Piracy can make Japanese artist give up on releasing titles in English
Another case of a Japanese author who complains about piracy that exists in foreign countries. Artist Choco (who in addition to creating h*ntai content also does other types of work), launched an artbook at Comiket 100 focused on KOS-MOS, a character from the Xenosaga game series.
The book is called “KOS-MOS FIX” and features several illustrations by guest artists who made their versions of the famous character, check out the cover below:
For example, we have the KOS-MOS designed by Takashi Takeuchi who does the art for TYPE-MOON’s Fate series games, and you can see other illustrations of the other guest illustrators:
Well, back to the piracy problem, Choco wanted to reach a good part of the public, so the book KOS-MOS FIX is bilingual, it is all in Japanese and English (as you can see in the pages above), because the author wanted to include foreign fans so they could buy the book without any problems, but piracy emerged.
In his profile Choco says the following:
I am really saddened by the uploading, especially by someone who claims to be a community of Xenoblade fans.
You are not a fan.
If there are such terrible people out there, I've decided to stop creating English versions.— CHOCO＠9/25サンクリA01a (@choco_mugi) September 10, 2022
Thank you for all the replies.
I cry with joy.
I almost forgot the fact that there are more fans who purchased the book correctly than those who got it illegally.
It is good to know that there are people who are happy with the book.— CHOCO＠9/25サンクリA01a (@choco_mugi) September 10, 2022
Some fans responded to him showing that they bought the copies and that they hope he doesn’t stop releasing the products in English as well.
For those who don’t know the Xenosaga series, it’s an RPG series that came out for the Playstation 2, 3 main games were produced on the platform. Xenoblade is kind of part of the “same universe” as Xenosaga (and also Xenogears, released for PS1) but at the same time, it’s not a very confusing relationship.
The book is available at MelonBooks for purchase and it is selling for R$ 67.55 without delivery.