D&D 5E Dungeon & Dragons in Japan.

[Lanefan]

Paging @Hussar who might be interested in this (but 99% likely knew about it long before this was posted!)

 

[bedir than]

I thought people would be strongly opposed to this cause it could cause anime to influence D&D? What changed?

Nothing. There's no evidence that any of this is going to happen.

Luis has two causes - D&D skins in Fortnite and anime into D&D as a way to make plushies

 

[Shardstone]

Berserk is literally the best D&D content of all time.

 

[Blue Orange]

I know everyone's excited about a potential D&D-anime cross-pollination, official stats for Lina Inverse and the wide variety of yokai, more anime about D&D and similar stories, and the like.

However, I'm not sure this changes all that much. This is about Hasbro selling 5e D&D in Japanese to Japanese people. A lot of the D&D-ish anime evolved on its own path (see the TV Tropes page on Standard Japanese Fantasy Setting--a great source for your RPG and an example of orientalism from the other end), arising from earlier versions of D&D and games like Ultima and Wizardry and of course being given a Japanese spin (there are animal-people and mecha) on the exotic West. They already have Sword World, their own domestic fantasy RPG, and Call of Cthulhu (which is bigger over there), and have already been making stuff like Record of Lodoss War, Slayers, Vision of Escaflowne, to the point the tropes are apparently well-known enough you have deconstructions like Fantasy of Grimgar and Ash and spoofs like Konotsuba. D&D has evolved over the past 50 years to appeal to Americans, not Japanese people, and I suspect a lot of Japanese people are going to look at this and be like "oh, OK" and go back to their domestic stuff that's more to their taste.

 

[Mind of tempest]

I know everyone's excited about a potential D&D-anime cross-pollination, official stats for Lina Inverse and the wide variety of yokai, more anime about D&D and similar stories, and the like.

However, I'm not sure this changes all that much. This is about Hasbro selling 5e D&D in Japanese to Japanese people. A lot of the D&D-ish anime evolved on its own path (see the TV Tropes page on Standard Japanese Fantasy Setting--a great source for your RPG and an example of orientalism from the other end), arising from earlier versions of D&D and games like Ultima and Wizardry and of course being given a Japanese spin (there are animal-people and mecha) on the exotic West. They already have Sword World, their own domestic fantasy RPG, and Call of Cthulhu (which is bigger over there), and have already been making stuff like Record of Lodoss War, Slayers, Vision of Escaflowne, to the point the tropes are apparently well-known enough you have deconstructions like Fantasy of Grimgar and Ash and spoofs like Konotsuba. D&D has evolved over the past 50 years to appeal to Americans, not Japanese people, and I suspect a lot of Japanese people are going to look at this and be like "oh, OK" and go back to their domestic stuff that's more to their taste.

depends on if they say make a hybrid setting a reintroduction of the new western elements and the new Japanese elements to see if you get something that is both familiar and fresh.

 

[Blue Orange]

depends on if they say make a hybrid setting a reintroduction of the new western elements and the new Japanese elements to see if you get something that is both familiar and fresh.

No evidence they're making new material, though. The pic is one from the 5e PHB. They translated it into Spanish and French, now they're doing Japanese.

I mean, I'd love to see a Japanese Adventures for 5e with a whole bunch of Japanese consultants so they can do it a little more sensitively this time but with modern Hasbro's production values. (Lots of D&D players would love to play ninja and samurai!) But that doesn't seem to be what this is.

 

[Mind of tempest]

No evidence they're making new material, though. The pic is one from the 5e PHB. They translated it into Spanish and French, now they're doing Japanese.

I mean, I'd love to see a Japanese Adventures for 5e with a whole bunch of Japanese consultants so they can do it a little more sensitively this time but with modern Hasbro's production values. (Lots of D&D players would love to play ninja and samurai!) But that doesn't seem to be what this is.

our rulers have not yet band us from hope, so I am allowed to hope even if I know it is a long shot plus we know we are getting new settings at some point I am hoping for something more divergent than just a different flavour of generic fantasy.

 

[Weiley31]

I low-key wouldn't mind some anime style book covers.

 

[Azzy]

Even as someone that wants more non-Western fanasy elements in D&D, I just don't expect this to really amount to much beyond the localizations. I'd be surprised if the localized books didn't have have the same artwork as the English products, like with the other translations.

Also, most fantasy anime tends towards Western-style fantasy (with a few nods here and there, if any, to Japanese or Chinese culture), so I don't think that even if D&D made major penetration into the Japanese market that there would be much more incentive to incorporate more Asian influence into D&D products.

 

[Blue Orange]

Also, most fantasy anime tends towards Western-style fantasy (with a few nods here and there, if any, to Japanese or Chinese culture), so I don't think that even if D&D made major penetration into the Japanese market that there would be much more incentive to incorporate more Asian influence into D&D products.

If anything, there would be less incentive. Asian culture isn't exotic to Asians. Imagine if you (a Westerner presumably) were happily watching a samurai movie and suddenly a medieval European knight in plate mail showed up.