Decay

Because there's a difference between a trans character being the butt of a joke, and the trans character's identity itself being the joke.

You don't think that this in itself is a problem? That a transgendered character is turned into a mere gag? And that this is the fate for the vast majority of transgendered characters in anime and VNs? That their sexuality is nothing more than a joke?

Like I said it's really not that bad in ML. But you also have to realize that people will come at this thing from different perspective and your perspective alone isn't the only one that makes sense. As for Steins;Gate, I'd really rather not like to open that can of worms here but the problems run deeper than what you're thinking, it's not just about Okabe's reaction.

I would have to fully replay this to properly remember all the details, but I remember a degree of insensitivity surrounding the handling of Mikoto's femininity. It's also not nearly as bad as the worst of the VN world has to offer, it was pretty tame all-told. I can still imagine someone who's not used to that kind of thing being weirded out by it, because it's handled fundamentally differently in Japanese media from how it's typically handled in western media.

Otome fans are numerous yet have been neglected for ages. Now that some of the localization companies have wizened up and realized that there's a market there, it's like blood has been spilled in a pool full of very, very hungry sharks. You better not get in their way if you know what's good for you. I joke, but for real, this really does show that if you ignore a fanbase for a while, they don't go away but grow even hungrier and more ravenous as time goes on. Spike Chunsoft is making them fight for their dinner scraps and fight they will.

Steins;Gate is also transphobic at points, and I say that with S;G being my favorite VN. The vast majority of all takes on homosexuals or transgender characters in Japanese media is heavily regressive, especially when you look at them through the lens of someone used to american media. Muv Luv might not be too bad about that compared to other VNs or anime, but that doesn't mean that doesn't mean there's no room for criticism there. Japanese media as a whole could use a lot of improvement in that department and someone who isn't used to it could easily find Mikoto to be shocking or even offensive.

Shiren's nowhere close to winning right now after 1800 votes, you have a strange definition of "probably." 428 was is generally very well regarded, don't let its use of live actors fool you into thinking it's some weird, niche thing. I guess it was pretty successful in Japan? Kenka Bancho Otome looks like a pretty unique otome game starring a girl martial arts expert crossdressing in a school full of delinquent boys, with a rhythm-based fighting system thrown in. A lot of otome fans are really pushing for it.

Voted Shiren the Wanderer. Hey, I liked the DS version when I played that a decade ago...

SP has absolutely no LN ambitions right now, actually. Every time they're asked about it they immediately shoot down the idea and seem to think very poorly of the LN market in general.

Yeah, sorry, I just cannot agree with you on any level here. Literal translations should be eradicated. If you prefer them, just learn Japanese to get the most literal translation of them all! I'm not exaggerating.

Try starting a new game from the beginning otherwise some flags might not be set. I'm not sure at what point exactly you have to do this, but it's necessary at some point. The prologue should be a little bit different, indicating you're on the right track.

Then you aren't expecting enough, sorry.

Maybe this is true in a fan translation where truly great talent is very hard to come by, but it is not at all acceptable in a professional translation.

I would refrain from jumping to conclusions about his departure. Usually people don't quite so suddenly, if he's quitting now it was probably in the plans for at least a little while now.

It seems they found a new less-off-putting way to say "porn patch."

Noooo, nonono. I'm sorry, but this is just entirely wrong. You've been poorly influenced by working on a very bad translation. What we're doing with Dracu Riot is NOT the norm, and is not how the process should ideally go. A good translator, and all of the best translators currently in the scene, will write sensible english the first time around. An editor isn't supposed to seek out "lost meaning" or extract hidden nuance, that's actually the translator's job. 1) No one is better equipped to do so than the translator. They know what the line means in Japanese, how it's conveyed to the Japanese readers, and all of that. An editor doing so can misinterpret the line due to inadequate translation and lead things even further off-track. They need to keep in constant contact with the translator, further wasting the translator's time, and they could get the smaller things wrong that they aren't contacting the translator for. 2) Your method leads to an inefficient use of manpower. If the translator gets things right the first time around, an editor doesn't have to waste as much time deeply analyzing every single line for hidden nuance, and basically "retranslating" the script from engrish to english, further necessitating additional editing and proofreading passes due to the heavy amount of rewriting involved. 3) It's just freaking hard. There's just so much you have to think about with every single line about what makes sense, what doesn't make sense. When you read a sentence in english and wish to rewrite it in english again, you end up with preconceived notions about the message it's trying to convey that are sometimes difficult to eliminate. Basically what I'm saying is that it's really too much, and you're going to miss some things here and there. The translator doesn't experience this phenomenon as strongly due to going across languages, which leads back to point #1. It's a pretty safe guess that almost all of the best translations you're most fond of don't go through this process. Their translators get things right the first time around because they're a fairly eloquent writer in English and are capable of putting out natural-sounding english language on their own. They still need editors because they don't have a perfect hit rate, and two heads are better than one, but the process goes so much more smoothly and turns out so much better when major rewrites aren't required on a regular basis.

"Buy lots of all-ages copies and we'll give you an 18+ version" is not something they ever said about Grisaia.

I don't ever recall that happening with Sekai Project at least.

When has this ever happened?

Erm, that's exactly what the 18+ patch is, it's an upgrade option.

Well, I was more referencing Hearts of Stone, which was a smaller quest series set in the same land as the rest of the game sold separately. I don't consider that nickel and diming, but still, it's DLC. Yeah, instead in Japan they sell stuff like KARAKARA for $20 or more. Here, we're getting it $10 + $10. I don't really consider that "nickel and diming." There may be something to be said about what the fairest price distribution is, but it's not like you're being forced to pay more for the game with this setup than you would otherwise, and people who don't care about that content don't have to pay for it.

Also the witcher 3 totally has dlc...

I haven't seen anything definitive about chapters 2 and 3. What we were told beforehand was that the translator responsible for Chapter 1 did not do the main translation for any additional chapters, and he seemed to indicate that everyone else on the project were much worse. Here's another cool tidbit: Remember this? It turns out that it was for ChuSinGura. Some people who have contacted them claim that they seemed poorly organized and didn't have a clue on what they were doing. They hired a whole lot of translators to translate this thing as fast as humanly possible. They seem to have hired someone decent for chapter 1, but failed to get anyone as good for the rest. It also seems that they failed to hire any editors or proofreaders, as became evident by the release state of Chapter 1.

As someone who has been pretty deeply involved with Fuwanovel the site lately, I felt like responding on behalf of fuwanovel, the site. I do feel that people who post in a community has some of that community's values reflected back onto them, however. If you're posting harmoniously on Stormfront but only in the off-topic threads, I'll still label you a racist.

Back then Fuwanovel indeed didn't deserve respect. I've pirated things in the past, and I would not expect anyone to treat me with respect for having done so, either. Pirates do not deserve to be handled with respect, period. We've been working hard to earn the respect we deservedly lacked for years of torrent use and you can't use that past as a weapon to invalidate the arguments being made here.