Games

[icycalm]

http://www.kickstarter.com/projects/174 ... developers

Szczepaniak is one of the good guys. No, he is not one of the smartest nor does he have the best taste (I'd give him 3/5 in both these respects), but like I said he's one of the good guys, and there are so few of them out there who have anything worthwhile to contribute, that that's enough qualification to guarantee this project will be worthwhile. My only (minor) gripe is that I find his target of £50,000 to be unwarranted. I am by no means denying him the right to make money out of all this, but make it once the book is out -- from book sales. There's no way in hell you need all that money to spend 3 months in Japan and hire a couple of decent translators. You can do that with 10 or 20 thousand EUROS -- not even pounds -- easily. The only way I can see you could spend so much money on this project is if you are paying the interviewees. Is he paying them?

At any rate, there are 12 days to go and he still needs close to £20,000. It will be such a stupid thing if it fails. With the 30,000 he's already got he could have hired half a dozen porn stars to suck his cock all the way through the trip.

At any rate, it's very exciting the way he frames his project, with only a couple of black spots, like for example his referencing of Kulata's "The Guide to Classic Graphic Adventures". Like I want a dude who admits to playing all adventure games with a faq to guide me through the genre. So depressing. And then he has that weeaboo "Persona" from the Select Button drawing the limited edition cover. He wants to interview the cream of the crop of Japanese game design from the 8- and 16-bit eras, and stick a drawing by a sub-DeviantArt-quality fan on the cover. And come to think of it, I highly doubt the interviewees will be the cream of the crop developers, since he can't figure out which games were the cream of the crop games, so he'll most likely go for obscure- and fan-favorites. Doubtless he'll get some good people in there, but if he knew who to go for, it could have been so much more.

Anyway, that's my negativity over with. He had a great idea -- there's no denying that -- but I only wish someone smarter and more knowledgeable would have carried it out. Come to think of it, I would be the ideal person. Or if at least he would allow me to TELL him who to interview and what to ask them. But there's no way that's going to happen so whatever. Let's just wait and see what comes out of this.

[icycalm]

Actually, the expenses include the design and printing of the book, so with that in mind they are reasonable.

[icycalm]

Recap's reaction lol:

http://postback.geedorah.com/foros/view ... 062#p17062

Es decir, la "historia nunca contada de los desarrolladores de vídeo-juegos japoneses" por un iletrado en japonés que necesita intérpretes que además es un fabuloso iletrado en vídeo-juegos con necesidad de asesorarse en foros especializados para cada artículo que redacta...

¡Gracias, pero no, gracias!


(Necesitamos primero un Historia Nunca Contada de "Hardcore Gaming 101". Por las risas.)

In googlish:

That is, the "untold story of the developers of Japanese video games" by an illiterate in Japanese interpreters also need is a fabulous video-games illiterate in need of advice in specialized forums for each item than words ...

Thanks, but no thanks!


(Need first one Story Never Told of "Hardcore Gaming 101." For the laughs.)

If I understand what he's saying, his problem is that the interviewer doesn't speak Japanese and the interpreter doesn't know anything about videogames, so his problem is that the translations won't be faithful. Typical Recap silliness, treating these utterly simplistic, pedestrian interviews like philosophy or something. That is the least of the project's problems. You could almost translate the interviews using Google and still wouldn't lose much. The real problems are the ones I explained above.

[icycalm]

He would get a much better result doing the interviews via email, so that each answer could be properly translated and understood, before the next question is asked, instead of the interpreter having to do everything in real-time, which will doubtless result in at least minor confusions here and there. And he'd save on traveling expenses. He could also save on translation expenses by getting someone who does fan translations to do it for free. And they'd be gamers, so he wouldn't have the to deal with the errors introduced by a non-gamer interpreter (then again, I don't see why he couldn't get a gamer interpreter -- he certainly seems to have the contacts).

But the face-to-face interviews are more prestigious and will convince more developers to grant him an audience. Let's hope he manages to make himself presentable enough.

At any rate, I don't place nearly as much importance on interviews and general trivia issues as he does. He wants to get Japanese developers to speak before they all die out and it's too late. But they have all already spoken, and far better than they could ever speak to him -- through their games. It's just too bad that neither he nor his buddy Kulata, nor any of the journalists he references can understand that kind of language, which is to say the artistic one. So they speedrush through entire franchises in a few weeks or even days, they use faqs for everything, credit-feed the fuck out of everything, praise the obscure for the sake of obscurity -- and then pretend to be the ultimate authorities on everything. But what can you be said to have understood of videogames if your only experience of them has been in this utterly debased manner? And the mouthbreathers who read them don't know any better, so the story goes on, they keep filling the internet with inane scribblings, and finally even make entire books of them. Thank god at least this book will not contain many of their own words. That's why I am sort of looking forward to it.

[Ryusenshi]

If I understand what he's saying, his problem is that the interviewer doesn't speak Japanese and the interpreter doesn't know anything about videogames, so his problem is that the translations won't be faithful.

Actually, he's saying that Szczepaniak is "fabulously illiterate in videogames, and needs to get advice from specialized forums for each article he writes".

[zinger]

http://versusjs.blogspot.se/2014/04/joi ... -case.html

We have recently endured a campaign of threats and defamation led by Mr. John Szczepaniak (a.k.a. Jon Szczepaniak) of Saint-Laurs, France. This is our first public statement on the matter.

In 2013, John successfully pitched a Kickstarter project involving a series of interviews in Japan. At John's request, Agness Kaku helped to plan and promote the project. She also introduced John to her sister, Hanako Abe, whose network of professional interpreters seemed a good match for his needs. John ended up hiring Hanako as an interpreter-coordinator, and came to depend on her heavily as a de facto project manager.

Shortly after John's arrival, it became clear that he was unprepared and under-qualified for the work ahead. Over the next several weeks, he repeatedly abused professional interfaces and strained working relationships. John's sense of entitlement, along with his health problems, eventually led to a personal and professional meltdown in Japan. When Agness intervened to save the project, John responded with hostility. When Hanako decided to resign, John responded with panic and false accusations.

Since returning to France, John has used public and private Kickstarter postings to spread lies about Agness and Hanako and about the people they brought to his project. We believe these lies were meant to displace blame for John's failures to meet project goals, to provide a false account of the project's funds, and to punish Agness, for whom John seems to have developed inappropriate feelings. When we privately informed John that we would not tolerate his abuse, he threatened to destroy the careers of both Agness and Hanako. He has since expanded this threat to include their respective spouses, Peter Duimstra and Nobuhiro Abe.

Because John Szczepaniak has refused to retract his public statements about us, we are now prosecuting him for criminal libel in French court. A hearing has been scheduled for June 12, 2014.

Also (lol):

Is John well?
We are not psychotherapists or doctors, but we refer you to this, this, and this.

[zinger]

From the same blog linked above:

John's response to the above post:

"...That website is filled with nothing but disgusting lies, and is a blatant attempt at character assassination by two con-artists who fleeced me in Japan and are now upset that I dared to reveal the truth publicly. They either twisted everything I said or outright lied. There is not a shred of truth in anything they say, and I have the emails, signed invoices, and audio recordings to prove it. If this persists, I will be forced to reveal every single thing in public in order to defend myself. Agness' husband Peter contacted me, and I repeatedly offered them an olive branch - I wanted peace. I said if they walk away and leave me alone, I will do the same. He refused. This, in addition to contacting all of my interviewees, is utterly disgraceful behaviour." [John Szczepaniak, Kickstarter, April 20, 2014]

We strongly encourage John to reveal "every single thing" in public, unedited. Like several of his backers, we also encourage John to take legal action against us, if he believes his claims are legitimate. Indeed, we begged him to do so.

[System Blower]

Hanako Abe, Nobuhiro Abe, Agness Kaku, and Peter Duimstra

Her MGS2 interview made her come across as an ingrate with a ridiculous air of self-importance. Maybe there's more to the story lol.

[icycalm]

What a clusterfuck... You don't know whom to believe... Best to just forget about the whole thing as quickly as possible.

[icycalm]

http://www.neogaf.com/forum/showthread. ... t111478984

Just finished watching the DVD. Fucking outstanding work. It's exactly what I wanted from this project. Just hang out with old school game developers, and have them talk about all the crazy shit they had to do to make those games.

On the technical side, it's ghetto as fuck. The cover artwork looks like it was drawn by a 5-year-old, the back of the box looks like an amateur porno/telemarketing scam video, the video color depth looks like a SEGA CD game at times, the audio levels are all over the place, but it all fists perfectly together into a chronicle of what it was like to make 8 and 16-bit games. You just made that shit work or else.

Disc 2 > disc 1. The visit to Hudson Soft's old building really hit hard. A manly tear or two may have been shed. R.I.P. old friend.

lol @ John giving these guys Spectrum ZX copies of their games as gifts. Brilliant way to make sure you don't get invited for follow-up interviews :P

[zinger]

http://shmups.system11.org/viewtopic.ph ... 04&start=0

And so it goes:

https://www.kickstarter.com/projects/17 ... sts/860418

vs

https://twitter.com/AgnessKaku

[icycalm]

I pity the judge who will have to sit and hear all this petty squabbling. It will make him pray for a murder case.