchises which achieved mainstream popularity. Half of them owned by Spike Chuunsoft which treated its expansion to the West seriously and without aiming at the super-niche VN community, but marketing them as any other games. Most other VNs are weighted down by just the same stigmas and cultural misunderstandings. For people not knowing much about the genre Clannad looks quite similar to any "creepy dating sim" or "hentai game". I didn't say there are easy answers to it, but I think you have a point about trying to please everyone. Because VN companies aren't willing to dedicate themselves to one or another, they keep their whole output is this weird shady corner. If they drop porn, they might gain something in the long run by creating a different image for the genre (or not, because it's reading and other unpopular stuff), but kill themselves in the short run by alienating the eroge fan base. If they do nothing, they'll never break through and are destined to forever barely scrape by. If they just focus on ero... Not sure if they can grow that much as porn games. We're fucked. 

On the other hand, there might be solutions that we didn't think of yet. MangaGamer however seem to follow a truly Japanese philosophy of changing as little as it is possible as long as it's even marginally sustainable. And there's the issue of number of releases, which is in no way a clear one to me. Would less releases/less competition mean larger profit margins for the companies? Is the market oversaturated? Maybe Sol Press with their "love of the medium" are not really helping the niche, but adding another nail to its coffin? Anyway, my prediction is not a full implosion of the publishing market, but downscaling. The same seems to be happening to the EVN scene (which is very "SJW" BTW) for both related and unrelated reasons. We can all "stop scapegoating" and try to "take responsibility"... But then what? 

This is exactly where both companies and fans need to be more transparent about their goals. This is exactly where translators should unionise and fight for their rights in this growing market. This is exactly the time to finally show the publishers that the community ascended from simply being mindless consumers into more self-aware group that also strives for the well-being of the entire market they get their beloved entertainment from. It is not only to show we're aware of the issues that ail all of us, but also to stop the scummy businesses from exploiting said issues for their own benefit. TL&DR a clearer conversation is needed between all the parties. In my opinion, our western publishers should also strive to help the japanese developers willing to reach out to us, so they can secure a safe marketing space to publish their works. I would rather not believe in such a pessimistic future, where crowdfunding suddenly becomes the only safe way to localize or even release these games at all.

1 hour ago, Mr Poltroon said:

It is funny, but it is a true phenomenon.

If you do something enough, the magic of it will disappear or lessen. And then something else needs to make up for the difference. This is the reason I don't consider cases like this "exploitation", exactly. As fans, people are willing to take on bad deals or volunteer for things. But this spirit will not remain forever. Once the magic is gone, they might end up feeling like they let themselves be exploited, but at the time they did not feel as such.

Regardless, fans that work for free enough will generally start to feel like that isn't enough anymore. Not out of greed or any such thing. It's not the desire for money that increases, it's the will to work hard for their hobby with no recompense that decreases.

It's because at a certain point, it becomes a habit. It's no longer a "phenomenon" in one's life - a hobby, side-job or a way to spend free time - but a part of their life and with it, so comes the need to sustain it in the only adult-like way possible - by earning money for the work they do. Either way, this entire community is an ecosystem of it's own; take one part away and everything will crumble down. Exploit it and you'll feel the wrath of nature raining down upon you like the dozens of thousands of weebs reeeeing in unison.

Edited by Narcosis
Link to comment
Share on other sites

9 hours ago, Narcosis said:

Examples? Majority of the global IT/internet tech/media businesses operate from the Eastern US, Steam included and they're all currently under the influence of left-wing American activists who aim to pigeonhole people in order to control their speech. (...)

It's slightly amusing to see such a train of thought coming from a fellow countryman, but who am I to judge.

 

Yet Steam opened the floodgates for porn in a situation when they were in no way forced to do so by their financial situation or pressure from the community, pretty much only censoring content that could be deemed illegal – illegal due to decades-long legal crusade against paedophilic material that is based on very classic form of moral panic which is always in its core reactionary/conservative. Maybe my perspective is different specifically because I'm in this country where conservative ideologies have way bigger influence on my life. But generally, while the Sony case is probably the biggest one suggesting deep consequences of left-wing cultural movements scaring media companies into self-censorship... For the most part, actual customers and their money always win and it'd take some extremely radical shifts to "eradicate" Japanese popculture. The biggest, very real threat is the anti-child-porn hysteria personified in progressively-more-strict laws, which, once more, has very little to do with any "SJW" positions.

Plus, it's not like the line of what's culturally acceptable shifting is a new idea. We're living, generally speaking, in times of unprecedented access to all kinds of media. Incredible freedom to consume whatever we like outside of anyone's scrutiny. People that want to genuinely change that or hate our favourite niches... I still have doubts if they have more to say than actual market demand. Sony's case worries me because of the influence it might have on eroge market and the all-ages versions of VNs that were always primarily aimed for PS... But you suddenly have Nintendo opening arms to more daring third party games and Switch is a gigantic market.

Maybe I'm underestimating the impact of the culture wars... But really, both sides of them suck to such extremes that I can't force myself to take sides myself. I know the "all libs are Antifa" statement you spew makes me cringe as much as the most ridiculous leftist mischaracterisations of anime. At least I'm very sure this world will burn (quite literally) thanks to the beautiful capitalist order that gave us those decades of prosperity and stability before any communist utopia can take over. And I'm quite unlikely to run out of VNs or anime before the shit hits the fan. ^^

Edited by Plk_Lesiak
Link to comment
Share on other sites

  • 2 weeks later...

What I can say? Well since I don't know the actual truth here I'll just say that hopefully Arunaru will get a good rest there. Also for the worry about the future of VN localization, well I guess the worry is very reasonable although if the translator's salary is very small then we have a lot of problem here. For Rance X, let's just say that I'm not particularly look forward to it as of now (Of course it would be very good if it's fully translated) so at least Arunaru here already finished most of his job at Mangagamer, and I'm sure that Mangagamer will get the new translator for X.

Edited by littleshogun
Link to comment
Share on other sites

4 hours ago, TexasDice said:

To my beloved dude:

Good riddance and don't let the door hit your ass on the way out. 

Yeah I don't like when translators take too much liberties with the original script and just basically rewrite whatever they want.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

If anything at least he can translate what he likes now that he didn't bound by Mangagamer anymore. Also I think his translation on Haruka is not as controversial as either Rance or Suki Suki here (Especially the latter), so perhaps there's something that caused him to chose controversial translation choice (Whether it's forced by some people or by his own will I don't know).

Edited by littleshogun
Link to comment
Share on other sites

2 hours ago, littleshogun said:

If anything at least he can translate what he likes now that he didn't bound by Mangagamer anymore. Also I think his translation on Haruka is not as controversial as either Rance or Suki Suki here (Especially the latter), so perhaps there's something that caused him to chose controversial translation choice (Whether it's forced by some people or by his own will I don't know).

Immaturity and being a 4chan person is my biggest bet.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

Join the conversation

You can post now and register later. If you have an account, sign in now to post with your account.

Guest
Reply to this topic...

×   Pasted as rich text.   Paste as plain text instead

  Only 75 emoji are allowed.

×   Your link has been automatically embedded.   Display as a link instead

×   Your previous content has been restored.   Clear editor

×   You cannot paste images directly. Upload or insert images from URL.

  • Recently Browsing   0 members

    • No registered users viewing this page.
×
×
  • Create New...