http://www.hirameki-int.com/
Hirameki closed and stopped production on Visual Novels January 2nd, 2008.
That's all she wrote. I should finish EVER 17's Shonen path in memoriam.
~Chun
You would've thought that they'd at least offer continuing support for all of their current products for a while - but then again, that'd probably still cost money to maintain, and mirrors/archives have probably already picked it up.
I suppose I should start finding a copy of Ever17 before it goes out of stock...
So much for bl games in the U.S. :-\
Quote from: GokuMew2 on January 07, 2008, 09:58:17 AM
So much for bl games in the U.S. :-\
...???
I'm not sure if Hirameki was
ever going to go down that path. Not to worry though as Jast USA, the first and only company to ever license a BL game (Enzai: Falsely Accused) is still going strong.
Quote from: Spiritsnare on January 07, 2008, 08:29:15 AMI suppose I should start finding a copy of Ever17 before it goes out of stock...
Jast USA still has the distribution rights for all Hirameki games so you will still find them there untill the very last box is sold I'd imagine.
eww. There were still games I wanted to get from them. D:
Quote from: Sunara Ishi on January 07, 2008, 05:33:04 PM
eww. There were still games I wanted to get from them. D:
Then, as Dev said, you can get them from Jast.
The main casualty here is the future, i.e. any games that have not been localized yet but might have been.
It's a good thing I nailed up Ever 17 back at AX....
Fry's Electronics were/are selling those games :O
ebay $$$$$
And suddenly, the world got darker.
Quote from: lyricaldanichan on January 07, 2008, 10:48:01 PM
Fry's Electronics were/are selling those games :O
I remember seeing Ai Yori Aoshi there a few years ago. I passed on it back then as I lacked the proper amount of money, but I guess I might as well get it now just to spite all of my friends.
Quote from: Devereaux on January 07, 2008, 04:20:55 PM
...???
I'm not sure if Hirameki was ever going to go down that path. Not to worry though as Jast USA, the first and only company to ever license a BL game (Enzai: Falsely Accused) is still going strong.
Hirameki had Animamundi and I know they were interested in getting some other bl games, or at least were looking for suggestions. Jast is the only other company that's ever licensed bl games so it's a bit sucky that one of the two companies has gone under.
Technically animamundi is not BL, in the original JP game "most of the paths have no yaoi and what is there is soft". (Don't ask me how I know that)
But honestly I'm not here to argue about what is or isn't BL. I'm here just to make an ass of myself and as far as I can see, mission accomplished.
Quote from: mDuo13 on January 07, 2008, 05:41:53 PM
Quote from: Sunara Ishi on January 07, 2008, 05:33:04 PM
eww. There were still games I wanted to get from them. D:
Then, as Dev said, you can get them from Jast.
I'm well aware of that.
The issue for me is if they'd still be around when I have the money to buy them. X.x; I wanted Animamundi and one of their other games. D:
I was reading nnl's (no name losers) webbie and the dude was saying how Hirameki lacked the passion. I don't know anything about the truth of the matter stated in said blog, but it's too bad that this happened. *mosey over here to webbie* (http://www.nnl1.com/)
It's not that they lacked passion, it's that they didn't want to take a huge risk that would bankrupt them. They lost thousands upon thousands with the much smaller risk they did take that ended in failure.
Some random blog is going to talk about their business practices and talk crap about them when they don't understand a thing about what happened, the licensing fees and why things happened the way they did.
Truth of the matter is, Hirameki were passionate about what they wanted, too passionate that they didn't want to deviate away from non-eroge. It's hard to break out with these kind of games without first building an audience for the games beyond what they see these games as.
If Hirameki just swallowed it and released a slew of ren'ai games they would have had a much better leg to stand on and would have been able to push more non-eroge while having more support with eroge. Eventually people would start catching on "... These games have stories? And they're good?" and started buying them not just for porn, but for stories.
But once again, fun licensing issues. Which strangely enough, is hard to get for a lot of games. Key for example wants over a million for license for any of their games. Type-Moon refuses to even sell their games to the US because they think the US translations will suck(which for the most part they were right. Even Mirror-Moons stuff can be called "decent" translations at best). Smaller companies don't want the hassle of licensing to the US, and larger companies want too much money, so it becomes a huge pain in the ass.
For once, I agree. -.-;
Lack of financial means != lack of passion.
You can have a lot of passion but no funds to pursue that passion.