Scanlation: the final frontier?

[tcaud]

One thing I've noticed about the Japanese game mags is just how different they are from the US and European magazines. The US and European mags are very controlled, systemic, and "professional": they rely on a formula of indocrination and manipulation, much like brainwashing, to cultivate their readerbase. Platform warfare is the most obvious manifestation of this, but the emphasis on hype is another. This of course due to the notion that advertisers and magazines are essentially one unit, and that the health of the platform is the health of the mag. The Japanese, however, take a very different approach, because their industry developed very differently.

In Japan, the MSX and PC98 developed as back doors into the games industry, resulting in an at once varied yet homogeneous body of effort. In the Japanese game scene passion has always played a strong role in the motivation of the participants. In the west, the idea was always to get rich, or at least to have a varied and cushy job. In the Japanese scene, there was a tacit acknowledgement that the maximization of opportunity meant a chaotic industry with low profit margins and less than stellar pay, but with the effect of a wide variety of ideas and experiments which would sustain and nurture the industry as a whole. This comes across in the late 80s/early 90s magazines which catered to this up and coming generation of game creators, which ultimately culminated in the Golden Era of PS2 RPGs. There was also much more cross-over between the roles of designer, artist, and programmer (and even composer) than in the west. This interdisciplinarian approach resulted in broad familiarity with all aspects of the design process, which in turn enabled the extraordinary depth of creativity and theme we continue to see in games such as Hyper Dimension Neptunia. The impact of interdisciplinarianism was even felt in anime, where as late as the early 90s computer screens filled with authentic BASIC code appeared in many works. The game review magazines of the period doubled as developer magazines, as is evidenced by MSX-Fan, available on Archive.org, inviting and enticing fans to take the next step with example programs and composition sheets. Neither the ST nor the Amiga really had this. Finally, there were plot discussions contained therein which formed the foundation for the epic storylines and complex characterizations for which Japanese gaming remains famous and esteemed.

It would benefit the West and Europeans to have exposure to the interdisciplinarian approach. The western approach has always been to specialize in one thing and to do it exceptionally well, but as far as creativity is concerned, a narrow intellectual focus is the soul of mediocrity. This is why there are a handful of exceptional, noteworthy games developed in the west, where in Japan exceptional design and notability is the norm. Additionally, console gamers in the west are missing a huge segment of the history of design theory itself, still recorded in the Japanese script of these mags. It would be worth the effort for persons fluent in both Japanese and English to translate these mags for the benefit of the industry and its creativity, and for these persons to receive tangible support for their efforts.

Edited December 7, 2015 by tcaud

[Areala]

If I was better at Japanese, I'd honestly consider this. But translation is hard, hard work. You not only need to translate the words but also the general sense the writer is trying to convey (upbeat, angry, optimistic, irreverent, etc...), and all manner of humour, colloquialisms, idioms, and cultural references that would make no sense when converted to another language.

I'll say this though: if we have any proficient Japanese readers here who want to give it a go, I'll be happy to perform the edits to make it read well in English.

*huggles*
Areala

[Sean697]

You lost me at depth and creativity of Hyperdimension Neptunia....

I've seen plenty of Japanese mags. They aren't all that different. A lot of US mags copied the likes of Famitsu. What the Japanese mags were doing with small self published games was only mirroring the early 80's mag scene where the exact same thing happened with readers submitted games. There is something to be said for learning all aspects of programming though. I do believe it helped make better Japanese games on a smaller budget in the 8 bit era.