It’s not often that you stumble across a find like this. Last week, while no one was looking, a fan translation group called insani held a festival titled al|together 2008. During this festival, they released no less than six fully translated, 100% free Japanese games, hand-picked from the best of the Eastern indie scene. And hoo man, some of these things are good.
I hesitate to call them “visual novels” because I know that people read that and think Anna Karenina but with giant anime eyes and clicking instead of page turning. These games are not like that (okay, there are giant anime eyes. Whatever.). The first one, From the Bottom of the Heart, is five minutes of perfect localization. The second game, Crimsoness, is three minutes of pure, delicious crazy, fairly interactive and worth playing multiple times. I can’t even describe it, you really just have to give it a go.
I’ve not even gotten to what insani calls “the crown jewel” of the festival, Moonshine. I’ve been way too immersed in all the other goodness that’s on offer. And if half a dozen games isn’t enough, the website also peers deep into the process, with notes on the original Japanese game creator, the translator that took on the project, the extensive peer review each game had to undergo. It’s all just so…passionate.
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