xelloss

No i don't think it does. Not if you talk about emotion. Even if some languages have some particularities like the one above (chinese which is a tonal language), there is a big difference between that and intonation conveying emotion. Basically in chinese tone can be either high, middle, low and such, but it's not something that affect the way emotions will be expressed. If someone is sad, happy or angry, it will still be easily percepted because those one aren't really related about these tones but subtles changes in the voice like trembling, variation of volume, speaking flow and type of "intonation (not related to tone). Some emotions are perceptible in any language even if the interlocutors can't understand directly what is said, they can for sure know if the person is afraid, angry, or happy by juding how the voice is. I think some intonations and accents can indeed modify the perception one can have of a person: eg. make him sound like he is from the countryside, arrogant or such, but these ones are not solely about emotion. More a matter of perception influenced by things like stereotypes, conciscous or inconscicous conceptions, own speaker language and such.

I've come throught the thread, and seriously i don't get some people reactions here: it's not like they are going to replace the original japanese voice by an english dub...just an option available People who say japanese developpers might aim a change for vn for the west, seriously i don't get it. I don't see how the adding of a dub which doesn't change the original content of the game at all in its essence can be interpreted to be something like that. I don't understand the way some fans here are approaching the matter . Some of the reactions just seems "elitist" to me. Also i don't like how some people seems to like categorizing condescendently supposed audience like "high level nerdy otaku", "lonely nerds" and such. You don't know who exactly make up this audience, actually, it is just based of your own preconceptions, and there is no need to make judgemental comments like you are better than others whereas you are also visual novel fans. And i don't see the point of using the argument of costs for justifing about a dub being a "good" move or not. It's not like it's the fans who are doing the investment or creating the content. To me it sound like people who are going to say to japanese developpers to not add voices in games because well "you have to diminish costs" which i find completely innapropriate. You are not entitled to comment about costs and all when you are not even involved into the creating process. As a mere customer, complaining about it, is i find, totally out of place. Basically how i see this: t's like having anime dubbed in another language that Japanese. When people are making this it's for providing something else which might appeal to other people as well, but is still not something specifically aimed at an audience, it just create a bonus and some people who usually listen japanese version might even try it out of curiosity and like it. I don't see it like a way to sustain a new audience because the old one is not sufficient enought (Jast as a company is making profit for every game they are licensing), but it's the nature of buissness to aim to widden the audience or improve sales. Like i said, If the original track is still available and the other one is optionnal, i don't see any problem at all really. I don't really know about the game in question, but if you look it into the perspective of other medias having some relation to the vn market , there is really nothing special or worth making assumptions about an editor making doubtfull choices and all. Sorry but some of the reactions here kind of annoyed me, so it had to be said.

I will start to consider Sekai as a "serious" vn distributor when they will release Japanese vns without censorship (all their titles have mosaics, so they are a bit late compared to the others about this matter) and not only all age games. Seriously i had a look at their survey, but there were too many questions with compulsory answers (when sometimes you might simply not be able to answer) and i find it strange that they don't ask users to suggest titles of vns they would like to see licensed. Also i noticed a minor detail but when they mentionned the others distributors (jast and mangagamer) they asked more about the former than the later.

Well, games like Imouto paradise, Eroge and Euphoria would probably sell very well on Steam, if the platform didn't have these restrictions about adult content. Given the large amount of erotic scenes in those, it's (obviously) impossible to make a "censored version" in order to bring them over here without ruining the games. By the way, i've heard games with an "adult" uncensored release like Gakhtkun are vns which only feature mild erotic content (suggestive poses and showing the breasts but not going further). I've came across various topics on Steam forums and some people over there don't know Mangagamer or don't go to their website. The success of some games like Sakura i think, is related to the aformentionned fact: users want games with erotic content but check only those available on Steam.