sanahtlig

You're inventive. I'm sure you could find a way to explain what an ex-German or ex-Allied agent would be doing in Poland. I'm working on this story instead of working on my dissertation as I should be. My funding comes from NIH grants. That should give you an idea. The chapter boundaries are a bit arbitrary. I'm not sure if I'll start a new chapter or not. I'll try to update this weekend. I write in short bursts, pausing before scene shifts (***) only if overwhelmed by exhaustion. You can see the timing and quantity just by looking at the post history in this thread and the story thread. I post as soon as it's written, basically. I'm not a heavy reviser. What you see now, by and large, is how it came out as I wrote, since I edit each sentence as I go.

I'm a scientist. I'm used to abbreviating measurements. I'm actually not sure what the standard in general fiction is. You're free to have your own ideas about your own characters and setting. I'm just a single voice that's read the introduction to what appears to be a larger work in progress. I can't see the greater picture of what's in your head, nor can I speak for others who might actually prefer a fantastic style over a more realistic one. I should caution that older readers have less tolerance for what they might see as flights of fancy. You'll have to decide whether that's a demographic you want to appeal to or not (maybe not). As for myself, I'm interested in appealing to a general audience. While many of the elements in my story are drawn from anime and games, I think that "otherness" could just as easily be a draw as a handicap. Just as news headlines about an unfamiliar topic might draw curious eyes, I hope my story can provide a glimpse of the culture I live and breathe from a vantage point the average person has never considered.

Surveys are always going to be skewed towards titles people have heard of, whereas people won't bring up titles they've never heard of. There were actually significant numbers of votes for titles that other companies had already licensed. What this all indicates is that (surprise) the collection of people's individual wishlists isn't a good indicator of the titles that would be a commercial success (low localization costs, high sales). Keep in mind that the top titles in the list probably have less than 20% of the overall votes, and you begin to realize that the list isn't that useful except for mocking in forum conversations like this. There's also the small matter that English speakers have no idea what Japanese titles they want because they don't play games in Japanese. They're just guessing what they think they'd like, based on a small number of titles that caught their attention. It's kind of funny looking at the recommendation threads on Mangagamer's forums because people just glance at screenshots on VNDB and determine that "Wow, this text game in a language I don't understand looks awesome!"

Your protagonist appears to kill others on a whim in rather inventive ways that are more brutal than efficient. She seems to enjoy killing. In another environment, I could easily imagine her as a serial killer or terrorist. Also worth noting is that the military generally prefers obedient lackeys that follow orders over unpredictable lone wolf types that would just as soon kill their allies as their foes.

In the age of automatic weapons, melee is typically a last resort, rather than the other way around. This is fiction, so there's leeway, but don't delude yourself that a skilled melee specialist would have the upper hand in most situations.

Experimental testing of anabolic steroids began in the 1930s. They obviously have unpleasant side-effects, especially for females. You could build roid rage into your insanity profile I suppose. Just be aware that many in your audience will be far more knowledgeable about this topic than you are, as body building is a common American past time, so you'll have to study hard to pull it off convincingly. That's empirically demonstrated to be false. Special forces rely mainly on firearms for a reason. No amount of skill will save you from an assault rifle at medium range with no nearby cover. And if you're surrounded by gun wielders, you're done, even with cover.

There's a limit to the strength a typical female can achieve without taking anabolic steroids. You can invent a reason, but that's normal physiology. I guess you could make her a "super soldier", the subject of some sort of experimental therapy that has given her extraordinary strength. Is there any particular reason she needs to be super strong? You don't need extraordinary strength to be an effective killer.

Yes, I do think about what anime and games are depicted. These serve multiple purposes: symbolism, vehicles to discuss certain themes, and a means to reflect on or influence the characters. Some choices may have had more thought put into them, and therefore have more importance, than others. I'm not an expert on martial arts. I do know females don't typically excel in upper body strength. Their hormonal balance doesn't lend itself well to body building. If I were going to write a female character who excelled in hand-to-hand combat, I would focus on technique and agility rather than overpowering strength. But I probably would just avoid making a topic I know a little about an important element of my story. That's why my story mostly centers on subject matter I'm familiar with or have expertise in. A top-class writer would spend a great deal of time researching exotic story elements; I'm content simply writing about what I know.

The idea for Ch. 1 was inspired by a combination of anime, VNs, and my own life. I wrote it shortly after watching Shingetsutan Tsukihime, which inspired the general mood. Ch. 2 onward, which has very different themes, was inspired squarely by VNs. And in fact, I've made many of my inspirations pretty clear: they're actually the games Brian plays (with more to come). I added the summary since it's standard to do so in formal reviews. I got the impression the "antagonist" has superhuman abilities from his strength, which appears to exceed the protagonist's (whose strength was already sort of doubtful), and because his wounds appeared to heal / close instantly.

I think it's useful to take a look at Doddler's response on this topic to see where Mangagamer is coming from. http://ask.fm/The_Doddler/answer/124680890609

Brian resembles me in a lot of ways. Why? Because it's easy to write about myself in a realistic manner. No research required.

I just accepted her strength under suspension of disbelief, with the assumption that she was some sort of martials arts master. As for my inspiration, it came from this thread actually.

But their data, which is the basis for their statement, is based on a pre-Steam market. When you're playing with large sums of money, you make decisions based on data, not hunches and speculation.

You should think of a history for your protagonist that explains her killing ability. People aren't natural born killers. It's a skill that has to be trained and honed through experience. In turn, that will require you to be an expert in killing to write it convincingly. You should take care that you don't bite off more than you can chew. I wrote Ch. 1 11 years ago. I wrote Ch. 2 and most of Ch. 3 the weekend before last weekend.

Those Ask.fm responses are mostly written by Kouryuu. In general, you should take them as Kouryuu's stance on the matter. I doubt he actually passes them by the rest of the staff before posting, unlike posts on the official staff blog. This guy isn't a PR or marketing major. He's a translator who got shoehorned into picking up the pieces of a company that was falling apart. Give him a bit of slack. Decay's points on advertising are valid, but on the other hand given MG's model (of no advertising), their arguments are also valid. In an environment with no advertising and no Steam, fan translations probably hurt the sales potential of a given title. You can point blame wherever you want; that's simply an evidence-based statement. My own opinion is that MG probably should have reflected on this statement a bit more before making it public. I think this is an instance of not seeing the forest for the trees. Fan translation plays an important role in the current market, and will continue to do so for the forseeable future.

You commented earlier that the story wasn't as plot-driven as you expected. Did that impression change as you read Ch. 3? What aspects of the story appealed to you? What aspects made you want to keep reading (or made you want to stop reading)?

I would devote more than one sentence to explain the opening scene. Try a paragraph. Insane people aren't typically top picks for military recruitment. I might explore her past and thinking patterns a bit more. You seem to be using a character-limited perspective--in which case, translating words she doesn't know doesn't seem appropriate. To make your setting believable, you need to really know it inside out. Read up on military protocol. Read up on 1939 Poland. Read up on the state of world affairs leading up to the invasion of Poland. To some extent, you drew the bullet in Russian roulette here, because I happen to be a World War II buff and your historical inaccuracies are very apparent to me. You can't write historical fiction without knowing your history. You also need to think about creating a realistic setting with real actors. Real society is a monolithic, inexorable system set up to crush sociopathic characters like your protagonist under its booted heel. You need to carefully consider how she's able to get away with what she does. As for my own story, I'm trying to push major updates at least once a week. My goal is to progress a week in-story every real life week, likely with most of my work happening on weekends. That seems the best way to maintain motivation, keep the story in my head, and keep my small group of readers interested.

Summary: The story follows a female recruit who joins the Polish army in the fall of 1939, just prior to the German invasion. She murders a man who threatens her in the wilderness, then murders a witness. She discovers 2 German spies and murders them. An acquaintance of her's becomes a suspect for the murder of the spies, and is turned over to her for torture. The suspect, who turns out to have superhuman abilities, turns the tables on her and escapes. Here's a collection of my thoughts on your work: Clarity of writing: The sentences are mostly solid and pretty easy to read. I was able to follow what was happening without difficulty, for the most part. This is the work's main strength. “A man in front of me” with a gun to her back? You need to work on painting this scene better for the reader. Setting: An enlisted female soldier in the standing Polish army in 1939 seems unlikely. A soldier wouldn’t call her commanding officer by name, especially in peacetime. Russia didn’t enter the war until Poland’s military had already been crushed, weeks after Germany invaded. They weren’t allies; they simply agreed to divvy up Poland. Characters: The main heroine seems utterly insane. Some exploration of this seems warranted. Why does she know German? Style: A distinct flavor of gratuitousness pervades the work. Overall: I don’t get a very good sense of a well-realized, believable setting with autonomous characters; instead the setting seems more like a house of wooden studs with stickmen for characters that were constructed to serve the plot.

Or a very angry man frothing about promising releases not meeting your professional standards of quality.

You're conflating IP blocking with no interest in the Western market. That's a dangerous assumption based on fanbase prejudices, similar to how people immediately assume that when fan translations are C&D'd the Japanese publisher responsible is being "xenophobic". My point is that most Westerners don't understand the thought processes of Japanese IP holders, and they shouldn't pretend to.

It's a work in progress. I anticipate it's less than half finished at this point. I have an overarching plot in mind from Ch. 2 onwards. Brian's summer vacation is 4 months. The story is currently at the end of week 2. I have a list of events in mind spanning that entire time period. As you can imagine, there's quite a bit left to be written. The story's focus is the developing relationship between Brian and Sena. Other thematic elements include Brian's relationship with his mother, exploring his hobbies including anime and games, and exploring his somewhat odd views of the world. If you've just finished Ch. 2, you probably don't have a good sense of this yet. I consider Ch. 1 the prelude, Ch. 2 the introduction, and Ch. 3 to be where the "action" starts. Sure, post your story and I'll take a look at it when I get the chance.

What? Bingo. That's why I reserve my support for the ones that buck the trend.

Mangagamer is commenting based on Mangagamer's negotiation experiences and Mangagamer's sales data. Their points are valid when qualified as such. I would interpret their response as "Hey, if you want to fan translate a title that falls under the umbrella of publishers we work with, talk to us first." I feel quite certain that JAST has a very different perspective on the impact of fan translations on the market and their ability to negotiate with Japanese publishers. Mangagamer certainly can't speak for JAST or their business model, which is quite different from Mangagamer's.

The word count is 13,600 currently.