Class of Heroes 2 Physical Release [UMD+PSN for $36] order forms up, min-2500 units

Depending on how COH2 is, I may share that sentiment, however, I would also gladly put my money down for the digital versions at $24.99 if it meant speeding up the production (translation) time.

Yes, the release of Class of Heroes 2 so people can actually play it will be the moment of truth. If people enjoy it and want more, it will grow the base. I think dungeon crawler and RPG fans will like it, but we won't know until they get to play it.

Also, I'm hoping that all the work to make a physical+digital happen inspires other digital-only PSP publishers. I want to buy their digital games physically as well.
 
Vic, I just bought some copies. Hope the support helps bring cool games to PS platforms.

Say, anything that you could about King's Field PSP games? I know there's two games released in Japan only and they are dungeon crawlers as well. Sadly I think KF is not that popular like CoH. Oh well.

Keep up the great work!
 
Vic, I just bought some copies. Hope the support helps bring cool games to PS platforms.

Say, anything that you could about King's Field PSP games? I know there's two games released in Japan only and they are dungeon crawlers as well. Sadly I think KF is not that popular like CoH. Oh well.

Keep up the great work!

Thanks for the support!

We've talked to From Software about some other titles of theirs and they seemed kinda lukewarm about letting their source code outside the company. Given that they're maxed out internally, that's the only way I see other smaller games they've done getting localized. It may change in the future (we do have a responsible track record with companies like SEGA, Sony, Acquire, Konami, Game Arts, Hudson Soft, and others letting us work in the original souce on our end), but it may be a while to convince them and a few other companies in the same boat. I will probably end up going to Japan to make the case in person.
 
Thanks for the support!

We've talked to From Software about some other titles of theirs and they seemed kinda lukewarm about letting their source code outside the company. Given that they're maxed out internally, that's the only way I see other smaller games they've done getting localized. It may change in the future (we do have a responsible track record with companies like SEGA, Sony, Acquire, Konami, Game Arts, Hudson Soft, and others letting us work in the original souce on our end), but it may be a while to convince them and a few other companies in the same boat. I will probably end up going to Japan to make the case in person.

Oh wow! Cool. Loved the PSX KF games but the PSP ones seems a little meh-ish so its cool. Thanx for that tid bit, very nice background info that you are providing :)
 
Got the reminder email about sales closing in 6 hours and thought 'ah fuck it' and ordered a standard edition to go alongside the KS edition I ordered initially.


Why not, it's only money.
 
Got the reminder email about sales closing in 6 hours and thought 'ah fuck it' and ordered a standard edition to go alongside the KS edition I ordered initially.


Why not, it's only money.

Thanks for the support. We just crossed 2,700. We're now greater than what people said they intended to buy the initial poll, which is tremendously heartening.
 
we do have a responsible track record with companies like SEGA, Sony, Acquire, Konami, Game Arts, Hudson Soft, and others letting us work in the original souce on our end), but it may be a while to convince them and a few other companies in the same boat. I will probably end up going to Japan to make the case in person.

A few from the companies that you mention I would love to see are:

7th Dragon series
Suikoden 1&2
Ore no Shikabane wo Koete Yuke
Tengai Makyou 4th apocalype
 
Vic, I just bought some copies. Hope the support helps bring cool games to PS platforms.

Say, anything that you could about King's Field PSP games? I know there's two games released in Japan only and they are dungeon crawlers as well. Sadly I think KF is not that popular like CoH. Oh well.

Keep up the great work!

Whoa, someone else knows about the King's Field PSP games? I'm an old school From head (I was playing King's Field since late grammar/grade school) and I too would have loved to seen these two games localized (or at least just the second game, because I believe it was an expansion of some sort). Actually, my brother, who is actually a bigger KF fan than I, imported the Additional titles and played through them without knowing Japanese. Of course, he had to resort to some guides/maps and there was a ton of stuff he couldn't figure out, but he still got through both titles to the end and considered them his favorite PSP titles.

From what I've seen, played, and have been told by my brother, the Additional games are quite like no other first person dungeon crawler (just how King's Field isn't like any other first person RPG). Instead of creating a character/group and selecting classes you must tackle the game alone as a solo adventurer. The dungeons are structured just like any other Wizardry/Shining in the Darkness type of game, but they somehow incorporated the real time aspect of the King's Field titles into a turn-based battle system. What's even COOLER is that the shields you equip can be brought up to block in real time during the battles. There's really nothing else like it.

Thanks for the support!

We've talked to From Software about some other titles of theirs and they seemed kinda lukewarm about letting their source code outside the company. Given that they're maxed out internally, that's the only way I see other smaller games they've done getting localized. It may change in the future (we do have a responsible track record with companies like SEGA, Sony, Acquire, Konami, Game Arts, Hudson Soft, and others letting us work in the original souce on our end), but it may be a while to convince them and a few other companies in the same boat. I will probably end up going to Japan to make the case in person.

So even with a great track record From Software was still cautious to let you work on their original source code? I'm assuming the more games you guys localize and the more Japanese devs you guys work with the more likely other companies will follow suit? If the money/fan base is there, wouldn't other companies want to jump on it? I guess that's assuming games like CoH2 do well, right?

I think King's Field PSP would be a great effort, considering how popular Demon's/Dark Souls games are now, you could re-ride that "From the makers of Demon's/Dark Souls" back cover bullet point shit, lol!
 
That would be amazing.

There's been conversation about that on the Gaijinworks board as well. What would be the amazing part for you? The fact that you could have Suikoden I&II together portably, or that it would require a new localization and you'd finally have a non-glitched version in English?
 
There's been conversation about that on the Gaijinworks board as well. What would be the amazing part for you? The fact that you could have Suikoden I&II together portably, or that it would require a new localization and you'd finally have a non-glitched version in English?

The latter for me. That would be a lot of effort for potentially minimal return though, unless the Suikoden community's bigger than I'm thinking. Not to mention Konami potentially stonewalling the whole thing. But then again, not like they have much else outside of Castlevania and Metal Gear...
 
Kickstarter backers have a rare variant? I didn't even know there WAS a Kickstarter until reading this thread.

I am getting a standard copy but I would definitely double-dip if I could find someone on the GW message board to snag me one. Is it still open for backers to buy additional copies?
 
Kickstarter backers have a rare variant? I didn't even know there WAS a Kickstarter until reading this thread.

I am getting a standard copy but I would definitely double-dip if I could find someone on the GW message board to snag me one. Is it still open for backers to buy additional copies?

The presales closed yesterday at 11:59PM PST, so at this point, for the original price, no.

Some was already selling the regular edition for like $90 on ebay while the presales were still going on and *getting it.* I have no idea who would pay more than double the going rate when it was still (at that time) readily available. The KS variant is almost 5x more rare, so I have no idea what that might go for, but I'm sure we'll find out, sooner rather than later.
 
The presales closed yesterday at 11:59PM PST, so at this point, for the original price, no.

Some was already selling the regular edition for like $90 on ebay while the presales were still going on and *getting it.* I have no idea who would pay more than double the going rate when it was still (at that time) readily available. The KS variant is almost 5x more rare, so I have no idea what that might go for, but I'm sure we'll find out, sooner rather than later.

How many you kept for yourself? :P
 
There's been conversation about that on the Gaijinworks board as well. What would be the amazing part for you? The fact that you could have Suikoden I&II together portably, or that it would require a new localization and you'd finally have a non-glitched version in English?
The latter.
 
How many you kept for yourself? :P

In the past I have always kept 2 cases of every game. But that led to the great purge of the early 2000's when 15+ years of game publishing spoils overran my storage in the garage and I downsized to only a few copies of each game to keep.

For a while it was looking like I would be forced to buy a few hundred games myself to hit the 2500, but now we're in the fortunate position of being more than 200 over the goal, so I can decide in a much more subjective way what I'm buying to keep, which is nice.

Now if we had a time machine and were back at the Elemental Gearbolt Assassin's case juncture, I'd keep a LOT more than ONE for myself. :)
 
What would be the amazing part for you? The fact that you could have Suikoden I&II together portably, or that it would require a new localization and you'd finally have a non-glitched version in English?

All of the above! What improvements did they add to the PSP version and what improvements would you do if it was localized?
 
Yes, big congratulations to you, Vic and Gaijinworks. I'm really thrilled about that 2700 number and hopefully it will be a stepping stone you can use to do more cool projects of a similar nature.
 
Thanks for the support. We just crossed 2,700. We're now greater than what people said they intended to buy the initial poll, which is tremendously heartening.

I was unaware of the original poll, so I am one of those extra purchasers.

I would like NeoGAF to allow you and other publishers to have sticky threads for their games. I belong to a hifi site where manufacturers offer contests and discounts to members. I think NeoGAF might be a suitable platform for a similar framework for videogames.
 
I'm hoping that all the work to make a physical+digital happen inspires other digital-only PSP publishers. I want to buy their digital games physically as well.

^This! Glad to see it was at least successful! Look forward to your next project!
 
Physical + Digital release for PSP? Fall-ish. We'll poll again before we offer it to make sure the support level's there, though.

For the next project, have you considered KickStarter again? 2,700 * $37 is $99,900. Creating a KS for $100,000 goal for 30 days seems entirely reasonable now. I understand the original KS was for a deluxe edition, but I feel like a successful 30-day KS with a more reasonable $$ goal would benefit the next project and bring more exposure?
 
For the next project, have you considered KickStarter again? 2,700 * $37 is $99,900. Creating a KS for $100,000 goal for 30 days seems entirely reasonable now. I understand the original KS was for a deluxe edition, but I feel like a successful 30-day KS with a more reasonable $$ goal would benefit the next project and bring more exposure?

Nah. We're pretty much done with Kickstarter for the foreseeable future. We hit the goal we needed without it for this physical edition, and why would we want to pay out EXTRA percentages of the cost just to be on Kickstarter (their fee) when the budget's already very tight? The way we did it worked out fine in the end, and if we do our job, word of mouth and the digital PSN exposure will grow the base.
 
Vic, congratulations on hitting the mark and going over!

Is this more than you expected, or did you hope to go over by more?
 
Nah. We're pretty much done with Kickstarter for the foreseeable future. We hit the goal we needed without it for this physical edition, and why would we want to pay out EXTRA percentages of the cost just to be on Kickstarter (their fee) when the budget's already very tight? The way we did it worked out fine in the end, and if we do our job, word of mouth and the digital PSN exposure will grow the base.

Not to mention that the KS for some reason remained unnoticed for many people.

Really glad we made the 2500 btw. Congrats.
 
Vic, congratulations on hitting the mark and going over!

Is this more than you expected, or did you hope to go over by more?

We had authorization for digital vouchers to pair with the physical for up to 3000, so we were covered. I was actually fine with 2500, and for a while there, it looked like we wouldn't even make that, so when we exceeded the 2700 from the poll, it was all sexytime explosion.

And even getting to 2700 physical with a series that had a really, REALLY bad start on a platform almost every publisher has left for dead in the US is an accomplishment. It bodes well for us hitting the 10,000 combined goal of the physical + PSN sales, and we should have a much easier time hitting minimums for titles that are more well-known in the future, as well as future CoH games once people see for themselves that the series can be fun.
 
Not to mention that the KS for some reason remained unnoticed for many people.

Really glad we made the 2500 btw. Congrats.

That's a great point. I don't have enough fingers and toes x 10 to count the number of times people who weren't eligible for the KS supporter variant said "I didn't even know abou the Kickstarter" or "I wish I had seen the Kickstarter". It's not the only way to do this. I think we're finding another way.
 
That's a great point. I don't have enough fingers and toes x 10 to count the number of times people who weren't eligible for the KS supporter variant said "I didn't even know abou the Kickstarter" or "I wish I had seen the Kickstarter". It's not the only way to do this. I think we're finding another way.

I think the Kickstarter could have worked, but to be blunt, it was poorly handled. Maybe next time it can succeed with the right groundwork.

Before this endeavor, you made it very clear why it was worth supporting, and had the media to back it up.
 
That's a great point. I don't have enough fingers and toes x 10 to count the number of times people who weren't eligible for the KS supporter variant said "I didn't even know abou the Kickstarter" or "I wish I had seen the Kickstarter". It's not the only way to do this. I think we're finding another way.

I go to Joystiq, Kotaku, RPS and Polygon every day and I still missed it. I didn't start following the GG Twitter until it was too late. :(

If there is a WD\GG subreddit, I would definitely subscribe to that as well.
 
Really would you prefer Suikoden 1&2 over a unreleased game like Suikoden: Tsumugareshi Hyakunen no Toki?

I'd have to seriously consider it. The PSP remakes feel much better (improved resolution, resolved color issues from #1). If they were re-translated, which is probably too much to hope for, it would be incredible.

I'd love to see both, of course. And a PS1 classics version would be a decent compromise for S1&2, even without the PAL bugfixes.

I enjoyed Tierkreis myself, but a better version of two of my favorite games ever is hard to turn down over a release of what sounds like a fairly mediocre game.

On topic - ordered a copy of CoH2 and looking forward to playing it. I might have to finish out CoH1 if the data-load bonuses require you to do so...

/edit: Alec, there is a JRPG subreddit (r/jrpg) that is pretty low-key much of the time, but has had a few posts about CoH2. That's where I heard about it first.
 
I think the Kickstarter could have worked, but to be blunt, it was poorly handled. Maybe next time it can succeed with the right groundwork.

Before this endeavor, you made it very clear why it was worth supporting, and had the media to back it up.

In my RPG future-bubble where I've played the games and know what's great, decent, fixable, or worthless, I forget that others aren't in the bubble with me. With Working Designs, we had built a level of trust where fans would buy a game just because it was WD. The Deluxe kickstarter was a problem of a poor first game dulling fan interest, no track record as Gaijinworks (many didn't even appreciate the WD connection), and relative expense of a deluxe pack for a game on a dead platform with a very weak first entry.

It was a matter of trying to blast back into a world-class sprint with no warmup. So, I just went back to the warmup and tried again. We managed to do it without Kickstarter on a much less ambitious path, but still forged a new release paradigm for PSP - digital+physical releases.

Now that we've done it without Kickstarter, I can't see us going back. We'll just build from here without that.
 
As expensive, hard to find, and buggy as Suikoden 2 is, it might as well be unreleased. :(

I actually shelled out around $100 for a copy a few years ago, but yeah, the poor translation and multitude of bugs really affect the experience. I'd buy at least 2 copies of Suikoden I&II if Vic is somehow able to do a Vita compatible UMD/PSN release in the future.
 
I'd have to seriously consider it. The PSP remakes feel much better (improved resolution, resolved color issues from #1). If they were re-translated, which is probably too much to hope for, it would be incredible.

I'd love to see both, of course. And a PS1 classics version would be a decent compromise for S1&2, even without the PAL bugfixes.

I enjoyed Tierkreis myself, but a better version of two of my favorite games ever is hard to turn down over a release of what sounds like a fairly mediocre game.

On topic - ordered a copy of CoH2 and looking forward to playing it. I might have to finish out CoH1 if the data-load bonuses require you to do so...

Suikoden II would HAVE to be re-translated to be released because of the way the translation was done the first time. I'm reasonably sure Suikoden I's translation might be salvageable as it appeared on PSOne. I'm actually fine with that idea, though because Suikoden II's localization (glitches aside) was wildly inconsistent. I'm just not sure there's enough interest to cover what it would cost to license/relocalize, and if there's a chance of getting it from Konami in do-able form (detailed code archiving is not a Japanese strong point).

Thanks for buying Class of Heroes 2! The support is appreciated. If someone has already finished CoH1, the small bonuses are fine, but I would not recommend playing it just to get the bonus (a medal and some money, maybe one other thing, depending on how you finished the first). The first game is just too dull and abusive.

Also, I have no idea how/when they're selling them, but some game outlet in Canada bought a few hundred of the CoH2, so it might be an avenue to get the game if/when Ebay gets expensive for those that missed the presale.
 
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