A Response to Recent DMCA Takedown Criticism?
News tipster Jaden brought this to our attention today: Sega of Japan released on Monday a lengthy launch trailer for Shining Ark, the upcoming JRPG from the Shining Force set for release on PSP this week.
You can look at the 11 minute trailer below, but the trailer itself is not what’s newsworthy; it’s how SOJ controlled its release. Jaden explains:
What’s interesting to note is that almost everything is disabled in the video, even the vote system, which is quite odd since the prior and succeeding video had it enabled, might have to do with the recent incident a while back maybe?
As Ryan Bloom reported in November and December, fans of Shining Force have come under fire from a swath of takedown notices Sega has filed with Youtube against a wide array of franchise-related video. Those fans have accused SOJ, and in particular current Shining franchise producer Tsuyoshi Sawada, of drowning out their voices in order to better promote current titles like Shining Ark. We should note Sawada does hold marketing credits on Sonic Adventure 2 and the Sonic Advance series, among other Sega games.
The truth is, most if not all video uploaded to Sega’s Japanese Youtube channel have such interactive features such as comments and voting enabled, so it’s not completely out of left field to consider that Sega may be controlling the message of Shining Ark a bit tighter than normal due to fan backlash. Whether that benefits Shining Ark will be known sooner rather than later, as sales data comes in.
We will continue to monitor the dispute and any impact it has on the Shining franchise, be it the fans or official development. In the meantime, thanks to Jaden for tipping us. If you have news to share, be sure to share it with us. Click Send Tips at the top of every page, or tip us on Twitter.
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Sega of Japan hasn’t been handling Shining Ark very well (handling; I’m sure it’s a good game, but the PR has been terrible). If I were in Tsuyoshi Sawada’s position right now, I’d apologize for the DMCA takedown and try to fix the matter on YouTube, or, if he/SOJ can’t, give the fans something big Shining Ark-related, like a demo or something.
inb4SEGAofJapan gets suspended by YouTube
Come to think of it, it’s also possible they’re trying to prevent trolls and haters from clogging up the comments with unrelated spam and flamewars. It happens on almost every trailer, gameplay video, etc. I’ve ever watched.
@A
Expect the comments they would probably get on this video would be their fault rather than someone arguing politics in a cat video.
@MetaRyan
SEGA can’t handle ANY game’s right anymore. >_>
When was the last time we have seen a “Shining” game in the west anyway? PAL regions got even less than the States. Almost as bad as the “Tales of” games.
@Chris K.
Most of these companies have taken to thinking that we only have the rights to buy their game and to shut the hell up, it doesn’t help that they a community of cheerleaders that throw around “hater”, “troll” and the popular newcomer “entitled”.
In my opinion, this doesn’t really convey a good image
Time to fecth the video and reupload it to check how fast SoJ will react.
The battle system seems similar to the one used in Valkyria Chronicles. Good thing the PSP isn’t region blocked.
Sigh …
Your video “Shining Ark teaser”, may have content that is owned or licensed by sega. As a result, the video has been blocked on YouTube.
@Chris K.
Agreed…smh.
A bit late to comment, but I can confirm the comments and ratings were taken down to stop fans from posting negative feedback regarding the DMCA takedowns. They started blocking comments and ratings when the uproar started and since then they’ve been doing this for all new Shining Ark videos (and only those, their other new videos have comments and ratings unlocked). They also seem to have told Sega of America not to respond to the fans’ questions regarding the matter, as even the community managers talk to the fans. Support tickets are also ignored, as are forum posts and tweets from fans looking for answers. None of the DMCA claims have been retracted, and even Youtube themselves are actively blocking counter claims from fans. As a result most videos and channels are still down. TotalBiscuit is also still boycotting Sega reviews and last we heard from him he doesn’t think Sega is going to drop the claims on his Shining Force playthrough videos.
It also seems to be more and more likely that Sega did this, at least in part, to control the search results for “Shining Ark” videos. MarauderEx is one of the few fans that managed to have his “Shining of the Holy Ark” videos restored, and those videos now appear on the first page of the Youtube search results for “Shining Ark”. Given the history between “classic” Shining Force fans and the developers of the new Shining franchise, it was probably also done as an attack on the fans of the old games, as no videos from Sega franchises have been taken down, at least not to this extent. Sadly not enough people really care about the matter so Sega is actually getting away with this. They may have stopped taking down videos (for now) but they already achieved their goal anyway.