True Love's Lily Dyes Red/Manakashi | 18+

[yumi 27]

Hi everyone, I'm yumi from pantsudev and we're working on a translation of the 2019 adult visual novel

True Love's Lily Dyes Red
真愛の百合は赤く染まる
Manakashi no Yuri wa Akaku Somaru

https://vndb.org/v26232

Team

Team: pantsudev - Discord - Homepage - Twitter

Lead: @yumi
Translators: yumi, @LuckyDaikon
Editors: yumi, @nihilloligasan, girlrituals, Beau
Programmer: yumi
Contributors: @Zakamutt, @Funnerific

Ex-members: BlackBane91 (TL), @aho (ED)

Background

The work started sometime in the spring of 2020, mostly due to happenstance. I was bored and started hacking around this nifty new VN I'd found.
I developed my own tools and launcher/loader and started translating. Once it began to look somewhat promising,
I announced my lone work here so that others wouldn't accidentally be duplicating my efforts at the same time.

Current State

Since the start of the project, I've been fortunate to meet some fantastic, nice and helpful friends who've certainly helped take the project to another level. Progress has been sometimes sporadic, sometimes steadfast, yet always inevitable. I'm a busy person, but never abandon my projects.

Last year (2021) was a bit quiet, but this year we've been happy to recruit THREE new awesome editors, and really picked up the pace again.
I created custom collaboration tools that allow the others to work on the project without my involvement at all, greatly improving efficiency.
A web-based translation editor allows everyone to translate, edit and comment on all the content in the game comfortably,
and a custom app allows everyone to synchronize the latest changes from the shared web editor directly into the game on their computer.

UPDATE (2022-05-25): We are no longer recruiting editors!
Thanks for your interest, and a warm welcome to nihilloligasan, girlrituals & Beau who recently joined the team!

As an interesting aside, with aho and BlackBane91 having retired from the project last year, we're now a team of 5 girls(!)
I swear it wasn't intentional, just a crazy coincidence. What are the odds and in what percentile of VN TL teams, gender distribution-wise, does that place us, I wonder...?

Anyway, we are still recruiting for two positions:
If you'd like to apply as a very good translator or native-level translation checker,
please join our Discord and/or DM yumi#0163 with an introduction!

Everyone is also totally welcome to join our Discord server to hang around and see what we're working on

2022-05-25: Situation update!

The project is roughly 50% done now - and we've doubled the translated line count within the last 5 months alone!
The new TL & edit tools make for a much faster workflow, and all the programming and UI work is also pretty much done.
Therefore I feel confident in stating that we're now moving at a much faster pace than at any point before.
It's not going to take two more years.

What else? Well, our previous YouTube channel/Google account went down the shitter.
We've also lost TWO previous Twitter accounts to these services' dumbf##k "anti-bot" measures.
We don't have a new YouTube account yet; Current Twitter account is @pantsu_dev should you care to follow.

However, join the Discord to really stay up to date (and chat with us)!

I'll leave the old-ass demo video up below, even if the text in it already feels cringy in hindsight,
until I feel like recording a new one.

2020-12-24: XMAS 2020 Demo/Trailer:

This is just a bunch of random clips to show how it looks at the moment.
Spoiler free and non-chronological. Everything shown in the video is subject to change.

Alright, cool! Anything else?

Feel free to let us know what you think!
Join our Discord or reply to this thread, or PM me with any questions.

 

Thanks for reading!

Edited May 25 by yumi
May 2022 Update!

[gjhostdiver21 1]

thanks for translating this!, i was just thinking of reading this by mt the hentai god must have send you. and nice job i don't see any probably in video

Edited August 11, 2020 by gjhostdiver21

[EroHataVNI 39]

Interesting project. I have a bunch of contacts which I can ask in case your project your take off.

[Raita McRonRon 1]

This sounds good! I don't mind a darker look into yuri romance/love stories once in a while, lol ^^ I mean, I did look at the CGs on hitomi, but the quality of visuals is high, so I wouldn't mind a fan translation! So keep up the good work!

[Black99 15]

Wow, I never thought anyone would translate this title due its content but I'm happy you're translating! I read it using machine translation, I'll gladly re-read the VN with your translation ❤

[littleshogun 1679]

Quite a twisted GL VN I would say, then again it's from Izumi Banya so I guess it's expected. I don't have much word other than good luck to the project and hopefully it'll be successful.

Edited August 28, 2020 by littleshogun

[Reo 川村 1]

Can't wait!!! Good luck!!!

[yumi 27]

Hey all, thanks for the replies and encouragement!
I realize that if one only uses this forum as their information source, the progress on this will probably have seemed rather scarce
And I admit, I haven't updated the thread at all to create any additional hype or expectations, but that's kind of been on purpose - I'm the sort of the person to typically walk the walk before talking about it. That way I can't let anyone down, heh.
Actually nothing in particular prodded me to post this update either, and I don't have a grand announcement to make right now, I just thought I'd pop in to say hi while coming to the forum to answer a few PMs.

So, how's it going? Well I'm not dead and the project certainly isn't either, all in all it has chugged along very well. I've been pretty active on a few big VN Discords and received a ton of help from a ton of absolutely awesome people, but for the past month or two I've unfortunately been very tied up in some other responsibilities. Such is life! However, I'm trying my darndest to get back to the Manakashi project right about now, so don't worry. I will, also, actually create a new teaser video of some sort soon to show off the quality and progress we're working with, as well as how I solved certain technical challenges.

I don't like talking line counts - and actually I don't keep or know exact line counts, either - but while there's a whole ton still to translate, I can at least say that I am rather proud of the quality of what has been done so far.

So anyway, I guess all I wanna say to you lovely people is that if you want to see this project happen, please don't hesitate to keep letting me know Reply to this thread, talk to me on Discord (yumi#0163), PM me on Fuwanovel, whatever - It does help me gauge interest and thus my own time allocation to the project, and actually means more to me than I'd like to admit.

I might've started the project for entirely selfish reasons, but due to the sheer volume of material alone it's not going to end that way. So, in addition to the previous paragraph, I guess I'd like to put out a lazy call for reinforcements. Translation (and the editing that follows) is the job I'm most picky about, but if you happen to be a proficient translator/writer and would want to help with this project, don't hesitate to get in touch. I also periodically need a few trusted people to QA/test the project while it is in progress. If you'd like to do that and think you'd be good at it, feel free to DM me on Discord, preferably. Additionally we will need a real TLC down the line, but that's actually not very critical right now.

So yeah, alright, that's the Manakashi project right now! Talk to you again later

Maybe I should ask for a developer role on the forums to create one of those dev diaries...

[Black99 15]

I bet there's a lot people interested in this game, we don't see often in English games like Manakashi, we have for now in English, Maggot Baits and Sadistic Blood, and sadly NikuNiku ENG TL, game from the same dev/writer/artist that Manakashi was dropped time ago  I come to here the forum monthly just to check if there's more updates, and I'm happy you're still alive. I don't mind wait years for this TL, I've waited years for the ENG TL of Maggot Baits. 

[yumi 27]

21 hours ago, Black99 said:

I bet there's a lot people interested in this game, we don't see often in English games like Manakashi, we have for now in English, Maggot Baits and Sadistic Blood, and sadly NikuNiku ENG TL, game from the same dev/writer/artist that Manakashi was dropped time ago  I come to here the forum monthly just to check if there's more updates, and I'm happy you're still alive. I don't mind wait years for this TL, I've waited years for the ENG TL of Maggot Baits. 

I can promise you this one is not going to take years
I'll post a full update on the current situation on Fuwanovel pretty soon; we're stronger than ever and things are looking up!

[yumi 27]

Hey hey and Ho ho, quick post before I write up any bigger update!

Merry only-slightly-late Xmas!
Here's a new demo video of the project:

It's just a collection of short clips from different places, meant to show the technical side and also the rough TL/writing quality of what we're working with.

The scenes are random, spoiler free and not in chronological order.

Feel free to let us know what you think!

[yumi 27]

Hello and good morning 
This is me just shamelessly bumping the thread to point out that the entire main post was replaced with fresh info and all that good stuff

Also, to reiterate, I'm officially putting the call out: We're looking for additional translators! Please see the main post or our homepage if you're interested, or point your friends there if you know someone who might be interested.

[Infernoplex 470]

On 8/8/2020 at 8:16 PM, yumi said:

Your English doesn't have to be perfect or particularly flowery, since that's what editors are for.

I'm not a fan of projects where you put the burden of good prose writing all on editors. Sure, editors are there to improve the flow of text and the overall reading experience. That's true. But I'm of the opinion that your TLer already needs to be at least somewhat versed in good prose writing (including flowery descriptions, etc.).

[yumi 27]

12 minutes ago, Infernoplex said:

I'm not a fan of projects where you put the burden of good prose writing all on editors. Sure, editors are there to improve the flow of text and the overall reading experience. That's true. But I'm of the opinion that your TLer already needs to be at least somewhat versed in good prose writing (including flowery descriptions, etc.).

Right, and I'd absolutely agree with you in general, if this was, say, a paid job.

But beggars can't be choosers, and it's easier to place more editing burden on myself than it is to find a translator who is both very skilled in Japanese and in creative English, willing to join a free unpaid project in this job climate. I'll rather have a horse now than keep looking for a unicorn, you know?

Spoiler

I don't mean to compare translators to horses. I'm not a horse either, I'm a shark. Rawr.

Edited December 28, 2020 by yumi

[Infernoplex 470]

@yumi - Well, when you put it that way, that's understandable. Sadly, it's not an optimal situation. You're in the same position I was when I was doing Miagete Goran Restoration project. Finding and getting TLers to help ain't easy. Also, it doesn't help that the fanTLer pool has kinda been dwindling with most of the folks going official these days. So yeah... you wouldn't have much choice, so I understand where you're coming from.

[yumi 27]

I'm very happy to announce that @LuckyDaikon has today joined the Manakashi team as a Translator!
She's very capable and I trust will be a major asset and advantage for our little project.

Give 'em a warm welcome, and remember to come hang out at our Discord to chat with our team and others who're looking forward to this title.

Edited January 10, 2021 by yumi
Typofix

[yumi 27]

Friends, we have a problem!
This is the first place I'm going to type this up, and then adapt to all the other avenues where we tend to communicate, I guess.

Our translation is moving too fast!
That is to say that editing at this pace cannot keep up - mainly because at this point I'm the only active editor, but I'm also so many other things for the project - and I can only do so much. A lot of the TL to be edited is also my own, and I get tunnel vision where I can see something sucks but can't see how to fix it.

All kinds of trouble arises from this fact, not the least of which is that I believe we should try to keep the translation and at least the first pass edit roughly in sync with each other, or we're going to both not move the project forward as a whole, AND likely create more differences in quality down the line if it takes months between the TL and Edit and who knows who's doing what and in what headspace at that point.

Anyway, this is all a long-winded way of saying that
we desperately need a new additional editor to join the team!
In practice, what does that mean? Well, the editor should be someone well versed in creative English writing, able to spot shoddy text in our translations or rough first-pass edits, and make the lines work and sing and flow like a beautiful river. A large vocabulary would be a nice benefit, and a firm grasp of good grammar more or less a requirement. But most importantly, the editor has to be able to adapt to the existing style of writing. That means playing through the translation as it currently stands, and getting a feel for how we like to say and format things and interpret the characters. An editor doesn't need to know Japanese, and we're always there to support each other when a question arises

So - If you feel like you might fit this role and would like to give it a try, or know someone who might, please don't hesitate to join our Discord and/or DM me personally as yumi#0163 on Discord, or hit me up on these forums or on Twitter!

TL;DR: We need an additional editor ASAP! Call 0800-555-PANTSU and apply right now!

[yumi 27]

Gosh darn, I can't believe the previous post was in January of 2021. Though I guess I did a community post sometime more recently, at least.

Anyway, I've updated the main post again!
Basically, 2021 was really slow but we're doing pretty great now. Found not one but three new editors, built a new workflow, fixed most bugs that remained etc.

I didn't imagine the project taking this long when I started it. Granted, I didn't think much anything back then.
For some reason I feel kinda bad about that, but real life happens. I'm unfortunately rather detached from the project myself still, because I need to earn my bread and there's not much of it going around in the first place, for a struggling freelancer and entrepreneur.

However, the fantastic change this year is that my attendance or lack thereof is no longer a bottleneck for the project!
It used to be that we'd TL and edit chapters by sending back and forth these small database files, and I was the authority keeping track of progress and assigning, receiving and compiling together the work units. It worked sort-of just well enough when it was just two or three of us and when I was more available day to day, but became untenable as soon as I couldn't be around as much.

Now, after a few weeks' coding work from myself, everyone shares the same centralized data store via an online editor, also making a full history of changes, commenting/discussion per line etc. possible - and I don't even need to compile a build of the data for the others, any team member can apply the latest changes locally to their game via a single button press.

TL;DR Manakashi - alive and kicking!

Join the Discord

[littleshogun 1679]

It's been a while since I saw this, and I see you're making some progress there. Well no much to say here other than good job on the progress so far and hopefully you'll be able to finish this later.