'Approved' Fansub Anime To Compete With Licensed Version
from the sub-competiiton dept
We've discussed the state of "fansub" anime video and video games in the past, whereby many fans will team up and help translate a release for different markets. While there have been some complaints, many in the anime community have figured out how to embrace this and use it to their advantage -- in some cases using the fansubs to determine what other markets to look at for official releases. Earlier this year, we wrote about how one developer from 07th Expansion was thrilled about the fansub work being done -- thanking the fansubbers for "loving" his work so much.An anonymous reader points out that 07th Expansion recently sold the rights of a new game to the company MangaGamer, which includes the right to translate the game. But the fansubbers were already working on their own version. So, would there be a clash? Apparently not. Both versions are moving forward legally with the approval of 07th Expansion. MangaGamer even did a good thing, offering to hire the fansubbers to do the translating for the official version, but they were unable to do so for work reasons. This did follow one bad move -- where MangaGamer asked the fansubbers to take down their version -- but after MangaGamer went back and learned of 07th Expansion's embracing of fansubbers, it changed its mind, and told the fansubbers they could continue with their effort.
Of course, even with the "competition" from fans, MangaGamer should have a huge advantage. The fansubbers admit that they're slow and doing it as a hobby -- so they fully expect MangaGamer to beat them to market by a long shot. But it's nice to see MangaGamer realize that this isn't the end of the world and to just compete in the marketplace, even without an exclusive monopoly on a translation patch to the game.
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Filed Under: anime, competition, fansub
Companies: 07th expansion, mangagamer
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so, a reason to buy is present, at the very least.
as long as they don't charge too much [and a translation project should be a lot cheaper than an original, after all] it sounds like it should work.
always nice to see stuff like this.
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I recently tried out one of the free demos MangaGamer put out, KiraKira, because a friend kept bugging me to try out a visual novel. The demo itself was 5 or 6 hours long, and contained a large percent of the game, and then I purchased the game once I completed the demo. I ended up loving the game, it was basically like a novel, with great background music and a decent story which was better than half the books I have read.
Now if only they could fix the problem with numerous typos in the script, but I suppose that because it is longer than most novels (2.3MB worth of text, according to my friend, and I see no reason to doubt this), and because they are a newish company still getting a handle on things, I suppose it was to be expected.
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Inuyasha / VIZ Media
-- Wikipedia: "The following week, Viz Media announced it has licensed the new adaptation, titled Inuyasha: The Final Act (犬夜叉 完結編, Inuyasha Kanketsu-hen?).[5]. It premiered October 3 in Japan, and the episodes are being simulcasted via Hulu."
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If only...
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For work reasons?
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Re: For work reasons?
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Re: For work reasons?
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The Visual Novel industry right now
1.) MangaGamer has hired for this game (Higurashi) someone who is a well known fanatic in the community who speaks Japanese and English as an editor for Higurashi.
2.) MangaGamer has also hired a fan translator for another one of their games, Soul Link. Also a representative actively check out fan translation groups to see if any cooperation would work, including showing up in the IRC channel of a fan translation group
3.) JastUSA, another visual novel translation company, has hired multiple fan translators (and editors, etc) for their upcoming big title (relative, since it is a small market) games.
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send us up the bomb
But before either of those versions come out, you crank your original game through Babelfish and release the "Zero Wing Edition" as a teaser. Drum up interest for the official localized release with the gameplay, graphics, and hilarious "translation".
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