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Urban Vision's Azumi Shrine
Hirameki's Booth at AX 2006
Hirameki's Shinichi Shimura
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August 05, 2006
by: James Jursudakul
A follow-through of our previous interview.
Click here to check out AMN Anime's previous interview with Hirameki International Group Inc. from April 2006.
Advanced Media Network - Anime had the opportunity to interview three members of Hirameki International Group Inc. at Anime Expo 2006 on Saturday July 1, 2006 at approximately 8:30 pm in the Anaheim Hilton. Present at the interview were Hirameki Tokyo Office Team Leader Shinichi Shimura, who we were able to do a previous interview with in early April 2006, as well as the webmaster, Nobutaka Aoyama, and Laura, who does translation at Hirameki and also translated the Q&As for this interview session.
AMN: Since I’ve already got Mr. Shimura’s introduction, Laura and Mr. Aoyama, can you please introduce yourselves?
Aoyama: Hi, my name is Aoyama. Ten-years-ago I worked at a bishoujo-game-making-company and then I worked for four years editing a bishoujo game magazine called Tech-Gian. After that, I came to Hirameki and am now their webmaster. I worked on about ten games at the company and one of them was Doukyuusei (which translates to Classmates).
Laura: I’m Laura and I do translating and marketing too. I do whatever I can do to help.
AMN: So Laura, which games have you translated so far?
Laura: So far I have only translated Yo-Jin-Bo, which is not out yet. It’s going to be out this Fall. I did some editing on Animamundi and I also edited Piece of Wonder, which will be coming out this Winter.
AMN: So Yo-Jin-Bo will be releasing in the Fall as opposed to Summer as originally announced?
Laura: Yes. We’re sort of trying not to release everything in one fell swoop but sort of pace them.
AMN: So can you tell us what the release dates for all your announced titles are?
Laura: Nothing is fixed as of now. Roughly speaking we’re planning to release Yo-Jin-Bo this Fall and Piece of Wonder this Winter, either in the Christmas season or early in 2007. Exodus Guilty will be this Winter.
AMN: Will it be volume 3 this Winter or. . .
The last Anime Play Interactive DVD Visual Novel title, Abel's Exodus Guilty Vol. 3 -Future-, will be releasing in the fourth quarter of 2006.
Laura: Volume 3 this Winter. (Volume) 2 is coming up very soon.
AMN: It’s in September I believe?
Laura: Yes.
Editor's Note: Since then an update at The Right Stuf has revealed that Exodus Guilty Vol. 3 -Future- will be released on September 30, 2006 and Yo-Jin-Bo will be released on October 30, 2006. Exodus Guilty Vol. 2 -Past- is currently available only at The Right Stuf as of this time.
AMN: So what was the reason for the Piece of Wonder delay from the original June 2006 release?
Shinichi Shimura: We had somebody look over the translation (Laura) and the translation was a little bit iffy. So we did that so that the audience could really enjoy it more in America. It’s all about the text in visual novel games so it needs to be well-written.
AMN: I’d like to inquire a bit about Hirameki’s past titles. I’ve asked Mr. Shimura before regarding unreleased Frontwing and K-Industry titles such as The Sixteenth Night Love Song and 5o1 - Five O One. Mr. Shimura said that they just weren’t suited for a U.S. release but I was wondering why they weren’t suited and are there still good relations with K-Industry and/or Frontwing?
Shinichi Shimura: Well, essentially we licensed them as DVD titles and we have since discovered that it was very difficult to produce DVD titles and we have stopped doing that. So that is one of the major reasons. We’re just not doing DVD titles anymore and when we licensed them we licensed them as DVD titles and not as PC games.
AMN: So if you’d want to release them you’d have to get them as a PC title?
Laura: Yes, we can’t just release them however we want.
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Though originally announced for a release in North America, titles such as 5o1 - Five O One and Azrael are no longer the type of games Hirameki wishes to release.
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