Just look at the history of releases for Hou. They were released about every 6 months. Except this one, which took over a year because MangaGamer had other priorities and the developer that works on this (Doddler) didn't have time to do so as a result. Hopefully, they're back on track, so I would look for it 6 months after this one, and the next 6 months after that. Or if we're lucky, they'll release sooner to make up for the schedule slippage, but only if Doddler is able to get to them.

This isn't the initial release of these even in English. MangaGamer released all 8 question and answer arcs once before, so if you can get ahold of those, you can read them. BUT there were a couple of issues: (1) the translation quality wasn't as great; (2) the music was a bit messed up, because MG replaced some of the music due to copyright concerns and ended up reducing the number of tracks, so even patches can't completely restore it (Hou, in contrast, aims to restore all of it). They also withdrew them from sale, apparently for licensing reasons. So now, you can only get them secondhand.

About the music thing, I should clarify: the original and MG's original release both used engines with scripts that get compiled to bytecode, making them not very easy to edit. It's possible, so one technically could fix the music issue, but it's not very easy. In contrast, Hou uses a new engine with provision specifically made for modding the scripts.

An example of this difference: The original MG releases were out for years, but there were no perfect mods to fix the music. On the other hand, as it happens, there was a problem originally with the Hou version of this arc, where they forgot to restore some of the music, and someone here on the Steam Community was able to very quickly mod the scripts to fix it, so we had that until it was officially fixed.

Originally posted by _newtz:

Is it available elsewhere? Are there updates when CH 7 will be on Steam?

Sometime before the heat death of the universe, assuming Mangagamer stays on schedule.

according to the Project Status on the blog from MangaGamer, both Chapter 7 and 8 are in the editing phase

Originally posted by Lenshiro:

according to the Project Status on the blog from MangaGamer, both Chapter 7 and 8 are in the editing phase

I think it's said that for eons.

Originally posted by Erebus:

I think it's said that for eons.

This is true, that page is rarely updated for the games that have been listed on it the longest.

To be honest, I'm just glad they're being released. I'm a Mac user, and I remember when Arcs 1-5 were on iOS but they stopped releasing after that. So I was over the moon when I found out these were being released for Mac.

Originally posted by Erebus:

Originally posted by _newtz:

Is it available elsewhere? Are there updates when CH 7 will be on Steam?

Sometime before the heat death of the universe, assuming Mangagamer stays on schedule.

I think chapter 7 and 8 won't take as long as chapter 6 did because between chapter 5 and 6 Umineko When they cry (question arcs, answer arcs and Golden fantasia) were released which might be a reason chapter 6 got delayed.

Originally posted by Lenshiro:

Originally posted by Erebus:

Sometime before the heat death of the universe, assuming Mangagamer stays on schedule.

I think chapter 7 and 8 won't take as long as chapter 6 did because between chapter 5 and 6 Umineko When they cry (question arcs, answer arcs and Golden fantasia) were released which might be a reason chapter 6 got delayed.

If memory serves the scripting and ♥♥♥♥ was done for 6,7, and 8 for a long ass time. Engine work was the cause for the delay cause they prioritized other projects. I don't even think the all the same people are working on Hig and Umineko.

Originally posted by Erebus:

If memory serves the scripting and ♥♥♥♥ was done for 6,7, and 8 for a long ass time. Engine work was the cause for the delay cause they prioritized other projects.

If you're referring to this tweet, they described it as "out of TLC and editing".

I know TL is sometimes a substitute for Translation, but what's TLC other than Tender Loving Care ("Editing")?

I'm really not sure myself. "Translation, localization, c??????"?? Maybe an alternate term to "TL", or they just added a letter by mistake??

I think TLC means "translation checking". Also, does anyone know exactly what more needs to be done if they already have the translated script, music, engine, and (most) sprites/art from previous chapters?

I imagine it'd include inserting the new translated lines and scripting each scene in the new engine, but can't most of that be automated somehow if they already have the files from the original game and from their initial release of the series?

Okay, I'll go with that interpretation.

As far as I've been aware of, the last step they announce before deployment has been editing, so far.