sanahtlig

Edit: Easy fix for this problem provided by binaryfail (scroll to Edit 1)!
After writing up my review for Venus Blood Gaia, I decided to launch into the next and most recent title in the series, Venus Blood Hypno.  To my chagrin, upon starting the game I was greeted with a screen similar to the one above.  Notice how the Japanese interface text is cut off?
English players of Japanese-language PC games will be familiar with the various locale hoops that need to be cleared to get these games to work right. Pretty much all titles require the user to set the system locale for non-Unicode programs to Japanese; this has the side-effect of causing a few installed programs to change from an English interface to a Japanese interface. This is annoying, but usually remedied by locating the language setting in the program's preferences and changing it from system default to English. A few especially irksome games, like some of Debonosu's titles, display gibberish instead of Japanese unless the time format is also set to Japanese. Eushully titles spawn periodic error popups unless the game is installed with the time format set to Japanese.
I'm used to dealing with these issues, so I figured there would be a similar easy workaround to get this title working. I did find a workaround... and it's not pretty. As it turns out, this game requires the Japanese multilingual user interface (MUI) to be installed (also known as changing the display language). What does that mean? It means all the interface elements in Windows become Japanese (including the start menu and control panel). That's shockingly bad if you've been relying on machine translators to stumble through VNs until now. But wait, it gets better. In Windows Vista and Windows 7, the ability to switch MUIs isn't included with the retail version for end-users! Only the Ultimate and Enterprise editions have this functionality! And here's the kicker: Microsoft isn't even selling Windows 7 Ultimate Edition upgrades anymore!
Fortunately a 3rd party has come up with an unofficial solution: Vistalizator. This 3rd party tool allows the user to bypass Microsoft's version protections and directly install and switch between MUIs. I've tested it and it works.
 

 
It's somewhat cumbersome to set up because you have to download several different files, one of which is specific to your version of Windows, and you're also forced to install several Windows updates. At the end of all that work, you'll be able to switch between English and Japanese interfaces with a simple Windows restart, just like you'd switch system locale (but with the caveat that a future Windows update could break the tool, with unknown effects on your system). Switching my MUI to Japanese caused some web pages in Chrome to display English text in an odd font (English Wikipedia was almost unreadable), so I had to manually reconfigure Chrome to use English as the display language.
I'm a big fan of the Venus Blood franchise, so this incompatibility really disappointed me.
3rd party tool to fix the corrupted interface display by switching to the Japanese multilingual user interface (Windows Vista and Windows 7, Home and Professional editions): Vistalizator
Users with qualifying versions of Windows can instead use the built-in Windows solution (Windows 8 [all versions], Windows 10 [probably all versions?], Windows Vista and Windows 7 Ultimate and Enterprise editions): Changing the display language
Locale Emulator has also been recommended as a general solution that works with this title.
Solution originally reported in the HongFire Venus Blood Hypno thread by Berries82 and Hopeful Death
Edit 1: Fan hacker binaryfail has identified the underlying issue and provided an easy fix that doesn't require changing the display language / MUI! Simply download this .dll file and add it to your Venus Blood Hypno install directory.
Venus Blood Hypno font fix
See my followup post for a response by Keimaru of Ninetail, the developer of Venus Blood Hypno!
"For sale in Japan only": A Japanese developer's perspective on the eroge embargo

(An old parody I wrote in 2013, I'm reposting here for general amusement. See the original forum thread for initial reactions.)
 
Announcer:
It’s a beautiful day for baseball today in Eroge Stadium. I’m your host Sanahtlig here to provide commentary for Visual Novel Translation TV. Today the Localizers play against the Fan Translators in a special Western League All-Star game. This should be an interesting matchup. On the Localizers team we have representatives from Mangagamer including the rising star Kouryuu, as well as veterans from JAST USA including the well known Peter Payne. The Fan Translators are a truly diverse bunch of big names playing together for the first time ever. We have Ixrec from Amaterasu, Moogy from TLWiki, Haeleth, and Aaeru from Fuwanovel. It’ll be interesting to see how they interact as a team.
 
The Localizers are up to bat first. But there seems to be a delay. The first batter from Mangagamer appears to have brought a large stick instead of a bat! He seems to be arguing with the umpire. Let’s listen in.
Umpire: You can’t just waltz in here with a stick for a bat. Go borrow a real bat from one of the JAST players!
Mangagamer player: ALL YOUR BASE ARE BELONG TO US!
Umpire: WTF?
 
Announcer:
The Mangagamer player just took off and started running the bases before the game even started! What is he doing??? We’ll be back after a word from our sponsors.
 
[Commercial]
VNDB, a compendium of visual novel knowledge, by you, for you: an oasis where you can request visual novel recommendations, speak freely, and engage in enlightened discussions. Please click our affiliates so we don't go broke!
 
5 min later
 
Announcer:
We’re back, and this time Peter Payne is up to bat with 1 out and 1 expelled player. Here’s the pitch and—it’s a hit! Wait, what is he doing? He’s just standing there! Let’s zoom in for a closer look.
On close examination, Peter is actually shuffling towards 1st base so slow it’s barely perceptible from a distance. He makes it a few feet before being tagged out by the catcher.
That’s two outs folks. Up to bat next is Kouryuu, Mangagamer’s newest darling. Here’s the pitch and—it’s a line drive. This—
At that moment the microphone fades out. The game ensues soundless until a member from Mangagamer finally strikes out, ending the round.
We’re back at Eroge Stadium. We apologize for the technical difficulties. A member from Mangagamer barged in and carried off the microphone, claiming we didn’t have rights to broadcast audio during their lineup. We’re assured now that the problem has been cleared up.
 
The Localizers are taking to the field. Wait, what is this? Mangagamer’s players have taken to the field without clothes! This isn’t baseball, this is pornography! Outrageous! JAST’s entire bench has rushed onto the field to subdue them. They appear to be re-clothing the Mangagamer players—is that 2 bras I see??? We’ll be back after a commercial break.
 
[Commercial]
Mangagamer staff A: Somebody set us up the bomb!
Mangagamer staff B: What you say?!
*Screen flash and booming sound*
Pictured is a box set of 3 games, priced at $150. A tag in the corner of the screen reads “no voice”.
Narrator: Shin Koihime Musou! Otanoshimini!
 
5 min later
 
Announcer:
We’re back and the game looks ready to resume. First up to bat is Haeleth, the oldest member on the team and a true league veteran. He seems to be getting some boos from the audience…hmm? Haeleth just threw down his bat and walked out of the stadium! Amazing! Looks like the Fan Translators are down one member!
Next up to bat is Moogy. Moogy is known for his often uncomplimentary remarks for his fellow players. Moogy steps up to bat and—he seems to be shouting something at the Fan Translator dug out. He’s throwing down his bat and…he just walked out into the field? He seems to have joined the Localizers! What an unexpected development!
Next up is Ixrec. This guy is a monster folks; he has the highest RBI in the entire league. Here’s the pitch, and—it’s a hard hit to right field! Peter Payne scrambles for the ball…what is he doing? Is he riding a wheelchair in the grass? Why is he in a wheelchair?! Ixrec scores! And he’s running around the bases again! Look at him go! One of the umpires from the Japanese league, Age, has grabbed Ixrec and is trying to stop him! Oh my, Ixrec just kicked Age in the balls and is running the bases again! Unbelievable! We’ll be back after a commercial break.
 
[Commercial]
JAST USA is proud to announce the best hentai dating sim ever, Lightning Warrior Raidy 3! Play the role of a cute swordswoman as she fights creepy tentacle monsters and devilish vixens with her new lesbian fusion powers! Coming to a store near you in 2018!
 
10 min later
 
Announcer:
We’re back. Age has left the game, and I doubt we’ll see him back for another Western League game in the near future. We have a Fan Translator on 1st base from a single up the middle.
Next up is Aaeru. A relative newcomer, Aaeru doesn’t seem to be getting along too well with her fellow Fan Translators. But in this game it’s results that count, which I’m sure Aaeru will show us today.
Here comes the pitch…it’s a fast line drive to left field! That’s a base hit! Wait! Aaeru appears to making a beeline for 3rd base! What is she doing?! She’s stopped on 3rd base and doesn’t seem to be budging. It appears that she’s decided to run the bases in reverse order! What are the umpires doing?! The other Fan Translators are snickering, but no one seems to be stopping her. That leaves a player each on 2nd and 3rd base.
Next up to bat is…Moogy? Did he switch sides again?! It’s probably best not to think too hard about this. Here’s the pitch—and it’s a pop up to right field! Peter goes for the ball—and his wheelchair tips over! The Fan Translators are running the bases and—Aaeru just collided with her fellow Fan Translator! Who would've seen that coming?! She’s getting up, and--
 
Mangagamer 3rd baseman: ALL YOUR BASE ARE BELONG TO US!
 
Announcer:
The Mangagamer 3rd baseman just clubbed her over the head with 3rd base! Ouch! Moogy runs up to her and…he’s kicking her while she’s down! I don’t know who’s the greater bastard: Aaeru, the Mangagamer 3rd baseman, or Moogy! Ixrec runs out of the dugout—he’s running the bases again! Someone catch him! What the hell??? The Mangagamer players are stripping again! Peter is still crawling out in right field towards the ball! This is utter chaos folks! It’s a wacky free-for-all today in Eroge Stadium. I’ve never seen such incredible dysfunction in all my days as an Eroge Stadium broadcaster. Will Moogy stop kicking Aaeru? Will Mangagamer stop turning this into a live porn event? Will Ixrec leave any points for anyone else? Will Peter ever get the damn ball? Stay tuned to Visual Novel Translation TV!
 
In the meantime, let's get some comments from the stadium audience.

I wrote this response to a thoughtful commenter on Reddit.
 
I would not support a non-adult only English release of Kagura Douchuuki, with a purchase or otherwise. I would also encourage other eroge fans not to support whitewashing of titles where sexual content was an integral part of the original concept (i.e., this title and MoeNovel's If My Heart Had Wings).
 
Just because a story can be told without sex doesn't mean it should. Just because it's easier to promote a game without sexual content doesn't mean that sexual content should be removed for the sake of convenience. This isn't merely a matter of supply and demand. It's about faithfulness to the original concept of the work. As a developer, it's lazy and disingenuous to cut content just to maximize sales in a given territory, while leaving fans with no option to restore the content and enjoy the original experience. It's callous to turn one's back on fans who have been supporting the market all along so companies like Debonosu could have the opportunity to release games like Kagura Douchuuki on Steam.
 
I wrote my Kaguara Douchuuki article to notify fans of the path Debonosu has embarked on, and hopefully to persuade Debonosu to change their minds. According to dovac (CEO of Sekai Project) our earnest pleas will fall on deaf ears (in his words, "They don't care"). But at least we'll have tried.
 
Should we support developers that "don't care"? I would say that, no, we shouldn't. And if Debonosu truly "doesn't care", then I would argue they don't deserve the support of you, me, or anyone else. And when a company truly doesn't care, that'll likely manifest in more than just needless content cuts; you'll see it in the slipshod way the localization is handled. Notice how the Greenlight campaign was started without any English description (which Sekai Project rushed to donate because they didn't want the black eye of a campaign for a prominent VN failing). Notice how Debonosu's single English comment was in broken English. Does that indicate to you that Debonosu is invested in making this release a success? Does that give you confidence that the final product will be professional quality?
 
I think if Debonosu doesn't start caring more pretty quick, this release will likely be a trainwreck that will cause gameplay VN fans to cringe for years to come (not unlike what's happened with MoeNovel's release of If My Heart Had Wings).
 
[Feature image: Thomas the trainwreck]

Wow. This is definitely a case of not being able to judge a book by its cover... or by its summary, either. I don't think I've encountered a VN with as much emotional impact as this one since Houkago no Futekikakusha, last summer.

Sumire is by Nekoneko Soft, one of the oldest existing VN brands... They are one of the 'founding names' of the moege umbrella genre, while also producing more serious works through their subsidiaries, such as Cotton Soft (of Reconquista and Owaru Sekai to Birthday fame).

Sumire is rather unique, by the standards of current VNs. The protagonist, rather than being a student, is a salaryman in in his mid-twenties, a socially inept man who was an otaku but has lost most of his passion. He goes to a virtual chat room/online game that imitates a school, where people use characters from Nekoneko Soft games as avatars. There, he is part a sub-community of four people (including him) of people that are similarly awkward.

This story is... emotional to say the least. So far, I've finished two arcs of the story (there is only one actual path, though there are apparently multiple endings) and I had to spend the last thirty minutes or so easing myself out of crying-mode. What is so good about this? Generally speaking, I have to say it is the overall presentation and characterization, as well as the narrative.

The depth of the characters lent by the narration and dialogue - keeping in mind that they are the same type of person, generally speaking - is impressive, considering how relatively short a time I have been playing. At the same time, the story itself - for all its odd aspects - is one that is mostly easy to understand. It reminds me of some of the best works of last decade (2001-2010) in that it tries to just tell a story rather than pretending to be something in particular (ex. a charage, a nakige, etc).

So, unless they seriously screw things up, this is VN is a definite candidate for VN of the Month...

Edit: Changed this post so it reflects the whole game.

Now that I've finished the game - and yes it is that short - I will go ahead give my final word on it. This game stops a bit short of kamige-level (the ending is a bit too short and 'things are looking up' optimistic for that), but it is nonetheless an excellent game.

Now, for the overall... first, I should say that there are a total of three arcs. There is one focused on Sumire, then Hinahime, then Akari. Sumire is the main heroine, with the other two girls having 'extra' h-scenes in the omake section or as an extra on the second playthrough.

The first two arcs are both straightforward - relatively speaking - stories of alienation and redemption, with a bit of love and friendship thrown into the mix. Really, in the first two arcs, you can't really get a good lock on what is motivating everyone, which isn't surprising, really. About two thirds of the game is in the characters rl and a third in the virtual space (it is more like half and half in the early game and ends up mostly rl at the end).

For those who like mild mindfucks... Akari's arc will fulfill your desires to an extent. You'll find out the last few undiscovered secrets of the characters, including what links them together. In addition, you'll also have to choose between one normal, one bad, and one true ending. The true ending is a nice conclusion, though it is very short. The normal ending is sad, and the bad ending is a bit... depressing looking at it from the outside.

Overall, this is an excellent VN, though short. I'd recommend it to those who want something unusual to break out of their usual reading habits but don't want something violent or with lots of sexual drama.

Winged Cloud. Guess I don't really need to make any introduction, since they are already well-known in visual novel community for their boobs-first-story-later "Sakura" series. Of course, after getting a mountain of money poured into their pocket with their previous titles, there is no way that they don't want more. May 29th, they released the 3rd one in the series - Sakura Fantasy Chapter 1. Yes, this is only the chapter 1, because they want to milk as much money as possible from this game (that said, the price is still the same as other "Sakura" games, which is 12$). And here I am, with my B-52 Bomb Squadron, ready to engage them.

WARNING: 18+ 15+ MATERIAL BELOW. YOU HAVE BEEN WARNED.





SYNOPSIS

The new visual novel from the makers of Sakura Spirit and Sakura Angels.

Sakura Fantasy Chapter 1 is an exciting visual novel fantasy adventure where you decide the development of the story by the choices you make.

It is the tale of an aspiring female protagonist who wishes to aim to become a knight.

CHARACTER

1. Raelin





Protagonist. A novice knight with the special ability a.k.a "gift" of "farseeing" (basically, let her "spirit" leaves her body and goes looking around). A perverted girl with the hobby of peeking at other people's nude private moment and getting nude herself.

2. Gwynne






Raelin's best friend. She handles paperwork in the barrack, and rarely participates in actual combat practice. She has the gift of lighting (summoning lighting and such).

3. Keira






Raelin's instructor. A serious and harsh girl, especially toward Raelin. She has the gift of stone skin.

4. Ardena





The Empress. An emotionless girl, or should I say, thousand years old grandma Her gift is currently unknown.

STORY

To summary, Sakura Fantasy is about Raelin, a novice knight that is currently training in some random barrack in some random empire. For some reason, she got the gift of farseeing from someone called "the creator". For some reason, she wanted to become an excellent knight in the army to fight again some kind of monster. One day, in her sleep, she found herself getting stucked in a swamp with a huge monster, but decided that it's just simply a dream after she woke up.







Yup, dark.


Sometime later, she was assigned to be the castle's guard. There, she met a strange girl who told her about "a star may soon falls from the heaven". She did not understand it well, until later of the day, when it really happened: A star fell from the sky, crashed down to somewhere outside the "wall" (which protect the city from monster).

Despite the opposition of the Council, the strange girl - who now revealed as the Empress - decided to assemble a group of brave soldiers to seek for the fallen star. Of course, everyone can guess who would be in that group: Raelin - the protagonist, Gwynne - best friend, and Keira - the tsundere instructor.





After crawling through the swamp filled with all kind of perverted monsters that you can expect (slime, tenta-tree) and fought a super anti-climax battle with a "slime girl" (which she soon retreated after throwing out some random attacks), Keira suddenly got shot down by a strange girl. Turned out that that girl - Ethy - mistook Keira with a monster - or something like that. The group then took a break at the small village where Ethy lived.

Before departing, suddenly, a huge monster came to attack the village. The group fought back, and won after a deus-ex-machina battle. They had a big feast, and Ethy ended up joining them after the Empress's spirit emerged from Raelin and talked to the villagers - who had a lot of respect toward the Empress. Anddddd that's the end of chapter 1.





Man, there are so many things to talk about that I don't even know where to start anymore.

First off, language. When Winged Cloud first released Sakura Spirit, they got a full container of rocks for the omfg English in the game. This time, there are improvements, but STILL NOT ENOUGH. I mean...






Yes, I'm not a native English-speaker, but I'm damn sure this is NOT how you use "wake" in a sentence! Btw, this is just the 4th sentence into the game! Other parts of the game are also trashed with random weird sentences all over the place.
In the synopsis also: "female protagonist who wishes to aim to become a knight". No no no, you either "wish" or "aim". You don't "wish to aim". That's retarded.

Secondly, detail. You wonder why I used so many "someone", "something", "somewhere" in the summary? That's because the game simply explained ABSOLUTELY NOTHING about those. They just throw the players into the game environment and leave them there dying with no information whatsoever. What is this empire called? Why did Raelin join the army? What are they fighting against? Where did those monsters come from? What's the current situation? What exactly is "gift"? There are simply no answer for those very basic questions. All there for players to know, is that they are soldiers with "gift" in an empire fighting against monsters. Done.
Let's take a look at the 2nd choice, about 2 minutes into the game:






Before this choice, they did not mentioned a damn single word about what the hell is this "gift" thing, and suddenly, they tell players to make a choice related to that "gift" thing. Are you trolling me here!?

Next, the consistency. In a sword practice scene:






Excuse me, girl, but those things are called "dummy", not "doll".


Realizing their mistake, in the later scene, not far from this scene, they changed it back to "dummy", but decided to keep the "doll" in this scene as it, just to remind the players "Oh, we actually wanted to use doll but it sounded too dumb so we changed it to dummy instead".
In another scene, when Gwynne told Raelin "You should not sleep in late." ("sleep in late", meh...), Raelin replied: "I was making strange faces? Like what?". Errr.....what? Raelin, are you still sleepy? She did not mention a damn single thing about your face you know!?

Fourthly, "the creator". In this game, "the creator" is pretty much "God" in this empire. "He" (nah, don't know the gender) granted people with gift, for some reason. And also for some reason, only granted it for some people, not all. And because he is the "God", some sentences in the game became weirdly funny:





Who were you thanking there, Raelin? The "creator" who granted you the gift, or did you just break the forth wall and thank Winged Cloud?

And finally, the choice. According to Wingled Cloud, players can "decide the development of the story by the choices you make". Nooooope. Most of the choices are absolutely pointless, they affect nothing toward the story development. In like half of them, Raelin will just go ahead and do whatever she wants to do, regardless of your choice. There are only 2, or maybe 3 choices that really make a different, that will result in different CGs, but even then, nothing is actually changed in the flow of story. There is no route, no bad end, so you are free to make whatever choice you want. You want to stay loyal to one girl? Go for it. You want to make a harem (in your imagination)? Go for it. You want to be a coward and always stay in the back line? Go for it. You want to be a crazy girl who charge headfirst into the monster without a single care in the world? Go for it.

You want to go commando? Go for it.






GRAPHIC

Well, it's Winged Cloud, so you know what is coming. Nice art as ever, with a heck amount of boobs, ass and fan-service. 80% (or more, I'm suck at math) of the CGs are fan-service. How did this thing even get through Steam again? No wonder why they can attract a bunch of perverts on Steam buying their games. Eeeeveryone fell for the honey trap. Not me, I pirated.






MUSIC

Just your normal everyday BGM, nothing to talk about. Actually, did they reuse some BGMs from their previous games...?

CONCLUSION

I will just say one thing: Please, stay away from this trash. Don't pour more money into Winged Cloud's pocket, giving them motivation to create more disasters. If you want something to spend your money on, then go for Grisaia (or wait for the 18+ ver if you want), Neptunia, or even Akiba's Trip. Much better.

Pros:
- Nice art.

Cons:
- Still have Engrish.
- Unexplained story, detail.
- Pointless choices.
- No route (this game is not designed to be a kinetic novel).
- Lack of consistency in wording and sentencing.
- Overused fan-service CGs.
- Overkill price.

Score
Story: 2/10
Character: 5/10
Graphic: 7/10
Music: 4/10
Overkill price: -2
Total: 2,5/10







My previous review:
Love Rec. (Trial Edition)

I wrote this response to a thoughtful commenter on Reddit.
 
I would not support a non-adult only English release of Kagura Douchuuki, with a purchase or otherwise. I would also encourage other eroge fans not to support whitewashing of titles where sexual content was an integral part of the original concept (i.e., this title and MoeNovel's If My Heart Had Wings).
 
Just because a story can be told without sex doesn't mean it should. Just because it's easier to promote a game without sexual content doesn't mean that sexual content should be removed for the sake of convenience. This isn't merely a matter of supply and demand. It's about faithfulness to the original concept of the work. As a developer, it's lazy and disingenuous to cut content just to maximize sales in a given territory, while leaving fans with no option to restore the content and enjoy the original experience. It's callous to turn one's back on fans who have been supporting the market all along so companies like Debonosu could have the opportunity to release games like Kagura Douchuuki on Steam.
 
I wrote my Kaguara Douchuuki article to notify fans of the path Debonosu has embarked on, and hopefully to persuade Debonosu to change their minds. According to dovac (CEO of Sekai Project) our earnest pleas will fall on deaf ears (in his words, "They don't care"). But at least we'll have tried.
 
Should we support developers that "don't care"? I would say that, no, we shouldn't. And if Debonosu truly "doesn't care", then I would argue they don't deserve the support of you, me, or anyone else. And when a company truly doesn't care, that'll likely manifest in more than just needless content cuts; you'll see it in the slipshod way the localization is handled. Notice how the Greenlight campaign was started without any English description (which Sekai Project rushed to donate because they didn't want the black eye of a campaign for a prominent VN failing). Notice how Debonosu's single English comment was in broken English. Does that indicate to you that Debonosu is invested in making this release a success? Does that give you confidence that the final product will be professional quality?
 
I think if Debonosu doesn't start caring more pretty quick, this release will likely be a trainwreck that will cause gameplay VN fans to cringe for years to come (not unlike what's happened with MoeNovel's release of If My Heart Had Wings).
 
[Feature image: Thomas the trainwreck]

In the Fallout 4 thread here, I was seemingly cynical on the game for no reason. I have reasons, I just didn't post them. So to not be that bitter pointlessly cynical guy, I'll talk about why I'm still not very excited for FO4. I'll start by talking about Bethesda's older games, because a lot of posters here weren't around for them, and I'll establish the trends that make me skeptical of more Bethesda-produced open-world RPGs. Bethesda started the Elder Scrolls series as just some self-insertion sandbox for their in-office D&D campaign. This is fine, Arena was a charming game in its own right. But it had nary an ounce of narrative to it, which was normal for anything other than adventure games at the time. The world was threatened and you were given a vague directive at the start, you went from dungeon samey dungeon, and eventually found the bad guy, killed him, and won the game. With Daggerfall, you had a bit more introductory story. The world was in trouble and only you can save it. You had to accomplish several tasks before confronting the big bad. Every once in a while you met with an NPC who had small amounts of exposition. There were more side-quests strewn about with some pretty basic objectives, mostly without any story behind them. The game was procedurally generated (not on the fly) so that's to be expected. There were also books around that explained the world a little, it was pretty interesting. You went from dungeon to samey dungeon, killed the bad guy, won the game. By this point, people started expecting more from not just RPGs, but from games in general. Narratives were becoming a big thing, Bioware and Black Isle started doing their things with storytelling in RPGs, and Metal Gear Solid in action games. Bethesda felt like they had to adapt, they had to tell cool stories with strong narratives in their games, too!

Morrowind was actually a pretty dang good first attempt at this. The world building was surprisingly strong, the setting was unique and interesting. It held inspiration from Heart of Darkness, which was fairly bold for a fantasy RPG. There was a complex political climate with clashes between colonizers and the colonized, on top of this world-threatening event that's going down. You met many of the people deeply involved with the sticky situation the island finds itself in, including the local god-king Vivec who is holding the island hostage by artificially suspending a giant meteor above it (including preserving its inertia) and claiming that if followers stop worshipping him, the meteor will crash and kill everyone. Welp. There's lots of cool stuff like this strewn about. But here's the thing, it's all relating to the setting and the backstory. Anything beyond that is pretty threadbare. Your mission was to find the savior the dark elf prophecies speak of so this person can save the world from some looming evil. You go from dungeon to samey dungeon, and BIG TWIST: you were the savior the whole time! You save the world, game over. You saw a lot of cool stuff along the way, but it felt more like a sightseeing tour than a proper narrative. You were an agent following the whims of others the whole time, too. You get the sense that no one at Bethesda had any experience writing these kinds of stories. But the world-building was so cool that you wanted to keep exploring for hours on end, seeing the unique sights of Morrowind and getting involved in their conflicts. The main quest kind of sucked, but the side quests were a lot of fun. They themselves didn't have particularly strong stories and were mainly filled with one-dimensional characters who just wanted a task done, but there was some real neat stuff thrown in there, like the last dwarf alive, in some plague colony, with his lower body replaced by mechanical spider legs. Cool! It was also the first TES game with an extensive mod community.






(Morrowind was full of bizarre flora, fauna, and architecture)


Oblivion was a disaster in a lot of ways. The industry was firmly planting itself in support of strong narratives in not just certain kinds of games, but ALL games, now. While Half Life did a lot for storytelling in shooters at the time, it was nothing in comparison to Max Payne, an intense third-person shooter with a lengthy, twisting plot and plenty of dialog. There was Warcraft 3, a real-time strategy with an epic fantasy story attached (the previous WC games had stories that were more window-dressing than anything). If your game didn't tell a long, complex story, it was junk. It didn't matter what kind of game it was. Even Rockstar got in on the trend with their nonsensical murder simulators, Vice City and especially San Andreas. Bethesda could not afford to release an open world RPG without an absolutely epic story. But here's the thing, they SUCK at at storytelling! They're good at writing backstory, at worldbuilding. Every other facet of their writing is terrible. But gosh darn if they weren't going to try. They splurged on several very expensive voice actors to deliver their surely incredible dialog, then only had a handful of VAs rest for the rest of their hundreds of characters. Oops. The dialog in the main questline was as generic as possible. There were no truly interesting hooks to it, the player didn't have to make any difficult decisions, and the characters were as flat as cardboard. You were tasked to find the savior, did so by going from dungeon to samey dungeon, doing a LOT of busywork in closing those damn oblivion gates, and BIG TWIST: there is no twist! You find the savior and he defeats the final boss, saving the world for you. You weren't even the main hero! Bethesda's one saving grace, their world-building, failed them here. Cyrodiil was originally written as a dense jungle with interesting, dynamic cultures, but was retconned because they deemed verdant plains and deer-filled forests to have more mass appeal in the US and Europe. They spent a lot of money developing a complex AI system where every NPC would have needs and wants, and would seek out their own methods to fulfill them, and then disabled it because it didn't work at all. One thing Bethesda did do is up their game on the side quests. A lot of them were generic, but there were these main guilds in the game, and each one had their own storyline, and some got reasonably involved. They were mostly kind of middling, but the star of the show was the Dark Brotherhood questline, where you join a guild of assassins. There were twists and turns to its story, shady characters with grey-area motives, many assassination contracts had complex setups, and there were multiple endings to the quest line. It felt like its own game. Looking back on it, it's really nothing special, but it was like a small pond in the middle of a scorching desert, an oasis players took solace in and gathered around as a shining example of how to do questing in an open world game. One man wrote and designed all of these quests, Emil Pagliarulo, and his work stood out so much from the rest of Bethesda's offering, they handed him the reigns to all of Fallout 3.

Fallout 3 was a cool game, although it didn't feel very much like a real Fallout game. I'm not talking about the shift in perspective and gameplay, but the shift in tone, storytelling style, and world design. And you know what? Bethesda's writing still sucked. It became clear that Emil Pagliarulo is not an especially skilled writer. When taken out of the sea of shit the rest of Oblivion was, Emil's quest design and writing was shown to be fairly amateurish and not actually all that interesting. The story still felt uninspired. It was a personal story to find your father (and maybe save the world in the process), but therein laid the problem. The player character was still nameless, mute, and devoid of personality. Can you really tell a personal story involving family with that kind of setup? Well, you can, but you can't get anyone to care. And while the world design was reasonably interesting in its own right, with plenty of unique sights to see, the setting overall was a total failure. It was meant to be 100 years after the apocalypse, but it felt like it was just one year, with no organization, barely anything in the way of factions (other than two shadowy organizations), and people still scrambling and scavenging to survive. I still had more fun with it than I did with Oblivion, but it felt so lacking in so many areas. A couple years later, New Vegas came out developed by a different studio, one staffed by members with experience developing previous Fallout games, Obsidian Entertainment. And it totally clowned Bethesda and their attempt at a Fallout game. It had its own set of downsides, but gosh was New Vegas fun. Many characters individually had more depth to them than the combined depth of all of FO3's characters combined. The quests had a wealth of options, diverging branches, and alternate outcomes. The dialog was often witty and compelling to listen to. The world truly felt like how a post-apocalyptic world should feel like, with budding governments, organized banditry, and more overt faction wars competing for territory with the citizenry caught in the middle. They even managed to make the story feel personal despite your character being a no-name cipher. Many of the dungeons felt more unique. There was more loot with a crafting system. The combat, armor, and weapon systems felt more balanced and more fun. The one point I will concede is that aimlessly exploring the wasteland felt a bit more frustrating and less rewarding.






(an example of the branching structure of one side quest in New Vegas)


Would Bethesda learn from their mistakes in Oblivion and Fallout 3, and Obsidian's triumphs in New Vegas? Yes and no. Skyrim was fun. Bethesda's world-building strength has returned to them Skyrim was gorgeous, varied, and a joy to explore. They incentivized exploration in some really smart ways. Character leveling didn't feel so broken. The story, though, was still a problem. Bethesda is still shit at writing. You are the chosen one, overcome these trials, delve through dungeon through samey dungeon, kill a dragon or two, and save the world! It was still stock fantasy fair, without a hint of depth or creativity. That's okay though, because exploring the world is fun. What about the questing in the rest of the world? Well, the faction quests felt like stepped-up versions of Oblivion's faction quests. They had a bit more dialog, a bit more story to them, but most of them were still kind of mediocre. The characters were still largely one dimensional. Most of them did allow you to make a decision or two, which could affect the outcome in some inconsequential manner. The stand-out side-plot in this game was the civil war. It created an interesting political climate, but how much did it really impact the world? You could side with one faction or the other, and each had their own quest line. The faction I sided with lead up to a cool battle where we laid siege to a major city, and assaulted it. There were missions that lead up to it that determined the effectiveness of the soldiers, siege weapons, etc. When you finally got into the battle, and catapults were going off, spells were firing, and soldiers were charging the gates, it was so cool! Then the scripting broke at multiple points, requiring reloads. Well, it's an Elder Scrolls game. Then you won the battle, some buildings were smoldering a little, and a different man sat on the throne. That was it. You could go into towns occupied by the opposing faction and no one would bat an eye at you. It felt like the battle had no impact whatsoever. It was all a bit underwhelming. Bethesda repeatedly teases the players in their games, make grand promises, and fail to deliver time and time again.

I'm kind of getting sick of being disappointed. I'm getting sick of being a no-personality mute who is little more than an errand boy. I'm sick of the samey dungeons in every single game. I'm sick of the quest design that feels like you're going down a straight predetermined line instead of doing things your way. I'm sick of the shoddy writing, the shallow characters with crystal clear motivations, the stale and generic dialog, and the simple boilerplate storylines. Yes, Bethesda makes some great worlds to explore, but you know, I've played every single Bethesda game. I've played plenty of other compelling open world games. I've kind of had my fill. I watch the Fallout 4 trailer and am filled with apathy. I'm not saying Bethesda should ditch the open world, not at all, but I need something more. I'm looking forward to E3 this year. I'm a long-time fan of Bethesda's games, and I desperately want them to prove me wrong. But I won't hold my breath for it.

----------------------

On a side-note, The Witcher 3 has been giving me that something more. Its characters are all fascinating, even the minor ones. The story is a compelling search for your adopted daughter in trouble. The quests are sprawling with many avenues of approach and outcomes, even the side quests. The writing is entertaining and never fails to capture your attention. You are prompted with so many decisions on such a constant basis, all of which have some impact on the world big or small, that it no longer feels like you're playing a god controlling the fates of these characters, but you ARE Geralt of Rivia, in the world, making these decisions. It's an incredibly immersive experience. You end up never wanting to reload and take back your decisions, because they become so personal. And the open world is not sacrificed even a little in the face of this narrative experience, with a huge world to explore with an enormous amount of things to discover. The Witcher 3 allows us to have our cake and eat it, too. What is a Bethesda game in the face of this?






(as I write this, I'm itching to jump back into The Witcher 3)

--------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Fans of my previous safe-for-work blog post, Rogue-like H-RPG Kagura Douchuuki hits Steam Greenlight + First Impression, will be interested to know that I've just released a new and improved NSFW version on ero-gaming news and reviews site LewdGamer.com.
H-RPG Kagura Douchuuki gets Greenlight for Censorship (Op-Ed) [NSFW]
The new version includes a completely new section "Steam: An opportunity and a threat to lewd gaming" that demonstrates how Steam is changing the face of professional eroge localization. HCG from the original Japanese title are also displayed (purely to decry the lamentful squandering of art assets, of course).
It was a pleasure to work with the staff of LewdGamer to bring my article to a wider audience than I could achieve here on my personal blog, and hopefully we'll have opportunity to work together more in the future. Unique among eroge news and reviews sites, LewdGamer caters explicitly to an adult audience. The staff are very passionate about promoting eroge in the West, and I hope I was able to provide useful feedback on their operations, as well as ideas for future coverage. LewdGamer as a site has exploded in popularity recently despite launching mere months ago, so they're definitely a group to keep an eye on.
Do you prefer safe-for-work or NSFW preview and review articles? Let me know!

Hi everyone, this is my first blog post but hopefully not my last. I wanted to show off my most recent cover, as I feel immensely proud of it. Plus, I've started playing Steins;Gate and it's SO COOL. I can't wait to get into the meat of the story! I'm sure there's some Steins;Gate fanatics here, heheh. Enjoy!

(An old parody I wrote in 2013, I'm reposting here for general amusement. See the original forum thread for initial reactions.)
 
Announcer:
It’s a beautiful day for baseball today in Eroge Stadium. I’m your host Sanahtlig here to provide commentary for Visual Novel Translation TV. Today the Localizers play against the Fan Translators in a special Western League All-Star game. This should be an interesting matchup. On the Localizers team we have representatives from Mangagamer including the rising star Kouryuu, as well as veterans from JAST USA including the well known Peter Payne. The Fan Translators are a truly diverse bunch of big names playing together for the first time ever. We have Ixrec from Amaterasu, Moogy from TLWiki, Haeleth, and Aaeru from Fuwanovel. It’ll be interesting to see how they interact as a team.
 
The Localizers are up to bat first. But there seems to be a delay. The first batter from Mangagamer appears to have brought a large stick instead of a bat! He seems to be arguing with the umpire. Let’s listen in.
Umpire: You can’t just waltz in here with a stick for a bat. Go borrow a real bat from one of the JAST players!
Mangagamer player: ALL YOUR BASE ARE BELONG TO US!
Umpire: WTF?
 
Announcer:
The Mangagamer player just took off and started running the bases before the game even started! What is he doing??? We’ll be back after a word from our sponsors.
 
[Commercial]
VNDB, a compendium of visual novel knowledge, by you, for you: an oasis where you can request visual novel recommendations, speak freely, and engage in enlightened discussions. Please click our affiliates so we don't go broke!
 
5 min later
 
Announcer:
We’re back, and this time Peter Payne is up to bat with 1 out and 1 expelled player. Here’s the pitch and—it’s a hit! Wait, what is he doing? He’s just standing there! Let’s zoom in for a closer look.
On close examination, Peter is actually shuffling towards 1st base so slow it’s barely perceptible from a distance. He makes it a few feet before being tagged out by the catcher.
That’s two outs folks. Up to bat next is Kouryuu, Mangagamer’s newest darling. Here’s the pitch and—it’s a line drive. This—
At that moment the microphone fades out. The game ensues soundless until a member from Mangagamer finally strikes out, ending the round.
We’re back at Eroge Stadium. We apologize for the technical difficulties. A member from Mangagamer barged in and carried off the microphone, claiming we didn’t have rights to broadcast audio during their lineup. We’re assured now that the problem has been cleared up.
 
The Localizers are taking to the field. Wait, what is this? Mangagamer’s players have taken to the field without clothes! This isn’t baseball, this is pornography! Outrageous! JAST’s entire bench has rushed onto the field to subdue them. They appear to be re-clothing the Mangagamer players—is that 2 bras I see??? We’ll be back after a commercial break.
 
[Commercial]
Mangagamer staff A: Somebody set us up the bomb!
Mangagamer staff B: What you say?!
*Screen flash and booming sound*
Pictured is a box set of 3 games, priced at $150. A tag in the corner of the screen reads “no voice”.
Narrator: Shin Koihime Musou! Otanoshimini!
 
5 min later
 
Announcer:
We’re back and the game looks ready to resume. First up to bat is Haeleth, the oldest member on the team and a true league veteran. He seems to be getting some boos from the audience…hmm? Haeleth just threw down his bat and walked out of the stadium! Amazing! Looks like the Fan Translators are down one member!
Next up to bat is Moogy. Moogy is known for his often uncomplimentary remarks for his fellow players. Moogy steps up to bat and—he seems to be shouting something at the Fan Translator dug out. He’s throwing down his bat and…he just walked out into the field? He seems to have joined the Localizers! What an unexpected development!
Next up is Ixrec. This guy is a monster folks; he has the highest RBI in the entire league. Here’s the pitch, and—it’s a hard hit to right field! Peter Payne scrambles for the ball…what is he doing? Is he riding a wheelchair in the grass? Why is he in a wheelchair?! Ixrec scores! And he’s running around the bases again! Look at him go! One of the umpires from the Japanese league, Age, has grabbed Ixrec and is trying to stop him! Oh my, Ixrec just kicked Age in the balls and is running the bases again! Unbelievable! We’ll be back after a commercial break.
 
[Commercial]
JAST USA is proud to announce the best hentai dating sim ever, Lightning Warrior Raidy 3! Play the role of a cute swordswoman as she fights creepy tentacle monsters and devilish vixens with her new lesbian fusion powers! Coming to a store near you in 2018!
 
10 min later
 
Announcer:
We’re back. Age has left the game, and I doubt we’ll see him back for another Western League game in the near future. We have a Fan Translator on 1st base from a single up the middle.
Next up is Aaeru. A relative newcomer, Aaeru doesn’t seem to be getting along too well with her fellow Fan Translators. But in this game it’s results that count, which I’m sure Aaeru will show us today.
Here comes the pitch…it’s a fast line drive to left field! That’s a base hit! Wait! Aaeru appears to making a beeline for 3rd base! What is she doing?! She’s stopped on 3rd base and doesn’t seem to be budging. It appears that she’s decided to run the bases in reverse order! What are the umpires doing?! The other Fan Translators are snickering, but no one seems to be stopping her. That leaves a player each on 2nd and 3rd base.
Next up to bat is…Moogy? Did he switch sides again?! It’s probably best not to think too hard about this. Here’s the pitch—and it’s a pop up to right field! Peter goes for the ball—and his wheelchair tips over! The Fan Translators are running the bases and—Aaeru just collided with her fellow Fan Translator! Who would've seen that coming?! She’s getting up, and--
 
Mangagamer 3rd baseman: ALL YOUR BASE ARE BELONG TO US!
 
Announcer:
The Mangagamer 3rd baseman just clubbed her over the head with 3rd base! Ouch! Moogy runs up to her and…he’s kicking her while she’s down! I don’t know who’s the greater bastard: Aaeru, the Mangagamer 3rd baseman, or Moogy! Ixrec runs out of the dugout—he’s running the bases again! Someone catch him! What the hell??? The Mangagamer players are stripping again! Peter is still crawling out in right field towards the ball! This is utter chaos folks! It’s a wacky free-for-all today in Eroge Stadium. I’ve never seen such incredible dysfunction in all my days as an Eroge Stadium broadcaster. Will Moogy stop kicking Aaeru? Will Mangagamer stop turning this into a live porn event? Will Ixrec leave any points for anyone else? Will Peter ever get the damn ball? Stay tuned to Visual Novel Translation TV!
 
In the meantime, let's get some comments from the stadium audience.

I wrote yesterday about the Steam Greenlight campaign for Debonosu's Kagura Douchuuki, a rogue-like H-RPG. Read my article for coverage of the announcement and a first impression. As Steam doesn't allow adult content, this release will be censored, with all adult content removed. Kagura Douchuuki contains dozens of H-scenes, so the content removed will be considerable. By my estimation, more CG will be removed than left behind. The game's art will be thoroughly gutted. Not only will the game itself be butchered beyond recognition, but if left unchecked this sets a dangerous precedent for future English releases that cannot be ignored. If Japanese developers get the impression that Steam is the one and only venue for visual novels, this will be the first of many Steam-only releases of VNs that were originally ero-games.
 
I've contacted both Debonosu and Sekai Project via Twitter, with no response. It's time to escalate this.
 

 

 
For those who are opposed to Steam censorship of this title, here's what you can do.
 
Go to Debonosu's twitter account (@debonosu) and tweet this message:
神楽道中記はエロシーンが取り除けたら、その利点を失くしてしまいます。神楽道中記の１８禁版も英語化してください！
If the ero scenes are removed from Kagura Douchuuki, the game will lose its main selling point. Please give us the 18+ version in English!
 
If enough fans speak up, they might listen and also release the original 18+ version in partnership with an eroge publisher like Sekai Project, Mangagamer, or JAST USA.
 
Edit: On a reader's suggestion, I changed the message to make more sense to a Japanese reader. The old message was:
言論弾圧には反対です。１８歳以上用版（英語訳）下さい！
I am opposed to censorship. Please give us the 18+ version (in English)!

I wrote yesterday about the Steam Greenlight campaign for Debonosu's Kagura Douchuuki, a rogue-like H-RPG. Read my article for coverage of the announcement and a first impression. As Steam doesn't allow adult content, this release will be censored, with all adult content removed. Kagura Douchuuki contains dozens of H-scenes, so the content removed will be considerable. By my estimation, more CG will be removed than left behind. The game's art will be thoroughly gutted. Not only will the game itself be butchered beyond recognition, but if left unchecked this sets a dangerous precedent for future English releases that cannot be ignored. If Japanese developers get the impression that Steam is the one and only venue for visual novels, this will be the first of many Steam-only releases of VNs that were originally ero-games.
 
I've contacted both Debonosu and Sekai Project via Twitter, with no response. It's time to escalate this.
 

 

 
For those who are opposed to Steam censorship of this title, here's what you can do.
 
Go to Debonosu's twitter account (@debonosu) and tweet this message:
神楽道中記はエロシーンが取り除けたら、その利点を失くしてしまいます。神楽道中記の１８禁版も英語化してください！
If the ero scenes are removed from Kagura Douchuuki, the game will lose its main selling point. Please give us the 18+ version in English!
 
If enough fans speak up, they might listen and also release the original 18+ version in partnership with an eroge publisher like Sekai Project, Mangagamer, or JAST USA.
 
Edit: On a reader's suggestion, I changed the message to make more sense to a Japanese reader. The old message was:
言論弾圧には反対です。１８歳以上用版（英語訳）下さい！
I am opposed to censorship. Please give us the 18+ version (in English)!

(This is the safe-for-work mirror of my LewdGamer article H-RPG Kagura Douchuuki Gets Greenlight for Censorship [NSFW])

Steam: An opportunity and a threat to ero-gaming

The opening of Steam to visual novels is changing the face of professional eroge localization. Until very recently this was a world where every eroge, no matter its merit or lack thereof, sold more or less the same. Story-focused eroge consume several times the resources in time and manpower as short sex-heavy titles, and lackluster sales meant these titles had trouble simply recouping translation and voice licensing costs. Just recently, Mangagamer warned that the failure of Princess Evangile (NSFW) could spell the end of moe-focused romantic comedies in English. Meanwhile, JAST's Peter Payne similarly declared that gameplay titles are 2-3 times more costly to localize than even story-focused eroge, and added that if Seinarukana does not sell better than their previous RPGs then it would likely be the last ero-RPG they choose to license (JAST’s failure to market Seinarukana as an RPG could doom English H-RPGs).

Enter Steam. Valve opened up Steam Greenlight to developers of all varieties and backpedaled on its stance that visual novels were not welcome on its platform. Visual novels began appearing on Steam and selling in unprecedented numbers. Capitalizing on this lucky break, JAST and Mangagamer rushed to offer censored versions of their eroge on the Steam marketplace. All at once, the calculus of eroge localization was flipped on its heels, as high-quality story-focused titles showed that they could turn a profit along with their budget porn brethren. Sales of Princess Evangile exceeded expectations. JAST reported increased adult version sales of Littlewitch Romanesque after its Steam debut, despite the availability of a fan patch that restored the adult content in the much cheaper Steam version. A successful release of Seinarukana is within reach, assuming JAST can get a version of it on Steam.


But for all its promise, Steam is a censored platform that does NOT welcome lewd games. There was always the risk that Japanese eroge developers would see Steam as a target market rather than as a means to fund eroge localization. And today we are confronted with the first eroge developer to bypass their natural fanbase--erogamers like you and me--and go straight for Steam, setting a dangerous precedent should they stay the path and find success.

Opening + gameplay trailer
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XvG1Ez2xJnM

Steam Greenlight page
VNDB
Official Japanese site (NSFW)

Announcing an English release of Kagura Douchuuki

With little fanfare ero-RPG developer Debonosu has unleashed its rogue-like RPG Kagura Douchuuki on Steam Greenlight. Originally released in 2009, Kagura Douchuuki was Debo no Su Seisakusho's first title after rising from the ashes of Studio e.go!. Fans of fan-translated RPGs Castle Fantasia 2 Renewal and Men at Work 2 will recognize the bewitching art of Kazue Yamamoto. Originally released as an eroge, Debonosu also released a non-adult version with erotic content removed, which presumably is the version being offered on Greenlight. It is unclear whether there are plans for a release of the adult version. Contrary to rumor, Sekai Project provided a translation of the description as a gesture of goodwill, but at present are not affiliated with Debonosu's effort to release Kagura Douchuuki in English (source).

Premise



Kagura Douchuuki takes place in a remote village built around a hot springs resort in modern-day Japan. The once prosperous village, now largely abandoned, provides a nostalgic glimpse into a rural past unfettered by modern-day civilization and the din of machines. Residents of this rural village have been disappearing recently, and despite a police investigation bizarre incidents continue to plague the area. Suspecting the involvement of otherworldly creatures known as youkai, a squad of Shinto exorcists is dispatched to investigate the disappearances. This 3-member squad consists of two warrior priestesses, sword-wielding Ibuki from the Youkai Coexistence faction and spear-wielding Nazuna from the Youkai Extermination faction, and the monk Minase tasked with coordinating the investigation and performing purification rites. Can the two priestesses overcome their differences and get to the bottom of the mysterious disappearances?


Ibuki (left), Nazuna (right)

Gameplay overview

I played a few hours into this game several years ago, so I'll try to recap what I remember. As shown in the second half of the video, Kagura Douchuuki features rogue-like gameplay: the player controls Ibuki and Nazuna as they investigate the youkai-infested forest around the village. The maps are essentially randomly-generated dungeon floors, where the objective is to locate the entrance to successive floors while fighting off randomly spawning enemies. Story objectives typically task the mikos with fighting through a specified number of floors to a boss encounter, defeat of which progresses the story.



Items and equipment are littered throughout each floor as well as being dropped by monsters and bosses, and these are the main source of character growth. As I recall, there's 3x2 equipment slots: weapon, armor, accessory. Characters level up by defeating monsters, unlocking new skills, but levels are lost after leaving the dungeon (except in Easy mode). In addition, unequipped items in inventory are lost upon defeat (Normal mode), while in Hard mode equipped items are also lost. Inventory space is very limited, so players will not be able to carry every item they find.

Combat takes places in semi real time with movement and attacks each being counted as one turn. Players and enemies can move in 4 directions; whenever the player moves or attacks, enemies do so as well. Attacks can occur diagonally as well. This game has gamepad support, which is a definite plus. Players can alternate freely between Ibuki and Nazuna. Ibuki is a melee fighter that can attack 1 space in front of her. Nazuna can attack 2 spaces out with her spear, but her defense is weaker so she takes more damage. Some enemies are best dealt with by Nazuna due to her longer reach, while Ibuki's higher defense is useful for others. Health is recovered with food and potions, while MP for skills recovers with time.

Story

While the gameplay dominates time-wise, Kagura Douchuuki still has significant stretches of text between dungeon excursions, and boss fights are preceded by story segments as well. The characters are the main draw rather than the plot, with interactions between Ibuki and Nazuna often forming the crux of the dialogue. Ibuki is a clumsy but good-natured girl (with an Osakan dialect) who seeks coexistence with the youkai, while Nazuna is a stern tsundere-type who believes the youkai should be eradicated without mercy. The plot isn't very deep, but it adequately serves up reasons to go dungeon crawling while providing opportunities for Ibuki and Nazuna to quarrel. There might be a romance arc with Minase, but I didn't play far enough to confirm.



Adult content

The adult version of Kagura Douchuuki is filled to the brim with sexual content. There's a reason that the priestesses do all the fighting: youkai are extremely hostile to and kill any males they encounter, but they use human females to propagate. They subdue and rape females they come across, but otherwise don't harm their captives. With time and sufficient insemination, these females will spawn more youkai or become youkai themselves. However, the sperm of a human male is curative of youkai fertilization due to its spiritual antagonism to youkai negative energies

In short, there's 2 unique defeat rape scenes for every monster type and boss, one per heroine. In addition, there's further scenes involving purification of the youkai fertilizations by Minase, which are required to prevent an eventual game over (i.e., being turned into a youkai) after being defeated. On top of that, there's textual and voice variations of the scenes on subsequent defeats that make the scenes worth re-experiencing, including variations for defloration. The art is one of this game's main assets, and the H-scenes really bring that out. Quite simply, the ero in this game is awesome, and frankly the writing in the H-scenes is more interesting than the main plot as it's very descriptive and filled with emotion. Contrast that with the cliched and somewhat dull vibe I got from the main plot.

Evaluation

EGS median: 70 (109 votes)
VNDB rating: 7.1 (12 votes)
Personal: 6/10

Kagura Douchuuki's strength is its art. And, ironically enough, every CG on both Getchu (NSFW) and the official site (18+ version, NSFW) is from an ero-scene. I can only imagine that Debonosu had to gut most of the art assets to create the non-adult version, and in fact a quick survey of the site for the non-adult version shows 4 CG compared to the 24 CG shown on the adult site. And as explained above, the H-scenes are really quite good. If you're into monster rape, you can't do much better than Debonosu's Kagura series--in English or Japanese.

The rogue-like gameplay is decent. It's simple without being overly tedious. I'm not a fan of level resetting, but you can always play on Easy if that bothers you. I wouldn't call the gameplay engaging, but at least it doesn't feel like a chore like Yumina the Ethereal's dungeon crawling did.

The story is... mediocre. If you've played the translated Studio e.go! titles, you'll know what to expect. If you like moe comedy, then maybe you'll appreciate the story more than I did. I found the dialogue to be pretty standard fare, and the plot was uninspired and mostly an excuse to set up the dungeon excursions and character dialogue. In the few hours I played, the setting didn't get much development and ended up feeling very generic, which is a shame because I feel that with a bit more detail into the mythology and the town's circumstances the story would've been much more engaging. I've played some of the sequel Kagura Gensoutan and I found the setting in that one a bit more developed.

Overall, Kagura Douchuuki compares well against titles like the Raidy series. The art is on par with if not better than the Raidy series (though it lacks animation), and it edges out Raidy in terms of battle system and story development. But as a non-adult title? It doesn't have much going for it other than having gameplay and not being terrible. It's unremarkable. I honestly can't recommend it against the likes of Littlewitch Romanesque, Aselia the Eternal, and Seinarukana, or even Yumina the Ethereal.

Kagura Douchuuki Sou and expansions

Debonosu released an updated version of Kagura Douchuuki in December 2014, Kagura Douchuuki Sou, which added widescreen support (game and CG resolution increased from 800x600 to 1024x576) and added 40 HCG to the defeat scenes. Three append disks were also released which added new dungeons, new monsters, further story content, and a new playable heroine. The Steam Greenlight campaign appears to be for the non-adult slimmed-down version of the original 2009 release, meaning that it won't include all of the bonus content released since.


Koharu, the additional heroine from append disk 3

Debonosu's other titles

Debonosu has a diverse lineup of gameplay titles, and if you include Studio e.go! titles they have a huge selection of games under their belt. The Kagura games are a long-running series including other rogue-likes and an SRPG (Kurenai Kagura). While the Kagura series is focused on monsters raping defeated miko, their other titles are more varied thematically (many featuring no defeat rape at all), though all boast high sexual content. These other titles include a Tales series-like sidescrolling RPG with raising sim elements (Sora o Aogite Kumo Takaku), a loli action RPG with item synthesis and base management (Hanasaku Otome to Koi no Grimoire), a dungeon crawler (Chaos Labyrinth), a real-time strategy game set against a backdrop of military conflict (Senjou no Folklore), and a traditional RPG (Gigai no Alruna).


Sora o Aogite Kumo Takaku (left), Gigai no Alruna (right)

Closing thoughts

Debonosu is what I'd term a third-tier gameplay eroge developer: they produce a wide variety of decent games, none of which are particularly outstanding. Their gameplay systems range from adequate to entertaining, their stories are character-centric with a comedy focus and plots that are simple and uninspired, and their art and especially their ero is excellent and probably the main draw.

Given the limited selection of licensed gameplay eroge in English, Debonosu fills a niche for high sexual content non-nukige gameplay titles. Stripping the ero-content out of these titles removes the very assets that make these titles stand out in the first place. My recommendation to readers is to clamor for release of the adult version of this title and future titles. While it's important for marketing purposes to get this game and others on Steam, without the ero these titles are merely soulless husks. The non-adult versions will never be more than hollow stand-ins for the adult versions. You can't strip the art out from titles that are remarkable only for their art and expect a satisfactory result.

(Also check out the followup post Tell Debonosu you want the uncut version of Kagura Douchuuki)

Article edited 5/29/15 to clarify Sekai Project's role in the Steam Greenlight campaign.
Article edited 5/31/15 to add information about Kagura Douchuuki Sou and append disks.

(This is the safe-for-work mirror of my LewdGamer article H-RPG Kagura Douchuuki Gets Greenlight for Censorship [NSFW])

Steam: An opportunity and a threat to ero-gaming

The opening of Steam to visual novels is changing the face of professional eroge localization. Until very recently this was a world where every eroge, no matter its merit or lack thereof, sold more or less the same. Story-focused eroge consume several times the resources in time and manpower as short sex-heavy titles, and lackluster sales meant these titles had trouble simply recouping translation and voice licensing costs. Just recently, Mangagamer warned that the failure of Princess Evangile (NSFW) could spell the end of moe-focused romantic comedies in English. Meanwhile, JAST's Peter Payne similarly declared that gameplay titles are 2-3 times more costly to localize than even story-focused eroge, and added that if Seinarukana does not sell better than their previous RPGs then it would likely be the last ero-RPG they choose to license (JAST’s failure to market Seinarukana as an RPG could doom English H-RPGs).

Enter Steam. Valve opened up Steam Greenlight to developers of all varieties and backpedaled on its stance that visual novels were not welcome on its platform. Visual novels began appearing on Steam and selling in unprecedented numbers. Capitalizing on this lucky break, JAST and Mangagamer rushed to offer censored versions of their eroge on the Steam marketplace. All at once, the calculus of eroge localization was flipped on its heels, as high-quality story-focused titles showed that they could turn a profit along with their budget porn brethren. Sales of Princess Evangile exceeded expectations. JAST reported increased adult version sales of Littlewitch Romanesque after its Steam debut, despite the availability of a fan patch that restored the adult content in the much cheaper Steam version. A successful release of Seinarukana is within reach, assuming JAST can get a version of it on Steam.


But for all its promise, Steam is a censored platform that does NOT welcome lewd games. There was always the risk that Japanese eroge developers would see Steam as a target market rather than as a means to fund eroge localization. And today we are confronted with the first eroge developer to bypass their natural fanbase--erogamers like you and me--and go straight for Steam, setting a dangerous precedent should they stay the path and find success.

Opening + gameplay trailer
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XvG1Ez2xJnM

Steam Greenlight page
VNDB
Official Japanese site (NSFW)

Announcing an English release of Kagura Douchuuki

With little fanfare ero-RPG developer Debonosu has unleashed its rogue-like RPG Kagura Douchuuki on Steam Greenlight. Originally released in 2009, Kagura Douchuuki was Debo no Su Seisakusho's first title after rising from the ashes of Studio e.go!. Fans of fan-translated RPGs Castle Fantasia 2 Renewal and Men at Work 2 will recognize the bewitching art of Kazue Yamamoto. Originally released as an eroge, Debonosu also released a non-adult version with erotic content removed, which presumably is the version being offered on Greenlight. It is unclear whether there are plans for a release of the adult version. Contrary to rumor, Sekai Project provided a translation of the description as a gesture of goodwill, but at present are not affiliated with Debonosu's effort to release Kagura Douchuuki in English (source).

Premise



Kagura Douchuuki takes place in a remote village built around a hot springs resort in modern-day Japan. The once prosperous village, now largely abandoned, provides a nostalgic glimpse into a rural past unfettered by modern-day civilization and the din of machines. Residents of this rural village have been disappearing recently, and despite a police investigation bizarre incidents continue to plague the area. Suspecting the involvement of otherworldly creatures known as youkai, a squad of Shinto exorcists is dispatched to investigate the disappearances. This 3-member squad consists of two warrior priestesses, sword-wielding Ibuki from the Youkai Coexistence faction and spear-wielding Nazuna from the Youkai Extermination faction, and the monk Minase tasked with coordinating the investigation and performing purification rites. Can the two priestesses overcome their differences and get to the bottom of the mysterious disappearances?


Ibuki (left), Nazuna (right)

Gameplay overview

I played a few hours into this game several years ago, so I'll try to recap what I remember. As shown in the second half of the video, Kagura Douchuuki features rogue-like gameplay: the player controls Ibuki and Nazuna as they investigate the youkai-infested forest around the village. The maps are essentially randomly-generated dungeon floors, where the objective is to locate the entrance to successive floors while fighting off randomly spawning enemies. Story objectives typically task the mikos with fighting through a specified number of floors to a boss encounter, defeat of which progresses the story.



Items and equipment are littered throughout each floor as well as being dropped by monsters and bosses, and these are the main source of character growth. As I recall, there's 3x2 equipment slots: weapon, armor, accessory. Characters level up by defeating monsters, unlocking new skills, but levels are lost after leaving the dungeon (except in Easy mode). In addition, unequipped items in inventory are lost upon defeat (Normal mode), while in Hard mode equipped items are also lost. Inventory space is very limited, so players will not be able to carry every item they find.

Combat takes places in semi real time with movement and attacks each being counted as one turn. Players and enemies can move in 4 directions; whenever the player moves or attacks, enemies do so as well. Attacks can occur diagonally as well. This game has gamepad support, which is a definite plus. Players can alternate freely between Ibuki and Nazuna. Ibuki is a melee fighter that can attack 1 space in front of her. Nazuna can attack 2 spaces out with her spear, but her defense is weaker so she takes more damage. Some enemies are best dealt with by Nazuna due to her longer reach, while Ibuki's higher defense is useful for others. Health is recovered with food and potions, while MP for skills recovers with time.

Story

While the gameplay dominates time-wise, Kagura Douchuuki still has significant stretches of text between dungeon excursions, and boss fights are preceded by story segments as well. The characters are the main draw rather than the plot, with interactions between Ibuki and Nazuna often forming the crux of the dialogue. Ibuki is a clumsy but good-natured girl (with an Osakan dialect) who seeks coexistence with the youkai, while Nazuna is a stern tsundere-type who believes the youkai should be eradicated without mercy. The plot isn't very deep, but it adequately serves up reasons to go dungeon crawling while providing opportunities for Ibuki and Nazuna to quarrel. There might be a romance arc with Minase, but I didn't play far enough to confirm.



Adult content

The adult version of Kagura Douchuuki is filled to the brim with sexual content. There's a reason that the priestesses do all the fighting: youkai are extremely hostile to and kill any males they encounter, but they use human females to propagate. They subdue and rape females they come across, but otherwise don't harm their captives. With time and sufficient insemination, these females will spawn more youkai or become youkai themselves. However, the sperm of a human male is curative of youkai fertilization due to its spiritual antagonism to youkai negative energies

In short, there's 2 unique defeat rape scenes for every monster type and boss, one per heroine. In addition, there's further scenes involving purification of the youkai fertilizations by Minase, which are required to prevent an eventual game over (i.e., being turned into a youkai) after being defeated. On top of that, there's textual and voice variations of the scenes on subsequent defeats that make the scenes worth re-experiencing, including variations for defloration. The art is one of this game's main assets, and the H-scenes really bring that out. Quite simply, the ero in this game is awesome, and frankly the writing in the H-scenes is more interesting than the main plot as it's very descriptive and filled with emotion. Contrast that with the cliched and somewhat dull vibe I got from the main plot.

Evaluation

EGS median: 70 (109 votes)
VNDB rating: 7.1 (12 votes)
Personal: 6/10

Kagura Douchuuki's strength is its art. And, ironically enough, every CG on both Getchu (NSFW) and the official site (18+ version, NSFW) is from an ero-scene. I can only imagine that Debonosu had to gut most of the art assets to create the non-adult version, and in fact a quick survey of the site for the non-adult version shows 4 CG compared to the 24 CG shown on the adult site. And as explained above, the H-scenes are really quite good. If you're into monster rape, you can't do much better than Debonosu's Kagura series--in English or Japanese.

The rogue-like gameplay is decent. It's simple without being overly tedious. I'm not a fan of level resetting, but you can always play on Easy if that bothers you. I wouldn't call the gameplay engaging, but at least it doesn't feel like a chore like Yumina the Ethereal's dungeon crawling did.

The story is... mediocre. If you've played the translated Studio e.go! titles, you'll know what to expect. If you like moe comedy, then maybe you'll appreciate the story more than I did. I found the dialogue to be pretty standard fare, and the plot was uninspired and mostly an excuse to set up the dungeon excursions and character dialogue. In the few hours I played, the setting didn't get much development and ended up feeling very generic, which is a shame because I feel that with a bit more detail into the mythology and the town's circumstances the story would've been much more engaging. I've played some of the sequel Kagura Gensoutan and I found the setting in that one a bit more developed.

Overall, Kagura Douchuuki compares well against titles like the Raidy series. The art is on par with if not better than the Raidy series (though it lacks animation), and it edges out Raidy in terms of battle system and story development. But as a non-adult title? It doesn't have much going for it other than having gameplay and not being terrible. It's unremarkable. I honestly can't recommend it against the likes of Littlewitch Romanesque, Aselia the Eternal, and Seinarukana, or even Yumina the Ethereal.

Kagura Douchuuki Sou and expansions

Debonosu released an updated version of Kagura Douchuuki in December 2014, Kagura Douchuuki Sou, which added widescreen support (game and CG resolution increased from 800x600 to 1024x576) and added 40 HCG to the defeat scenes. Three append disks were also released which added new dungeons, new monsters, further story content, and a new playable heroine. The Steam Greenlight campaign appears to be for the non-adult slimmed-down version of the original 2009 release, meaning that it won't include all of the bonus content released since.


Koharu, the additional heroine from append disk 3

Debonosu's other titles

Debonosu has a diverse lineup of gameplay titles, and if you include Studio e.go! titles they have a huge selection of games under their belt. The Kagura games are a long-running series including other rogue-likes and an SRPG (Kurenai Kagura). While the Kagura series is focused on monsters raping defeated miko, their other titles are more varied thematically (many featuring no defeat rape at all), though all boast high sexual content. These other titles include a Tales series-like sidescrolling RPG with raising sim elements (Sora o Aogite Kumo Takaku), a loli action RPG with item synthesis and base management (Hanasaku Otome to Koi no Grimoire), a dungeon crawler (Chaos Labyrinth), a real-time strategy game set against a backdrop of military conflict (Senjou no Folklore), and a traditional RPG (Gigai no Alruna).


Sora o Aogite Kumo Takaku (left), Gigai no Alruna (right)

Closing thoughts

Debonosu is what I'd term a third-tier gameplay eroge developer: they produce a wide variety of decent games, none of which are particularly outstanding. Their gameplay systems range from adequate to entertaining, their stories are character-centric with a comedy focus and plots that are simple and uninspired, and their art and especially their ero is excellent and probably the main draw.

Given the limited selection of licensed gameplay eroge in English, Debonosu fills a niche for high sexual content non-nukige gameplay titles. Stripping the ero-content out of these titles removes the very assets that make these titles stand out in the first place. My recommendation to readers is to clamor for release of the adult version of this title and future titles. While it's important for marketing purposes to get this game and others on Steam, without the ero these titles are merely soulless husks. The non-adult versions will never be more than hollow stand-ins for the adult versions. You can't strip the art out from titles that are remarkable only for their art and expect a satisfactory result.

(Also check out the followup post Tell Debonosu you want the uncut version of Kagura Douchuuki)

Article edited 5/29/15 to clarify Sekai Project's role in the Steam Greenlight campaign.
Article edited 5/31/15 to add information about Kagura Douchuuki Sou and append disks.

Recently, a spirited argument erupted in the Monobeno -Happy End- project thread regarding the perceived poor quality of translation samples. As this a topic of general controversy in the fan translation scene, I decided it might be worth addressing on a general level to those who might not care about this particular title. Please don't take this post as an invitation to reignite controversy in that thread; post your comments here instead.
 
Fan translation is as much about the journey as the destination. While the audience may only care about the final product, for the translator the journey may be even more important. This is an opportunity for a translator to improve both his Japanese skills and his English skills. As much as he's doing it for you, he's doing it for himself. I don't understand why anyone would think that fan translators have an obligation to provide a quality product, and that the audience should have an expectation of a quality product. All fan translations should be treated as being of suspect quality until proven otherwise. That's really all there is to it. If you're unhappy with the final product, don't play it. A game like Monobeno will never ever get licensed in English, so it's not like a substandard fan project would be ruining our chance at a professional translation (as might be the case with other titles).
 
So before you complain about projects that don't meet your quality standards, remember that no one deserves a quality product for free, and that fan translators have just as much of a right to benefit from a project as their audience. Maybe if there were a better resource for tracking translation quality across different releases we wouldn't even be having these arguments. And maybe if the more skilled fan translators simply took pride in the quality of their own work, and weren't so preoccupied with the attention other groups were getting, there wouldn't be so much bickering going on.
 
[This is a repost of my response in that thread edited for a general audience]

(This is the safe-for-work mirror of my LewdGamer article H-RPG Kagura Douchuuki Gets Greenlight for Censorship [NSFW])

Steam: An opportunity and a threat to ero-gaming

The opening of Steam to visual novels is changing the face of professional eroge localization. Until very recently this was a world where every eroge, no matter its merit or lack thereof, sold more or less the same. Story-focused eroge consume several times the resources in time and manpower as short sex-heavy titles, and lackluster sales meant these titles had trouble simply recouping translation and voice licensing costs. Just recently, Mangagamer warned that the failure of Princess Evangile (NSFW) could spell the end of moe-focused romantic comedies in English. Meanwhile, JAST's Peter Payne similarly declared that gameplay titles are 2-3 times more costly to localize than even story-focused eroge, and added that if Seinarukana does not sell better than their previous RPGs then it would likely be the last ero-RPG they choose to license (JAST’s failure to market Seinarukana as an RPG could doom English H-RPGs).

Enter Steam. Valve opened up Steam Greenlight to developers of all varieties and backpedaled on its stance that visual novels were not welcome on its platform. Visual novels began appearing on Steam and selling in unprecedented numbers. Capitalizing on this lucky break, JAST and Mangagamer rushed to offer censored versions of their eroge on the Steam marketplace. All at once, the calculus of eroge localization was flipped on its heels, as high-quality story-focused titles showed that they could turn a profit along with their budget porn brethren. Sales of Princess Evangile exceeded expectations. JAST reported increased adult version sales of Littlewitch Romanesque after its Steam debut, despite the availability of a fan patch that restored the adult content in the much cheaper Steam version. A successful release of Seinarukana is within reach, assuming JAST can get a version of it on Steam.


But for all its promise, Steam is a censored platform that does NOT welcome lewd games. There was always the risk that Japanese eroge developers would see Steam as a target market rather than as a means to fund eroge localization. And today we are confronted with the first eroge developer to bypass their natural fanbase--erogamers like you and me--and go straight for Steam, setting a dangerous precedent should they stay the path and find success.

Opening + gameplay trailer
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XvG1Ez2xJnM

Steam Greenlight page
VNDB
Official Japanese site (NSFW)

Announcing an English release of Kagura Douchuuki

With little fanfare ero-RPG developer Debonosu has unleashed its rogue-like RPG Kagura Douchuuki on Steam Greenlight. Originally released in 2009, Kagura Douchuuki was Debo no Su Seisakusho's first title after rising from the ashes of Studio e.go!. Fans of fan-translated RPGs Castle Fantasia 2 Renewal and Men at Work 2 will recognize the bewitching art of Kazue Yamamoto. Originally released as an eroge, Debonosu also released a non-adult version with erotic content removed, which presumably is the version being offered on Greenlight. It is unclear whether there are plans for a release of the adult version. Contrary to rumor, Sekai Project provided a translation of the description as a gesture of goodwill, but at present are not affiliated with Debonosu's effort to release Kagura Douchuuki in English (source).

Premise



Kagura Douchuuki takes place in a remote village built around a hot springs resort in modern-day Japan. The once prosperous village, now largely abandoned, provides a nostalgic glimpse into a rural past unfettered by modern-day civilization and the din of machines. Residents of this rural village have been disappearing recently, and despite a police investigation bizarre incidents continue to plague the area. Suspecting the involvement of otherworldly creatures known as youkai, a squad of Shinto exorcists is dispatched to investigate the disappearances. This 3-member squad consists of two warrior priestesses, sword-wielding Ibuki from the Youkai Coexistence faction and spear-wielding Nazuna from the Youkai Extermination faction, and the monk Minase tasked with coordinating the investigation and performing purification rites. Can the two priestesses overcome their differences and get to the bottom of the mysterious disappearances?


Ibuki (left), Nazuna (right)

Gameplay overview

I played a few hours into this game several years ago, so I'll try to recap what I remember. As shown in the second half of the video, Kagura Douchuuki features rogue-like gameplay: the player controls Ibuki and Nazuna as they investigate the youkai-infested forest around the village. The maps are essentially randomly-generated dungeon floors, where the objective is to locate the entrance to successive floors while fighting off randomly spawning enemies. Story objectives typically task the mikos with fighting through a specified number of floors to a boss encounter, defeat of which progresses the story.



Items and equipment are littered throughout each floor as well as being dropped by monsters and bosses, and these are the main source of character growth. As I recall, there's 3x2 equipment slots: weapon, armor, accessory. Characters level up by defeating monsters, unlocking new skills, but levels are lost after leaving the dungeon (except in Easy mode). In addition, unequipped items in inventory are lost upon defeat (Normal mode), while in Hard mode equipped items are also lost. Inventory space is very limited, so players will not be able to carry every item they find.

Combat takes places in semi real time with movement and attacks each being counted as one turn. Players and enemies can move in 4 directions; whenever the player moves or attacks, enemies do so as well. Attacks can occur diagonally as well. This game has gamepad support, which is a definite plus. Players can alternate freely between Ibuki and Nazuna. Ibuki is a melee fighter that can attack 1 space in front of her. Nazuna can attack 2 spaces out with her spear, but her defense is weaker so she takes more damage. Some enemies are best dealt with by Nazuna due to her longer reach, while Ibuki's higher defense is useful for others. Health is recovered with food and potions, while MP for skills recovers with time.

Story

While the gameplay dominates time-wise, Kagura Douchuuki still has significant stretches of text between dungeon excursions, and boss fights are preceded by story segments as well. The characters are the main draw rather than the plot, with interactions between Ibuki and Nazuna often forming the crux of the dialogue. Ibuki is a clumsy but good-natured girl (with an Osakan dialect) who seeks coexistence with the youkai, while Nazuna is a stern tsundere-type who believes the youkai should be eradicated without mercy. The plot isn't very deep, but it adequately serves up reasons to go dungeon crawling while providing opportunities for Ibuki and Nazuna to quarrel. There might be a romance arc with Minase, but I didn't play far enough to confirm.



Adult content

The adult version of Kagura Douchuuki is filled to the brim with sexual content. There's a reason that the priestesses do all the fighting: youkai are extremely hostile to and kill any males they encounter, but they use human females to propagate. They subdue and rape females they come across, but otherwise don't harm their captives. With time and sufficient insemination, these females will spawn more youkai or become youkai themselves. However, the sperm of a human male is curative of youkai fertilization due to its spiritual antagonism to youkai negative energies

In short, there's 2 unique defeat rape scenes for every monster type and boss, one per heroine. In addition, there's further scenes involving purification of the youkai fertilizations by Minase, which are required to prevent an eventual game over (i.e., being turned into a youkai) after being defeated. On top of that, there's textual and voice variations of the scenes on subsequent defeats that make the scenes worth re-experiencing, including variations for defloration. The art is one of this game's main assets, and the H-scenes really bring that out. Quite simply, the ero in this game is awesome, and frankly the writing in the H-scenes is more interesting than the main plot as it's very descriptive and filled with emotion. Contrast that with the cliched and somewhat dull vibe I got from the main plot.

Evaluation

EGS median: 70 (109 votes)
VNDB rating: 7.1 (12 votes)
Personal: 6/10

Kagura Douchuuki's strength is its art. And, ironically enough, every CG on both Getchu (NSFW) and the official site (18+ version, NSFW) is from an ero-scene. I can only imagine that Debonosu had to gut most of the art assets to create the non-adult version, and in fact a quick survey of the site for the non-adult version shows 4 CG compared to the 24 CG shown on the adult site. And as explained above, the H-scenes are really quite good. If you're into monster rape, you can't do much better than Debonosu's Kagura series--in English or Japanese.

The rogue-like gameplay is decent. It's simple without being overly tedious. I'm not a fan of level resetting, but you can always play on Easy if that bothers you. I wouldn't call the gameplay engaging, but at least it doesn't feel like a chore like Yumina the Ethereal's dungeon crawling did.

The story is... mediocre. If you've played the translated Studio e.go! titles, you'll know what to expect. If you like moe comedy, then maybe you'll appreciate the story more than I did. I found the dialogue to be pretty standard fare, and the plot was uninspired and mostly an excuse to set up the dungeon excursions and character dialogue. In the few hours I played, the setting didn't get much development and ended up feeling very generic, which is a shame because I feel that with a bit more detail into the mythology and the town's circumstances the story would've been much more engaging. I've played some of the sequel Kagura Gensoutan and I found the setting in that one a bit more developed.

Overall, Kagura Douchuuki compares well against titles like the Raidy series. The art is on par with if not better than the Raidy series (though it lacks animation), and it edges out Raidy in terms of battle system and story development. But as a non-adult title? It doesn't have much going for it other than having gameplay and not being terrible. It's unremarkable. I honestly can't recommend it against the likes of Littlewitch Romanesque, Aselia the Eternal, and Seinarukana, or even Yumina the Ethereal.

Kagura Douchuuki Sou and expansions

Debonosu released an updated version of Kagura Douchuuki in December 2014, Kagura Douchuuki Sou, which added widescreen support (game and CG resolution increased from 800x600 to 1024x576) and added 40 HCG to the defeat scenes. Three append disks were also released which added new dungeons, new monsters, further story content, and a new playable heroine. The Steam Greenlight campaign appears to be for the non-adult slimmed-down version of the original 2009 release, meaning that it won't include all of the bonus content released since.


Koharu, the additional heroine from append disk 3

Debonosu's other titles

Debonosu has a diverse lineup of gameplay titles, and if you include Studio e.go! titles they have a huge selection of games under their belt. The Kagura games are a long-running series including other rogue-likes and an SRPG (Kurenai Kagura). While the Kagura series is focused on monsters raping defeated miko, their other titles are more varied thematically (many featuring no defeat rape at all), though all boast high sexual content. These other titles include a Tales series-like sidescrolling RPG with raising sim elements (Sora o Aogite Kumo Takaku), a loli action RPG with item synthesis and base management (Hanasaku Otome to Koi no Grimoire), a dungeon crawler (Chaos Labyrinth), a real-time strategy game set against a backdrop of military conflict (Senjou no Folklore), and a traditional RPG (Gigai no Alruna).


Sora o Aogite Kumo Takaku (left), Gigai no Alruna (right)

Closing thoughts

Debonosu is what I'd term a third-tier gameplay eroge developer: they produce a wide variety of decent games, none of which are particularly outstanding. Their gameplay systems range from adequate to entertaining, their stories are character-centric with a comedy focus and plots that are simple and uninspired, and their art and especially their ero is excellent and probably the main draw.

Given the limited selection of licensed gameplay eroge in English, Debonosu fills a niche for high sexual content non-nukige gameplay titles. Stripping the ero-content out of these titles removes the very assets that make these titles stand out in the first place. My recommendation to readers is to clamor for release of the adult version of this title and future titles. While it's important for marketing purposes to get this game and others on Steam, without the ero these titles are merely soulless husks. The non-adult versions will never be more than hollow stand-ins for the adult versions. You can't strip the art out from titles that are remarkable only for their art and expect a satisfactory result.

(Also check out the followup post Tell Debonosu you want the uncut version of Kagura Douchuuki)

Article edited 5/29/15 to clarify Sekai Project's role in the Steam Greenlight campaign.
Article edited 5/31/15 to add information about Kagura Douchuuki Sou and append disks.

The following list only contains threads made from May 16 to May 23, any older thread will be placed under the "Updated" banner if new relevant content is added to it.



If you don't know how the list works, please check the project
thread.






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Recently, a spirited argument erupted in the Monobeno -Happy End- project thread regarding the perceived poor quality of translation samples. As this a topic of general controversy in the fan translation scene, I decided it might be worth addressing on a general level to those who might not care about this particular title. Please don't take this post as an invitation to reignite controversy in that thread; post your comments here instead.
 
Fan translation is as much about the journey as the destination. While the audience may only care about the final product, for the translator the journey may be even more important. This is an opportunity for a translator to improve both his Japanese skills and his English skills. As much as he's doing it for you, he's doing it for himself. I don't understand why anyone would think that fan translators have an obligation to provide a quality product, and that the audience should have an expectation of a quality product. All fan translations should be treated as being of suspect quality until proven otherwise. That's really all there is to it. If you're unhappy with the final product, don't play it. A game like Monobeno will never ever get licensed in English, so it's not like a substandard fan project would be ruining our chance at a professional translation (as might be the case with other titles).
 
So before you complain about projects that don't meet your quality standards, remember that no one deserves a quality product for free, and that fan translators have just as much of a right to benefit from a project as their audience. Maybe if there were a better resource for tracking translation quality across different releases we wouldn't even be having these arguments. And maybe if the more skilled fan translators simply took pride in the quality of their own work, and weren't so preoccupied with the attention other groups were getting, there wouldn't be so much bickering going on.
 
[This is a repost of my response in that thread edited for a general audience]

Recently, a spirited argument erupted in the Monobeno -Happy End- project thread regarding the perceived poor quality of translation samples. As this a topic of general controversy in the fan translation scene, I decided it might be worth addressing on a general level to those who might not care about this particular title. Please don't take this post as an invitation to reignite controversy in that thread; post your comments here instead.
 
Fan translation is as much about the journey as the destination. While the audience may only care about the final product, for the translator the journey may be even more important. This is an opportunity for a translator to improve both his Japanese skills and his English skills. As much as he's doing it for you, he's doing it for himself. I don't understand why anyone would think that fan translators have an obligation to provide a quality product, and that the audience should have an expectation of a quality product. All fan translations should be treated as being of suspect quality until proven otherwise. That's really all there is to it. If you're unhappy with the final product, don't play it. A game like Monobeno will never ever get licensed in English, so it's not like a substandard fan project would be ruining our chance at a professional translation (as might be the case with other titles).
 
So before you complain about projects that don't meet your quality standards, remember that no one deserves a quality product for free, and that fan translators have just as much of a right to benefit from a project as their audience. Maybe if there were a better resource for tracking translation quality across different releases we wouldn't even be having these arguments. And maybe if the more skilled fan translators simply took pride in the quality of their own work, and weren't so preoccupied with the attention other groups were getting, there wouldn't be so much bickering going on.
 
[This is a repost of my response in that thread edited for a general audience]

Recently, a spirited argument erupted in the Monobeno -Happy End- project thread regarding the perceived poor quality of translation samples. As this a topic of general controversy in the fan translation scene, I decided it might be worth addressing on a general level to those who might not care about this particular title. Please don't take this post as an invitation to reignite controversy in that thread; post your comments here instead.
 
Fan translation is as much about the journey as the destination. While the audience may only care about the final product, for the translator the journey may be even more important. This is an opportunity for a translator to improve both his Japanese skills and his English skills. As much as he's doing it for you, he's doing it for himself. I don't understand why anyone would think that fan translators have an obligation to provide a quality product, and that the audience should have an expectation of a quality product. All fan translations should be treated as being of suspect quality until proven otherwise. That's really all there is to it. If you're unhappy with the final product, don't play it. A game like Monobeno will never ever get licensed in English, so it's not like a substandard fan project would be ruining our chance at a professional translation (as might be the case with other titles).
 
So before you complain about projects that don't meet your quality standards, remember that no one deserves a quality product for free, and that fan translators have just as much of a right to benefit from a project as their audience. Maybe if there were a better resource for tracking translation quality across different releases we wouldn't even be having these arguments. And maybe if the more skilled fan translators simply took pride in the quality of their own work, and weren't so preoccupied with the attention other groups were getting, there wouldn't be so much bickering going on.
 
[This is a repost of my response in that thread edited for a general audience]

Recently, a spirited argument erupted in the Monobeno -Happy End- project thread regarding the perceived poor quality of translation samples. As this a topic of general controversy in the fan translation scene, I decided it might be worth addressing on a general level to those who might not care about this particular title. Please don't take this post as an invitation to reignite controversy in that thread; post your comments here instead.
 
Fan translation is as much about the journey as the destination. While the audience may only care about the final product, for the translator the journey may be even more important. This is an opportunity for a translator to improve both his Japanese skills and his English skills. As much as he's doing it for you, he's doing it for himself. I don't understand why anyone would think that fan translators have an obligation to provide a quality product, and that the audience should have an expectation of a quality product. All fan translations should be treated as being of suspect quality until proven otherwise. That's really all there is to it. If you're unhappy with the final product, don't play it. A game like Monobeno will never ever get licensed in English, so it's not like a substandard fan project would be ruining our chance at a professional translation (as might be the case with other titles).
 
So before you complain about projects that don't meet your quality standards, remember that no one deserves a quality product for free, and that fan translators have just as much of a right to benefit from a project as their audience. Maybe if there were a better resource for tracking translation quality across different releases we wouldn't even be having these arguments. And maybe if the more skilled fan translators simply took pride in the quality of their own work, and weren't so preoccupied with the attention other groups were getting, there wouldn't be so much bickering going on.
 
[This is a repost of my response in that thread edited for a general audience]

Recently, a spirited argument erupted in the Monobeno -Happy End- project thread regarding the perceived poor quality of translation samples. As this a topic of general controversy in the fan translation scene, I decided it might be worth addressing on a general level to those who might not care about this particular title. Please don't take this post as an invitation to reignite controversy in that thread; post your comments here instead.
 
Fan translation is as much about the journey as the destination. While the audience may only care about the final product, for the translator the journey may be even more important. This is an opportunity for a translator to improve both his Japanese skills and his English skills. As much as he's doing it for you, he's doing it for himself. I don't understand why anyone would think that fan translators have an obligation to provide a quality product, and that the audience should have an expectation of a quality product. All fan translations should be treated as being of suspect quality until proven otherwise. That's really all there is to it. If you're unhappy with the final product, don't play it. A game like Monobeno will never ever get licensed in English, so it's not like a substandard fan project would be ruining our chance at a professional translation (as might be the case with other titles).
 
So before you complain about projects that don't meet your quality standards, remember that no one deserves a quality product for free, and that fan translators have just as much of a right to benefit from a project as their audience. Maybe if there were a better resource for tracking translation quality across different releases we wouldn't even be having these arguments. And maybe if the more skilled fan translators simply took pride in the quality of their own work, and weren't so preoccupied with the attention other groups were getting, there wouldn't be so much bickering going on.
 
[This is a repost of my response in that thread edited for a general audience]

Recently, a spirited argument erupted in the Monobeno -Happy End- project thread regarding the perceived poor quality of translation samples. As this a topic of general controversy in the fan translation scene, I decided it might be worth addressing on a general level to those who might not care about this particular title. Please don't take this post as an invitation to reignite controversy in that thread; post your comments here instead.
 
Fan translation is as much about the journey as the destination. While the audience may only care about the final product, for the translator the journey may be even more important. This is an opportunity for a translator to improve both his Japanese skills and his English skills. As much as he's doing it for you, he's doing it for himself. I don't understand why anyone would think that fan translators have an obligation to provide a quality product, and that the audience should have an expectation of a quality product. All fan translations should be treated as being of suspect quality until proven otherwise. That's really all there is to it. If you're unhappy with the final product, don't play it. A game like Monobeno will never ever get licensed in English, so it's not like a substandard fan project would be ruining our chance at a professional translation (as might be the case with other titles).
 
So before you complain about projects that don't meet your quality standards, remember that no one deserves a quality product for free, and that fan translators have just as much of a right to benefit from a project as their audience. Maybe if there were a better resource for tracking translation quality across different releases we wouldn't even be having these arguments. And maybe if the more skilled fan translators simply took pride in the quality of their own work, and weren't so preoccupied with the attention other groups were getting, there wouldn't be so much bickering going on.
 
[This is a repost of my response in that thread edited for a general audience]

I'm from the US. We have a strong tradition of freedom here signified in the words of the US Declaration of Independence:
 
All men (and only men, but not African men) are created equal. We have a right to Life (except if drafted into the army), Liberty (except when others disagree with you), and the pursuit of Happiness (except if you're a repressed minority).
 
In addition, we enjoy unparalleled freedom of expression and as a culture we're strongly opposed to censorship in all its forms.
 
We believe in democracy and the right for the people to decide their own government, both at home and abroad.
 
We believe that America is a model for democracy everywhere, and that other nations should follow our example.
 
American, and proud of it.

I'm from the US. We have a strong tradition of freedom here signified in the words of the US Declaration of Independence:
 
All men (and only men, but not African men) are created equal. We have a right to Life (except if drafted into the army), Liberty (except when others disagree with you), and the pursuit of Happiness (except if you're a repressed minority).
 
In addition, we enjoy unparalleled freedom of expression and as a culture we're strongly opposed to censorship in all its forms.
 
We believe in democracy and the right for the people to decide their own government, both at home and abroad.
 
We believe that America is a model for democracy everywhere, and that other nations should follow our example.
 
American, and proud of it.