http://store.steampowered.com/app/445440

yeah, there are complains about typos and translation errors.

According to a friend, is currently unplayable. You can forgive some typos but when you're dealing with a novel about mystery and clues and the dialogues contradict one another or don't make sense at all (shorted or changed names) then you can't sell it... 1 month is left for the release, I don't think they'll make it in time.

for anyone interested, you can find more here

https://storify.com/KurosakaRyuuko/flowers-demo-translation

last edited at Feb 25, 2016 9:57PM

Such a travesty. A beautiful game made unplayable.

https://twitter.com/jastusa/status/703057486660567040
https://twitter.com/jlist2/status/703051751088193536
https://twitter.com/jlist2/with_replies

well, I dont know what to think. they say the demo was “pre-coding” or “pre-alpha”. so it didnt use the final script. still it was a bad move. you can look at the drama it generated

Drama can be good. What we might see from this is a forced better translation while the drama gets it more attention. Just looking optimistically.

they updated the demo with a new version, but I am still not confident, I dont know what to think.

Drama can be good. What we might see from this is a forced better translation while the drama gets it more attention. Just looking optimistically.

I have seen fan translations more dedicated with the accuracy and beauty of the work than commercial ones. But to be fair, sometimes commercial translations can do a better work if they can afford it. what does that say in an age where we are torn between supporting the creators and/or wishing for better translations from fansgroups over commercial releases when stuff like this happens?

what does that say in an age where we are torn between supporting the creators and/or wishing for better translations from fansgroups over commercial releases when stuff like this happens?

Quite the opposite, I'd say. The best way to support the original creators is to purchase the native language game the fan patch it. For Kindred Spirits' case, the original Japanese is sold for about $50 while the translated is $35. Already, we have a $15 loss per sale when buying English rather than Japanese. On top of that, official releases have to pay for translation, editing, international legal stuff, etc., so even if they were sold at the same price, there's still a loss per sale because the number of people the money has to be distributed between is greater. The main reason to support official releases is because it's expected that fan translations will be worse since they're not at risk of losing their ability to buy food should they get lazy. And it is sad that in this case the professionals felt they could get away with that laziness.

They said that, even if they have to delay it (slightly) they will fix it https://twitter.com/jlist/status/703570200646397953
My english is far from perfect but even I cringe when I read things like "come here when your on duty"

what does that say in an age where we are torn between supporting the creators and/or wishing for better translations from fansgroups over commercial releases when stuff like this happens?

Quite the opposite, I'd say. The best way to support the original creators is to purchase the native language game the fan patch it. For Kindred Spirits' case, the original Japanese is sold for about $50 while the translated is $35. Already, we have a $15 loss per sale when buying English rather than Japanese. On top of that, official releases have to pay for translation, editing, international legal stuff, etc., so even if they were sold at the same price, there's still a loss per sale because the number of people the money has to be distributed between is greater. The main reason to support official releases is because it's expected that fan translations will be worse since they're not at risk of losing their ability to buy food should they get lazy. And it is sad that in this case the professionals felt they could get away with that laziness.

How many westerners were importing the original language game and using fan translations, as opposed to pirating it? I can't imagine it would be anywhere near the numbers that would be buying an official translation, particularly given ease of purchasing on a popular platform and a decent amount of press ahead of time. So yes you lose $15 per sale and add some overhead for localization overall, but that's likely more than made up for by volume so I imagine the original Japanese company would come out ahead in the long run.

[Nez Quote]

I didn't say that it's a bad business move to localize a product in a format that's easy to access — just look at how many Steam games people buy that they never have and never will play. I was arguing that for the people who are personally interested in supporting the authors, fan translations are just as good, if not better, than official ones.
To be clear, I was responding to the "torn between supporting the creators and/or wishing for better translations" section from EvilDevil which made it seem like a dichotomy of either using fan translations and not paying for the original product or paying for sub-par translations.

last edited at Feb 27, 2016 1:02PM