2183: Why It Would Be a Mistake to Not Localise Valkyrie Drive Bhikkuni

Earlier today, a tweet from Senran Kagura creator Kenichiro Takaki did the rounds, apparently indicating that his newest video game creation Valkyrie Drive Bhikkuni — part of an ambitious transmedia project that involves anime, mobile games and conventional games — would not be localised.

Takaki’s wording is a little ambiguous, due to English not being his first language, but if I’m interpreting his words correctly, it seems that there are no current plans to release a localised version of Valkyrie Drive Bhikkuni, but that he does want to release a localised version.

In other words, there’s a shred of hope in that tweet thanks to the word “currently”, particularly as the creator himself has expressed a desire to bring the game over. However, the final decision will be in the hands of Marvelous and their frequent localisation partners XSEED Games and Marvelous Europe, and this is where things become a little worrisome.

You might recall that a few weeks back there was something of a hoo-hah over Dead or Alive Xtreme 3, with a widely quoted comment apparently from a Tecmo Koei employee seeming to indicate that Western territories would not be receiving an official release of the game due to the unwelcome influence of loud-mouthed outrage megaphones in the games press and on social media at large. Whether or not those comments were actually true is beside the point; plenty of people believe them and have no reason not to given recent happenings. As a result, import specialist Play-Asia scored something of a coup by pointing out that there was an Asian English version available, and that, conveniently, they were offering it to those who wanted it — along with a cheeky biting of the thumb at so-called “social justice warriors” along the way, too. Fine with me.

The thing Valkyrie Drive Bhikkuni and Dead or Alive Xtreme 3 have in common is that they’re both provocative, sexy games that feature exclusively female characters in cute outfits, suggestive poses and varying states of undress. The similarities end there, of course, with DOAX3 being a beach volleyball/dating sim type affair, while Valkyrie Drive Bhikkuni is more along the lines of Takaki’s successful Senran Kagura franchise, but to the eyes of those who thing everything involving depictions of the female form — particularly in works of Japanese origin — is somehow worse than ISIS, there’s little difference; these are games for neckbeard basement-dwelling virgins, they’d say — games for desperate losers who’d never get their hands on a real woman.

This is enormously reductive thinking, as I’ve argued on a number of occasions in the past. I think it’s extremely important that video games as a medium feels that it is able to explore sex, sexiness, sexuality and deliberately provocative aesthetics. And, over the last few years, we’ve started to see more and more developers, publishers and localisation outfits apparently feeling the same way, with PlayStation platforms in particular getting more than their fair share of games that are unafraid to revel and delight in explorations of sexuality. Sure, a few have made it over with some edits here and there in the name of differing cultural norms — particularly with regard to the depiction of young-looking (“loli”) characters in provocative situations, even if, canonically, they are of an appropriate age to be engaging with such activities — but for the most part, the last two generations of hardware in particular have been a wonderful time to be a fan of Japanese gaming and sex-positive titles.

What the loud-mouthed outrage megaphones threaten to do, though, is undo this amount of progress we’ve seen over the last few years. Because yes, it is progress, whatever you may personally think of the games in question. These games seeing a successful release to a passionate audience in the West demonstrates that it is possible to release games to a niche rather than a mainstream audience — and, thus, if it’s possible to run a successful business catering to those who enjoy games involving pretty anime girls (which isn’t just white cis heterosexual men, I might add, as my Twitter Following list will attest) then it is certainly possible to cater to other audiences too: gay men, heterosexual women, gay women, asexual people, bisexual people, trans people and even the genderfluid otherkin bullshit that Tumblr seems to make up on a regular basis.

As such, seeing a relatively high-profile title from a high-profile niche-interest creator like Takaki at risk of not coming over for reasons as-yet unknown — but you can bet it’s something to do with the recent controversies, along with the amount of outright ill-informed abuse that has been spewed at the Senran Kagura series in particular over the last few years — is both saddening and worrying, but perhaps understandable. To be honest, were I in Takaki’s situation, as a creator who clearly loves both his work and his creations, I would feel enormously demoralised every time the mainstream press covered my games and wrote them off without, in many cases, even playing them — though I would take heart from the fact that there are plenty of passionate fans out there willing to spread the good word, even if the press isn’t. And in this age of social media, as the traditional games press becomes more and more irrelevant, sadly, it’s word of mouth that really counts more than anything.

I sincerely hope that Takaki, XSEED and Marvelous are able to reach some kind of arrangement where Western fans are able to pick up Valkyrie Drive Bhikkuni officially, without having to resort to possible Asian English imports, because refusing to release this sends a message to the wannabe “progressive” bullies of the world that their tactics — shaming creators and audience members of niche-interest products rather than being the change they want to see in the world and creating their own media that better reflects their interests — are working. And I really don’t want them to get that message, because for all their bleating about “diversity” and “representation”, nothing good ever comes from denying groups access to the media they want to enjoy; in fact, if anything, it makes the world a less diverse and representative place overall.

So fuck that. Takaki-san, XSEED, Marvelous: you announce an official Western (preferably European — we’re a lot more open-minded over here!) release of Valkyrie Drive Bhikkuni, and I — and numerous others I know — will more than happily pre-order it immediately, particularly if there’s a lovely limited edition on offer with, say, posters, figurines, soundtracks, dakimakuras and the like.

Do the right thing. Don’t let the crybullies of the world win. Take a stand. Show that you believe in your work, and in your audience. Tits are life, ass is hometown — and your games are happiness.