D&D 5E WotC Takes Control of D&D Translations

WotC has just announced that it is taking direct control of French, Italian, German, and Spanish versions of its D&D books (which previously were licensed to third parties).

They’ll also be looking for new printers outside the US and China, and pricing books more equally in non-US markets.

Localised social media accounts are being launched as well as localised pages on the D&D website.

The first products will be the Essentials Kit in September, along with the three core rulebooks.

The initial focus will be Europe and Latin America.

D&D Products in New Languages | Dungeons & Dragons

Read about efforts to create a truly global D&D community with the localization of select products in French, German, Spanish, and Italian.

dnd.wizards.com

 

[MoonSong]

I hope WotC will translated the names of monsters and places when this was reasonabely possible. We don't like the "Spanglish" in the Game Workshop's last sourcebooks.

In the motherland perhaps... here on this side of the pond some English is acceptable when the alternative is overtranslating. That is why we have computadora and archivo instead of ordenador and fichero. In general, translations made in Spain tend to fare very badly and look odd, childish and not serious/rigorous enough.

Any serious attempt at a distribution here would need its own translation which resonates with the conventions that work in here.

 

[thom_likes_gaming]

Posters from/in Germany, do you think this will pose a significant challenge to Das Schwarze Auge, or is that too entrenched as the fantasy RPG of choice to make a difference?

There has already been a German version (licensed by Galeforce9 to Ulisses, far as I know). And d&d has always been a major player on the German market, probably still sells more than DSA (though a lot of English units, I would imagine).

DSA has it's own loyal following,
I doubt this move will mean much to them.

I'm sad for my former colleagues at Ulisses, hoping they find enough other projects to keep their freelancers busy

 

[Paul Farquhar]

Many - possibly the majority - of place names in the UK have elements that are not part of modern English (e.g. wick, thorpe, chester) and you see that mimicked in some D&D names. Should they be translated or left as is?

"Caer" is particularity popular in fantasy.

 

[Whizbang Dustyboots]

No, only Spanish translations from Edge Entertainment (though Gale Force 9, if I'm not mistaken). And there's no distribution to Latin America, so purchasing the books directly from Spain is quite expensive. Usually, if you can manage reading English, it's much more affordable to just buy the books in English.

Here's hoping that changes.

 

[Jadeite]

DSA's main competion is probably Splittermond, another german RPG created by former members of the DSA team. DSA has lost much of the importance it used to have. In the 80s and 90s, while it was still being published by Schmidt Spiele, you could buy its supplements in most toy stores and Das Schwarze Auge was synonymous with RPGs in general, similar to D&D in the anglosphere.

There has already been a German version (licensed by Galeforce9 to Ulisses, far as I know). And d&d has always been a major player on the German market, probably still sells more than DSA (though a lot of English units, I would imagine).

DSA has it's own loyal following,
I doubt this move will mean much to them.

I'm sad for my former colleagues at Ulisses, hoping they find enough other projects to keep their freelancers busy

Ulisses is also translating Pathfinder, so there should be some work for freelancers left.

 

[Zehnseiter]

Yes, and you heard that right, Ulisses Spiele, publisher of DSA, had been the translator for D&D books in Germany, talk about business incentives at cross purposes!

Not really. Ulisses Spiele also translates Pathfinder.

They are not concerned about D&D taking customers away from The Dark Eye as that game offers something that D&D cannot match in its current publication mode. The main selling point of TDE is it's very detailed and more then 30 year ongoing setting that gets as much material published per year as Forgotten Realms got at the heights of AD&DII.

The game has to put it simply a different customer base as D&D. In Germany D&D has often the reputation as the gonzo beer and pretzel game that you play when you take a break from more deep and detailed TDE campaigns.

Personally speaking that announcement of WotC taking over the publishing makes me fear that support for German D&D translations will dry up. They didn't do a good job with 3E and 4E translations to German and at least with Ulisses doing the translations for Gale force 9 we actually got most of the stuff available for 5E translated to German language.

 

[Lucas Yew]

I wish the South Korean version gets the same direct treatment ASAP (especially on the general quality dept.). As stated sometime ago here, the previous licensee were a total bunch of unprofessional dumpster fire...

 

[themarkwilkinson]

Why is the initial focus on Europe and Latin America? I think the focus should be more on Asian countries. Well, this is just based on my observation. I just hope that it will not be overpriced. Also, is this already released or not? I haven't heard updates about it.

 

[Urriak Uruk]

Why is the initial focus on Europe and Latin America? I think the focus should be more on Asian countries. Well, this is just based on my observation. I just hope that it will not be overpriced. Also, is this already released or not? I haven't heard updates about it.

Combined reasons that these languages are very popular (high number of speakers) and that the basic premise of D&D (medieval fantasy) is pretty familiar to the speakers of European languages. Plus, Europeans tend to have more disposal income to spend on TTRPG books compared to speakers in other regions.

So if you wanted to translate the books to the highest volume or speakers, your focus would be on Mandarin, Hindi, Arabic, and Bengali. But D&D would definitely feel like a much more "foreign game" as it relies on a lot of European/American fantasy tropes that these speakers are not as familiar with.

It would be awesome to see the core rulebooks (specifically the PHB/DMG) with not just translations, but updated art to reflect fantasy of Asian/Arabic regions.

 

[Alzrius]

Combined reasons that these languages are very popular (high number of speakers) and that the basic premise of D&D (medieval fantasy) is pretty familiar to the speakers of European languages. Plus, Europeans tend to have more disposal income to spend on TTRPG books compared to speakers in other regions.

I'm not sure about that, at least when you put up things like an Italian language translation against, say, a potential Japanese translation.

For instance, according to Wikipedia, there are approximately 85 million Italian speakers worldwide, whereas the number of people who speak Japanese is estimated to be 128 million. Likewise, there's no question that medieval fantasy is familiar to people in Japan as well if the sheer number of fantasy anime is anything to go by. And while there's some month-to-month volatility, disposable income in Japan is comparable to Italy as well:

So in that case, a Japanese translation would make just as much sense, if not more, than an Italian translation, and yet the latter has been announced and the former hasn't.