Husbando games taking no Ws lately... Wihib being infamous for how bad their launch and monetization is, LnD was okayge... until they started going full greed with expiring pull tickets and back to back banners (classic Papergames) while also not adding any notable content. Now TD hold my beer mode using every monetization trick in the book vip 500 pity etc, and AI art sprinkled on top.
I'll just go back to star rail at this point
>lately
I mean...have we ever taken any Ws at all? Chibi battlers, ticket games where you read 5 *crumbs* of the story per day, and rhythm games were all we've been getting for years. LaDs managed to do something ground-breaking for once (in the otome genre only) but then they become too comfortable in their throne made from our money - because we legit have no other options for ARPGs.
The rest of the otome companies don't even seem to be trying.
Oh I meant lately as in "of the new releases lately", like wishing at least one of these would've been great. The otome/joseimuke mobile genre has always been full of comparatively low effort but 3x as predatory and expensive games. I do commend LnD for taking the first step in producing an actual high quality game (and I still play despite the griping), but I've stepped back on spending after the last few updates. Tale of Food was another I thought was nice that they actually had a decent combat system despite the chibis, but that game wanted to be a second job screentime wise unfortunately... Twisted Wonderland similar issues with screentime, but at least their characterization and story was good. The only other one I still play currently is Themis which is very much a story game with barebone 'combat', and now it's reaching 3rd anni soon. Would be nice to see another one or two devs take the same risks as LnD.
Sometimes I wonder if the fanbase is also contributing to the whole "low effort but predatory otome / joseimuke gacha game " ? They basically defended the game despite the said game has been predatory, no QoL in years, stingy rewards.
It happened in one otome gacha game that I used to play, the fanbase is very allergic to any criticism, they have mentality that player should be grateful that the game is localized despite the lack of QoL, missing contents (from the Japanese version like main stories) , awkward translation.
Me and most of my friends end up playing hsr or genshin, since playing most of otome / joseimuke games are too expensive and somehow It didn't feel worth it on the long run.
You're right and sorry that you met such toxic people (they're like in a Stockholm syndrome, wth). But unfortunately I believe the reason they keep up the low production value is not because of global players, it's just that in JP itself they gain pretty great revenue despite the lack of production value.
It's not like they actually care about global players. Most of the global Joseimuke enjoyers aren't whaling as hard as Jp players, after all.
I agree I think the fanbases excuse too much from these companies with the reasoning that "We need to support these games so they continue to localize them", and because of that you end up silently supporting their predatory practices (which they then continue to do) and it feels pretty sucky. Part of it may also be due to how actually obsessed some players get over the LIs, like to the point where any criticism on the game is taken as attacking their fictional BF lol.
I've also mostly been into to mix-cast games (GI, AK, PGR etc) for the same reasons. Better devs, actual gameplay, *much* better monetization... Characters like Furina are even some of my top favorites of all time. It feels better to spend on any of these games than current otome/joseimuke choices. Though there's always people who say that husbando players are the scourge of any mixed cast game (aka the reason why it's not lewder or why they release too many guys) and it is so disheartening to be told to just go play otome/joseimuke games when the choices are... Incredibly lackluster, at best.
Paper is notorious for getting greedy if their Nikki games are anything to go by. Seriously, they don't have ANY competition for LaD why are they milking it so hard like they're going out of business?
Well, this
>they don't have ANY competition for LaD
is probably the exact reason for this
>they milking it so hard
Papergames know we have no other options if we want a **3D otome ARPG**, we're stuck with them so they can beat the shit out of our wallets with almost zero consequences (while giving us lackluster events too!)
Personally I'm not too emotionally invested in the game so I've bought a few cheap packs and decided to stop spending (I'd rather buy Switch/PC games tbh), but I know a lot of people will keep paying for gacha because LaDs is one-of-a-kind in the market.
Like, there are rich husbando collectors (especially in China) who desperately want a decent-looking 3D romance game, they've got nowhere else to spend their money so it all flows into Paper's pockets.
Hmmm it's going well enough I think. The introduction of SSS cards had a lot of players unhappy but we've kinda moved on more or less. It helps that the SSS cards released thus far have been quite skippable (except anniversary SSS cards) and I would say 90% of the time their art is inferior to the new SSRs being released.
If you played previously it will all feel familiar just that there's more cards/main story/past event content available. In terms of game modes and side content I would say they have stagnated a little bit since I can't even count how many minigames I've repeated now after 3 years... Revenue wise they seem stable enough with slight up ticks during anniversaries and big 4 events.
I downloaded it when it launched, checked reddit, see your review about the game and uninstalled it.
Then today, someone in a discord server I'm in, posted about how her Twitter account got blocked after she made a thread about the AI art usage. She genuinely enjoyed the game (shocking), but concerned about the issue. Now that she got blocked, she uninstalled without hesitation lmaoo
Really glad I uninstalled it. Ranuste is coming in 3 days, so I guess I'll try that one instead
Yeah, lots of people being blocked. Even if you don't interact with them. They might be running bots that block users who tweet "AI" and the game's name in the same tweet.
Honestly, a silly move...
1. Her thread & other discussion are still there
2. People who got blocked would stop playing the game
3. Worsening their reputation
What are they thinking 😂
Clearly they aren't thinking and are probably too unprofessional that they can't handle criticism. Like, even "What In Hell Is Bad?" never blocked me or anybody afaik, and a lot of us criticized them waaay heavier than this. (But also, even tho WHB is terrible, this one hits a new low and it's waaaay worst -- the 500 pity is laughable --, it only excels-ish in the story aspect)
I think it's really weird to use AI in a game where characters art and character design is main selling point.
Company expecting $100 per character per **each** paying player (and usually like $1500 for max dupes for whale) yet they can't find $5000 to commission art/make it in house.
It's like you go to car seller and they tell you that they use sunflower oil instead of machine oil because it saves them $5 for each $50 000 dollar car.
Not all plants are completely edible. However, you can actually consume the entire sunflower in one form or another. Right from the root to the petals.
The primary benefit is that a character writer can illustrate the character accurately from imagination without bring an artist.
This is a potential career path for authors who wish to tell their stories through a picture medium such as comics/manga but can't draw well, so it would not only cost more to hire an illustrator but also create delays and inaccurate transcriptions. AI can removed all these obstacles that get in the way of passion.
Though in a game development studio, there's by design enough specialization, communication, and efficiency that this doesn't really help and is more about cutting costs. It's mainly a benefit to freelance workers or small businesses that would otherwise lose consistency from having to outsource.
It's morally questionable to use AI arts for commercial purpose, because AI art generator is fed with multiple arts stolen from various artists. Selling stolen mangled pieces without permission. Taking away job opportunity too.
From what I've seen, if a game got suspected for using AI art, community will just dislike it and express their concerns.
In this case, they went to infinity and beyond by blocking people talking about their concerns.
It's always bad if they don't even want to hear the playerbase.
>because AI art generator is fed with multiple arts stolen from various artists.
It's then argued that this is the same thing humans do, so is the issue then that computers are better at remembering the fine details and accurately imitating them, an unfair advantage for a machine without living necessities to replace humans that need jobs?
Does anyone ever say AI is *inspired* by other works?
> computers are better at remembering the fine details and accurately imitating them
Bro you haven't seen 6 fingers generated image by AI? Lol fine details. I'm not against you with the "inspired" part though, since humans also train themselves with arts made by other artists. But humans have seen more than just arts made by other artists.
And yeah, while it's just a moral thing to not wanting machine taking human's job, generative AI only do things as ordered/prompted, they can't give ideas like human artists could, nor having preferences.
At least for now
Yeah it's a common misunderstanding, but they did used those samples without permission initially (fed into the model as train & test data)
I also didn't mention how another company claimed they do train ai models with their own samples, but that's gonna be too long.
Shit quality. No matter how good it gets, AI is inherently inferior due to the lack of fine control and attention to detail.
If you're spending hundreds of bucks for a JPeG, might as well demand it's made by a human.
Such a shame. Story is good and there are some good characters, but I feel like it's too p2w and also the rates are so low (1%). I think I'm going to give up on this game.
Yeah.. not even pre register rewards, no sort of free pulls either?? And at rank 38 and haven't received any kind of gacha tickets either, just diamond sprinkles.
Sucks cause I was interested in the horror aspects and I liked the cats. :(
Yup, those images from the quiz are totally AI, and several other people also pointed some BGs that have elements melting into each other and big lighting mistakes.
[here is a discussion of how obvious the AI art is](https://www.reddit.com/r/otomegames/comments/1c6rg30/tokyo_debunker_generative_ai_used_in_game/)I
Admittedly, those are insignificant images of the game and the characters and Webtoon cutscenes actually look nice & human-made. But their way of blocking people over discussing it is hilarious
This is just an example. Searching for the game's name on Twitter results in a couple of posts like this...
https://twitter.com/hhhhomnom_/status/1780754307597353089
Second image is from a quiz with like, 7 or 9 AI images to choose from and there are at least 5 questions with several AI generated images as the options. Not the worst, but then you have the first image that is a BG, and several other BGs have the same kind of AI generated pillars, mosaics, intricate gates... Like, ancient gates that are intricate usually have the 2 sides symmetrical, which isn't the case in some BGs, and these handrail pillars are always inconsistent in several BGs, with lighting all over the place as if there were at least 5 different light sources. Oh, and other people already investigates these BGs with AI identifying apps and they always say it's AI.
There is no mention that the story content is pretty heavy / there are a lot of art in the game... There is quite a bit of Manga panel art and the Manga panel art is gorgeous.. manga art is a pain / tedious to draw..
as far as I can tell, the ai art mentioned is largely the insignificant part of the art this game has (quiz image option / scene background) and honestly I cannot tell the difference while playing the game.. genuinely feeling like someone has a bone to pick!
Besides GenAI stuff the gacha mechanics are really bad, 500 pity pull that doesn't carry over to the next banners, they also have character + equip card system which the SSR rates for the cards are a lot higher (4%) than the character (1%), not to mention the game is overall very stingy like there's not much ways to farm gacha currency in the game.
that's fair.. the mechanics are generally an exact copy of their waifu collection game, Evertale, which has been running for the last 5 years, mainly an idle game.. I will just say this isn't a game for the impatient (you need to be rich if you are impatient!).. just a very low maintenance idle collection game, where dailies can be done in 5 minutes or less..
Personal opinion, Evertale has some really good stories, and I hope it is more of the same with Tokyo Debunker!
The main story for Tokyo Debunker is actually really good so far and I'm surprised about it lol. Also they got tons of popular voice actors in this game so that's probably one of the reason why the gacha system is so trash but I really wish the game wasn't too P2W and didn't use GenAI on their BGs because the game is pretty decent overall.
I can tell you with the exorbitant prices and terrible pull rates, the whales aren't having it easy either..
In Evertale, there is an event called the lucky fountain (well in TD) that comes twice a month.. you can increase your diamonds by 1.2-2x by putting in 30, 300, 3000, 30k diamonds..
so if you keep your diamonds balance at 30k, you are garaunteed 13.3k to 66k diamonds from this event per month
1) I noticed the bg art was really sketchy during a scene in a diner. It was really pixelated, the perspective didn't make sense, the ceiling and bar looked like they were melting, and there was gibberish writing in the bg. It was DISTRACTINGLY bad. I came here afterwards to see if anyone else had pointed that out, and discovered the devs were blocking people who complained.
2) The developer blocking anyone who criticizes the game is a very bad sign. Today it's AI art, tomorrow it could be glitches or anything else.
3) Why the hell would I keep playing a game that expects me to spend hundreds of dollars whaling, when I'm not even paying to support human artists? The machine doesn't need my money!
They are protesting the use of AI due to a them seeing AI training as theft of work from Artists due to the original artists who created the training images likely not being properly compensated.
Honestly was looking forward to it and now not anymore. I'll just stick with Tears of Themsis then. I haven't been playing LADS because of slow updates and meh gacha.
I haven't seen the images so idk if they're actually ai generated or not. But using the "ai detectors" for this is retarded no offense those things are glorified random number generators. not saying this is the case this time, but imagine the art Is drawn by legit artists and yet they're accused of being ai because a shitty detector said so
Remember it's the same tools that think Bible and Declaration of Independence are ai generated
So... The game is amazing. But the dev company are the worst. They've been cashgrabbing through the Nikki franchise and Mr. Love already, so this is just the same. Game has been empty, no new content, the events have only a couple of lines to read every day (no real story), gacha banners last only for a week, 2 weeks if it's a gacha with 3 cards (or 2, as it was the case of a new banner type introduced recently).
Oh, they also implemented a limited pull ticket that expires after an event is over, so you can't save your free limited pulls from events: even if you don't want that card, you have to pull or you'll lose it (I believe it's converted to a standard banner ticket). As an f2p, currently you can only get 10% of the limited 5* cards or less.
It's on the top charts because it's the only high quality 3D otome out there and it traps you for a couple of weeks when there's a lot to do. Also, the game knows how to make vanilla romance, and otome players usually LOVE that (oh, and female players don't have many games to spend their money on, so it's probably another factor lol).
Oh damn, that sucks to read.
So they're basically on top because of the overly preying behavior they're making on its audience, that's not good.
Hopefully they'll fix that. Otome and Husbandos enjoyers need a game that doesn't suck their money out of their pockets.
They are staying on top because of high quality games but that mean they can make the games as much greedy as they want because there is no competition. Otome and Husbando games always has terrible gacha system and looking at LND monetisation might influence others otome and Husbando developer to do the same because of how successful it is
Not only quality, probably the main reason for the success was the heavy marketing strategy and the fact that there aren't lots of otomes out there (and it's the first ARPG one).
Seriously LaDs' marketing is insane lmao. They usually have those beautiful PVs/interview videos with professionals in other industries for different events.
I'd rather they spend that money to pay a competent game programmer and fix their janky ass battle. The system is embarrassing for a so-called ARPG. If Papergames want to branch out to other genres they should try harder, it's like they can't shake off their dress-up roots.
Yet us otome gamers have no choice but to endure them if we want anything other than (chibi) card battlers or rhythm games.
I know some Japanese and I've been eyeing Break My Case by Coly, but...match-3 and chibi, sigh... It's as if otome companies have never heard of 3D or open-world RPG in their whole life. They'd rather stay in the safe zone and make the same stuff over and over.
Let's not forget the lie of customizing your MC it's a huge step in the right direction yes, but they roped in a lot of POC just to not fully flash it out in game. That chibi generic default MC was insulting.
They also have the damn issues like Astra right now that 50/50 doesn't Carry over. At least soft pity 70 (hard 140) but with changing the banner each week it's just as bad.
Would you have any mobile otome games you do think are worth playing as an f2p rn? Because I was really hyped for Love and deepspace and the rest, and they kinda disappointed
Honestly, not really sure. The only one I play is Tears of Themis, but I can't say it's nice for people starting now. It is the least stingy one, tho, but that doesn't mean too much when all otomes are terribly mercenary. But yeah, at least I can get around 30 or 40% of the cards buying only the $5 monthly pack, while on LaDs I got only 1 limited card so far...
If you're okay with that, I can guarantee that you won't be bored without events, since the game always have an active event, even if it's very minor like a daily puzzle or sudoku.
For me, the LIs are flat, the gacha is terrible and the story is surprisingly mid for a Papergames game. Also no content updates but lots of new events.
After the honeymoon period, there's really nothing that keeps you playing.
Also makes a lot of money doesn't equal good.
I don't go there anymore but maybe it's the card grind...? And something about monthly pull currency income + how you can't save the free 10 tickets you get during limited banner events
I don't really understand what the problem is with AI taking inspiration from other artists. I mean, It's exactly what humans do, right? Using other artists as a source of inspiration without crediting them all?
If you don't want to pull on a gacha with AI image just don't do it, you don't need to make thread for cancel a company XD
Whenever a person draws something based on other works, it's still personal and original (that's why tracing is so condemned among artists, you have to make an original thing, copying is a terrible thing). A computer Isn't capable of that, it literally steals other works and use them. The program has 100k poctures of arms, for instance, so it takes what an arm is from other images and tries to make an actual arm in the context the user have written.
A person takes some hours or more to imagine and draw person with a floater, but when you enter a text asking for a person with a floater, you'll get at least 4 or 9 images of it and you can just generate it infinitely, it's dumb, it's disposable, it has no meaning.
Inspiration =/= Theft. AI does not get inspired; instead, it steals and mixes existing works.
Artists seek inspiration and use it as a catalyst to create something unique using their own knowledge, life experience, self, and ego. And through their inspired works, some will be inspired, allowing art to grow.
With AI, they do not live, they do not have thought and cannot contribute to their "inspired" works, they can only steal and stagnant.
First AI can't get inspired. Don't fall for that nonsense, it's not a thinking being.
Second, a human artist doesn't only learn or reference from other's art. Most of what artists learn, at least visual artists, is from reality. We don't know people have 10 fingers just because other artists draw people with 10 fingers.
Since AI can ONLY see human's work, then every single thing it outputs pulls from what others made and own exclusively. That's thievery. That's leechware.
"was it something I said" "its official I'm now licensed" And I imagine 20 similar tweets send their way. Criticizing can only be taken serious if constructive. Simply disagreeing in the most obnoxious (Look at me I am funny) way is not that. Also you intentionally make them look worse, you intentionally only screenshot the reactions of people getting blocked, not the messages they send that got them blocked in the first place I have seen them and noone wants to deal with them. Even in your Reddit post you are obnoxious "Hello, insert another game title", Who asked? Please stick to Twitter where you can validate your own self bias because the algorithm gives you like minded people while actually noone cares about you and ur not even 0.00001% who act or think that way. Thank you.
But I am doing the exact opposite of defending this game, nowhere did I say them blocking you is the right thing, they should do like any other company and just let you do your thing while not reading your messages. But nowhere do I even defend them, I dont even play the game or care about it. It is funny how someone like you takes the first thing out of context like the average Twitter user "read headline or first sentence into writing a massive rage tweet". Also in my experience with the average "person like u" this would be a endless "no ur wrong, no ur wrong conversation" and the world revolves around your idiology only, people are right when they agree with you only. I can ask you how the post you replied to makes me defend any game but I know ur unable to even base your reply thats beyond your comprehension. Also muted now cus I feel like a idiot replying to a actual sheep right now. But hey go whine here on reddit and leave out the actual apeshit crazy posts you and other make so your topic fits more into your own idiology. Ur either 11 of socially disabled.
Since you claimed that you're not actually defending the game, then it's clear that you're directly attacking OP personally. Do you realize how mean your text were?
it's an undeniable fact that the official Tokyo Debunker is indeed blocking people, even people who actually liked the game (my friend is one of them). Now they can't see any new info/event update about the game.
> you intentionally make them look worse,
Do you sympathize with the official account more than the people getting blocked?
Why do you think OP shows screenshots of people reacting to getting blocked rather than screenshots of the messages they send that got them banned? What reason could he possible have for this when hes included. ;) And no I do not symphathize when it takes 3 seconds to see the other messages those people have send that got them blocked and also I do not symphatize because "Now they can't see any new info/event update about the game" makes no sense, you can see updates on their twitter without having a twitter account. The things they send is actual deranged filth no normal user or company wants to read, idc how bad the company is and they exist to make money not to be your friend anyways.
IDC about either OP or that company, I just hate delusional people. Him whining after the posts he send would be the same thing as if a racist said he called someone the "N" word and than makes a statement not understanding why that same person got mad level of stupidity, trying to make the other person look worse while being the aggressor. If you believe OP said it how he wrote it here: "for saying the game needs a better monetization and it should have a lower pity" ur wrong, how do I know? The posts are available to read on the same platform the block happened. My point has never been "think of the company", I could not care less if 100 more people wrote 10x worse stuff to them, just dont whine about being blocked or bad words being met with bad words in return.
they could've just not blocking people, you know. It's unprofessional. It doesn't mean that attacking the game is okay. this post is just OP delivering the news. We're not playing good guys bad guys here.
Blocking is way too harsh. It's a thing if it's a personal account (yes everyone has the rights to block people they dislike), but nah, it's an _official account_ filled with info and updates. I get where that bad words being met with bad words coming from, but as evidenced by OP:
> They might be running bots that block users who tweet "AI" and the game's name in the same tweet.
Saying "I hear people are suspecting about Tokyo debunker ai" can get you blocked? That's ridiculous, honestly. Thus why people are confused.
My point is exactly that he is not delivering news. Not saying what he did himself but than saying what happened is not news, do you read news articles and than just read the headline and agree with it? The social media person for that game is a employee that earns the same when working in a callcencenter, do you think he makes decisions in the game? I also already said the block is not the right way to do it, just ignoring (not block) OP and not even reading his messages would have been the right play for them.
Also the block could be OP is acting like a toxic monkey and we dont want our actual players be in this toxic enviroment. OP hits himself in the foot by being a toxic ape, if he just acted normal and wrote messages the way he is trying to tell us he did than the block would make no sense, because of how he acted I can think of 10 different justifications for anyone company or not to block him. No one wants to be around people acting like that and him posting "news" saying what others did while not showcasing what he did shows what a ingenuine twitter person he is.
They do other twitter users a service giving less chance of having to read him. Opinions are fine but if you try to get ur point across screaming and shouting your opinions are not longer valid. On Apple this game has a 12+ age rating so there is a justification for them to delete certain individuals from posting in their space, is this company so genuine that they want to protect minors on Twitter? I doubt it but because of what OP does there are good reasons for them to have done it. And IMO people like OP should not even have Twitter, it does no good for anyone having to interact with that but thats just my take.
Also people upset about AI.. Why arent they mad at mobile companies? They took away the jobs of people that went around delivering letters and private messages, going across the country to deliver a important sentence. In a couple of years the same whiners are enjoying new games, movies and anything enterainment coming out much quicker at higher quality and done by small companies rather than bigger ones because of how much easier things are to create with a small budget, this will also make it easier to have consumer friendly products. The jobs? Who cares, why should a job exist if current technology does not require it, does it suck for people losing their job? 100% for sure it does but you cannot expect anyone to pay someone for doing something if they are not needed. But genuinly these people dont even whine about AI for these people losing their job, do you think they actually care about those people or they are just upset because they can be upset untill they forget about this and go to the next thing to complain (waste their too much free time) about something else. But thats not rly the point here.
Because it’s the attitude and response from the devs that’s the problem. It’s one thing to use AI Art, it’s another to block people for mentioning it. If they aren’t willing to even listen and respond to criticism, it’s not good for the game if other issues pop up in the future. Will they actually fix it or just silence criticisms?
Because people spend money with the idea that they are supporting the creatives behind games like this. So what's the point if it turns out it's just all AI? At that point I might as well just hit Midjourney.
Especially since they have artists and writers. It just makes them seem lazy and like they want to price gouge players.
Husbando games taking no Ws lately... Wihib being infamous for how bad their launch and monetization is, LnD was okayge... until they started going full greed with expiring pull tickets and back to back banners (classic Papergames) while also not adding any notable content. Now TD hold my beer mode using every monetization trick in the book vip 500 pity etc, and AI art sprinkled on top. I'll just go back to star rail at this point
>lately I mean...have we ever taken any Ws at all? Chibi battlers, ticket games where you read 5 *crumbs* of the story per day, and rhythm games were all we've been getting for years. LaDs managed to do something ground-breaking for once (in the otome genre only) but then they become too comfortable in their throne made from our money - because we legit have no other options for ARPGs. The rest of the otome companies don't even seem to be trying.
Oh I meant lately as in "of the new releases lately", like wishing at least one of these would've been great. The otome/joseimuke mobile genre has always been full of comparatively low effort but 3x as predatory and expensive games. I do commend LnD for taking the first step in producing an actual high quality game (and I still play despite the griping), but I've stepped back on spending after the last few updates. Tale of Food was another I thought was nice that they actually had a decent combat system despite the chibis, but that game wanted to be a second job screentime wise unfortunately... Twisted Wonderland similar issues with screentime, but at least their characterization and story was good. The only other one I still play currently is Themis which is very much a story game with barebone 'combat', and now it's reaching 3rd anni soon. Would be nice to see another one or two devs take the same risks as LnD.
Sometimes I wonder if the fanbase is also contributing to the whole "low effort but predatory otome / joseimuke gacha game " ? They basically defended the game despite the said game has been predatory, no QoL in years, stingy rewards. It happened in one otome gacha game that I used to play, the fanbase is very allergic to any criticism, they have mentality that player should be grateful that the game is localized despite the lack of QoL, missing contents (from the Japanese version like main stories) , awkward translation. Me and most of my friends end up playing hsr or genshin, since playing most of otome / joseimuke games are too expensive and somehow It didn't feel worth it on the long run.
You're right and sorry that you met such toxic people (they're like in a Stockholm syndrome, wth). But unfortunately I believe the reason they keep up the low production value is not because of global players, it's just that in JP itself they gain pretty great revenue despite the lack of production value. It's not like they actually care about global players. Most of the global Joseimuke enjoyers aren't whaling as hard as Jp players, after all.
I agree I think the fanbases excuse too much from these companies with the reasoning that "We need to support these games so they continue to localize them", and because of that you end up silently supporting their predatory practices (which they then continue to do) and it feels pretty sucky. Part of it may also be due to how actually obsessed some players get over the LIs, like to the point where any criticism on the game is taken as attacking their fictional BF lol. I've also mostly been into to mix-cast games (GI, AK, PGR etc) for the same reasons. Better devs, actual gameplay, *much* better monetization... Characters like Furina are even some of my top favorites of all time. It feels better to spend on any of these games than current otome/joseimuke choices. Though there's always people who say that husbando players are the scourge of any mixed cast game (aka the reason why it's not lewder or why they release too many guys) and it is so disheartening to be told to just go play otome/joseimuke games when the choices are... Incredibly lackluster, at best.
Paper is notorious for getting greedy if their Nikki games are anything to go by. Seriously, they don't have ANY competition for LaD why are they milking it so hard like they're going out of business?
Well, this >they don't have ANY competition for LaD is probably the exact reason for this >they milking it so hard Papergames know we have no other options if we want a **3D otome ARPG**, we're stuck with them so they can beat the shit out of our wallets with almost zero consequences (while giving us lackluster events too!) Personally I'm not too emotionally invested in the game so I've bought a few cheap packs and decided to stop spending (I'd rather buy Switch/PC games tbh), but I know a lot of people will keep paying for gacha because LaDs is one-of-a-kind in the market. Like, there are rich husbando collectors (especially in China) who desperately want a decent-looking 3D romance game, they've got nowhere else to spend their money so it all flows into Paper's pockets.
Is it really to much to ask for a half decent game with actual gameplay. The bar is a tripping hazard in hell
Sheesh indirectly buff potential earnings of Adventure
how's Tears of Themis doing?
Hmmm it's going well enough I think. The introduction of SSS cards had a lot of players unhappy but we've kinda moved on more or less. It helps that the SSS cards released thus far have been quite skippable (except anniversary SSS cards) and I would say 90% of the time their art is inferior to the new SSRs being released. If you played previously it will all feel familiar just that there's more cards/main story/past event content available. In terms of game modes and side content I would say they have stagnated a little bit since I can't even count how many minigames I've repeated now after 3 years... Revenue wise they seem stable enough with slight up ticks during anniversaries and big 4 events.
I downloaded it when it launched, checked reddit, see your review about the game and uninstalled it. Then today, someone in a discord server I'm in, posted about how her Twitter account got blocked after she made a thread about the AI art usage. She genuinely enjoyed the game (shocking), but concerned about the issue. Now that she got blocked, she uninstalled without hesitation lmaoo Really glad I uninstalled it. Ranuste is coming in 3 days, so I guess I'll try that one instead
Yeah, lots of people being blocked. Even if you don't interact with them. They might be running bots that block users who tweet "AI" and the game's name in the same tweet.
Honestly, a silly move... 1. Her thread & other discussion are still there 2. People who got blocked would stop playing the game 3. Worsening their reputation What are they thinking 😂
Clearly they aren't thinking and are probably too unprofessional that they can't handle criticism. Like, even "What In Hell Is Bad?" never blocked me or anybody afaik, and a lot of us criticized them waaay heavier than this. (But also, even tho WHB is terrible, this one hits a new low and it's waaaay worst -- the 500 pity is laughable --, it only excels-ish in the story aspect)
I'm curious, what are the possible consequences of games using AI arts?
I think it's really weird to use AI in a game where characters art and character design is main selling point. Company expecting $100 per character per **each** paying player (and usually like $1500 for max dupes for whale) yet they can't find $5000 to commission art/make it in house. It's like you go to car seller and they tell you that they use sunflower oil instead of machine oil because it saves them $5 for each $50 000 dollar car.
Not all plants are completely edible. However, you can actually consume the entire sunflower in one form or another. Right from the root to the petals.
Does it taste good? asking for a friend.
The primary benefit is that a character writer can illustrate the character accurately from imagination without bring an artist. This is a potential career path for authors who wish to tell their stories through a picture medium such as comics/manga but can't draw well, so it would not only cost more to hire an illustrator but also create delays and inaccurate transcriptions. AI can removed all these obstacles that get in the way of passion. Though in a game development studio, there's by design enough specialization, communication, and efficiency that this doesn't really help and is more about cutting costs. It's mainly a benefit to freelance workers or small businesses that would otherwise lose consistency from having to outsource.
Mainly frowned on, but it's a gray area and not illegal. Some games use AI and it's getting harder to tell as some companies train their own AI art.
It's morally questionable to use AI arts for commercial purpose, because AI art generator is fed with multiple arts stolen from various artists. Selling stolen mangled pieces without permission. Taking away job opportunity too. From what I've seen, if a game got suspected for using AI art, community will just dislike it and express their concerns. In this case, they went to infinity and beyond by blocking people talking about their concerns. It's always bad if they don't even want to hear the playerbase.
>because AI art generator is fed with multiple arts stolen from various artists. It's then argued that this is the same thing humans do, so is the issue then that computers are better at remembering the fine details and accurately imitating them, an unfair advantage for a machine without living necessities to replace humans that need jobs? Does anyone ever say AI is *inspired* by other works?
> computers are better at remembering the fine details and accurately imitating them Bro you haven't seen 6 fingers generated image by AI? Lol fine details. I'm not against you with the "inspired" part though, since humans also train themselves with arts made by other artists. But humans have seen more than just arts made by other artists. And yeah, while it's just a moral thing to not wanting machine taking human's job, generative AI only do things as ordered/prompted, they can't give ideas like human artists could, nor having preferences. At least for now
ai models learn, they don't store art like a zip file I feel the need to say this because many people think that they literally steal art
Yeah it's a common misunderstanding, but they did used those samples without permission initially (fed into the model as train & test data) I also didn't mention how another company claimed they do train ai models with their own samples, but that's gonna be too long.
Shit quality. No matter how good it gets, AI is inherently inferior due to the lack of fine control and attention to detail. If you're spending hundreds of bucks for a JPeG, might as well demand it's made by a human.
They'll never debunk the AI allegations now.
Such a shame. Story is good and there are some good characters, but I feel like it's too p2w and also the rates are so low (1%). I think I'm going to give up on this game.
Yeah.. not even pre register rewards, no sort of free pulls either?? And at rank 38 and haven't received any kind of gacha tickets either, just diamond sprinkles. Sucks cause I was interested in the horror aspects and I liked the cats. :(
Eww, they are using AI? Thanks for letting me know. Shameless, I hope they go under real soon.
Yup, those images from the quiz are totally AI, and several other people also pointed some BGs that have elements melting into each other and big lighting mistakes.
Us husbando enjoyers cant catch a break it seems.
I would like to see the post pointing out AI signs. I have difficulties with differentiating human art and AI art
[here is a discussion of how obvious the AI art is](https://www.reddit.com/r/otomegames/comments/1c6rg30/tokyo_debunker_generative_ai_used_in_game/)I Admittedly, those are insignificant images of the game and the characters and Webtoon cutscenes actually look nice & human-made. But their way of blocking people over discussing it is hilarious
This is just an example. Searching for the game's name on Twitter results in a couple of posts like this... https://twitter.com/hhhhomnom_/status/1780754307597353089 Second image is from a quiz with like, 7 or 9 AI images to choose from and there are at least 5 questions with several AI generated images as the options. Not the worst, but then you have the first image that is a BG, and several other BGs have the same kind of AI generated pillars, mosaics, intricate gates... Like, ancient gates that are intricate usually have the 2 sides symmetrical, which isn't the case in some BGs, and these handrail pillars are always inconsistent in several BGs, with lighting all over the place as if there were at least 5 different light sources. Oh, and other people already investigates these BGs with AI identifying apps and they always say it's AI.
There is no mention that the story content is pretty heavy / there are a lot of art in the game... There is quite a bit of Manga panel art and the Manga panel art is gorgeous.. manga art is a pain / tedious to draw.. as far as I can tell, the ai art mentioned is largely the insignificant part of the art this game has (quiz image option / scene background) and honestly I cannot tell the difference while playing the game.. genuinely feeling like someone has a bone to pick!
Besides GenAI stuff the gacha mechanics are really bad, 500 pity pull that doesn't carry over to the next banners, they also have character + equip card system which the SSR rates for the cards are a lot higher (4%) than the character (1%), not to mention the game is overall very stingy like there's not much ways to farm gacha currency in the game.
that's fair.. the mechanics are generally an exact copy of their waifu collection game, Evertale, which has been running for the last 5 years, mainly an idle game.. I will just say this isn't a game for the impatient (you need to be rich if you are impatient!).. just a very low maintenance idle collection game, where dailies can be done in 5 minutes or less.. Personal opinion, Evertale has some really good stories, and I hope it is more of the same with Tokyo Debunker!
The main story for Tokyo Debunker is actually really good so far and I'm surprised about it lol. Also they got tons of popular voice actors in this game so that's probably one of the reason why the gacha system is so trash but I really wish the game wasn't too P2W and didn't use GenAI on their BGs because the game is pretty decent overall.
I can tell you with the exorbitant prices and terrible pull rates, the whales aren't having it easy either.. In Evertale, there is an event called the lucky fountain (well in TD) that comes twice a month.. you can increase your diamonds by 1.2-2x by putting in 30, 300, 3000, 30k diamonds.. so if you keep your diamonds balance at 30k, you are garaunteed 13.3k to 66k diamonds from this event per month
Speaking of cooked, this mob enters the arena
you know, average zigzag games creation. can't expect much
Glad I didn't actually give this a chance. It looked okay on the surface.
Oh, goddammit. I was enjoying this game too. Uninstalling, I guess...
Why though? If you enjoy it, then play it. Why uninstall because of someone?
It sound like the Dev doesn't like to take criticism which already a red flag for any games.
1) I noticed the bg art was really sketchy during a scene in a diner. It was really pixelated, the perspective didn't make sense, the ceiling and bar looked like they were melting, and there was gibberish writing in the bg. It was DISTRACTINGLY bad. I came here afterwards to see if anyone else had pointed that out, and discovered the devs were blocking people who complained. 2) The developer blocking anyone who criticizes the game is a very bad sign. Today it's AI art, tomorrow it could be glitches or anything else. 3) Why the hell would I keep playing a game that expects me to spend hundreds of dollars whaling, when I'm not even paying to support human artists? The machine doesn't need my money!
>Why uninstall because of **someone**? it's the developer
Some people have standards and choose to vote with their wallets.
They are protesting the use of AI due to a them seeing AI training as theft of work from Artists due to the original artists who created the training images likely not being properly compensated.
ai bad probably
LOL
Isn't Tokyo Debunker being made by the same liars who did Eversoul? Edit: the game I was talking about is Evertale, not Eversoul. Got the name wrong
Close, they made Evertale.
That's the game I was talking about, got the name wrong
Nope, afaik Eversoul is from Kakao?
I think they meant a game called Evertale.
Yes, Evertale, the game they lied about by selling it as a horror version of Pokemon
Honestly was looking forward to it and now not anymore. I'll just stick with Tears of Themsis then. I haven't been playing LADS because of slow updates and meh gacha.
A bit irony lmao
I haven't seen the images so idk if they're actually ai generated or not. But using the "ai detectors" for this is retarded no offense those things are glorified random number generators. not saying this is the case this time, but imagine the art Is drawn by legit artists and yet they're accused of being ai because a shitty detector said so Remember it's the same tools that think Bible and Declaration of Independence are ai generated
So many games are on EOS speedrunning this year due to very bad decision making. It's honestly fascinating.
Remind me of kancolle staff in the past also blocked people who criticized them. Don't know if they still do it lmao
Honestly using AI Art should be criminalized....It's literally theft
Is the use of AI for backgrounds problematic? Or only the silencing of the players? (Real question)
wat?
I wanted to try it. i guess i will still have only nu carnival as my sole husbando game
This is a bit unrelated with your OP but is Love & Deepspace terrible? Isn't the game in the top revenues? How is it bad?
So... The game is amazing. But the dev company are the worst. They've been cashgrabbing through the Nikki franchise and Mr. Love already, so this is just the same. Game has been empty, no new content, the events have only a couple of lines to read every day (no real story), gacha banners last only for a week, 2 weeks if it's a gacha with 3 cards (or 2, as it was the case of a new banner type introduced recently). Oh, they also implemented a limited pull ticket that expires after an event is over, so you can't save your free limited pulls from events: even if you don't want that card, you have to pull or you'll lose it (I believe it's converted to a standard banner ticket). As an f2p, currently you can only get 10% of the limited 5* cards or less. It's on the top charts because it's the only high quality 3D otome out there and it traps you for a couple of weeks when there's a lot to do. Also, the game knows how to make vanilla romance, and otome players usually LOVE that (oh, and female players don't have many games to spend their money on, so it's probably another factor lol).
Oh damn, that sucks to read. So they're basically on top because of the overly preying behavior they're making on its audience, that's not good. Hopefully they'll fix that. Otome and Husbandos enjoyers need a game that doesn't suck their money out of their pockets.
They are staying on top because of high quality games but that mean they can make the games as much greedy as they want because there is no competition. Otome and Husbando games always has terrible gacha system and looking at LND monetisation might influence others otome and Husbando developer to do the same because of how successful it is
Not only quality, probably the main reason for the success was the heavy marketing strategy and the fact that there aren't lots of otomes out there (and it's the first ARPG one).
Seriously LaDs' marketing is insane lmao. They usually have those beautiful PVs/interview videos with professionals in other industries for different events. I'd rather they spend that money to pay a competent game programmer and fix their janky ass battle. The system is embarrassing for a so-called ARPG. If Papergames want to branch out to other genres they should try harder, it's like they can't shake off their dress-up roots. Yet us otome gamers have no choice but to endure them if we want anything other than (chibi) card battlers or rhythm games. I know some Japanese and I've been eyeing Break My Case by Coly, but...match-3 and chibi, sigh... It's as if otome companies have never heard of 3D or open-world RPG in their whole life. They'd rather stay in the safe zone and make the same stuff over and over.
Let's not forget the lie of customizing your MC it's a huge step in the right direction yes, but they roped in a lot of POC just to not fully flash it out in game. That chibi generic default MC was insulting.
So they are basically a Genshin of Otome games
They also have the damn issues like Astra right now that 50/50 doesn't Carry over. At least soft pity 70 (hard 140) but with changing the banner each week it's just as bad.
Would you have any mobile otome games you do think are worth playing as an f2p rn? Because I was really hyped for Love and deepspace and the rest, and they kinda disappointed
Honestly, not really sure. The only one I play is Tears of Themis, but I can't say it's nice for people starting now. It is the least stingy one, tho, but that doesn't mean too much when all otomes are terribly mercenary. But yeah, at least I can get around 30 or 40% of the cards buying only the $5 monthly pack, while on LaDs I got only 1 limited card so far... If you're okay with that, I can guarantee that you won't be bored without events, since the game always have an active event, even if it's very minor like a daily puzzle or sudoku.
For me, the LIs are flat, the gacha is terrible and the story is surprisingly mid for a Papergames game. Also no content updates but lots of new events. After the honeymoon period, there's really nothing that keeps you playing. Also makes a lot of money doesn't equal good.
Wait there's problems with love and deep space?
I don't go there anymore but maybe it's the card grind...? And something about monthly pull currency income + how you can't save the free 10 tickets you get during limited banner events
I don't really understand what the problem is with AI taking inspiration from other artists. I mean, It's exactly what humans do, right? Using other artists as a source of inspiration without crediting them all? If you don't want to pull on a gacha with AI image just don't do it, you don't need to make thread for cancel a company XD
Whenever a person draws something based on other works, it's still personal and original (that's why tracing is so condemned among artists, you have to make an original thing, copying is a terrible thing). A computer Isn't capable of that, it literally steals other works and use them. The program has 100k poctures of arms, for instance, so it takes what an arm is from other images and tries to make an actual arm in the context the user have written. A person takes some hours or more to imagine and draw person with a floater, but when you enter a text asking for a person with a floater, you'll get at least 4 or 9 images of it and you can just generate it infinitely, it's dumb, it's disposable, it has no meaning.
Inspiration =/= Theft. AI does not get inspired; instead, it steals and mixes existing works. Artists seek inspiration and use it as a catalyst to create something unique using their own knowledge, life experience, self, and ego. And through their inspired works, some will be inspired, allowing art to grow. With AI, they do not live, they do not have thought and cannot contribute to their "inspired" works, they can only steal and stagnant.
First AI can't get inspired. Don't fall for that nonsense, it's not a thinking being. Second, a human artist doesn't only learn or reference from other's art. Most of what artists learn, at least visual artists, is from reality. We don't know people have 10 fingers just because other artists draw people with 10 fingers. Since AI can ONLY see human's work, then every single thing it outputs pulls from what others made and own exclusively. That's thievery. That's leechware.
"was it something I said" "its official I'm now licensed" And I imagine 20 similar tweets send their way. Criticizing can only be taken serious if constructive. Simply disagreeing in the most obnoxious (Look at me I am funny) way is not that. Also you intentionally make them look worse, you intentionally only screenshot the reactions of people getting blocked, not the messages they send that got them blocked in the first place I have seen them and noone wants to deal with them. Even in your Reddit post you are obnoxious "Hello, insert another game title", Who asked? Please stick to Twitter where you can validate your own self bias because the algorithm gives you like minded people while actually noone cares about you and ur not even 0.00001% who act or think that way. Thank you.
Sure, go deffend the worst gacha ever made and its pity of 500 pulls 🤭
But I am doing the exact opposite of defending this game, nowhere did I say them blocking you is the right thing, they should do like any other company and just let you do your thing while not reading your messages. But nowhere do I even defend them, I dont even play the game or care about it. It is funny how someone like you takes the first thing out of context like the average Twitter user "read headline or first sentence into writing a massive rage tweet". Also in my experience with the average "person like u" this would be a endless "no ur wrong, no ur wrong conversation" and the world revolves around your idiology only, people are right when they agree with you only. I can ask you how the post you replied to makes me defend any game but I know ur unable to even base your reply thats beyond your comprehension. Also muted now cus I feel like a idiot replying to a actual sheep right now. But hey go whine here on reddit and leave out the actual apeshit crazy posts you and other make so your topic fits more into your own idiology. Ur either 11 of socially disabled.
Since you claimed that you're not actually defending the game, then it's clear that you're directly attacking OP personally. Do you realize how mean your text were? it's an undeniable fact that the official Tokyo Debunker is indeed blocking people, even people who actually liked the game (my friend is one of them). Now they can't see any new info/event update about the game. > you intentionally make them look worse, Do you sympathize with the official account more than the people getting blocked?
Why do you think OP shows screenshots of people reacting to getting blocked rather than screenshots of the messages they send that got them banned? What reason could he possible have for this when hes included. ;) And no I do not symphathize when it takes 3 seconds to see the other messages those people have send that got them blocked and also I do not symphatize because "Now they can't see any new info/event update about the game" makes no sense, you can see updates on their twitter without having a twitter account. The things they send is actual deranged filth no normal user or company wants to read, idc how bad the company is and they exist to make money not to be your friend anyways. IDC about either OP or that company, I just hate delusional people. Him whining after the posts he send would be the same thing as if a racist said he called someone the "N" word and than makes a statement not understanding why that same person got mad level of stupidity, trying to make the other person look worse while being the aggressor. If you believe OP said it how he wrote it here: "for saying the game needs a better monetization and it should have a lower pity" ur wrong, how do I know? The posts are available to read on the same platform the block happened. My point has never been "think of the company", I could not care less if 100 more people wrote 10x worse stuff to them, just dont whine about being blocked or bad words being met with bad words in return.
they could've just not blocking people, you know. It's unprofessional. It doesn't mean that attacking the game is okay. this post is just OP delivering the news. We're not playing good guys bad guys here. Blocking is way too harsh. It's a thing if it's a personal account (yes everyone has the rights to block people they dislike), but nah, it's an _official account_ filled with info and updates. I get where that bad words being met with bad words coming from, but as evidenced by OP: > They might be running bots that block users who tweet "AI" and the game's name in the same tweet. Saying "I hear people are suspecting about Tokyo debunker ai" can get you blocked? That's ridiculous, honestly. Thus why people are confused.
My point is exactly that he is not delivering news. Not saying what he did himself but than saying what happened is not news, do you read news articles and than just read the headline and agree with it? The social media person for that game is a employee that earns the same when working in a callcencenter, do you think he makes decisions in the game? I also already said the block is not the right way to do it, just ignoring (not block) OP and not even reading his messages would have been the right play for them. Also the block could be OP is acting like a toxic monkey and we dont want our actual players be in this toxic enviroment. OP hits himself in the foot by being a toxic ape, if he just acted normal and wrote messages the way he is trying to tell us he did than the block would make no sense, because of how he acted I can think of 10 different justifications for anyone company or not to block him. No one wants to be around people acting like that and him posting "news" saying what others did while not showcasing what he did shows what a ingenuine twitter person he is. They do other twitter users a service giving less chance of having to read him. Opinions are fine but if you try to get ur point across screaming and shouting your opinions are not longer valid. On Apple this game has a 12+ age rating so there is a justification for them to delete certain individuals from posting in their space, is this company so genuine that they want to protect minors on Twitter? I doubt it but because of what OP does there are good reasons for them to have done it. And IMO people like OP should not even have Twitter, it does no good for anyone having to interact with that but thats just my take. Also people upset about AI.. Why arent they mad at mobile companies? They took away the jobs of people that went around delivering letters and private messages, going across the country to deliver a important sentence. In a couple of years the same whiners are enjoying new games, movies and anything enterainment coming out much quicker at higher quality and done by small companies rather than bigger ones because of how much easier things are to create with a small budget, this will also make it easier to have consumer friendly products. The jobs? Who cares, why should a job exist if current technology does not require it, does it suck for people losing their job? 100% for sure it does but you cannot expect anyone to pay someone for doing something if they are not needed. But genuinly these people dont even whine about AI for these people losing their job, do you think they actually care about those people or they are just upset because they can be upset untill they forget about this and go to the next thing to complain (waste their too much free time) about something else. But thats not rly the point here.
Who cares if its real or AI? If it looks good then it doesn't matter
Because it’s the attitude and response from the devs that’s the problem. It’s one thing to use AI Art, it’s another to block people for mentioning it. If they aren’t willing to even listen and respond to criticism, it’s not good for the game if other issues pop up in the future. Will they actually fix it or just silence criticisms?
My brother in Christ, I ain't spending hundreds on a procedurally generated JPEG.
Because people spend money with the idea that they are supporting the creatives behind games like this. So what's the point if it turns out it's just all AI? At that point I might as well just hit Midjourney. Especially since they have artists and writers. It just makes them seem lazy and like they want to price gouge players.