itch.io

While I regret that you would follow up our previous collaboration only with these complaints, I am far more concerned now about the fact that you had elected to strikethrough those complaints instead of simply deleting them. I must assume that this was done with the intent of representing a continuous narrative, (as befits a writer of fiction) complete with a context, conflict, characters, and resolution. Yet this is an incomplete story. The “team” you claim to have represented was formally credited in the original Jam Submission for the first Demo of this game. Therein, they were listed as collaborators, though in fact all assets I had implemented for that Demo, with the exception of one sketch of the sleeping quarters, were published over a year prior, and to the best of my knowledge at the time all contributors whose work I had implemented for this Demo had abandoned the project during that year.

Seeking to maintain the anonymity of the contributors whilst avoiding confusion on the part of consumers, for many of the assets I had prepared for use had yet to be implemented, (though they appeared in the “game” folder, as pointed out) I elected to credit the organization as Team Magestic. If you are still allied with this organization, it should not be news to you that, while I was the author of that name, (among other things) I had surrendered rights to its use, for free, to the ongoing leader of the organization, who took my initial brand name (“Magestic Games”) and Japanized it to be “Team Magestic”. If memory serves, you would have seen this latter moniker as the name with which I credited my “collaborators”, though in fact members of that same Team had the Demo removed from the Jam shortly after publication. I must imagine that you never saw the credit I had given, only because you filed your public complaints within that narrow window between my Game’s removal from the Jam and its suspension from publication on itch.io. (presuming that this window ever existed).

It may be exceedingly ironic, therefore, to consider that the same Team that inherited that name has been working with my existing concept, script, design document, and assets for the Pirates of Gensokyo doujin franchise. While I anticipated, with paranoia, that my unannounced publication of the Demo would raise eyebrows amidst my former collaborators, I saw no grounds for its legitimate removal. I had used only assets that were developed specifically for a Game that, from the outset, I had pitched and pushed for with a unique Idea in mind.

You might recall extensive meetings over various media aimed at the development and consolidation of this Idea. You might also confess that a Design Document was drafted, open to revision by multiple members of the former (then unnamed) Team; it was precisely this same Document that I downloaded shortly prior to the development of my Demo, and it was in accordance with these same plans that I implemented the assets that were designed around them. The plans, to the best of my knowledge, have remained unchanged over the course of the first year, as did the Game Itself, despite attempts to depart from its core vision, which you also will recall being a matter of bitter dispute, though one which we ultimately resolved. (The continued use of “Team Magestic” as a name, esp. by the man who primarily instigated this conflict, is a testament to our best attempts at diplomatic relationships thereafter.)

The Final Version of the Game, which I published a week after the Demo was released, continued to adhere with stringency to these original plans. The Demo itself was met with instant acclaim and enthusiasm, compelling me to finish the Game; this Demo had been published on a whim as a peace offering to several parties with whom I had encountered misunderstandings of opinion and creative differences, and I was still tentative about its prospective completion. Be that as it may, I was spurned by the support of the TouHou fangame community, and though it pained me to work under a deadline with so much political pressure surrounding a thirty-minute Visual Novel with no price tag, (including, I am told half-jokingly, death threats by members of the new “Team”,) I endured with the same rigour as you will recall from the publication of the Original Game a year prior. I did all of this believing that it was the only way that Alice’s Story might be told as it was originally written, and of all the stories written in this franchise it remains the one most explicitly associated with the Jam’s Central Theme: Pride and Identity, for which the Idea was developed in the first place.

The final publication of Pirates of Gensokyo: the Quest for the Heart of Alice Margatroid not only credited “Team Magestic” in the closing credits, but it also credited all contributors by their aliases of choice (from the previous publication) in both the closing credits and the Game’s Description on itch.io. This same principle was observed in crediting my translator when the game was re-released in Spanish in August of this same year. My initial hesitation for crediting contributors as individuals had run its course, for not only had I implemented all the assets as I had intended to, but the Game seemed worthy of a resume belonging to such talents.

Subliminal Mind Games remains devoted to the honest and sincere publication of creative content aimed at furthering the Art of Narrative Video Game Design. To date, all publications made under this name, in collaboration with Team Magestic, or by former associates are free for download. If the “Team” is what concerns you, I advise you to attend to it, yet if you are simply concerned for building a personal resume, I assure you that not only was your contribution credited accordingly, but it remains a fraction of the final product, most of which I developed singlehandedly, under needlessly stressful circumstances.

Regards,

Rinzai Gigen.

Subliminal Mind Games.

[({R.G.||S.M.G.)}]

Post-Scriptum: I should add, though it hardly bears repeating, that the current head of Magestic Games, though he had intimated to me an overt uninterest in continuing “indie” Game Design, (an intimation which spurned my sudden reappearance on the Development Scene, for the sole reasons recounted above) continues to use the same library of assets that I have availed myself of towards these ends, towards what he professes as the same ends, working from the same established plans, designs, and templates. He continues to support my independent ventures, even crediting this release on his own Development Logs. It follows logically that any rights which he inherits, having to date only contributed one asset to this Library, transfer without exception to my person, not only because I have contributed far more to this Library of Assets, but also because the Idea Itself, as a work of doujin protected by ZUN’s Guidelines, retains the identity of MY intellectual property, and while any asset from that Library may be substituted in future releases, the Games Themselves require my permission for publication. My grounds for allowing this are generous: that I continue to use the assets as agreed-upon, taking what artistic liberties I see fit while waiving Creative Control over other projects implementing my Ideas.

R.G.