iDOLM@STER 2!!

[hamuzou961]

im not against it, but after thinking about it, it makes sense for namco to introduce more rivals into the mix. specifically because it is central to the gameplay now since it seems like in most auditions you will be challenging a rival group. we cant just have ryuuguukomachi every time, and even with jupiter now it only mixes it up slightly. hopefully there are more rivals such as a 765 B team or even 876.

[Raestloz]

Change can be good, but it makes it so much harder to explain what this game is about now D:

And it was hard enough beforehand to explain I guess xD

This + 1

One problem with male rivals is the fact that romancey stuff will inevitably appear. From arcade to SP, that "unstated obvious reason" was directed towards players. Now that they got 3 more candidates to choose....

Also, all this time I can explain "THE iDOLM@STER" as "visual novel with a lot of mini games, a lot less hentai, a lot of songs, a lot less boys"

What am I supposed to say now? "visual novel with a lot of mini games, a lot less hentai, a lot of songs and watch girls and boys argue"?

However, when you think of it from a company perspective, you've only got so much resources to use. The time, effort, and money you sink into these new guys will inevitably take resources away from anything else, like putting Ryuuguu idols in.

They already got the models to work (we won't see them in game otherwise), the only things missing are their face in selection screen and dialogues.

Also, unless they decide to get the Jupiters as producable they don't need to develop further models (outfit) that much. Those three can be made just once, and they only have to do voice recordings for the additional content

That argument can be void for the sake of variety (you might not want to see only 3 kinds of outfit even for rivals). But then again, that means they have to develop outfits for Ryuugukomachi too (seeing as they can be counted as in-house rivals), which means the development is pretty much the same: They have to do everything for everyone.

If it comes to space, that Hard Drive could use some more content :/ it's the same thing either way

[Neruibara]

The more I see, the more I want to play this game. If people really are worried about space on the disc, I can think of a simple solution to that problem, put the game on ps3. The graphics on the ps3 are just as good, better than the 360.There is more space on the disk.To back up that argument I have an example FFXIII. On the 360. FFXIII had to be split between 3 discs. On the ps3, only one disc was necessary. Most importantly of all, the ps3 is region free. They would be tapping into a much larger market. I wonder how many Im@s fans are out there that would play it who can't obtain a jp 360, but can more easily obtain a ps3? I know I'm one.

[Magenta Galaxy]

To back up that argument I have an example FFXIII. On the 360. FFXIII had to be split between 3 discs. On the ps3, only one disc was necessary. Most importantly of all, the ps3 is region free. They would be tapping into a much larger market. I wonder how many Im@s fans are out there that would play it who can't obtain a jp 360, but can more easily obtain a ps3? I know I'm one.

Well. 1) The 360 version wasn't entirely 'worse' than the PS3 one. It was handled badly, sure, but is disc-swapping really a big issue in this day and age? I'd have preferred it on four discs with better encoding on the FMVs. Really, the issue is the time it takes to do everything.

Certainly, recording songs, programming costumes, etc, is a lot of work. But, coming up with dialogue paths for all these characters and the way certain choices early in the game might change things later, or having them teamed up with different characters, etc, and juggling all those flags is where, IMO, the real issue begins.

An example, there's 504 possible unit combinations in im@s2 atm. If Ryuuguukomachi were producable, that'd be 1716. That's a lot of dialogue to write, mang. There's also the issue of having 'too much' content. Crazy as it sounds, you have too many playable characters and the game starts feeling like a chore to 100%.

2) Whilst we are an active and loud fanbase, the foreign im@s userbase is small and probably in the 4-digit region, maaaaybe breaking 5 if they're lucky. Certainly, they could get more sales, but it'd be a fraction of the userbase they already have and not worth catering to from a business standpoint.

[Scotty]

And even so, think about NBGI as a whole. There are many more tales of fans than Im@s, and yet it's still rare that we get a localized version. NBGI is just plain cruel sometimes.

[H4ataraxia]

The more I see, the more I want to play this game. If people really are worried about space on the disc, I can think of a simple solution to that problem, put the game on ps3. The graphics on the ps3 are just as good, better than the 360.There is more space on the disk.To back up that argument I have an example FFXIII. On the 360. FFXIII had to be split between 3 discs. On the ps3, only one disc was necessary. Most importantly of all, the ps3 is region free. They would be tapping into a much larger market. I wonder how many Im@s fans are out there that would play it who can't obtain a jp 360, but can more easily obtain a ps3? I know I'm one.

I can't say how man fans agree with you, including me, but as you can see in the interview I translated 10's of pages back of the producer of the game. It's plain obvious that the company is money-hungry since they're only excuse to make IM@S xbox exclusive was that "It was the only system that was able to support HD during the time the next gen systems were released in 06/07". Unless some new guy comes in and makes a huge change and persuasion in the company like Hitler, than there's no hope.

Also the game requires you to install it on your HDD for DLC which takes up around 10GB per game, and probably more for I@MS 2.

[Scotty]

Heh....page 72...

Oh gosh darn it, it's gone!

[SalemJeanette]

Also...out of curiosity (I have no idea how 360 discs work XD), why would adding the male idols be at the cost of the 4 idols that can't be produced? It's not like they have more than one song (or, for that matter, more than one stage), and they probably don't have an insane amount of interactions (if anything, it'd probably be like how you interacted with the 961 idols in SP; when you decided to get sidetracked on your way to/from the office).

I mean, comparatively, Ryuuguu Komachi and Ricchan (would) have more costumes, songs, communications, and stuff to do in general. It doesn't seem like it's Jupiter's fault for those 4 being unplayable...

They cant deliver all of it now, they have to sell DLC later

[Cael K.]

They already got the models to work (we won't see them in game otherwise), the only things missing are their face in selection screen and dialogues.

Communications and events. I don't know if they plan on three idol communications, or three idol events, but if they do, having those four will increase the amount of stuff they have to do considerably. It's been gone over before, the amount of combinations of idol groups there are.

But, when you get down to it, if all those dialogs are like:

Point: We need the leader to say X, your leader is Haruka and she delivers it like this.
Point: 2nd idol responds to X with Y, your 2nd idol is Mami and she delivers it like this.

Then in my opinion, it's not much more expensive to include 4 more characters (and the dialog would seem pretty... hollow). If however, the dialogs, and the direction of the dialogs, are all unique (in that, say, Haruka and Chihaya both respond with different ideas, and dialogs are tailor-made to suit them), then I can kinda see exactly how much content you need.

"Oh well, they're still going to buy it anyway, because it's Idolmaster!! MUWAHAHAHAHAHA!!!"
*waits for cash to come in*

I'm more thinking that, with corporate politics, there's a lot of finger pointing and a lot of I-told-you-so going on. I mean, first you have to tell this to the people making the game, which also consists of fans. I mean, you saw the reaction that certain fans had, but you're telling these guys to make the exact thing that they railed against. And for those people making the game that aren't fans, you still have a PR crisis on your hands.

[Haldo]

I wouldn't be suprised if the dialogs were unique depending on which characters you were producing, because that would explain why the ryuugukomachi gang was removed.

[animagic4u]

Naturally they don't want to work any harder than they absolutely have to. 

In response to all the bickering about ps3 v. xbox thing, the ps3 is technically superior. But- maybe there is something that they are not telling us about their real influence to make the game on the xbox.Whatever the case, I hope a ps3 sequel/spin off is soon to come.
Also...IMO, an American translation would be terrible. I would not want another terrible translation that ruins it.

[Neruibara]

Actually to an extent, I have already come up with a solution to an American Im@s. Whether or not it get's implemented is another story. For now, I'll stick to my story I am writing. To avoid getting off topic, I'll keep this short. My story is basically a set of brand new idols, naturally American idols.The story is set stateside so it starts here to begin with. (That reminds me. I have to get back to work on that story and introduce the first of my idols.)

[animagic4u]

Actually to an extent, I have already come up with a solution to an American Im@s. Whether or not it get's implemented is another story. For now, I'll stick to my story I am writing. To avoid getting off topic, I'll keep this short. My story is basically a set of brand new idols, naturally American idols.The story is set stateside so it starts here to begin with. (That reminds me. I have to get back to work on that story and introduce the first of my idols.)

Thank you. A loose adaptation for the American market is exactly what I had in mind.

[Scotty]

It's exactly what I wouldn't buy.

[iDOL15]

It's exactly what I wouldn't buy.

This.

Seriously I wouldn't mind an actual US release. Just as long as they have good voice actors. But with iM@S 2, I think the chance of them doing so is gone. unless they release SP first but I don't that's how they want to do things. I mean really, the people who know nothing about will probably think of the series as Pokemon then iM@S 2 would come out and they would be like WTF?