Talk:Bishōjo game

Can someone find valid sources?

For the information in this article?

older entries

I tried to finally create a solid article on this topic. In particular, I tried to set down some stardard terminology for use on Wikipedia. My view is that the three most unambiguous terms are "bishōjo game", "ren'ai game" and "H game", so these are the primary ones I'm using. I know a lot of people are nitpicky about these things --- I hope this naming scheme will be acceptable for most people. If not, feel free to discuss it here. Note also that I'm using standard Wikipedia naming conventions, with the macrons over the "o"s and all that. I would've preferred "bishoujo game" and "ren'ai game" in the article title too, but hey, it's the standard. --Shibboleth 22:58, 13 Jun 2004 (UTC)

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About Magical Drop 3: It's not purely bishōjo I'd argue. There are several male characters in the game, the text below the pic was misleading saying it was girls only... Kajtek 19:48, 9 Dec 2004 (CET)

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The characters in the Magical Drop games are based on the major arcana of the tarot. There are female characters in the game because their tarot counterparts happen to be female. I would not classify this game as bishōjo either. --Anon user.

The main character is the extremely bouncy-breasted World, and others include the moé Star, the dominatrix Empress and the angel-winged Temperance. The art-style is pure bishōjo, emphasizing the femininity of the characters and baring a considerable amount of flesh in the arms. While the game can certainly be enjoyed for its fine puzzle gameplay alone, there is no way that this is not a bishōjo game. The tarot was chosen as a theme because it contains mostly female characters, not the other way around. 69.70.138.192 18:59, 10 Dec 2004 (UTC)

Okay, I'm considering changing it to Money Idol Exchanger for three reasons.

1. Nearly half of the total Magical Drop character lineup is male.

2. World is not the main character. I'm fairly sure there IS no main character.

3. Money Idol Exchanger, as far as I'm aware, only features one male character.

Sounds good to me. Go ahead and make the change. 69.70.136.130 19:31, 12 Jun 2005 (UTC)

Okay, I did it (finally). Hope I didn't mess things up too much!

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I cut a comment about age of consent. The Japanese national age of consent is 13, but in most prefectures it is higher (16--18). the article less misleading if this sentence is cut.

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Terminology and slang

I think I can add more but there are some problems. Revth 02:43, 26 Aug 2004 (UTC)

• Some words apply more to a H game and not to a Bishojo game.
• Some words are just normal Japanese words used out of their normal meanings.
• Some words doesn't even make sense to me, as I have never played those games.

Thanks for your efforts. I think it isn't so important to be rigidly complete on these terms, because they are extremely temporary and rapidly changing ephemera --- e.g. people will still be playing bishōjo games ten years from now, but nobody will be saying "ugu". An encyclopedia doesn't necessarily have to keep up with that sort of stuff. As well, they are of no practical use to anyone except Japanese speakers, which isn't the main audience here on en. So their main benefit is providing some cultural color, and insight into the type of talk that goes on on Japanese websites. For this purpose I think we have plenty of terms already, so there's no need to add more if you find them dubious. --Shibboleth 03:45, 26 Aug 2004 (UTC)

You're probably right about there being more than enough slang terms here. However, seeing "ugu" there, I'm compelled to suggest adding "gao" from AIR. In the places on the internet I frequent, it seems to be more popular than "ugu" (could be because the AIR anime is more recent, and more English-speaking otakus are familiar with anime than with bishojo games). Anyway, I didn't add it myself because I don't know how to write it in Japanese... - Commander Nemet 18:12, 3 November 2005 (UTC)

Could I remove the female-targeted games from the section about bishoujo games today, to the genres that are related or derive from bishoujo games? Definitely they started from the idea of bishoujo games, but I have never seen them actually categorized as bishoujo games, only as ren'ai games, simulation games, or adventure games. Probably because there are few to no bishoujos in these games, just one or two normal females (the main character/s) and tons of good looking boys and men.Lijakaca 20:28, 28 January 2007 (UTC)

English translations

I admit that I haven't played any bishōjo game in English translation (I bought the ones I had while living in Japan), but my sense is that the games currently out are poor stuff. It is hard to exaggerate the obscurity of most of them in Japan: googling for "さくらの季節　JAST" (Season of the Sakura) results in all of 20 hits. And visiting Season of the Sakura's web page and looking at the screenshots, I don't get a good impression. That's why I didn't bother naming any of them aside from Princess Maker: I consider all of them pretty much non-notable in every sense except that they happened to be translated. (With one exception: I do get 5000 Google hits for "加奈いもうと" (Kana Imoto), which is not bad.)

So English speakers are currently in the position of judging an entire genre based on a few of its third-rate clones. Imagine trying to form an opinion of first-person shooters without having access to the major players like Id software and Valve, or of J-RPGs without Square and Enix. No wonder Something Awful is so contemptuous of them.

Now, I'm not on a mission to advocate for ren'ai games to the West: even the most popular ones are not very good as games or as writing. They're mainly interesting because of what they reveal about Japanese sexuality, gender roles and attitudes to pornography. Still, I think it's important to make it clear that the games currently translated are poorly representative of the overall quality of the genre. Kanon is poorly written, but it's still leagues ahead of Western pornography. I don't want people to apply Western preconceptions of pornography to Japanese works --- and unfortunately the bishōjo games currently out in English happen to lend support to the misconception that any work containing pornography must automatically be vapid in every other respect. --Shibboleth 00:51, 3 Sep 2004 (UTC)

Good and thought-provoking points, and I think you're basically right. Please do edit the sections I added if you want to clarify this - I'm not possessive of what I wrote, and I'm all for giving as accurate a portrayal as we can. I think that for an article on en, though, being translated is in and of itself something to render a game notable, to non-Japanese speakers. I'm also convinced that, even though they may be poor by comparison with what's out in Japanese, they also provide a near-unique combination of story, game decisions affecting the story, and romance and sexuality. Few as the translated ren'ai games are, there are probably more of them than of Western-origin computer games with any significant romantic aspect. I think this is the chief appeal to the "thinking" English-speaking bishoujo player.

(Who is in the minority: one of the best-selling translated games is X-Change, which is agreed almost everywhere to be frankly awful and just a set of sex scenes strung together. It does still sell in large amounts even now, which is why I listed it as notable, but it reveals that the majority of the market for English-language games is still basically people after porn. I personally hate the way that the marketing in general will hype up the sex scenes out of all proportion to the romantic rest of the game, especially in cases like Brave Soul where there's proper gameplay and puzzles as well as romance and the sex is a tiny amount of the romance stories, but I tried to avoid my Wikipedia text coming out biased (please edit if anyone thinks I failed). There are a number of people who'd love to see the big names like Tokimeki Memorial translated to English, but it seems that it ain't going to happen soon.)

It may be that games like Season of the Sakura, Brave Soul, and the AnimePlay games are awful by comparison to those in Japanese, but it seems they're among the best available in English, and lots of those who play them do love them. And I think for an English-language encyclopaedia article, both sides of that should be communicated.--AlexChurchill 08:38, Sep 3, 2004 (UTC)

You're right that the mere fact of their being translated does make them worth noting, so I've left them in. But I think Wikipedia generally shouldn't say that a work is good or bad (unless it can be backed up by a quote from some notable critic), so I've just noted that they're obscure and said nothing else either way.

Yeah, I used to feel strongly about such things also, but I've come to grow detached. The more anime I watched and bishōjo games I played, the more I realized that with a very few exceptions, it's always the same old cliches over and over again. Japan's pop culture output doesn't really hold a candle to its serious artists like e.g. Haruki Murakami or Koreeda Hirokazu. So I've come to appreciate Japanese pop culture mainly as fodder for analysis of the country's culture, instead of for its own sake. I've been writing all these articles because as a disillusioned fanboy, I feel I have the unusual capacity to be both highly informed and NPOV :).

Tokimeki Memorial is one of the last games I can see being officially translated, because Konami doesn't want to hurt its brand name in America by becoming associated with something potentially controversial. A game by a bishōjo-specific studio probably has a better chance. --Shibboleth 01:34, 4 Sep 2004 (UTC)

Hmm, X-Change was admittedly pretty vapid but I really enjoyed X-Change 2 and not just for the H elements. Then again, I haven't played very many titles due to my Japanese being mediocre so maybe I just don't know what I'm missing. Also, since Something Awful's reviews exist for the sole purpose of making fun of everything I don't think their opinions are very instructive :P DopefishJustin (・∀・) 05:07, Dec 8, 2004 (UTC)

Non-English translations

Bishojo games have been translated and released in Korea. Fan translation is not unheard of, and a few projects have even been completed. I think this would need to be taken in to account. Does anyone know about other non-English translations?

Some fan translations into Chinese language exist in Taiwan and I have heard of pirated copies with translation in Chinese as well. I also have heard about, but not sure where I heard it, about some fan translations done in French, German, Italian, and Spanish but I can't confirm this.Revth 17:43, 8 Dec 2004 (UTC)

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...the most popular have sold over a million copies, and they make up the majority of offline PC games in Japan.

Fine, except that the word "offline" links to the single player article. They're not necessarily the same thing, since you can have online single-player and offline multiplayer games: which one is meant in this case? 81.156.109.77 02:46, 8 Dec 2004 (UTC)

Thank the Gods!

Finally, a good article about anime that has earned the "featured" title! This is wonderful! Good job to everyone who worked on this! I'm saving it so I can remember...

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What Happened to Wikipedia?

So a game about Japanize porn video games makes the front page. This is awful, as many little kids come to Wikipedia. This disgusting garbage should not be on the front page of Wikipedia, it should only be availible to those perverts who want to search for it. --BarbaraM 09:18, 7 dec 2004 (UTC)

Did you read the article, or uh, what? Apostrophe 04:18, 8 Dec 2004 (UTC)

I think it is an excellent article. I guess I must be a pervert. --Zero 04:44, 8 Dec 2004 (UTC)

Please do not troll on Wikipedia. DopefishJustin (・∀・) 05:38, Dec 8, 2004 (UTC) (this was in reply to a comment I made have subsequently removed)

This article is awesome, in my opinion. If you're letting your kids on Wikipedia unsupervised in the first place, they're going to be exposed to things that aren't all-ages appropriate (several pages on the reproductive system, for instance). This article is a wonderful example of the standards of encyclopedic writing that the 'pedia strives for, and I think it's just fine as it is. Perhaps as a compromise, the MediaWiki developers can add a parental control flag to each account, and allow articles to be flagged inappropriate for children? Vogon 05:42, Dec 8, 2004 (UTC)

Something similar is being debated--Evil Monkey → Talk 05:51, Dec 8, 2004 (UTC)

Please do not whine about something that you know next to nothing about. Few bishojo games involve any porn. The article itself isn't the least bit pornographic. You are judging an entire genre of video games based on a stereotype.

By this logic, Larry Flynt shouldn't have a WikiPedia article. NPOV, children, NPOV! Miwa 00:48, 19 December 2005 (UTC)

People like you are why the natural human body is censored in today's society. I wouldn't care as much if you were complaining about some kind of violent content, which is actually bad. Stop conditioning our nations children to hate themselves.

...yeah, because these games never, ever contain a lot of rape and satanism. Games like Bible Black just don't exist.128.210.27.101 (talk) 00:12, 9 February 2008 (UTC)

娘

In the list of terms, the kanji 娘 appears a lot of times, and is translated as "kid". Its meaning is closer to "daughter" or "young girl"; it may have been a conscious translation choice, or the author may have been thinking of another kanji (子, which means "child", is also read "ko"). Just thought I'd put this out there, in case it was a mistake. Keep up the good work. Vogon 05:36, Dec 8, 2004 (UTC)

That's a good catch, I would definitely expect 子 there. But oddly enough, for both of the affected terms Google gives more results for the spelling with 娘. I suppose it should be left as-is. DopefishJustin (・∀・) 05:41, Dec 8, 2004 (UTC)

Yeah, I don't doubt the veracity of the kanji, but I think the translation could be improved a bit. Vogon 05:43, Dec 8, 2004 (UTC)

Translating "meganekko" as "young-girl-with-glasses" wouldn't really capture the original ring of the term, I think, so the current translation seems like an acceptable compromise. Also, 娘 is usually read "musume", not "ko"; so I think this is an irregular reading that emphasises "kid"-ness. 69.70.138.192 05:50, 8 Dec 2004 (UTC)

It is an odd cultural and language tid-bit and 娘 is used with a positive, somewhat sexual meaning to replace 子 in bishojo genre. 子 means child especially those under teen when used together with 娘 and this distinction let writers use Onna 女 to mean those older than the main character. It is somewhat like the use of "baby" or "baby girl" in a casual English conversation or a song. Revth 17:39, 8 Dec 2004 (UTC)

I believe "boku-girl" and "glasses-girl" would be better translations than "-kid", as neither of the original words are gender-neutral. Damien 23:08, 30 Dec 2004 (UTC)

Background?

I found this article lacking in the fact that it describes the content and history of the games extensively, yet there is no section on the background of the phenomenon. Why is Bishojo so popular in Japan, and why is it so unpopular in other parts of the world. There are likely numerous sources that explore this part and I would like read about that in this featured article. -- [[User:Solitude|Solitude\^talk]] 07:52, Dec 8, 2004 (UTC)

(Note: I'm the original author of the article, User:Shibboleth; I just don't have access to my account.) Good point, that's indeed a question of considerable interest. However, at a base factual level all we can really say is "Japanese people just like it because it's in their culture". They (or at least some of them) like young girls, they like anime-style art, they like highly feminine and cute stuff (and Westerners mostly don't). They just do. Any more elaborate answer explaining how this preference came about would be a theory, and inherently POV. I was actually adding my ideas about this to an early draft of the article, but ended up junking them because they were original research.

Actually, the sources are remarkably few; the only real scholarship I know of about this comes from Sharon Kinsella (one of her articles is in the references), and even she only spends a few paragraphs on the topic in the paper linked. As I understand her, Kinsella's thesis is that bishōjo is popular among Japanese males due to sexism. In her words: "Despite the inappropriateness of their old-fashioned attitudes, many young men have not accepted the possibility of a new role for women in Japanese society. [...] The little girl heroines of Lolicom manga reflect simultaneously an awareness of the increasing power and centrality of young women in society, and also a reactive desire to see these young women dissarmed, infantilised, and subordinate." As I said, very POV.

Now that you mention it though, it would be interesting to present her theories provided they're properly attributed to her. Also, Kinsella will be releasing a new book covering more of this topic soon, perhaps there'll be more to say then. The history of the general phenomenon maybe could be expanded as well --- as I mentioned in the article, this, as well as most gender-oriented anime and manga, is really strongly tied in to dojin comics. However, maybe the general bishojo article would be more appropriate for this stuff, since it's not specific to games. I'll make additions when I have the time. 69.70.138.192 08:43, 8 Dec 2004 (UTC)

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I wanted to make the bishojo "correction" on the Talk page, but a restrictive firewall at work prevented me for some strange reason from accessing the Talk page but not the actual article. So, I stand corrected. However, I do want to bring up an additional concern on this talk page: NPOV. For example, most of the article is rock-solid, but isn't there some North American cultural POV in terms of analyzing Japanese culture? This article has the slight but detectable air of "that exotic foreign topic," to it, IMHO. Anyone else see this? --Naif 08:15, 8 Dec 2004 (UTC)

Well, I wrote the article with the assumption that the reader knows nothing about the topic to start with, and also made several comparisons with North America with the assumption that this would be more familiar to the reader than Japan. That might account for your feeling. I am not sure how this can be fixed, though; if the topic is inherently unknown and "exotic"-seeming to 90% of its readers, the article has to adapt to its audience. That said, if you find any specific POV phrase, go ahead and fix it. 69.70.138.192 08:55, 8 Dec 2004 (UTC)

Perverted and depraved?

For example, one of Enix's was a 1983 game entitled Lolita Syndrome, which consisted of five mini-games with cutely drawn girls appearing to be about ten years old. One of these mini-games involved throwing knives to remove the girl's clothes.

Reading this has solidified my disgust with the Japanese moral character and explained to me part of the reason why the Japanese were capable of committing hideous WWII atrocities like the Rape of Nanking. During the Rape of Nanking Japanese soldiers slashed girls' vaginas open with bayonets. Doesn't this kind of sick sado-sexual violent depravity sound similar to the things they fantasize about in their video games? I will forever be uninterested in all things Japanese. Some people get titillated by this crap but I don't. Zh 23:10, 9 Dec 2004 (UTC)

Sigh, I mention a game to show the history of Enix and you turn it into a sweeping condemnation of Japanese culture. You are hugely overgeneralizing --- most Japanese would also be repelled by this game. Lolita Syndrome probably sold no more than (my guesstimate) a few thousand copies, to porn fiends exclusively. Nor would it be releasable today under the new regulations established in the 90s. Do you also judge other countries by the content of their hardcore pornography? 69.70.138.192 00:55, 10 Dec 2004 (UTC)

It would be easily releasable even today as games like those are very popular in Japan. If you were to have a look at Getchu you might find a lot of ADV games involving characters like those.

Every single country in this world has its atrocities and things in its past that they are ashamed of. Parihaka, Auswitch, Abu Ghraib just to name a few. But of course you wouldn't judge all New Zealanders on the actions at Parihaka, just as you wouldn't judge all Japanese by Lolita Syndrome Evil Monkey → Talk 01:53, Dec 10, 2004 (UTC)

It seems you have absolutely no understanding of how a bayonet was used in Japanese Army during WWII. It was used like a spear attached to a gun to stub but never to slash. It actually looks like a knife but this is due to the fact that the design was copied from a French bayonet. In many fictions and nonfictions of Japanese troop in Southeast Asia, after capturing wild animals to eat, they were forced to use machete and officer's swords as well as privately owned knives to eat. Now, please read something beside propaganda to figure out how Japanese behave. Revth 06:11, 20 Dec 2004 (UTC)

Someone needs a refresher course in NPOV. Please leave your slippery-slope racial preconceptions out of WikiPedia. This is akin to saying NAMBLA is a key indicator in the moral quality of the United States - it isn't, and this is just a footnote in the grand scheme of Japanese culture. Also, Nanking was 60 years ago. Are Americans still interning Japanese in concentration camps in Arizona? No? Then don't try to draw those parallels. *sigh* Miwa 00:45, 19 December 2005 (UTC)

You want to see a culture steeped in violence and depravity? Just look at the U.S.A.

Meganekko

A character wearing a pair of glasses who turns out to be quite beautiful once they are removed. A meganekko is often parodied by having a character drop or lift their glasses, but unexpectedly not become beautiful — much to the disappointment of everyone around.

I believe that this is inaccurate, as it presumes that characters with glasses are not considered beautiful. I see no evidence for this--indeed, to the contrary, there are a number of fans who prefer the glasses-adorned characters. If nobody objects, I'll reduce this to "A girl wearing a pair of glasses." Damien 23:08, 30 Dec 2004 (UTC)

I've rephrased what's there to be more accurate but still keep the extra text since it does have some truth to it. DopefishJustin (・∀・) 23:23, Dec 31, 2004 (UTC)

American bishoujo games?

Maybe this is only a Japanese phenomenon, but wouldn't BMX XXX and those Dead or Alive volleyball games also count as bishoujo games?

The North American release of DoA Beach Volleyball is actually a stripped-down port of the original Japanese release with bishoujo game themes. DoA is a Japanese franchise. Miwa 00:46, 19 December 2005 (UTC)

Also, bishoujo refers to Japanese games of this genre

The article mentioned that there are no equivalents in western gaming culture, but weren't the Lula games that were somewhat popular in the mid to late 90's similar to this, if a bit more explicitly pornographic? During the peak of the live acted full motion video game era, also during the mid 90's, there were plenty of dating themed games that may also qualify - games like Man Enough, Midnight Stranger(http://www.ew.com/ew/article/0,,304035,00.html) and the infamous Plumbers Don't Wear Ties? 213.89.227.243 (talk) 18:49, 14 October 2013 (UTC)

Scene from an unkown game

Warning to the sensitive, contains depictions of girls dressed in Sailor_fuku styled aprons with some showing bare bottoms.

http://img119.imageshack.us/my.php?image=tehapron2ly.jpg

What game is it from?

Are you sure it's a game? It looks like it might just be an original drawing. —The preceding unsigned comment was added by 69.131.126.105 (talk • contribs).

It dosen't look like a game to me. I agree with above that it is probaly a drawing, although it might well be a screen shot of a cutscene. Cerevox 01:17, 25 March 2007 (UTC)

I think this scene is from H game「裸エプロン学園」. Please refer to http://www.cd-bros.co.jp/sekilala/game/apron/ (may contain adult content) --kctsang 06:48, 28 March 2007 (UTC)

game engine

can somebody integrate this apropriatly here [1]--Pixel ;-) 01:51, 4 September 2006 (UTC)

OR tag

The pornographic content and portrayal of women sections consist almost entirely of original research observations. Marskell 13:42, 9 October 2006 (UTC)

Tag placed... Reasons:

• Lack of inline citations
• Repression of women section (Also possible NPOV violations)
• Pornography section

VivioFateFan ^{(Talk, Sandbox)} 00:46, 25 October 2007 (UTC)

Possible Name Change --> Galge

I have found that nearly 100% of the time japanese (this is from watching anime in which they name this type of game) call bishoujo games "galge". The japanese version of this page also has this name. The english page didn't even mention this name (I added it). Should we maybe use the more correct name? Ergzay 02:48, 7 November 2006 (UTC)

Extrapolating from usage in popular culture is risky, as an encyclopedia can be expected to use more formal terminology. Google searches are very unreliable, but suggest that "bishoujo game" is more common in writing (美少女ゲーム gets 2,250,000 hits, compared to 1,510,000 for ギャルゲー). Even galge.com describes itself as a site about "美少女ゲーム". (The ja wiki page name is a counter-argument, of course...)

Moreover, as this is the English Wikipedia, we need to give consideration to the terminology used by English fans. Purely anecdotally, I don't recall seeing "galge" used very frequently in English discussions. I don't have any figures to back that up, though, and I'm perfectly happy to be proven wrong on this point! :)

To clarify, my personal position is that I'm not convinced the page needs renaming, but nor would I oppose it if it can be shown that "galge" is a common term for the genre in English. — Haeleth Talk 13:37, 7 November 2006 (UTC)

70's games in English

The precursors were just as present in English - look at the sexual content of the Unix game "battlestar" which came preinstalled in some versions of Unix.--190.56.85.26 22:03, 2 July 2007 (UTC)

RhynCheck Dead Links

This Article Has Been RhynChecked. 1 Deadlink was found, however Article citation method is incorrect ((Error - No in-place Numbers)). Deadlink is found in Section 'References'. Rhynri 02:45, 27 July 2007 (UTC)

Comment

Pretty old article here, and couple of things need to be updated to keep up with the times. Haven't quite gone through the whole article, but the little bit about the Sega Saturn and Dreamcast being the choice of platform for "eroge" today is certainly no longer true: so many adult games have successfully moved into the mainstream market that they get ported over to almost every other console, including the handhelds like the PSP. [Yoshi, 15 Jan 2008] —Preceding unsigned comment added by 134.159.107.99 (talk • contribs)

References

The references at the bottom seem to be more "for more information" - they don't seem to be used as sources for anything actually in the article. You guys really need to add some.128.210.27.101 (talk) 00:14, 9 February 2008 (UTC)

Indeed. For example, Kinsella, Sharon (Summer 1998). "Otaku and the amateur manga movement". Journal of Japanese Studies 24 (2): 289. does not mention the word "game". Trzepacz, Tim. "Gainax's premier computer game was set to come to the US. So what happened?" does not mention the word "bishojo". Yukino, Yoshi (2000-12-28). "Girl Games Come of Age" is inaccessible without a password. I'll delete all three soon if no-one objects. Kenilworth Terrace (talk) 19:14, 30 April 2010 (UTC)

They should be moved to a "Further reading" section, not deleted. Many articles use that section. Being Password protected is also not a reason to outright remove it, although there needs to be a way to show that it is relevant to the topic.陣内_Jinnai 20:48, 30 April 2010 (UTC)

Why mention further reading that has nothing to do with the article? On the third link, WP:ELREG states that "external links to websites that require registration or a paid subscription to view should be avoided because they are of limited use to most readers" and "a site that requires registration or a subscription should not be linked unless the website itself is the topic of the article (see Official links below) or the link is part of an inline reference (see WP:CITE)". Neither of the latter exceptions applies here. Kenilworth Terrace (talk) 20:55, 30 April 2010 (UTC)

However, more to the point is to find some actual sources for the article. Google Scholar produces 4 hits and Google Books 5. That's not encouraging for notability. Kenilworth Terrace (talk) 21:04, 30 April 2010 (UTC)

Well that's because you're looking at English sites (i assume). This is a Japanese term and thus sites describing it will be in Japanese. Notability isn't limited to the English-speaking world.陣内_Jinnai 21:07, 30 April 2010 (UTC)

Quite so, and you will observe that I was careful not to draw an unwarranted conclusion. But it is to no purpose to discuss what sources might exist or what language they might be in. Actual verifiable sources are what is required. Kenilworth Terrace (talk) 21:14, 30 April 2010 (UTC)

And you have said you found several with google scholar alone? It takes generally just 2 to be considered notable for most subjects and something like well known subgenre 2 should suffice. Furthermore, the way it is you've been slapping {{notability}} tags across the various subgenres, it becomes hard to assume good faith on your part since it seems you haven't checked Japanese sources. Unreferenced tag, that's fine. This isn't some obscure game title here; its a whole subgenre we're talking about.陣内_Jinnai 21:19, 30 April 2010 (UTC)

I said 4 hits, not 4 reliable sources. If this genre is so notable, sources should be easy to find. Kenilworth Terrace (talk) 21:23, 30 April 2010 (UTC)

A quick search through WP:Anime's RS google checker for 美少女ゲーム finds plenty. While a few are questionable, there are notably many hits for that word. In addition ギャルゲー which gives similar results. Further those, don't include many of RSes from Visual novel task force's RS list itself. Therefore I conclude that your assertion that the topic is unnotable is unfounded. Unreferenced, certainty, but lack of references is not atomically make something unnotable..

I'd also point out that the usage of the name "bishoujo game" in English is fairly recent; I'd wager that a thorough search through the literature would produce a number of references that discuss the genre without using the term. - JRBrown (talk) 00:57, 1 May 2010 (UTC)

(←) I removed this link from "Further reading" for the reasons I alluded to above. Perhaps anyone who wants to replace it should summarise its content and relevance to the article on this talk page first. Kenilworth Terrace (talk) 17:02, 1 May 2010 (UTC)

See also

I was unable to determine any special relevance of Hadaka apron in the "See also" section. Kenilworth Terrace (talk) 17:06, 1 May 2010 (UTC)

move to Bishoujo game or Bishojo game

After the recent tagging, I've done some research (still compiling stuff) and I think that while their are some RSes, including some academic RSes that use the term Bishōjo, there are more, including some academic sources, that use the term Bishoujo. Gal game is used occasionally, but not very often and Galge I did not really see present.

Academic sources:

• Bishoujo game - 2
• Bishōjo or Bishojo game - 4, but in some cases it used the bar, but not in all cases.
• Gal Game - 1 (most refer to Game Analysis Logic games) or something else.
• Galge - 0 (all foreign language articles

WP:Anime's RS site search:

• Bishōjo[2][3][4][5][6]
• Bishojo[7][8][9]Bishojo girl games[10][11]Bishojo "Adventure" game
• Bishoujo[12][13][14][15][16][17][18]
• Gal game Welcome to the NHK review[19]Welcome to the NHK reviewWelcome to the NHK review[20][21][22]Welcome to the NHK review[23][24] * Welcome to the NHK uses the term and so they may be referencing the usage in the media
• Galge

陣内_Jinnai 00:26, 24 May 2010 (UTC)

Based on what you've posted here, it looks like it's almost a toss-up between the various possible spellings. There doesn't seem to be any very clear winner, even though "bishoujo" seems to be slightly ahead of the others, though only slightly. In cases like this, I think it's best to leave it at the revised Hepburn spelling, and make sure all the possible spellings redirect to it. ···日本穣^? · 投稿 · Talk to Nihonjoe · Join WikiProject Japan! 00:30, 24 May 2010 (UTC)

I should also note that "gal game" or "galge"/"gyaruge" are the most common in Japan, but they haven't really caught on (yet) in English. ···日本穣^? · 投稿 · Talk to Nihonjoe · Join WikiProject Japan! 00:32, 24 May 2010 (UTC)

(edit conflict)Summary of sources: Looking at the sources more closesly, outside of Anime News Network which is focused on a particular readership, no site uses "bishōjo game" and only select academic sources do. In addition, their is mixed usage of "bishojo game" and "bishoujo game" among the wider public and the English industry (basically Jast USA and MangaGamer) are divided; the former, and more established uses Bishoujo while the latter uses Bishojo. The former is also based in US and the latter in Europe which may be part of the reason.陣内_Jinnai 00:33, 24 May 2010 (UTC)

update

• Bishōjo: [25][26][27][28][29][30][31][32][33][34][35][36]
• bishojo game: [37][38][39][40][41][42][43][44][45]
• Bishoujo game: [46][47][48][49][50][51][52][53][54][55][56]
• Gal game: [57][58]gal-game[59][60][61]gal-game
• Galge: [62][63]∞陣内Jinnai 06:46, 17 December 2011 (UTC)

References for article improvement

Patrick W. Galbraith, Bishōjo Games: ‘Techno-Intimacy’ and the Virtually Human in Japan, Game Studies volume 11 issue 2, May 2011, ISSN:1604-7982 free html - JRBrown (talk) 21:46, 10 June 2011 (UTC)

Formatting of current references

The article is currently referenced using "notes" which excerpt the cited articles extremely heavily, to a potentially copyright-infringing extent: almost a third of the text on the page consists of excerpts from the cited papers. Besides being ethically questionable, this makes the "notes" section very cumbersome. I would suggest that the article be reworked to a more standard form, which summarizes the papers' descriptions and arguments, provides inline citations and leaves it to interested parties to read the original if they wish. Objections? - JRBrown (talk) 22:06, 10 June 2011 (UTC)

The following discussion is an archived discussion of a requested move. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made in a new section on the talk page. No further edits should be made to this section.

The result of the move request was: page not moved. No consensus in English-language publications, fall back to Japanese publications per Wikipedia:Naming conventions (use English)#No established usage in English-language sources and Wikipedia:Manual of Style (Japan-related articles)#Romanization. BTW, the macron is a diacritic, according to macron. Going to the end of the searches offered by Kauffner below gives me 111 uses of Bishojo, 20 for Bishōjo, and 49 for Bishoujo. JHunterJ (talk) 19:16, 23 January 2012 (UTC)

---

Requested move

• Bishōjo game → Bishojo game
• Bishōjo → Bishojo

– It is clear that the current name is not in compliance with WP:COMMONNAME and that the use of macrons makes it an unlikely search term (naturalness) and is outside of the anime/manga community and some scholarly sources an unlikely recognizable term.

Of the possibilities listed in the previous discussion, bishojo and bishoujo are the two most common terms. When you look closely at the popularity of bishōjo it is limited almost exclusively to Anime News Network, a site dedicated to the afore mentioned subculture, ie not as mainstream as something like Wired or even 1up.com. As for galge and gal game, those 2 are far less popular, although gal game has gained some traction.

I am chosing bishojo over bishoujo because it appears with the recent check it seems more sources are using the non-ou form. I am including Bishōjo in here also because it likely falls along the same line of usage as its being used here as a genre descriptor.-Relisting for wider participation.--Aervanath (talk) 22:34, 11 January 2012 (UTC) - ∞陣内Jinnai 06:57, 17 December 2011 (UTC) ∞陣内Jinnai 06:57, 17 December 2011 (UTC)

• English usage seems to use "bishoujo"/"bishoujo game".

  "bishōjo game" (16.7k) "bishojo game" (17.7k] "bishoujo game" (318k)

  "bishōjo" (159k) "bishojo" (778k) "bishoujo" (4.64M) "bisyoujo" (186k) "bisyojo" (109k)

  76.65.128.198 (talk) 09:27, 17 December 2011 (UTC)

• Comment -- The nom appears to be seeking to rename two separate articles to the same target. The first one ought to have the target Bishojo game. Assuming the diacritical is technically correct, the present titles should be retained as redirects. If the object is to merge, the two articles, that should be done separately, after this RM is closed and based on comments here. Peterkingiron (talk) 12:38, 17 December 2011 (UTC)
  • Fixed that.∞陣内Jinnai 19:02, 17 December 2011 (UTC)
• Support English sources never use the macron in this name. Both "bishojo" and "bishoujo" are correct, no idea which one is more frequent. --Enric Naval (talk) 23:31, 8 January 2012 (UTC)
• Oppose "Shojo" is a technically incorrect romanization for 少女 (in fact, "shojo" is the correct romanization of an entirely different word). "Shōjo" and "shoujo" are equally acceptable romanizations under two different systems; the use of "shojo" in English is a product of laziness, ignorance, and/or systems that can't accommodate diacriticals. I don't think any of the 少女 derivatives have naturalized enough in English to argue the existence of a English-specific spelling. - JRBrown (talk) 18:42, 9 January 2012 (UTC)
  • No one disputes which is the technically correct one, but that is not how WP:TITLE works, especially when its been shown that no mainstream English RS uses bishōjo. If you contention is that "bishoujo" is a better alternative, please make it clear and why.∞陣内Jinnai 22:38, 9 January 2012 (UTC)
    • The guidelines applicable to this article would seem to be Wikipedia:Manual of Style (Japan-related articles)#Romanization, which state: "To determine if the non-macronned form is in common usage in English-language reliable sources, a review should be done of all the related reliable sources used for the article (as well as any which may not have been specifically used, but can still be considered reliable per WP:RS). [...] If it can not be determined whether the non-macronned form is in common usage in English-language reliable sources, then the macronned form should be used until such time as it can be determined." You state that "no mainstream English RS uses bishōjo"; on what grounds? A quick rummage through Google Scholar for "bishōjo game", "bishôjo game", "bishoujo game" and "bishojo game" suggest that they are all approximately equally common (or more correctly, equally rare). A similar look through Google Books gives similar results. - JRBrown (talk) 15:53, 10 January 2012 (UTC)
      • WP:TITLE supercedes that. If you insist that a guideline trumps the policy from which it came from, ie since we cannot choose a common name because 2 common names exist we default to the obvious name that is not used then I will be forced, as I was asked to at WT:TITLE if someone tried to push that to bring it up there by Jfgslo after a huge discussion at WT:MOS-JA as a way of circumventing policy. That is mean to be used only in the cases where there wasn't any major usage by English sources.∞陣内Jinnai 17:52, 10 January 2012 (UTC)
        • As far as I can see, the relevant part of WP:TITLE says "If there are too few English-language sources to constitute an established usage, follow the conventions of the language appropriate to the subject". I am having a hard time figuring out what the second sentence of your comment means, but perusing the discussion you linked, I don't see where there is any consensus that a macronless romanization should automatically be preferred over macron versions. And I still don't see where you present evidence that "bishojo" is more prevalent in English RS or or more widely recognized by readers than "bishoujo" or "bishōjo" or even "bishôjo". The MOS for Japan clearly states that if there is no one preferred English spelling, Modified Hepburn romanization should be used. - JRBrown (talk) 18:49, 10 January 2012 (UTC)
          • My point is that there is not "too few". There is in fact quite a number even if you count only reliable sources. If you think bishoujo is better than bishojo, that is another argument altogether.∞陣内Jinnai 19:17, 10 January 2012 (UTC)
            • "My point is that there is not "too few". There is in fact quite a number even if you count only reliable sources." Please summarize your evidence for this, because I'm not seeing a clear bias towards any one usage. "If you think bishoujo is better than bishojo, that is another argument altogether." Why is this "another argument altogether"? There is either a preferred English term or there isn't. My impression is that at the moment there isn't. - JRBrown (talk) 19:36, 10 January 2012 (UTC)
              • See one of the previous sections I linked to in the opening statement on this page where I give a detailed breakdowns on usage for bishojo game and related titles. I also give some analysis there as well. Bishojo game is also related to the title bishojo and that is why its here as those sources (except gelge and gal game) can be used as evidence for bishojo article. And no, there is not always such thing as "either there is a preffered English term or there isn't". There are many instances where there are more likely terms and we pick from those more likely. Not doing so is in direct violation of WP:COMMONNAME because you're trying to argue that since we can't agree among which of the 2 more common names to use, we should use neither and one that virtually no one uses!∞陣内Jinnai 19:41, 10 January 2012 (UTC)
                • "See one of the previous sections I linked to in the opening statement"; Yes, I saw that, but between your pop-culture site refs and my look at academic sources, it looks to me that there is not only no preferred term, there is also no noticeable bias against bishōjo. "[Y]ou're trying to argue that since we can't agree among which of the 2 more common names to use"; No, I'm arguing that you haven't shown that any of the possible non-macron romanizations are significantly more common than bishōjo, even if bishōjo only makes up a portion of the total usages. I don't find it surprising that there isn't a consensus; in the grand scheme of things, it's an obscure topic, and RS sources for all of these terms are relatively few. - JRBrown (talk) 20:16, 10 January 2012 (UTC)
                  • I haven't seen you assert specific sources that would dispute the usage. I am especially sceptical about the specific term of "bishōjo game" being so widely used at all in scholarly reliable sources since its been hard to find enough such sources for this article. I would also argue that even if more scholarly sources use that term, they all don't. I can assert that several do not. Plus any macron-usage term automatically fails the "naturalness" argument in TITLE (even if it might be acceptable in-spite that) because QWERTY keyboards cannot reproduce macrons naturally. Given the evidence, it is clear that bishōjo isn't even close to being anywhere near the common title.∞陣内Jinnai 21:23, 10 January 2012 (UTC)
                    • The question isn't "is bishōjo the common title", it's "is there a particular term that seems to be winning". I'm not asserting that bishōjo is the most common form in scholarly uses, but that there is no discernible bias. And I'm certainly not asserting that there are many such sources. Looking through Google Scholar and Google books for direct references to "bishōjo/bishojo/bishoujo game(s)" (ignoring all other uses - the primary use of bishōjo/bishojo/bishoujo, incidentally, appears to be references to Sailor Moon) gives the following, most of which are passing references (omitting non-per-reviewed articles and articles that are more-or-less identical reprints in different journals) (in no particular order, and please forgive the formatting - anyone who can make this neater, please do):
                      • bishōjo:
                        • Dating-Simulation Games: Leisure and Gaming of Japanese Youth Culture, E Taylor - Southeast Review of Asian Studies, 2007
                        • Bishōjo Games: 'Techno-Intimacy' and the Virtually Human in Japan, PW Galbraith - Game Studies, 2011
                        • Nintendo revolution: what is happening in videogame industry and individuals, K Li, PhD Thesis, Hong Kong University
                        • Malice@Doll: Konaka, Specularization, and the Virtual Feminine, Margherita Long, Mechademia 2, 2007
                        • (book) How to Do Things with Videogames, Ian Bogost - 2011
                      • bishôjo:
                        • Maid Meets Mammal: The'Animalized' Body of the Cosplay Maid Character in Japan, L Sharp - Intertexts Volume 15, Number 1, Spring 2011
                        • Nostalgia and Futurism in Contemporary Japanese Sci-Fi Animation, Y Ono - Asiascape Ops 3, 2008
                      • bishoujo:
                        • The Impact of Telepresence on Cultural Transmission through Bishoujo Games, MT Jones - PsychNology Journal, 2005
                        • (book) Porn & pong: how Grand Theft Auto, Tomb Raider and other sexy games changed our culture, Damon Brown, 2008 (quoting J-List proprietor Peter Payne)
                        • (book) Sex in video games, Brenda Brathwaite, 2007
                      • bishojo:
                        • The Otaku in Transition, R Rivera - Journal of Kyoto Seika University, 2009
                        • 'Asianizing' Animation in Asia: Digital Content Identity Construction Within the Animation Landscapes of Japan and Thailand, R Contreras - Nippon Foundation, 2007
                      • And for the truly esoteric (or perhaps a typo?), bishȳjo:
                        • Anime and Philosophy, Josef Steiff, Tristan D. Tamplin, 2010
                      • Non-scholarly books, using bishojo:
                        • The Akiba: A Manga Guide to Akihabara, JPT Staff, Makoto Nakajima, 2008 -
                        • Cruising the anime city: an otaku guide to neo Tokyo, Patrick Macias, Tomohiro Machiyama, 2004
                      • Using bishoujo:
                        • How to Draw Anime & Game Characters: Bishoujo Game Characters, Tadashi Ozawa - 2003
                    • And off-topic, but I'll note in passing that the Ronen paper seems to be an unpublished paper written for coursework, and thus not RS. Perhaps we should remove it. - JRBrown (talk) 00:48, 12 January 2012 (UTC)

Which source is Ronen? I'll strike that one (pending a check on the author to see if they'd qualify as an expert). I also looked in The Otaku Encyclopedia (offline) which I own and it uses bishojo.

What this means is that even with the scholarly sources added there is still a clear pattern of disuse of the macron by RSes. To meet COMMONNAME, one source does not need to be the dominant one, there can be multiple WP:COMMONNAMEs as is the case with Sega Genesis, but we chose 1 of them. Here, even with those 4 extra sources, that still isn't enough to grant the macron usage of bishōjo is at all common even among more scholarly sources (albeit it does seem to be slightly more common).∞陣内Jinnai 04:33, 12 January 2012 (UTC)

• The Ronen paper is in the "further reading" section of the article. I don't think "a clear pattern of disuse of the macron" is a valid way of parsing the data, since the various non-macron uses are not interchangeable; each of bishōjo, bishôjo, bishoujo and bishojo represents an alternative romanization, and aside from bishôjo, which is pretty much restricted to scholarly sources, there does not seem to be a clear preference for any one of them nor a specific bias against any one. So, to repeat, I think we should stick with the romanization scheme that is Wikipedia "house style"; that is, bishōjo. - JRBrown (talk) 14:09, 12 January 2012 (UTC)
  • On the Ronen paper, that is not being used as a source, but as an external link in the form of further reading section. That is allowed because the standards for ELs and further reading is not the same as citations. It specifically allows for items that might not be permissable as citations (on the other hand it also is more restrcitve than citations requiring it to be relevant directly to the topic which I believe it is). You are correct though that it cannot be used as a RS unless sometime in the future the author becomes an expert in the field.
  • As to the latter that is not how we work. We care about ALL reliable sources, not just scholarly ones and there is a clear preference outside scholarly ones. Just because there isn't a clear preference between bishojo and bishoujo doesn't mean we default to bishōjo. That is not how it works anywhere else in Wikipedia. When that happens, you chose between either bishojo or bishoujo. If you don't like bishojo, then bishoujo is a valid alternative if you think its better somehow. However, bishōjo isn't.∞陣内Jinnai 17:42, 12 January 2012 (UTC)
    • You keep asserting that there is a clear bias against "bishōjo game", and I keep saying that I'm not seeing this. There are a limited number of RS (academic or popular) that ever mention "bishōjo/bishoujo/bishojo games"; the vast majority of the non-academic mentions that you link to above are from ANN (which uses all three romanizations). I still don't think that the small pool of references that exist so far are showing a clear bias, especially once you correct for the mentions that are based on press releases or interviews and thus not independent of each other. - JRBrown (talk) 21:36, 12 January 2012 (UTC)
    • "Bishoujo" is generally more popular in the world at large, so that seems like the better choice. 76.65.128.132 (talk) 20:07, 12 January 2012 (UTC)
• Oppose: Because there is no established common English form for the Japanese word 美少女, the English Wikipedia should default to WP:MOS-JA's guidelines and stick with the Hepburn romanization form of the name. We should not use a non-Hepburn romaji form for the sake of having a non-Hepburn romaji article title based on a flimsy application of WP:COMMONNAME.
  Also I would like to point out that googling "Bishōjo" and "Bishojo" would bring up the same results because Google doesn't take diacritics into account.—Ryulong (竜龙) 20:15, 12 January 2012 (UTC)
  • Clearly you don't know how to check the sources I linked to or are just purposefully ignoring them. You are also assertubf that guidelines trump policy.∞陣内Jinnai 02:23, 13 January 2012 (UTC)
• Support. I get 31 post-1990 English-language Google Book results with the diacritic, 300 without. Google seems to have a lot more trouble with macrons than with the French or German diacritics. Diacritics are a style issue rather than a COMMONNAME issue. But even the NYT stylebook, which is the most pro-diacritic of the major stylebooks, doesn't provide for Japanese diacritics. Many editors point to Britannica as a model, but their style is use a single form of any given name. We give variations all the time. So it can be "Bishojo" in the title as the "common name", while "Bishōjo" can stay boldfaced in the opening as a more formal version of the name. Kauffner (talk) 13:27, 14 January 2012 (UTC)

  This isn't a Japanese diacritic. This is a method by which we signify that the first O sound in the Japanese word 美少女 is a long O, which is the form by which the governing manual of style suggests.—Ryulong (竜龙) 02:30, 16 January 2012 (UTC)

The above discussion is preserved as an archive of a requested move. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made in a new section on this talk page. No further edits should be made to this section.

Bishoujo game versus galgame

currently, this article's lead section said bishoujo game is galgame, but they are in different article in Japanese wikipedia and their different had been mentioned in Japanese wikipedia article for bishoujo game. So, it seem we should move some of this article's information that talk specifically about galgame to the dating sims article, the current corresponding article on english wikipedia for japanese wikipedia's galgame article? 124.244.140.2 (talk) 12:06, 30 November 2013 (UTC)

There is a generally excepted split between the two: Bishoujo game is the catch all term. Galgame refers only to games without adult content e.g. console ports Finding a cite will be hard as with anything on here, it's all JP internet/otaku subculture. 109.156.127.187 (talk) 15:13, 6 July 2017 (UTC)

interwiki links

Currently, interwiki link of some articles in some languages version of wikipedia are arranged as follow (all article names translated into english):

Articles in en wiki

Dating sim-->zh:love simulation game, ja: galgame

bishoujo game (include content for galgame)-->zh:bishoujo game, ja:bishoujo game

Articles in ja wiki

bishoujo game-->zh:bishoujo game, en:bishoujo game (include content for galgame)

galgame-->zh:love simulation game, en:dating sim

love game (genre)-->zh:love game, en no corresponding item

Articles in zh wiki

love game-->ja:love game (genre), no en link

love simulation game-->ja:love simulation game-->redirected to: love game (genre), en:dating sim

love adventure game-->ja:love adventure game-->redirected to: love game (genre), no en link

bishoujo game-->ja:bishoujo game, en:bishoujo game(include contents for galgame)

Coulld they be arranged more logically?124.244.140.2 (talk) 12:32, 30 November 2013 (UTC)

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