Also, from what I heard, Japanese (h)gaming industry is in an economic crisis, and needs to go global to not disappear, simply.
It is not as bad as you picture it, but there's truth to that.
Since the "Bubble Era", the Japanese economy suffered quite the decline. The population is ageing, and the younger generations don't have as much money as their elders, so the Japanese spend less and less on entertainment. From videogames to movies to anime to music, all the sales numbers are steadily falling down.
Even though, there's still a lot of money to make in Japan. The sale figures may decrease, but they were so insanely high in the first place that there's still a lot of room before a total collapse. We're talking about the second largest "First World" economy, after all.
And the Japanese economy is really "domestic". When it comes to local productions, like anime or eroge (and even food like Kobe beef or Yubari melons), they're used to rely on business models based on low volumes and high prices, thanks to rabid fans ready to pour big money on their favourite stuff. They know how to survive with little sales.
So, the eroge industry is not actually dying, but rather stuck in an economic limbo : as long as they stay domestic, they won't totally shut down, but won't grow either due to the economic depression. That's why they need to go global : not to fight for their survival, but as a mean to retrieve some much needed growth. It's a small but subtle difference.
It's kind of true, but this isn't blatant loli, nor having any darker (and more interesting ^^) fetishes, so I guess it's in the gray area. (I can't believe I'm arguing about the age of a bunch of pixels BTW, what a world to live in).
Don't you know ? Titties are magic.
Create any imaginary creature, any digital character, and you'll be able to do whatever you want to them : slaughter them like pigs, send them flying, kill them by the thousands, capture and confine them in small spaces to raise them like pets... Anything is possible ! And everything is fun !
But as soon as you put some titties on them, you materialise them. You make them real people with real rights. That is the magic of the titties.
Or at least, that's how I understand it. Any other explanation would make much less sense than that.
Also, even if it was a full fleshed obvious MILF, haters will hate, so...
And even so, I guess the market is so big now, so diverse, and somewhat more mature, that a shitstorm like the one for rapelay will be less likely IMO.
That's the issue : haters are gonna hate. And when haters hate, they use anything they can to dirty the target of their loathing. And here, with the teeny look and the schoolgirl uniform, Illusion simply gave them some munitions. A stick that haters will sure use to try to beat them.
There are reasons why even big studios like Koei Tecmo or Namco Bandai don't sell all their games in the West. And they're pretty open about it : they don't like the "climate" that is currently trending in Occident, with SJW shitting on everything that may feature sexualisation of female characters and politicians ready to jump on the bandwagon to get a bit of publicity.
We'll see how everything plays out. They may fail in the end, but I'm sure that there will be attempts to get this game banned and censored. There may even be some successes. Let observe the political reaction to this game in countries like France, UK, Australia...
But, I do feel that Illusion is taking the right steps in jumping on the VR bandwagon now. Pretty soon the market will be saturated with titles like this now that they are paving the road.
Indeed. But I can't help but feeling uneasy. We saw so much shitstorm over nothing during the last few years that having such a controversial company as Illusion as the front-runner for VR adult-gaming may end up being a prejudice.
If SJWs decide to start a war on VR, it can be disastrous. Even if the VR community is really welcoming toward Illusion, we don't know how the big companies behind VR will react. I'm sure they don't want their multi-billion dollars market to be stained. I'm sure that big players like Facebook or Google don't want their platform to host games from a company that is known for rape simulations featuring underage girls.
But alienating the silent majority in order not to hurt the feelings of a vocal minority could also backslash. This could lead to interesting outcomes.
Interesting move, though I think it'll probably be softcore (esp. considering Steam Greenlight), so not the usual Illusion game. Even so, I still look forward to play it on my CV1.
I totally agree with you on this one, I have a strong feeling that this will be a tame release.
The title that is on Steam is just the demo.
If you remember how "
Real Kanojo" played out, you first had some kind of branched storyline with simple yes/no questions, silly mini-games and a few panty shots. You changed location a couple time and, in the end, you had the sex scene, with different scenarios (location and positions) based on your choices.
This title will be really similar. It is from the same series, after all. And
Real Kanojo already had some "fake VR" features like stereoscopic 3D and "head-controlled" interactions (you could even zoom simply by approaching the screen / camera). I'm pretty sure it will follow the same kind of progression pattern.
What is going to happen is pretty obvious : in the demo, you'll only have the first "date" with the girl. A short introduction sequence that settles and sells the game, with just a few upskirt takes, questions and games.
And you'll have to buy the full game for the rest, that will feature all the following "dates", probably with a progressive escalation in sexual content (groping, fondling, foreplay, etc...).
Honestly, I don't think that they will chicken out and sell a "no sex allowed" title. It is branded as an adult game, and in the "product" info at the end of its website, they clearly states that it is "Adults only, or 18 and older". And when a Japanese publisher says "adult", there's no ambiguity : it's porn (like in adult games, adult anime or adult videos).
I agree that the Steam version will be softcore, but that doesn't say anything about a separate international or patched version.
NEKOPARA & the Sakura games are all precedents of that. All of them are on Steam, and the hardcore versions continue to work on Steam just fine.
That's another possibility. In my previous message (higher on this page), I stated that "they could even follow the "Nekopara Route" and release the game and adult content separately."
A free demo and a "softcore" game sold on Steam. While they publish a patch to add the sexual content on their website. It could work. I could even lead to some massive sales.
And if a shitstorm is coming, and they're asked to censor the game, they could even go the "unofficial patch route". Just like JAST did with games like
Starless and
Shiny Days, that they had to censor in the West due to zoophilia, scatology and lolicon. They published a "restoration patch" that they distributed via torrents, while saying : "Oh, it's not us. This is just some community-made uncensored content that has nothing to do with us. Use it at your own risk."
Even so, I still look forward to play it on my CV1.
I hope you'll give us some feedback. If you can do so, and AK420 too, we'll have an idea of how the game runs with the two major headsets currently available.
A good choice is to wait for the second generation Vive and Oculus to buy them (and the computer to run them properly) IMO.
I'm like you, I'm trying to be patient (and I don't have the money anyway to buy all of that).
I'm a PC gamer and a hobbyist gamedev, so I have a VR-ready PC and enough budget for a headset. And each and every time I launch UE4, I'm thinking to myself : "And how would this look like in VR ?"
I know that the best choice is to wait for second-gen hardware. It will be better and cheaper. It will have extended compatibility, nicer features and the game library will be much larger.
But we're talking about virtual waifu. Right here, right now. Waiting is a torture when I think about all the cool things I could do with such an equipment. So, when the Vive is going to be available on Amazon in my country, I don't know if I'll be able to resist the urges to blow my mind with custom-made VR girls.
).
