#my art would not be what it is now if it weren't for a3!

[hakogyi]

thank you for 7 years! 🌸🌻🍂❄️

[otdiaftg]

The Raven King - Chapter Nine

Day: Saturday, October 14th Time: 3:10 PM EST

"Dad liked partying it up with the other rich shits of New York," Matt said, "but his party favors were drugs. He let me—encouraged me, even—to try whatever I wanted so I would fit in. When Mom realized what was going on she took time off from the circuit to get me clean. We thought I was okay until I started here. The juniors we had back then were into some pretty heavy things, and I was tempted. The only way I stayed sober was by hiding from them. Last year the monsters joined our team. It took Andrew all of two weeks to figure out something wasn't right with me, and he took it upon himself to fix things. They invited me out with them to Columbia. When we got there Andrew gave me speedballs." Neil's stomach bottomed out. "He what?" "He didn't make me take them," Matt was quick to say. "He just offered them, and I was drunk and stupid and desperate enough to say yes." "Coach should have kicked him off the team." "He should have, except Andrew cleared it with Matt's mother first," Dan said, jaw tightening a little in old anger. "She knew Matt was having a hell of a time here and she wanted him to kick the habit for good. Andrew promised he could help, so she gave him her blessing. She flew in for the summer to help walk Matt through withdrawal and asked Coach not to punish Andrew. She even offered to pay Coach for the trouble." "But—" "No harm, no foul," Allison said carelessly. When Neil stared at her, she gestured at Matt. "You can't really have an opinion on this because you weren't here then. You didn't see what Matt was like. It was pathetic. He couldn't even look any of us in the face. Look at him now. The monster's methods might have been a little extreme but they worked." "You're not really okay with this," Neil said to Matt. "What if it backfired? What if you hadn't gotten back up again?" "Andrew had too much invested in Matt's success to let him fail," Renee said, speaking slowly like she was choosing her words with great care. Neil guessed she knew Andrew's reasons better than anyone else did, given herfriendship with him. "I don't know if they've talked to you about Aaron's history, but you understand Andrew's, don't you? He's not allowed to fight his addiction. Watching Matt struggle was very hard on them both." Her reference to Aaron didn't make sense at first, but then Neil remembered. On his second trip out to Eden's Twilight he asked Andrew why he bothered with cracker dust. Andrew said they'd picked the habit up for Aaron's sake. Just the other week Nicky mentioned that Aaron used his mother's drugs, though he hadn't specified what all she'd been into. Chances were cracker dust was a paltry substitute. Watching Matt crumble under temptation would have wrecked hell on Aaron's own sobriety. Neil was starting to rethink how apathetic Andrew was about Aaron's life. Matt misinterpreted Neil's silence. "You're a year too late to get mad on my behalf, Neil. Trust me: I'm okay. I'm more than okay, really. I thought rehab was bad the first time through. The second time almost killed me. It definitely killed any chance of me being tempted ever again. I'm clean for good and I feel better than ever." Neil needed more time to figure out how to feel about this, but it wasn't his life, so he said only, "It's your fight."

Art used with permission by rainbowd00dles. Thank you @rainbowd00dles

[otakumakes]

It's times like these where the fanbase needs to be clear with the company. We can't just roll over and let the Mankai Theater be taken away from us. We're all Sakuya and Izumi right now, and the company is Sakyo.

The show must go on!

Debt day is looming actors and directors, and unless we can convince the company otherwise we will all lose out on our accounts and home within the Mankai family !!!

I agree, there was little to no advertising for A3 outside of thr Fandom doing the labor. Fanart, lyric videos, and fan makes or clips from the game was the only legitimate talk of thr game outside of the game itself I saw. It was because of the Fandom I got into the game! I absorbed information via fanart, got interested and asked, then I downloaded the game and I've played almost everyday since.

But official advertisements or merch? Nada. Nil. None. Especially for us English members.

Obey Me is a wonderfully done game, albeit the advertisements fall into the clichéd "not as advertised" ads we've all seen lately--they populate my YouTube, Facebook and here in Tumblr. People who don't play the game have seen it.

It's had such a boon in the last 2 years whereas A3 has pittered to a halt, and I too blame the lack of marketing!

It would be a wonderful breath of fresh air for there to be ads on YouTube, and content on YouTube itself. The official page for the english server legit has 2 videos....both under 2 mins. One is a trailer for thr game itself and the other is for Act 2s release.....

And that's it.

No events. No songs. No merch alerts. No demonstrations on how to play the game. Nothing!

Obey me has taken to releasing Character songs, audio dramas and a radio show from the voice actors a d LET ME TELL YOU WE ARE ALL FAST AS LIGHTENING WHEN THAT SHIT DROPS

A3 fans weren't given this opportunity. We had to get what we could from the JP servers or merch or shows outside the game.

Imagine the amount of ad revenue they'd get for releasing copies of in game songs. Trailers for each of the past events with the special songs, some voiced clips and pictures you can earn from each?

All the coding is already in there. You don't have to add anything new to the game. You just need to let people KNOW that it's there and worth playing!

And I don't think you'd even have to pay for someone to edit it!!

Run a contest: create a video for the official A3 English servers youtube! Win X amount to Gems and have your video featured and credited in game and on the official YouTube page!

If you want to show the best of something, you let someone whose passionate about it handle it. Cause it'll be a labor of love, and they'll do it justice!

You'd give back to the community who loves the game, actually show what the game is like, and pique the interest of new players!

It would drum up interest for things already in game. They could reopen the store to allow people to support via irl cash for in game Gems and rewards in order to read the past stories, delay the shut down and watch profits rise as the community does what it does best: create art filled with love and admiration and support the object of their affection.

Even if it's too expensive to run two separate servers, there should be a way for English readers to transfer over to the JP server and just...change the language.

I don't like to keep comparing it, but Obey Me has language options! If someone's English isn't great, they can take it into their native language as long as it's offered! Right there in thr app itself! No separate app needed for another language!

If A3 would make merch more available to English players, I believe it too would help support the company financially. I've seen recordings of Live stage plays for the game--why isn't that available on DVD or for digital download from YouTube? Live concerts as well!

Why haven't I heard of plushies of Mr triangle (aside from rhe one I made) or a marshmallow pillow or a penguin plushie!? Why on earth hasn't there been any chibi plushies advertised for the actors? I've seen them. People in the Fandom show them off! Yet the company did little to promote that they were available...

Whatever happened to the anime? Are they going to continue it? Is it permanently in hiatus? Was it stopped?

Despite the Twitter updating when it was time for an update or a maintenance announcement...we were kept in thr dark about a lot!

Transparency is a must, especially when things are rocky and the future is up in the air like this.

Make sure you tell the devs (POLIETLY MIGHT I ADD) that you want to help keep the game available, and to help it thrive and grow. Let them know your experiences with rhe Fandom and how they can better engage with us to help us, help them.

Here’s a video on how to reach Liber/Eng staff about the termination of the English server:

[Video ID: Player is in the A3! app, the songs “Insert the Sunshine” and “Slowly Flowing”, both OST from the game, are playing. The player click on the profile icon, (the content isn’t important). They click on their bio and write “Hi” with a kaomoji on the side, then they write a letter “i” and hesitate before deleting it and click off. They exist their bio and leave the profile page. They instead click on the “Support” button which leads them to a page titled “A3! for Appstore inquires”, there’s a hyperlink that reads “For feedback regarding the ceasing of operations”, and below that in smaller writing it reads “Frequently asked questions (FAQs)”. There are four options viable to the viewer, “I want to play on another device”, “I have received my purchased Gems”, “I can’t login. / I got error 904/905/906.” The player clicks on the hyperlink that leads them to a page to give feedback, it has a green banner and says “For feedback edgar ceasing of operations. Below it reads: “Players that have any opinions or feedback on regarding ceasing of operations can do so here. A disclaimer is below that reads “*Although feedback from users will be reviewed, we cannot respond to individual users”. Green text above a box is present after scrolling, it reads “Please input your feedback here.” The user types in “don’t please ahaha you’re (stylized as ur) so sexy” with a winky emoji, they then access their emoji keyboard and place a broken heart. They can clarify “Actually write something serious though (written tho) with a kaomoji of a smiling person, then press done (two exclamation points) don’t spam and remember to be kind (two exclamation points)”. They then click off the page and settings, the video ends with them on the main page of the game. End ID]

Bellow the readmore is what I ended up (actually) submitting, if you want to copy and paste it, please make a few changes! But ultimately what I felt like was needed to highlight:

- Marketing issues and comparisons between other games that handled international marketing.

- The sudden nature of the announcement and how it impacted the player base.

- The fact the game does have a fanbase and has a market (leads back to the point of bad marketing), and that the success in Japan is an example that the game does have ability to be a hit.

- Other options that don’t include terminating the server (such as a temporary hiatus).

—

Other ideas: Events to connect with the fanbase (example: art contests where winners get “X” amount of gems), twitter events (“Y” amount of retweets in “Z” days will give “X” reward”), subtitles of the stage play so international fans have more content to interact with, etc.

DISCLAIMER: I wrote this while still drowsy from crying and sleep medication, so if you’re able to, please help us write something better than… this.

“Hello, I hope this review/feedback finds you well.

As you can imagine, this is about the ceasing operations of the A3! English/International servers, and the opinions and ideas I (as well as other players) have.

I’ve been observing the way the player base has reacted to the news and, not so surprisingly, the reaction has been pretty negative. A lot of players feel overwhelmed with the sudden news, many disappointed at – what feels like – the sidedness of the decision. While we are all thankful for the amazing localization of the game, we can’t help but feel deeply saddened and, in more extreme cases, betrayed at the decision. The game has garnered quite a community, notably in social media sites such as Twitter and Tumblr, as it became quite a vital and comfort game for many.

Alongside seeing the way the player base has reacted, I looked at the graphics and economical side of things and noticed how players in the server have been lowering. Which, alongside the pandemic and loss of profit Cybrid and Liber have been experiencing as of the last two years, is what I imagine is impulsing the decision to halt activities.

With all of that in mind, I personally still think that terminating content to the English server is a bad idea — in the long run, that is.

The last two years have been quite a financial struggle for many, and to decide to end the game due to loss of profit seems hasty. While I understand it’s not possible to continue operations, I think halting operations until further notice would be a better idea.

Instead of completely pulling the plug, halting operations while focusing on marketing would honestly work better.

The marketing of the game has been, for lack of a better word, quite messy. I think there were lot of missed opportunities, marketing the game as found family and card game — where you accompany a group of people to achieve their dreams — would have been a better strategy than saying it was an otome game - which is what led to a lot of player joining and then leaving due to the lack of romance wh the characters. A good example of marketing, in my opinion, would be the Obey Me! franchise or games such as Cookie Run.

I’m saying all of this, but what I mean is, if the team behind it focused more on the advertisement on social media’s such as twitter and ads on youtube where the nature of found family and the true nature of Mankai (a company where family and brotherly love blooms) the game would find and flourish in the demographic, since it’s not unheard of players wanting a game like that — especially in the west.

Basically, what I’m saying is that I think the idea of terminating operations on the English server is a bad idea especially when there is an obvious marker for it, and A3! really does fit it. Personally, I think halting the events and focusing on marketing the game further — truly pushing the game with ad’s (which could include in game CG’s where we see how the boys grow and connect as a family) where the nature of A3! is shown clearly, A3! English server could absolutely bloom into something amazing.

A3! is about not giving up, even when things get tough, and to try and reach an audience – which is why, I guess, seeing you guys give up on it seems… sad and like a truly missed opportunity.

As someone who’s been with the game since launch, the game has so much potential, so please, please give it another try. Focus on the marketing, push it with ads on youtube and instagram, put the boys’ face out there and make the focus of the story known.

Look into the way games such as Obey Me!, the idol games (mostly female based), and other successful asian/japanese games have marketed themselves and try to adapt it into A3!. An example, instagram ads where you can see parts of a CG (let’s say the Muku and Yuki from Act 1) where Muku comforts Yuki, the voice lines there as you hear the game music and subtitles playing. Be honest about the gameplay, it’s not the most exciting, but market it as fun, add more rewards for when you train the actor — more gems or maybe trophies if you train “X” amount of times in a day instead of just a training card. You can even make more Eng server exclusive cards to insensitive Japanese players to also engage with the English server.

I feel like there are so many ways to go about it that don’t include shutting down the game, because shutting down the game truly feels like the easiest way out… but it doesn’t mean it’s the best way.

Anyway, I hope nothing in this feels malicious, I'm simply passionate about it as someone who’s invested hours and hours, almost 700 days of their life, onto this, A3! and the Mankai company feels like a part of my life, and as many others feel as well, I don’t want to let go. Not when I know there’s so many events and games, gachas and character, left for us as international players to experience.”