But haven't the TurboGrafx-16 VC games been selling at least as well as the other VC platforms? If it ever happens for any VC platform, then wouldn't it make sense for Hudson to bring over PC Engine titles? The fan bases of Genny/SNES/TG-16 don't mean anything to VC sales if the VC sales don't reflect them.
Well, I think you can figure that whatever the sales figures are for the VC, they are a miserable fraction of what they were back in the day
I think the VC sales do reflect established fan bases, but not directly. This is why I think the TG16 VC games are selling as well, if not better than the other platforms.
And there are tons of PCE HuCards that don't need even any translation at all. For titles with a few japanese words, they could even include an extra disclaimer at the compatability screen before you download, warning about small amounts of japanese text.
Good point, but how many lay-people are going to download a translated Japanese TG16 game? Not many I bet. I think the majority of people are downloading VC games for the novelty or nostalgia. I don't have any facts to support this of course, but I can bet you that pretty much everyone I know in "real life"
do not want to download a VC game they have never heard of (I wouldn't, and I'm a huge retro nut)
The handful of us who asked Hudson to fix Military Madness was enough to motivate them to get into the code to make the changes.
Something wasn't working as intended after it was put on the market. Gotta fix it. Not quite the same thing
It may not be the best business model for Sega or Nintendo, since they're busy pumping out tons of big titles for all kinds of platforms. But Hudson is a totally different company that can use all the business they can get.
Maybe, but I think it's more likely Hudson would go do something else like it's own handheld or something, or stick just to developing new games and releasing VC games for now. As we all know profits come from the software, and at around $4 a pop on VC they can't be raking it in all that good (I think we can assume Nintendo receives a fair chunk of that money) And even if a whopping 400 people downloaded 1 translated game over a course of a year - that still isn't very much money.
Unless Hudson charges a premium, in which case we can almost guarantee people won't be spending extra dough on a Japanese game they've ever heard of.
If they're willing to push hard on the cell phone market developing "original/new" games, I think its reasonable to believe they'd consider putting the resources into translating PC Engine games if VC sales are doing well enough. Basically, if they can make enough money off of it, they'll do it if they're allowed to.
That sounds like an odd statement to me - I don't think it's reasonable at all to believe they would put resources into translating 15/20 year old games
And I agree with your last sentence, I just doubt they would make any money out of it.
It's hard to see and easy to forget, but we're quite the little Niche here.
I have a very hard time believing a big game company today would engage in fanboy fancy
(I sense flame posts coming...
)
OD
edit: Just to be clear, I would be more than thrilled to see a Japanese game show up translated in English on the VC. I just don't think it will ever happen.