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The end of ILLUSION (Patreon)

Published:
2023-07-14 11:16:06
Imported:
2026-06
Tags:

Content

EDIT: So apparently this was just a really bizarre rebranding(?), and they will continue making games under the ILLGAMES brand, starting with a KK-styled HoneySelect game (more info and mirror of trial on the discord server). Old games are still being pulled off the stores though.

--- Original message below ---

As some of you may already know, ILLUSION has sadly announced that they are closing down, starting today.

No new games or updates to existing games will be made, and on 2023/08/18 all of their existing games will be pulled off of Steam, DLsite and other stores. This means it will become impossible to get games made by ILLUSION legally after that point unless you buy a used disc. If you want to own KK and/or HS2 on Steam, make sure to buy it before that point!

It's unclear if VRKanojo and similar offshoots will be affected, but I'd buy it sooner rather than later if you were already thinking about it.

Twitter announcement post

Closure roadmap on their official website

If you'd like to discuss this and get up to date information, hop on the KK and/or IS discord servers. These servers are unaffiliated so they will not be affected.

What does this mean for existing users and modders?

In practice, nothing will change for their released games (like KK or HS2). The games will keep working while mods and unofficial patches will continue to be made and maintained.

The only difference for me is that I'll start looking for games from other companies to mod and make patches for instead of waiting for new games from Illusion.

Well, shucks :(

It's truly a sad day today, as they've been one of the oldest and the most consistent 3D eroge makers in history, and they've created many cult classic series like Artificial Girl, Artificial Academy, and many others. They'll now join TeaTime and REAL in the nostalgia land of HongFire and the old internet days :(

I hope that everyone has a good weekend. If anyone from Illusion reads this, please let me thank you for the countless hours of entertainment you've brought to me and many others. I wish you the best in your future endeavours.

Comments

lyr

Saw the steam message really sucks that the can’t continue making games

LosLos_Sensei

I saw that new too,it is really sad😭

IZSM

It was an amazing journey

Maxamilian Meeker

Will the people who own KK on Steam still be able to play or even access it?

Fonseca

The problem with woke society, I hope you keep your HS2L Mods available cause Im buying a new PX a need to intall agsin, cheers and kerp up the goid work

AnimeArtStalker

Well shit glad I grabbed Honey Select DX 2 while I did. According to their Steam announcement I'll still be able to play it. May grab Koikatsu before the 18th but I can't drop $100 on it at the moment.

ManlyMarco
>>112894976

Yes, you keep access to any game you bought on Steam even if the developer pulls it down.

ManlyMarco
>>112895274

I doubt this was the cause, they most likely got into financial trouble after multiple underperforming game releases. Mods won't be affected by this, don't worry.

Cjhappy

That really sucks, i was hoping to buy HS2 soon but not this soon, why are they removing the games from steam?

AnimeArtStalker

Nvm just bought Koikatsu anyway lol. Not risking it

setsuna200

So both Koikatsu and Koikatsu sunshine?

Reinstenberg

How could this happen? I'm still waiting for KKS to be localized!

ManlyMarco
>>112898174

Doesn't look like it will happen. Fan translation is getting close to complete though.

Chloe Saunders

They're closing down? Noooooooo! I was looking forward to Koikatsu Sunshine!

Reinstenberg
>>112898174

Thanks for reply, Marco. I'm a TC speaker and I'd say the KKP official TC localization is amazing. Too bad the time had come for Illusion to take leave of us...

Jovanie Rodriguez

Will you still update and maintain the HF packs for illusion games?

Ozzy Puzzles
>>112895274

Yeah I highly doubt the reason why the game company based in the country that's more accepting of sexual content in media shutted down because of "woke society". You're thinking of groups like Christians or loud women groups who are strongly against porn and the sexualization of women, but even then I highly doubt that's why they shutted down (let alone cause of a buzzword) considering they've been dealing with those critics for decades.

RaijinRonin

Well my hopes of an Artificial Academy 3 type game with Koikatsu character creation system is over I guess. Any idea on what games you might want to work on?

StoicThinker

Sad news indeed. I started Koikatsu a little over a year ago and I gotta say I love it. Shame others won't be able to enjoy it soon if they don't have it

ManlyMarco
>>112904008

Definitely Miconisomi games, especially the upcoming one. If anyone knows of similar games please let me know.

Ruben

Well shit witch of there games do you recommend I grab before they take them off?

TheProfessorsLeft

That's a shame. I kept putting it off, but I should probably pick up some of those expansions while I still can.

Sir Valentine

As an American I need a guide to pick up their titles because I'm not familiar with how they handle dl of their past games.

Ozzy Puzzles

Guess it's fitting that one of their last games was tropical themed, because while their fans were enjoying the bikini beach setting; there was trouble in paradise.

Pyroman31FF

That's really sad :(

Sndragon

Godd*mn it. Here I thought that with the advent of AI, their next step of evolution would be AI + VR Koikatsu. Which company should I place my hope in now T-T ?

kiterunnerdio
>>112900304

It's still available on dmm for now. You have about a month to buy what you need.

ManlyMarco
>>112927387

Get it on DLsite, which is fairly friendly to international audience and supports PayPal and such. If it's not available on there then don't bother, they went out of their way to make it difficult to buy their games outside of Japan.

Morepork
>>112895274

Omg save this shit for reddit. Woke is by far the most boring, lazy and uncritical critique of society.

Fonseca
>>112895274

Wouldn´t it be great if the World turned always around you ? LOL, but sorry, it doesn´t !!! The fact an original game with dicks and pussies, being sold at original price, coming vanilla with censorship is not WOKENESS at all, oh no it isn´t, tell you what, it is a glitch, dam Devs, a sad coincidence

Qian Yifan

A darkest day indeed. But this is the reason why I picked up everything from them on DLsite today and Discovered you in github.

Bri

So that im clear, if I were to uninstall kk because something went wrong with a update try to reinstall I will be fine right?

LateGamer547

Does that mean that Koikatsu Sunshine isn't coming to Steam on August 27th?

Diakai

I saw the news on Steam... 😔 So if I have a couple of these on Steam, should I go to to https://dlsoft.dmm.co.jp/ and buy them there too to save the install files? Looks like they have them on 10% sale there right now too.

ManlyMarco
>>112951148

Yes, if you own the game on Steam or DLsite you will be able to download it just fine. Not sure about DMM but it should be the same. You can just copy the installed game somewhere safe if you want to keep a backup too.

ManlyMarco
>>112960694

If you own the game on Steam you will be able to download it just fine, no need to also get it on DLsite. You can also just copy the installed game somewhere safe if you want to keep a backup too.

KuromaruFan

A truly sad day we wont forget! If you're looking for something new, maybe you can get involved in Projekt Melody's Big Bang Studio game engine.

John Tejada

If i were to choose between sunshine and regular koikatsu which one would you recommend?

Diakai
>>112960694

Awesome! Good to know about copying the installed file!

Commander Cream
>>112927387

Thank you, went through the trouble of getting Sunshine on FANZA, but DLsite looks like it'll be an easier alternative to get the Sunshine expansion on my next paycheck.

Michaelous

I see Koikatsu Sunshine complete set on DL would this be good?

ManlyMarco
>>112979388

If you want to play it as a game or for H (especially in VR) and you have to pick one, go for KKS. Both are mostly equivalent but KKS has better performance at the cost of cards/scenes not being loadable in KK.

Michaelous
>>113020440

I already have Party not Sunshine. a %18 coupon can make Sunshine with all the stuff $93 to $76.

Nobody

So, while back I picked up "Koikatsu Party" on Fakku!. Fakku! never released the "After Party" DLC. Could I pick it up the "After Party" DLC on Steam, and use it with the Fakku! version of Koikatsu, or would that DLC only work with the Steam version of the game?

Zachariah McElrath

i'm with Sndragon. i was really waiting to see where illusion, as well as the rest of the community would go with this. i've seen quite a few different styles/types games created with illusion as the base platform. i was really hoping to to see more genre specific games as well. or something with koikatsu's control/mechanics and hs&ai shoujo graphics

ManlyMarco
>>113072707

You can't really buy the DLC if you have the Fakku version unfortunately. If you got lucky and cosmic rays flipped a lot of bits on your drive in the shape of the DLC, you might have been able to copy it into the game and make it work though.

Jonathon Barton

If you feel like a *serious* challenge - bring Illusion Style Game and Story Mechanics to Virt-a-Mate. 😹

Sabre Mushy

Never bought a game on DLsite before, anyone know if you can run KKS without converting your PC over to Japanese? Or is that just a warning they put on everything from their site in case there isnt an english version?

Joseph Page'

HAD to be August. >.> this news Sucks hard.

Astro

So if i bought koikatsu on steam and buy the after party dlc on DLsite would there be a problem with installation?

ManlyMarco
>>113451551

You can still use the DLC but you must install HF Patch afterwards or it won't work properly with the Steam version of the game. If you have the DLC on Steam then it will work fine without the patch.

J Willson

HoneySelect2 recently was verified as playable on steamdeck. Will the patch be able to run on steamdeck too?

El Chunko

Could you switch support to Custom order maid 3d 2 if you are going to leave koikatsu behind because of this? They still release dlc to this day.

emptysteve

just bought kk party from steam and cant access the special patch from illusion site as it says internal error. does the hf patch include? sorry im new to this

Nathanael L Golser

The HF Patch files all say damaged or unreadable when trying to read them through winrar.

ManlyMarco
>>114131119

Do not use winrar. Pretty much any other modern file archiver should work, I recommend 7zip. If you have bin files then you can't extract them, use the .exe file included with the bin files to install the patch.

ManlyMarco
>>114003895

Yes, it's included. Official illusion site is down and will probably not come back up since they are closing down.

ManlyMarco
>>113920713

I'm not going to leave. The problem with maids is that the community is pretty entrenched and it's all paid DLC so there's not much space for a patch that avoids including paid stuff.

$@uron

Which version is better the steam or the dl site one... and is the DL site version in English?

emptysteve
>>114153772

If u use DL site u need to use a VPN as ur country may block u accessing the site and PayPal to buy the games. As I just brought sunshine. When I used internet explorer it translated the site to English for me.

emptysteve
>>114003895

Thank u just used the hf patch. I thought that was the case with the site as the company is winding down

Joshua Bautch

or hell, why not make a love letter or memorial to Illusion Soft by pulling together a team to make your OWN version of Koikatsu? (and maybe one that uses Vroid models)

asd asdas

Real sad news really. Grew up playing their games like Biko and even the infamous Ra*eLay which was actually one of my favorite game by them. Guess good things never last forever. Though I must say.. their quality has been dropping for many years now despite tech improved. Probably because the older staffs were already no longer with the company. P.S don't stop Marco the ero game community needs you 😂

idrisz19
>>114196574

Concerning Vroid models, the V-Sekai team is currently working on adding VRM 1.0 support to Godot via a plug-in.

Frozen Saiyajin

Is the download section of the game down as well? it wont load any characters for me

$@uron
>>114153772

But is there's a difference between the steam and the DL Site version like cut content? And I mean if the game is translated to English in DL site. And thanks for the suggestion of the VPN.

idrisz19
>>114196574

Your suggestion presumably requires a game engine with VRM support, so I suggested Godot.

$@uron

Holding on from buying HS2 cause in Steam there is HS2LibidoDX and in DLSite it says that the HS2LibidoDX is a DLC so Steam sells only the dlc? So waiting if anyone can clarify me that.... at least before the 18.

ManlyMarco
>>114233332

Yeah, it's a real shame. As unlikely as it was, now we definitely won't get AG4 or AA3. I'm not going to give up so no worries.

ManlyMarco
>>114196574

The parent company still owns the IP and does not seem interested in selling it so it's still copyright protected.

ManlyMarco
>>114153772

Depends, Steam versions are cheaper once you include DLCs. KK darkness doesn't work on the steam version but most people don't even want it. After you install HF Patch then the content is pretty much the same otherwise in all of the games. DLsite versions are only in Japanese while Steam versions are in Japanese, English and Chinese. HF Patch adds English to the JP-only releases.

Clutch

I don't think this is said enough but thanks for all your work, Marco. Sad news indeed.

Joshua Bautch
>>114196574

No I meant like your own original IP that is IN Functionality Similar to Koikatsu but instead maybe using Vroid Models

kn ny

They seem to have started a new game maker called ILLGAMES.

Dr.Sheperd#0004

Oh well, I still bought the remaking games before they get pulled either way

Eric J

Lame. I just dropped over $500 buying their library. All their games will likely be back after they rebrand all of them too. Super lame... Huzzah!

Diakai

Well shucks!!!! (To the rebranding)

Frostfx23

That’s good to hear is just a rebranding

Ozzy Puzzles

So, wait, was this all a marketing stunt? Also they're still taking their "old games" off the store? Do they mean games that are actually old, or every game that was under the Illusion brand.

idrisz19
>>114485974

I think Illusion and Illgames are two separate companies. The person(s) with assess with Illusion's "@Projecti18" Twitter is involved with Illgames though, so I would say that it's safe to assume that Illgames is a spiritual successor to Illusion, but the key word here is "spiritual". I don't believe that Illusion's catalogue of games have been transferred to Illgames, so I think that the old Illusion games will still cease to be sold.

ManlyMarco
>>114485974

If this was a separate company then they wouldn't be able to use assets from KK and HS2, and the trial definitely has some. Like I said it's just bizarre.

Ozzy Puzzles
>>114485974

I'm starting to get the impression that "Illusion" really sucks at communicating with their audiences.

MpMan
>>114485974

i think th new game , a honey select 3 ++ , they need a lot money , and with this stunt , they will basically make illusion hoard a lot of money for illgame to use.

OriUni
>>114258023

Damn no wonder. Now its up to making creations by myself..

asd asdas
>>114478041

I don't think so. We don't really know what happen to Illusion internally, people suspect it's debt or what sort. Illusion is officially no more, which is why all products are being pulled. Illgames is a totally "new" branding that has nothing to do with illusion don't think they can legally just sell the old products officially unless illusion was actually absorb by Illgames which is not what happened

asd asdas
>>114233332

guess you get to do what you do xD Looking forward to your new stuff soon

vladeemer

Just popping in to express my wish for Room Girl Paradise to get modded. Thanks for all you do!