2020 Licensing Survey Results

Hello again, friends! We know these have been long overdue, but with the disruption to con season this year, things have been a little out of sorts. If you’ve been following long on our Twitter, you’ve already seen the top 10 license suggestions for the year, but we’re going to be going over it again in case you haven’t, along with a brief discussion of some of the other data from this year’s survey!

The survey reached fewer people this year, with a little under 6,000 responses as opposed to our usual 8,000. The majority of respondents remain in the 18-24 age range. The survey reached slightly fewer women this year as well, accounting for only a quarter of respondents as opposed to a third. Purchasing habits among respondents remained largely steady.

The majority of respondents spend quite a bit of time researching titles before making a purchase, typically focusing on story and character details found on sites like VNDB. Most respondents are Windows users who prefer to play visual novels on PC, with digital downloads from a third party platform like Steam being overwhelmingly preferred to other formats.

Surprisingly, the voice acting was not a significant concern for most respondents unless version differences were a factor and, contrary to popular belief, the majority of respondents do not make purchasing decisions based on whether a title contains adult content or not, with a mere 11% of respondents who exclusively purchase adult titles.

Most respondents are much more concerned with the genders of available love interests than that of the protagonist.

And that about covers that! Onto the top 15 if you missed the countdown on Twitter:

Top 15 License Suggestions

  1. Evenicle 2
  2. Yoshiwara Higanbana
  3. Rose Guns Days
  4. Fate/Stay night
  5. Sakura no Uta
  6. TRianThology
  7. White Album 2
  8. Rance (series)
  9. Bunny Black (series)
  10. Mahoutsukai no Yoru
  11. Higanbana no Saku Yoru ni
  12. Soukou Akki Muramasa
  13. Jooubachi no Oubou
  14. Youkoso! Sukebe Elf no Mori
  15. Ken ga Kimi

Thanks again to everyone who participated in the survey this year!

Bookmark the permalink.

28 Comments

  1. Are you really sure that the votes for Yoshiwara Higanbana are not the ones for Higanbana no Saku Yoru ni

    • Quite sure! Unless some people mysteriously wrote “Yoshiwara Higanbana” when they meant something else entirely. You may have noticed that Higanbana no Saku Yoru ni is, in fact, on the list at #11 with two other 07th Expansion titles in the top 10.

      • But if some people only wrote “Higanbana”, what would have happened?

        • Counted as a separate entry which, in this case, would not have made a significant difference in ranking position. Even if it would have, those entries likely would have been thrown out in the interest of “fairness” (although, I must remind you that the ranking is just for fun and has no direct effect on licensing). If you’re concerned about your suggestions being misinterpreted in the future, I’d encourage you to use full titles.

    • Stop acting like it’s impossible for people to want to play a romance game.

    • They are entirely different games. I think people know the difference, especially considering they look nothing alike and Higanbana no Saku Yoru Ni is well known.
      There are people who play otomege.

  2. …Funbag/Kyonyuu Fantasy’s not even in the top 15? Oh dear.

    • Most likely because we have kyonyuu fantasy 1 and 2 already. Having the series already licensed, I would guess, that most who “did” want it would probably vote for something else.

  3. Just waiting for the eventual official announcement of sukebe elf. Can’t believe the developers Lune teased the Eng release but has yet to reveal who the Eng publisher is. I REALLY want a physical Super Duper Lucie no Ecchi na Lotion Rabu Rabu Special Sukebe is it wrong to want to Lewd an Elf All Night Long Limited Ultimate Collectors Edition. I mean its Aoi Nagisa’s girls we are talking about, Aoi Nagisa!

  4. Praying for a Sakura No Uta translation.

  5. I agree with you. There are still ‘Funbag 3’ or ‘Kyonyu Majyo’ as major works and some minor fan discs in this series. I’m looking forward to their releases.

  6. So happy Yoshiwara Higanbana is top 2~ There’s a couple of otome games I wanna play like Ken ga Kimi and Jouubachi no Oubo so hopefully it’ll be localised!

  7. what about fate/hollow ataraxia!? if FSN is being suggested, then hollow ataraxia MUST be considered!!!!!

  8. This was very interesting – “Most respondents are much more concerned with the genders of available love interests than that of the protagonist.”

    That has always been true for me, but in conversations it always seemed like I was in a tiny minority who didn’t care about the protagonist’s gender.

    • We need more boys’ love and otome games in English, that’s for sure. Although I am much more interested in BL because they seem to have better stories than otomege and I want to see male X male romance. I like the yuri VNs that are out there as well.

      I did care about the protagonist’s gender a while ago before I realised that I am transgender FTM and slightly bisexual. In a way I thought I would not relate to VNs with straight male protagonists, but I was really repressing myself in a way because I did not think of myself as a guy and I didn’t know I was attracted to women.

      Also, as it turns out, gender doesn’t matter when I am choosing a heroine or a hero. I end up liking them for their personality.

  9. I am a bit surprised and disappointed that there have been less women respondents this year. Hopefully the trend reverses with time (I hope it’s not the Discord’s fault è_è)

    • Well, if it helps, I’m FTM and I keep voting for yaoi or otome game along with other more popular games. I hope they localise Kintouka someday because it looks awesome.

  10. ahh i’ve been dreaming about Jooubachi no Oubou eng release since 2k14

  11. 1 evenicle 2
    8 rance 9 + 10
    9 bunny black 3

    please if u want get real money go that one since most ppls will want to pay for those, unlike other games.. n most important is, make sure not translate the ones that alrdy translated like bunny black 1 n 2. it already translated n if u guys try to act like translating again n make like u guys one who translate it like sengoku rance, it just make lot of ppls here got disgusted with mangagamer. thank that my honest opinion n no offense.

    • yeah,H RPG as good as those was rare nowsday. Eve 2 may be translated by Alicesoft herself and MG only publishes their uncensored version (Alicesoft couldnot herself due to fucking Jap law), hope it would be quick and the same with rance 9 + 10 and even Rance 3. I hope Bunny black series (and then even Battle goddess series) would be fully stranslated too. MG should make use of old fan translation insteads of wasting time and money to re-trans, we wont complain as long as the games would be soon released

  12. Sono Hanabira not even inthe top 15 when it was #2 last year.. It’s official, it is completely cursed. Valve should be proud of themselves that they managed to kill a whole VN series dead by themselves.

  13. Without a shadow of a doubt “Alicesoft” titles makes it on the weekly page each and everytime, so it shouldnt come as a surprise of Rance or Evenicle was on this list. Evenicle was your Number 1 game sold at the time too. I understand Japan doesnt lie realesing thier games over to the West as often as they should(i mean its money) but with numbers like that it should be a no brainer. Evenicle 2 as releases Feb 2018 shouldnt have to wait 2 whole years for it and it took forever to Translate Evenicle 1 so how long will we be wating for this one MG?

  14. I hope for an english version for Kuroinu 2 uwu

  15. I really wish you guys could localise Kintouka someday. It seems like a good game and we are desperately in need of more boys’ love and otome games in English. I remember asking for it and other games in another survey.

  16. I have a question will MangaGamer translate kara no shoujo 3 once it comes out in December 25, 2020?

  17. Please consider
    Love x Holic ~Miwaku no Otome to Hakudaku Kankei~
    and
    Mama x Holic ~Miwaku no Mama to Ama Ama Kankei~

    • THAT i whole heartily agree! especially its become pretty obvious that the series would do well here! especially if its uncensored!

Leave a Reply

This site uses Akismet to reduce spam. Learn how your comment data is processed.