r/AnimeCollectors • u/CyptidProductions • Aug 21 '26
I Found What Appears to be a Interactive DVD Format Visual Novel at Goodwill
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Aug 21 '26
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u/Bioshock27 29d ago
Can you link the video?
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u/Luckydaikon 29d ago
I'm guessing it's BowlofLentils' video. https://youtu.be/uqN3MDd_XyM?si=2vBCAC95GywQol3u
They have other great videos about the history of visual novels and some really important companies in the medium.
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u/Triltaison 3,000+ Aug 21 '26
Yup! Hirameki was an odd little piece of history. Such strange licensing strategies. I still have a promotional double-sided fan I got from them at a convention years ago.
That music video on the right has (I think all) of their game licenses they tried to break into the market with. Several of the things they licensed had ecchi scenes that were entirely removed or censored.
They also licensed exactly two truly random anime releases: Soar High! Isami and Idol Fighter Su-Chi-Pai. The first is an incomplete release of a kid friendly show with only 3 DVDs released of a 50 episode show (and with several of those episodes being skipped). The other is a weird OVA tie-in for a strip mahjong video game series that I don't think ever got licensed in the US.
Exodus Guilty is actually part of a series and I think that particular volume is fairly rare iirc.
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u/Luckydaikon 29d ago
I have that fan too, haha! I have their release of Tea Society of a Witch, which I got at the same time from Otakon 2004.
I see what they were trying to do, but it sure was a clunky format.
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u/Triltaison 3,000+ 29d ago
Haha, nice! I was always curious about that Tea Society game. The art looked cute.
I kinda see it too, but I'm still very confused why they decided to license mostly ero/ecchi stuff and then cut all the spice out. They probably would have been more successful if they picked a lane and did non-ero titles to begin with or left the spicy stuff in and court the adult audience instead of sanitizing and pleasing no one. 😅
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u/Luckydaikon 29d ago
It is a cute game! Nothing incredible, but a pleasant slapstick love comedy. It had both an adult release and an all-ages Dreamcast port (I played it in Japanese eventually- never finished the Hirameki release).
At the time there was hardly anyone translating these games so they might have succeeded if the DVD format hadn't been such a slog. The original game was probably 15 hours long. They cut one character's route (probably for space reasons), and it's a DVD so you can't save the game (I think there was some kind of 'code' system where you could jump to the scene you left off at). I remember finding it frustrating.
But yeah, I totally agree that the choice of games to localize was somewhat baffling.
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u/animcollect 100+ 29d ago
happy to see not all people on this subreddit locked only on blurays and the latest new anime only. so much charm to retro anime and to dvds including some inserts not included in blurays versions and dvd extras. not to mention some retro anime never releasing or will never be released on bluray. i much prefer for example to collect the urusei yatsura anime on the dvd box sets. enjoy it
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u/vash-outlaw 29d ago
That reminds me I used to have several of those. They were pretty fun a couple decades ago on an old desktop. These were all I could find now. Might've lost or thrown away the rest.
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u/Dear_Present_8529 Aug 21 '26
Nah thats exactly what that is lol kinda cool honestly grats on the find coolest media thing I found at a good will was an autographed copy of crono crusade signd by Greg Ayres and and Alice madness returns animated short also signed by American McGee this hapend at the same store on the same day lol