xenofem

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@xenofem

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translating things, building chill software for my friends, playing ttrpgs, making procedural vector art, learning piano, writing unhinged Utena fanfics, and just vibing

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stepnix
@stepnix

New mahou translation from Silver Vine

Card-based resolution system for episodic magical girl play. and super sentai play. and, should you so desire, mechanics that reflect the production of your show itself, not the just the "inside" of the universe. you may have to dodge corporate censors, but, the show must go on, right...?

The original (ハト☆プリ!RPG) was an unlicensed Pretty Cure fan game, this new release combines those original rules with a later super sentai expansion. Silver Vine has been chipping away at this for a while, very excited things are finally moving forward. As far as I'm aware, this is the first JP magical girl game to get an official English translation.

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in reply to @stepnix's post:

malymin
@malymin

It continually strikes me how much of the average western anime fan's concept of mahou shoujo is fundamentally incomplete. Especially during the 2000's and 2010's, I often saw it analyzed as effectively a wholey self-contained genre with no precedent outside of itself; the only framework people had for understanding it in relation to the rest of the medium was "other shoujo has romance, but no action" (vast oversimplification) and "other anime that has action is either battle shounen or some flavor of seinen."

When to the Japanese viewer, sailor-moon-style mahou shoujo is obviously a hybrid genre, born of the coupling of a broader "girls with transformation magic" genre and Japanese superhero tropes. It seems, judging from the systems you've shared on this blog, as though any Japanese game system looking to model warrior-princesses in frilly dresses has to at least give a nod to the notion of playing as spandex-wearing helmet-headed heroes, and vice-versa. I do not think most anglosphere game devs would think to do the same thing.

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NotMiki
@NotMiki

I think a big chunk of that is that as far as a western kid in the early 90s was concerned, Sailor Moon and Power Rangers were born on the same day, so saying the former is borrowing elements from the latter, and also the latter is part of genre that has been developing for 20 years now? sure in theory but no one internalized it like that. And when fledgling manga localization got hold of shoujo, it wasn't Sailor Moon's precursors but rather other 90s comics. So yeah you can tell something different is going on in Miracle Girls or Saint Tail, but all you can do to see 80s magical girl stuff is try and triangulate from those 90s products.

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stepnix
@stepnix

I'm not quite willing to commit to that as a trend for JTRPGs, although I see where you're coming from. I'll have to double check if Princess Wing has anything about switching up the default flavor (which admittedly is invoking heavier armament than typical mahous), and my toku JTRPG knowledge is much more limited.

There is an extra twist to this particular game that I think supports your broader genre-exists-within-a-context point. The mechanics for this system were adopted from an Evangelion fangame, so, I doubt the designers were thinking of magical girls as a totally self-contained thing.

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stepnix
@stepnix

on the anglo TTRPG side of things, I have seen a couple recent systems try to invoke both magical girls and toku sentai teams at once. not a lot, but I try to pay attention when it happens. the example that immediately comes to mind is uhhhhhh this DnD 5e setting/hack thing, which hit almost $50k on Kickstarter.
https://magi-knights.com/

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malymin
@malymin

I'm not quite willing to commit to that as a trend for JTRPGs, although I see where you're coming from. I'll have to double check if Princess Wing has anything about switching up the default flavor (which admittedly is invoking heavier armament than typical mahous)

Ah, fair. I'm probably jumping the gun. As for Princess Wing - it doesn't mention changing the setting flavor, per say, but on page 22 it mentions that the default setting contains Princess Cores with a "transformation hero" like designs, even though frilly and feminine is the general social norm:

Due to the policies of development companies and nations, most Princess Cores are announced with elaborate decorations under the label of “for women,” featuring cute (or beautiful) designs. However, being a Princess does not necessarily mean that one must prefer highly decorative designs. Some individuals may lean towards streamlined and sporty designs, robust and weapon-like aesthetics, or even designs reminiscent of transformation hero suits.

There is an extra twist to this particular game that I think supports your broader genre-exists-within-a-context point. The mechanics for this system were adopted from an Evangelion fangame, so, I doubt the designers were thinking of magical girls as a totally self-contained thing.

The mahou/mecha overlap is another thing I don't really see talked about much, even though I get inklings of its existence: Princess Wing's whole schtick, this game being effectively a Precure fangame adapted from an NGE fangame, and in the 2000's Nanoha wearing its mecha influences on its sleeve. It would seem, at the very least, the genres' fanbases in Japan have decent overlap.

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stepnix
@stepnix

I've run into the comparison a few times. My favorite explanation is that the similarities point to Ultraman as an origin point for the tangle of tropes, but maybe slightly more likely is that they started exchanging elements once they fused into the greater otaku space (remember how Nanoha was a VN spin-off? we're in huge nerd territory here)

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xenofem
@xenofem

Looks like the creator of this game (and the E.V.A. game it's based on) specifically credits Tokyo NOVA as the inspiration for the card-based mechanics. The only JTRPGs I've encountered that use cards are this game, Princess Wing, and Tokyo NIGHTMARE (by the same creator as Tokyo NOVA); all the other JTRPGs I can recall seeing (Shinobigami, Kamigakari, Picaresque Roman, Fledge Witch, If If If, Sword World, ...) have all used dice for randomness, but maybe there's a particular lineage of card-based games out there? I'm not sure if Princess Wing took inspiration from anyplace in particular or just arrived at it independently

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stepnix
@stepnix

Magical Magia was the other card-based game I remembered seeing. maybe you have some clues for how it fits?
http://rhapso.daa.jp/magi/system.html

Edit: I have some notes about a few other systems (Steam Wall Espionage, Alice the fairy world ～心を持った世界～, Traders!, ASURA Easy System) using cards, so it does look like there's some kind of recurring lineage imo. unfortunately these notes are more or less just "these are a bunch of games that exist" so I can't say if any of them resemble PW more specifically

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xenofem
@xenofem

ooh interesting, I hadn't heard of any of these!

I did run into this little Beginner's Guide to TRPGs on Conos, a Japanese online store that sells a lot of TRPGs. They describe TRPGs as predominantly using dice, and don't specifically discuss any other resolution mechanics; the two major games they highlight as popular ones in Japan and recommend to beginners are Call of Cthulhu and Sword World (and then D&D gets quietly tossed in below those for good measure lol)

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