[Skortched Urf' Studios] Black Tokyo Released

[jezter6]

While I agree with some of your statements, I don't think the review was as harsh as you make it out to be. I fully agreed that Hentai wasn't my style, so I tried to keep it as fair as I could without thrashing the style.

I understand you're a small company, but hey - layout is layout. Fonts staying the same throughout and quality looking tables are just part of a good product. If you wish to keep the 'small company = bad layout' going, that's cool - but don't charge $12 for it. I had $12 to spend on rpg's this weekend - and I opted for this over the Trude20 Adept's Handbook. I guarantee you, that for the same money, I would have got a professionally done book. If you're going to charge like the big dogs, be prepared to be judged in the same category. If you're printing out PDF's with a free PDF printer from Word or Open Office, then it's your own fault. If you're not going to have an editor look it over for spelling mistakes in 32 point font - it's your fault. Hire an editor. If you can't afford an editor, you can't afford to make $12 PDF games without getting a bad review or two. There's absolutely no reason to have spelling mistakes in an electronic document. As a small press company, you have very minimal deadlines to meet in this regard and have all the opportunity to take that final look over the product and notice the glaring issues that make a product look and feel like it was done professionally.

Had this been half the price, I would have been half as dissapointed.

Again, without being a true hentai fanboy, I tried to keep it as even as I could. The feats present some pretty awesome power for just one feat. Stuff that could break a game if not everyone is taking feats from this pool. Then again, you have stuff like Cosplay. does that really require a FEAT to use cosplay?

And art, I even mentioned that some if it was neat (the covers). However, I remember the interior art looking exactly what my friend was drawing back in high school. He did end up going to art school and cleaned up his work a bit, but the art was bad clip art at best. Not to mention, much of it wasn't even to the style you seemed to be indicating:

Black Tokyo focuses on one particular sub-genre of Hentai: supernatural horror and bondage. With visually spectacular demon lords, stunning action scenes, virginal heroines, hyper-sexualized magic rituals and psi-talents and cunning modern demon-slayers, horror Hentai makes the most ‘gamable’ background for a Hentai flavored setting.

Tentacle sex I could see. Tribal warriors urinating on themselves is a not really supernatrual horror or bondage. I count two pieces of 'bondage' flavored artwork. I also count two pieces of urination artwork. Urination isn't listed as a 'specific sub-genre' in the book.

 

[Alzrius]

While I agree with some of your statements, I don't think the review was as harsh as you make it out to be. I fully agreed that Hentai wasn't my style, so I tried to keep it as fair as I could without thrashing the style.

Jezter, while I don't think your review was a hate-filled tirade against the book, it did have a layer of harshness to it that underscored what you were saying. In several places you go after it simply for what it presents ("If tentacle rape is your thing...go nuts.") or simply blaming it for not being what you personally expected it to be ("It could have been a well produced setting book..."), rather than talking about what's there and judging it on its own merits. To be fair, though, a goodly amount of what you say is true.

I understand you're a small company, but hey - layout is layout. Fonts staying the same throughout and quality looking tables are just part of a good product. If you wish to keep the 'small company = bad layout' going, that's cool - but don't charge $12 for it. I had $12 to spend on rpg's this weekend - and I opted for this over the Trude20 Adept's Handbook. I guarantee you, that for the same money, I would have got a professionally done book. If you're going to charge like the big dogs, be prepared to be judged in the same category.

See, this is what I was talking about above. While your point is not without merit, the manner in which your saying it carries a fairly derisive tone, which makes the actual point get lost beneath how acerbic this comes off as.

Mark wasn't offering an excuse, he was giving an explanation. Let's try not to go after him for that.

If you're printing out PDF's with a free PDF printer from Word or Open Office, then it's your own fault. If you're not going to have an editor look it over for spelling mistakes in 32 point font - it's your fault. Hire an editor. If you can't afford an editor, you can't afford to make $12 PDF games without getting a bad review or two. There's absolutely no reason to have spelling mistakes in an electronic document.

On a personal note, how I wish that last statement was true; currently, my computer's spellchecker is on the fritz, and while I think I know why, I can't seem to fix the thing.

As a small press company, you have very minimal deadlines to meet in this regard and have all the opportunity to take that final look over the product and notice the glaring issues that make a product look and feel like it was done professionally.

Had this been half the price, I would have been half as dissapointed.

As a note, you misspelled "disappointed," and there's no reason for that in an electronic posting.

Again, without being a true hentai fanboy, I tried to keep it as even as I could. The feats present some pretty awesome power for just one feat. Stuff that could break a game if not everyone is taking feats from this pool. Then again, you have stuff like Cosplay. does that really require a FEAT to use cosplay?

Some of the feats were fairly powerful, but I didn't see any of them as being truly game-breaking. Likewise, anyone can cosplay, just not anyone can gain a bonus for it, which is what the feat gives.

And art, I even mentioned that some if it was neat (the covers). However, I remember the interior art looking exactly what my friend was drawing back in high school. He did end up going to art school and cleaned up his work a bit, but the art was bad clip art at best. Not to mention, much of it wasn't even to the style you seemed to be indicating:



Tentacle sex I could see. Tribal warriors urinating on themselves is a not really supernatrual horror or bondage. I count two pieces of 'bondage' flavored artwork. I also count two pieces of urination artwork. Urination isn't listed as a 'specific sub-genre' in the book.

Strictly speaking, no part of the passage you quoted talks about tentacle rape (though it is implied). That said, the book doesn't list every specific sub-genre of paraphilia that hentai (and this book, by extension) caters to, and it shouldn't have to. A lot of hentai includes watersports, often in conjunction with hentai of a more dark nature (and if they use that to gain some effect, then it's supernatural, and potentially horrifying given how they're doing it). Hence, I think that's still in the style that the book indicates.

A few more reviews for the book have gone up, and most of them seem to be almost outraged over what the book covers. While the book does have problems, and the reviews do mention those, it seems that most people who're reviewing this are bringing some level of personal offense into their reaction to it.

 

[HalWhitewyrm]

it seems that most people who're reviewing this are bringing some level of personal offense into their reaction to it.

And you expected this to be not the case with this product? You don't make a book about hentai and expect people to keep quiet, you know what I mean.

 

[Alzrius]

And you expected this to be not the case with this product? You don't make a book about hentai and expect people to keep quiet, you know what I mean.

I guess I expected people to be more objective (that is, professional) in their reviews, leaving their personal biases aside and reviewing a product based only on its flaws and merits.

I suppose that was rather naive of me, though.

 

[Urizen]

As a publisher of E-books, I've had people give my products bad reviews. It's a part of the game. You take the bad right along with the good and try to learn from mistakes.

Jezter has been kind enough to review one of my products: Technothrillers; a True20 espionage toolkit and I felt his opinions were fair. He gave the product 2 stars and, while I feel this was a bit low, I respect his opinions and don't flame him for them in public forums.

I don't think James is doing that here, but I do think other people should respect the reviewer's opinions.

If you think the product was better than has been said, then review it so people can see differing opinions and make better choices as to how they will spend their gaming dollar.

 

[HalWhitewyrm]

Look at it this way, all this talk is certainly not hurting the promotion for the book, so hey.

 

[Urizen]

Look at it this way, all this talk is certainly not hurting the promotion for the book, so hey.

Definitely!

 

[Urizen]

Heck I wish people would talk this much about my products!

 

[jezter6]

or simply blaming it for not being what you personally expected it to be ("It could have been a well produced setting book..."), rather than talking about what's there and judging it on its own merits. To be fair, though, a goodly amount of what you say is true.

Read the first post over again. Publisher states that it's a d20 modern SETTING book. The amount of 'setting' in here is very low in comparison to the amount of near pr0n content.

As a note, you misspelled "disappointed," and there's no reason for that in an electronic posting.

I looked around for a spellchecker in the post editor but couldn't find one. However, it didn't cost you $12 to read my post, so I'll respectfully ask that you not be childish about my spelling mistakes.

A few more reviews for the book have gone up, and most of them seem to be almost outraged over what the book covers. While the book does have problems, and the reviews do mention those, it seems that most people who're reviewing this are bringing some level of personal offense into their reaction to it.

I'm not outraged by it all. While I may have had a bit more sarcastic tone than necessary, most of my review about the subject was merely to warn others that this was not for the basic anime lover.

Again, I bought this because it was implied as a setting book, about a dark side of Japan. I was not impressed with the amount of actual setting material and found the writing to be juvenile. I think the subject has merit for those that enjoy it, but between the writing, art, and layout, this looks like a sexually frustrated fat high school kid (believe me, I'm describing ME of 10 years ago) scanning his late nite drawings and turning his blog rants into a 'setting book.' There is open and decent discussion of a mature subject matter, and then there is this sense of shock jocking on paper. It's hard to respect a product (although I did laugh heartily) when the first 3 words of which I can't even copy and paste here without being banned.

As for the number... a 3 is AVERAGE. So if I give it a 2, it's just 'below average.' It's not like it was a 1 or a 0, it was a 2. I remember publishers going nuts over getting only 3's a few years ago. Come on! An average product should get a 3. A product that is not up to average (bad layout, less than stellar writing, etc), does not deserve a score of average.

And I think that Urizen will also remember that a lot that came from my review led them to realize that somewhere between writer and layout, a few paragraphs were missed in all the copy and pasting, which lost a lot of material that was necessary to understand the product. Without getting an honest review of "what he hell, this product makes NO sense," they probably would have kept on thinking it was fine. It was a good review in that they get to figure out the problems early and come up with a resolution before things might have made it into print and been missing items forever.

 

[mcathro]

most of my review about the subject was merely to warn others that this was not for the basic anime lover.

All other criticisms aside, I think we state that quite clearly in our sales listing:

WARNING!

This setting is intended for ADULTS ONLY.

If you are easily offended you do not want to purchase this product.

If you are hard to offend you still may not want to buy this product!

(I’m serious; we have plenty of other offerings for "mainstream" gamers.)

This PDF is full of Hentai-inspired RPG rules, classes and setting elements; so if you would not purchase a typical Hentai product then this may not be your cup of tea. Consider yourself warned.