Tokimeki Memorial 4 letter writing campaign started
January 29th, 2010, by
Posted in Translation
, Tagged: Konami, Tokimeki Memorial
A fellow going by the handle “Nargrakhan” has started a letter writing campaign to Konami in the hopes that they will release Tokimeki Memorial 4 in English. The campaign website includes a synopsis of the game and character descriptions, as well as a FAQ section for common questions regarding the campaign.
Tokimeki Memorial is a fairly popular dating simulation franchise in Japan. In the first game in the series, the player selects the schedule for the male protagonist and the goal is to win the heart of one of the girls at his school. This franchise has expanded to a “Girl’s Side” spin-off series as well, where the player controls a girl whose goal is to win the affection of a guy. One direct-to-video animated adaptation exists of the original game, and an animated series based on the massively multiplayer online version of the game (which, by the way, flopped) also aired a few years back. Tokimeki Memorial 4 is the latest iteration in this series and was released in Japan for the PlayStation Portable at the end of 2009. The new iteration improves on the speech system from the older games, allowing the heroines to more naturally call out to the protagonist, and a video camera accessory can also be used with the game.
Tokimeki Memorial, the first game, had been the target of several attempts at fan translation, but none of those projects have come to fruition. Issues varied from the extraordinary length of text compared to the other console games being fan translated in the ROM hacking community, to hacking issues for the PlayStation version. The inability to play Tokimeki Memorial in English was actually one of the reasons behind the creation of Shira Oka, an original English dating simulation game.
January 29th, 2010 at 10:45 am
Wow, Shira Oka still exists. I thought something happened to them since they didn’t show up at their usual cons for the last 2 years or so.
January 29th, 2010 at 2:26 pm
I hope Konami will listen to the fans especially about this one.:(
January 30th, 2010 at 1:26 am
I’d rather have a fantranslation project for Tokimemo2, if anything. The girls of Tokimemo4 look far too manly and too realistic for my tastes. I also wouldn’t like to see the series taking the Sakura Taisen approach of skipping the best games (like with SakuTai, there are PSP ports of 1+2) but at the same time releasing the newest one in the West with the number taken from the title to fool ignorant window shoppers.
Nah, I’d rather have Tokimeki Memorial remain the fan translator’s holy grail, with a small but dedicated fanbase, and with all the casually interested being scared away by its import-only-heavy-language-barrier reputation.
January 30th, 2010 at 5:33 pm
Added a small bit in the TM4 Wikipedia entry, if that can help anything with this campaign… thingy. Whatever…
January 30th, 2010 at 5:56 pm
Craps said, here is my 2 cents: If it’s Konami we are talking, I can expect high quality translation from the one who localised MGS, Suikoden, ZOE, Silent Hill. Question remains whether they will do it or not. I think I’m gonna place my bet on this one.