The recollection of Doujin games at Comic Market 87

It was fine day in 2014 December 30.

Usually Comic Market takes place 29, 30, 31.

But Comic Market 87 was one day earlier.

And at last day, December 30 Doujin soft corner is set.

Doujin soft is the genre of Comic Market which has long history.

From the start people sold and bought computer softs beside to Doujinshi.

Now this genre includes many Japanese indie games, especially Doujin games.

My purpose is going Doujin soft, and see and buy many Japanese indie games.

Last year there were 700 circles exhibiting at Douji soft.

It is fewer than normal.

I think the reason is other indie game event recently.

There are BitSummit and Digital Game Expo.

I arrived at Tokyo Big Site in the morning.

Waiting in a queue, then making for east floor to apply for press.

And then I was going to west.

In the west there are 4 blocks.
There are some exhibitions of companies like Shaft or 5pb on 3rd and 4th block.
On 1st and 2nd blocks collegiate manga circle, gal-game fanart, Type-moon's fanart and Doujin Soft share the floor.

In terms of the whole this event size there are few space of Doujin soft.
However this area was full of participants at this time and it had the booth and booth of colorful arts and packaged games.
It was good view to just watch.

Why is it referred to as "Doujin Soft"?
It is why this corner includes non-game software.
And there are some hardware like game controller, handmade monitor, vintage chip-tune audio device.

Kawaii circuit board!!! 

The basic policy of Comic Market is similar to DIY of punk.
However they are more easygoing and lesser political.
So various contents are displayed, sexual contents and all age games are mixed up.
It embarrasses me, but this is Comike.


To get back to Doujin game, some exhibitors are very famous and release their games by Steam or other platforms for oversea.For example World End Economica is famous visual novel written by Isuna Hasekura. He is the original author of Spice and Wolf. They distributed luxury art books of World End Economica.

PlatineDispositif is a veteran Doujin developer. He is amazing one man dev. This year he distributed very mysterious shoo'em up. This game is made by unusual language, and nobody else author can read it. He released some games on Steam localized by western publishers, but this one have to be localized by alien.

Additionally there was many shoot'em up. As you know Doujin shoot'em up is most procreant Japanese indie games. This year veteran developers and newcomers distribute shoot'em up. Doujin shoot'em up seems to be low tone in the late 2000, but it gets moving again.

The most favorite and promising game of this Comic Market is Imalice by Wakusei Marimo. It is vertical shoot'em up drawn by flat stylish arts. It feels like old Compile games like Zanac or Milestone's KAROUS and Radirgy. Very fast pace, ambient dark music, pretty cool!

Unfortunately this alpha demo was sold in the morning. And another game "伊" by Wakusei Marimo sold too. However I will catch up this project.

Goda Mamora, Mori no Asagao (郷田マモラ、モリのアサガオ）)

  Maybe you don't know, but Japan is the one of the country which has had capital punishment. And many Japanese feels a little bit uneasy, but think that it is necessary to remain this type of punishment(www.moj.go.jp/content/000023824.pdf). However, most ordinary citizens know nothing about Japanese capital punishment. One of the main reasons for that is a policy of MOJ. MOJ remains to keep silence on how they enforce various punishments, including death penalty, as possible as they can. This is called 'Gyokei Mikkou Syugi', in Japanese（http://ja.wikipedia.org/wiki/%E8%A1%8C%E5%88%91%E5%AF%86%E8%A1%8C%E4%B8%BB%E7%BE%A9）.So, capital punishment is one of the area of secret in Japan.
　Goda Mamora's this work is a challenge to reveal and explore to this secret area, through the eye of a young prison guard who happens to be assigned to a death-row in Osaka.  This young man, Naoki Oikawa got shocked on its real life of convicts, deep sorrow, suffering, agony  of victims and their families, and severe face of Japanse cirminal institutions. From the beginning to the end of this seven-volume manga, he keeps questioning, gets confused, suffers from many contradiction, cries about distress of death-row convicts... and dicover a slight hope.
  Fiction sometimes has a great power. Goda Mamora's work should make you re-realize that.  

Hirakata Ikorusun, Naruhodo（平方イコルスン、成程）

   The title of this manga, Naruhodo means 'Oh, I understand ' in Japanese, but this is one of the most un-understandable short slapsticks in recent japanese manga.
　Firstly, every stories in this volume contains some very unusual situation. For example, in 'Totteoki no Wakizashi( Japanese dagger as a trump )', women in this world seem to be permitted to resolve the trouble by duel. However, the author never explain this extraordinary world-settings. So we get confused, 'What the hell is this? What's happening in this?'. And as story goes, we finally get the idea about what is it about, the story ends abruptly.
   Sounds terrible? but you may not believe, this weired, short, reader-unfriendly slapsticks are incredibly funny! Try it!

Here's the author's website.
http://blog.livedoor.jp/love_cry/

Pixiv site.
http://www.pixiv.net/member.php?id=70277

C82 Doujin Softs Round Up

Recently I've visited C82, as you may know, it's biggest festival of Japanese Pop Cultures. My aim is Doujin Softs(as you may know, nearly Japanese indie games. But Doujin Games or Softs≠ Japanese indie games).

This video is C82 Doujin Softs Round Up made by えーでるわいす which is one of most famous Doujin Game circle. 

I've bought some Doujin Softs, but stockpiled(in the Japanese language "積みゲー" sound "tsumi-ge") most of them....

So I will write about them in this blog. Maybe I wil.

New taxation act has passed.

ねじまき少女 上 (ハヤカワ文庫SF)
パオロ・バチガルピ 鈴木康士

I've read Nejimaki-syoujyo(The Windup Girl, written by Paolo Bacigalupi) . This book is widely known as a new great cyber-punk SF. I agree it is splendid novel, but i wonder if it is a SF...
  First of all,  it is not so fictional. The stage is near-future Thailand, but political situation is so much like real Thailand.

氷菓 (角川文庫)
米澤 穂信 上杉 久代


I finished the Koten-bu(classic literature club) series by Honobu Yonezawa .
I'm not a fan of mystery novels, but this series are pretty good.

Honobu Yonezawa always picks up relatively small incidents such as 'who locked the door?', or  'why a certain book is rent on certain days?'. but these initially seemingly trivial matters finally turned out to have surprisingly meaning.

And characters he made are slightly different from ordinary mystery hero or heroin. They are, more or less, hesitate to behave like a detective.For example, Kobato Jotarou, the main character of the other series by Yonezawa, always does NOT try to solve problems around him. Moreover, He wants to live as a syo-shimin(an ordinary citizen) , and believe that running into troubles and trying to resolve it are  unsuitable behavior as sho-shimin.