Re: MaiDenSnow Eve
Here's some food for thought.
Most Japanese game-makers are making games for their native country, and for a specific audience (ie. Japanese people). The game language/UI is in JP, the site it's hosted on is in JP, and even the subtle nuances in game are for JP people (like something a person who doesn't live in Japan would not pick up on, despite knowing the language). Therefore, for all intents and purposes, their products are for Japanese people. Foreigners pirating these games? Well, it's a deal, but not an enormous deal. Why? Because I'm betting most of these developers aren't expecting revenue from our demographic. Like Stiltz stated, it takes a great deal of convincing to persuade someone to drop around $20 on a product that isn't in their language.
Now there are some developers (very few) that are catering to this foreign scene. The most obvious examples are those that have translated their game and put it on Dlsite English, which a lot of people on these forums have attested to purchasing successfully from. And frankly, it just feels more comfortable playing a game in a language you truly understand.
Don't get me wrong, blatant piracy isn't a good thing and it's no doubt rampant. But it's not as if we're taking money out of the developer's purse every time we download a JP game. Some of the onus is on these game developers to see if they want to expand into the English-speaking market; which once again to informally quote Stiltz, can be achieved with proper communication channels. I am frankly all for this, since I believe it'll be a good thing for both sides. Sales will no doubt increase if these types of games do get out.
Correct on all counts. I never said that establishing this bridge of communication would have to start from the English side. As you said, the majority of the games we're talking about here are developed in Japan. If those developers want to make money off of our interest (which by all means seems pretty substantial), we would need to be willing to make the investment. If Japanese developers were willing to work with a few select members of the English community, I think that they could find that having a translation done would be very, very cheap; much cheaper than having it done 'professionally' as in the case of GirlvsGirl.
Maybe there could be an arrangement worked out where a separate, translated version of a game is posted on the English DLsite, and the translator gets a meaty cut of the profits. That way, the translator gets paid for their work, and the developer gets a free translation, plus they make a bit more money on the translated version, since it should sell much more than an untranslated version on the English Dlsite. The only drawback is that the developer wouldn't be making the full price sale to the members of the English community who buy games off the English site in full Japanese...but how many people do that? Compare sales between the English and Japanese DLsites for fully Japanese games, and you will see that the ones on the English site have abysmal sales numbers, in the area of less than 1/10. I believe that with a quality translation, those numbers could easily be doubled and then some, which would mean more final profit for the developer.
Japanese game (developer makes 100% profit after DLsite fees)
$10 x 100 sales = $1000
Translated game (developer gets only 50% profit after fees)
$5 x 300 sales = $1500
And I think that would be a very low estimate (for any decent game). If it's a good game with a good translation at a fair price, then the only issue remaining is convincing the people who have been pirating for so long for semi-legitimate reasons to pony up and pay. A system like this could start slow, but with the right, good quality games I think it could really take off.
Until then, people who want to play a good Japanese game are going to wait and try to play it in English, which usually comes with piracy as an unfortunate by-product.
I know I've gone way off topic here, but part of my frustration is that for this particular game, I could never even get it to work properly, and even if I could, I would lose interest in it trying to figure everything out.