Pix'n Love Publishing Frustrations - Part 2

[UPDATE: Pix'n Love is deleting negative feedback on their most recent Facebook posts. You know, where people complain that they're not receiving their books, refund, tracking number, email, or any sort of response whatsoever from Pix'n Love. Instead of addressing the issue, they're just sweeping it under the rug. So when you look at the page, it has Pix'n Love asking for feedback, and almost only positive responses. How lovely.]

Here we are again...

A few months ago, I posted about a certain French publisher and their abysmal business practices. Jump ahead to now. Where are we with our promises, Pix'n Love Publishing? Have we learned anything, or tried to make up for past slights?

Whoa! An actual updated website? Actual books in stock? After all this waiting, you've finally come through, Pix'n Love! I'm so happy! Time to just walk away with this good happy feeling inside without investigating further!

Except...Hmm. Upon closer inspection, only the surface of the site has been touched up. The History of Nintendo volumes are still listed as "In Stock," but prices of these books elsewhere are nearly double Pix'n Love's listing, so I'm going to say that part hasn't been updated. And the Gunpei Yokoi biography is still listed as "TBA" for a release date, so...I guess that hasn't changed either.

But hey, The History of Mario is finally out! Really surprising, actually. I'm sure tons of people are looking forward to ordering, reading, and enjoying it for years to come.

But what's that, right at the top? Let me take a closer look...

500 copies!? Are you serious? After all this time, only 500 English copies are going into circulation? That's a pretty low number. So people that find out months down the road are probably going to be out of luck, huh? Dang. I would guess that Pix'n Love is taking a hard financial hit on these books, since they took pre-order money before figuring out how much it was going to cost (which is incredibly stupid, by the way). They claim that the 500 is in addition to the pre-order copies, but I highly doubt it.

Well, at least your general business practices have improved, right? That's a relief...wait, what?

I'm really not surprised. It's just their same old practice of stealing money. Here's their "excuse" as to why they didn't respond:

It's just the same old story of Pix'n Love trying to shove the blame elsewhere and avoid responsibility. You would think that the whole team going to an expo right after taking orders would be something you would notify customers of (or at least set up an automated email response). Nobody is left to manage orders, process money received, contact buyers, or ship things out. And the Japan Expo is July 2 - 6. People placed orders as early as June 17. That excuse doesn't cover all your bases of inadequacy, especially when you posted this more than ten days prior:

You are a business. You have taken people's money. You are expected to follow through on delivering a product and having some sort of customer service. Especially when you've repeatedly stated time and time again that your top priority is communication with your English customers. Whatever though, am I right? It's not like Pix'n Love has a shady past dealing with English customers, right? It's not like they have to try and regain trust, right? And I love how they use the phrase "after-sales service." It's a terrible attempt to conceal the statement, "We will do our best to actually send you what you paid for and not just flat out steal your money."

Let's delve a bit into Pix'n Love itself for a moment, shall we? One of the three founders behind the whole operation is Jean-Marc Demoly. He has experience in the publishing industry prior to Pix'n Love (though how he defines "experience" is surely different from most). Harold Goldberg, who wrote the book All Your Base Are Belong to Us, actually went to the publishing company Demoly worked for back then (MCES Publishing), and had the pleasure of having Demoly as a representative. You can read all about Goldberg's wonderful experiences here. If you don't have time to read the article, just know the title is "When A Publisher Tries To Scam You."

Demoly obviously has not changed, but simply helped create a company where he doesn't have to answer to anyone above him, thus avoiding being let go for incompetence. There's an interview he gave with Retro Collect back in 2011 (before the shit hit the fan), where he drops the statement that sums up Pix'n Love Publishing to a T:

Retro Collect: To bring this interview to a close we would like to thank and congratulate you for expanding the audience of your writings with these English translations. Is there anything left you want to tell our readers?

Jean-Marc Demoly: Thanks for your congratulations, we really appreciate the compliments! We are fans rather than businessmen, so we are not very proficient in marketing, advertising and all those boring things.

There you have it, firsthand from the man himself. Aren't you glad that somebody with that set of skills and mindset is in charge of your money and the books you love? Yeah, forget all that "boring stuff," like refunding money, shipping products, and communicating with customers. Yuck. But back to the original topic of this post:

In addition to The History of Mario, there's a previously unannounced book that was just released! That's almost unbelievable. It's the Mario Goodies Collection, a brief documentation of the largest Mario-themed collection in the world. There's even two versions available. There's a normal "Classic" edition, and a "Tanuki Limited" edition. Wow, I guess it's kind of an apology for all those years of screwing people over. I'm sure nothing will go wrong with this. Heh heh heh...

If you were planning on getting the limited edition, it's already sold out. Sorry! Limited to 150 copies. Oh, did you read their Facebook page and think that there were 200? Sorry, according to their official site, it's only 150. Thanks for that, Pix'n Love.

And I really don't see Pix'n Love updating their site when the Classic edition is gone (see: the aforementioned History of Nintendo series). For all we know, that's already out of stock too. So order that at your own risk. I would say the main reason the Mario Goodies Collection was printed is because it's 95% pictures, so virtually no translation was necessary. They have learned at least one thing though. The English text is printed right below the French. So they save some money on printing costs by doing it all in one batch.

But look at what the sales say about the level of interest. 150 copies gone in less than a month. Now is the time to keep that momentum going, Pix'n Love. The interest is high, the demand is high, so get more shit translated, printed, and sent out like you've been claiming to want to do for years. Oh, but wait...that's just the "boring stuff." Never mind.

I can't imagine this will change anything. What will probably happen is that the hype over the History of Mario and Mario Goodies Collection books will build, Pix'n Love will announce newer translated books, take pre-orders, but then not release them for 3+ years (if at all). Anger will build up again, but this time by new people that don't know the publisher's and Demoly's history. It will be even easier for them to fool people because as stated above, Pix'n Love is flat out deleting negative feedback and comments from people that have their money stolen.

I can hear the laughter all the way from France.

Please don't forget! You can still pre-order the English printing of the Gunpei Yokoi biography! I'm sure it will be released quite soon!

Yeah, it's not happening.

The fact that Pix'n Love, the company of thieves, is offering to give a refund, could not send a clearer message.

I would love to be proven wrong. Every book I have that has somehow managed to make it over here is fantastic. I would love to have the ability to own more. So prove me wrong, Pix'n Love. The challenge stands. And I know how steep it is for you.

Pix'n Love Publishing Frustrations - Part 1

[UPDATE: The founder of this company (who is discussed in Part 2) jumped shipped in 2013. With his horrendous track record, it is a safe bet that a large amount of people will never get their money back. Consider it effectively stolen. But don't worry, because he started yet another company! It's way easier to scam people if you do it fresh each time.]

In earlier posts, I talked about the brilliant books by Florent Gorges and Isao Yamazaki, The History of Nintendo - Vol. 1 and The History of Nintendo - Vol. 2. I also mentioned if you wanted to buy these books, why you should avoid the publisher (Pix'n Love Publishing) like the plague. Get the books from Amazon, eBay, or some other reputable site. Here's why in one sentence:

They've stolen money from a lot of people.

Pix'n Love is based in France, and has practically no ability to deal with international business. If you go to their english Twitter, Facebook, or official website, you will find it is poorly maintained and rarely updated. If you go through the comments of their Facebook posts, you will find a majority of people that have placed both orders and pre-orders, only to never hear from the publisher again. Pix'n Love has no issue with taking your money, they just won't deliver. It isn't like Amazon, where you're charged once your order actually ships. Your card is charged as soon as you make that order/pre-order, no questions. Refunds are sluggish (if they ever happen at all). People contact Pix'n Love multiple times in every way possible, only to run into a brick wall. Apparently, they only have one english translator, who is not involved in any of the actual business side of things. He only relays the messages, which are simply ignored.

The excuse you will find littering their posts is something like, "We are a small publishing company based in France. We are still figuring out all of the intricacies of this business." I could see that statement working maybe once, but it has become their company mantra. What's worse, it's a bald-faced lie. It is infuriating if you check out their French website, because they are cranking out books like clockwork (seriously, see the bottom of this post). What's really happened is that they figured they could jump into the international market, found out it's not that easy, and just gave up. But don't worry, they decided to keep all the money they've already received. Even if you order and pay for the books that are already out (e.g. History of Nintendo - Vol. 1), you still won't get them.

The three books people have been waiting for the most are The History of Nintendo - Vol. 3, the Gunpei Yokoi biography, and The History of Mario. Pix'n Love announced pre-orders for the Yokoi and Mario books. Years ago. And started taking money for them. Years ago. They stated they were already done, going through the final touches, and ready to print. Years ago. People have been sitting with their wallets down cash and their thumbs up their asses waiting. For years. Any updates from Pix'n Love? Not really. Once all the negative reception started heating up, they just started ignoring everybody. All their regular posting stops right around the end of 2012. Even on their official website, the availability for the Yokoi and Mario books were at "Sep. 2012" up until maybe a month or so ago, when it changed to simply "TBA."

Check out that release date. Yeah.

They also did a History of Sonic and Devil May Cry book, but what they decided to do was jump the printing queue with these since they had official support and collaboration with SEGA, Capcom, Ninja Theory, and UDON. Even though they were written, edited, and translated after the three aforementioned books (and after people had already paid for them), Pix'n Love decided to deliver the Sonic and Devil May Cry books first due to official support. I would assume a large part of it is that SEGA, Capcom, and UDON handled a lot (if not all) of the international business stuff themselves. If they hadn't, I doubt they would have been released outside of France at all, since Pix'n Love is so inadequate. And a lot of their posts are things like, "We really want to release these books so badly." I guess they just assume that everyone in North America is a total moron.

They're acting like it's someone else's fault. Um, the release of these books is up to nobody but you, Pix'n Love. If you "really really want to release them," then start making it happen instead of shirking responsibility and whining like a child. They also state that they're trying to make the purchase price lower, because international costs and all that. I understand that, but you already took people's pre-order money. Do you understand what a pre-order is? It's when you say, "This is what it costs. When you pay $X.XX amount, you get the book." Your statement of trying to figure out how much it's going to cost after taking pre-orders is one of the most idiotic things I've ever heard.

If you type any of the book titles into any search engine, results are praising the hell out of the books that have been translated, and announcing the imminent release of others. It's because the books are really freaking good, but nobody goes farther in-depth about Pix'n Love's business practices. The sites are just going off of the empty promises Pix'n Love has been making and leaving it at that. Most of the relevant articles are also from circa 2012, further giving evidence that Pix'n Love just stopped giving a shit for their international customers. If they would just announce that they're not releasing any books outside of France, then at least that would put the matter to rest. Instead, they've decided to drag a ton of hopeful buyers along behind their train of crap for no reason other than to keep those buyers' money. If they announced the books officially cancelled, then they'd have to refund them. Oh no!

I would admit fault if Pix'n Love actually released all the stuff they've been promising for years. Even on the inside cover of The History of Nintendo - Vol. 1, it states that "coming very soon" are The History of Nintendo series all the way up through Volume 4, not to mention the Takahashi Meijin and Gunpei Yokoi biographies. It's just so frustrating that these brilliant books are being handled by the most incompetent publisher ever. If I was Gorges, Yamazaki, or any of these authors, I'd be super pissed that all my hard work is only reaching a percentage of people that would absolutely love to read/purchase it. Many posts on Facebook are people stating that they'll put up with practically anything in order to get these books because they want them so badly. Pix'n Love is taking that to heart, using it as admission to take their money. I feel so bad for these people, because they're practically brainwashing themselves.

It's so frustrating, because going through their French site, they know what they're doing, and they're really good at it. They just can't do the international side to save their life. So don't even tempt us with empty promises, you pieces of garbage. Or hire another company to take care of that side for you (e.g. The History of Sonic) if you really want to release your books in other languages and countries (as you repeatedly state you do). The fact that we don't have these books doesn't bother me as much as the fact that you take people's money and then do nothing but repeatedly apologize and avoid the issue.

Bottom line, if you want any of the few really good books that have been translated, get them from Amazon, eBay, or somewhere else where you know you'll get what you're paying for. And for everything sacred, do not order anything from Pix'n Love directly. You might as well rip your money up right now. Oh, and if you were planning on pre-ordering The History of Mario on Amazon, apparently it has been removed entirely from that site, which is just another sign that it's never going to happen over here.

Are you telling me you don't have the capital or ability to do more (or at least get things moving), Pix'n Love? Because when I check out your French site, I see things like this:

But it's good to know that your numerous statements about caring about getting a measly two repeatedly delayed books to us are truthful, and you're really trying your hardest. Thanks, Pix'n Love Publishing!

It's basically a copy/paste post from September 2012. Laughable.