D&D 5E WotC will not allow translation of D&D NEXT.

[Patrick McGill]

As near as I can tell, the only two people in this thread who can read the press release are in perfect agreement on what it says.

I don't doubt that's what it says. My whole deal is A) HJ could be wrong or misrepresenting what Wizards told them, and B) What Wizards has said doesn't match up to what HJ is saying here.

Could be they're planning on something different, could be they're working with a different distributor(s), I dunno. I just don't accept it as gospel until I hear it from the horse's mouth. Speaking of which, we can ask Mike about it on twitter.

 

[Henry]

As near as I can tell, the only two people in this thread who can read the press release are in perfect agreement on what it says.

Cybit's friend disagrees, so it's not unanimous.

I'm sorry if you find the situation outrageous, but since I myself have little hope the rules will never be released in a way that some of my favorite companies can take advantage of developing for them, I can't find much untenable with the likelihood that the foreign translations will probably be waiting an extra quarter or three before being released. That they WILL be releasing language translated versions is not in doubt - you yourself said so in one post above. The extra wait for a game that's already been two and a half years in development is kind of par for the course for this edition - they're taking EVERYTHING slowly and deliberately, even if their fans don't want to wait, me included.

 

[Iosue]

I don't doubt that's what it says. My whole deal is A) HJ could be wrong or misrepresenting what Wizards told them, and B) What Wizards has said doesn't match up to what HJ is saying here.

What Wizards said was that they were "still formulating plans for translations." That was in May. Now HJ has made this announcement, in July. There's no mix-up here. Enough time has passed since Mearls' tweet to take HJ's announcement at face value.

Could be they're planning on something different, could be they're working with a different distributor(s), I dunno. I just don't accept it as gospel until I hear it from the horse's mouth. Speaking of which, we can ask Mike about it on twitter.

Already have, but no response after 12 hours.

 

[Patrick McGill]

What Wizards said was that they were "still formulating plans for translations." That was in May. Now HJ has made this announcement, in July. There's no mix-up here. Enough time has passed since Mearls' tweet to take HJ's announcement at face value.


Already have, but no response after 12 hours.

I'll tweet as well. Perhaps enough of them and he'll take notice and speak about it.

 

[Iosue]

Cybit's friend disagrees, so it's not unanimous.

With due respect to Cybit, his friend's wife is not in this thread, and Cybit's report of what his friend's wife said it said probably shouldn't be given the same weight as two Japanese speakers telling you first hand what it says.

 

[Henry]

With due respect to Cybit, his friend's wife is not in this thread, and Cybit's report of what his friend said his wife said its said probably shouldn't be given the same weight as two Japanese speakers telling you first hand what it says.

Except that you've reported back the literal translation, say it means one thing, and others, myself included, read the words and concluded it could mean something a bit different, namely, "there won't be" versus "there won't be yet." And one other native Japanese speaker, admittedly not in the thread, who says the intent is likely "there won't be yet." So like I said, there's a difference of opinion in what the Hobby Japan spokesperson MEANT, not how it was said. Until Mearls or an official WotC spokesperson comes out and says, "there won't be ANY translations, EVER." or "not for X years," there's not much to tell or get outraged about. If they say one of those statements, or it's August 2015 and still no language translations, then I'll gladly join the online petitions.

 

[doghead]

In other words, a bit of the detail may have gotten lost in translation?

I was so going to say that, only in italics (to give it a more foreign feel).

thotd

 

[Syunsuke]

Well, I'm happy if Hobby Japan's announcement is wrong and Japanese version is published.
But announcement itself is very clear and I see no ambiguity. They bluntly says "WotC has decided to sell only English versions of D&D Next, and not put out a license for translations."
That's why I post this topic here.

 

[Alzrius]

There is no mention of "yet", or "at this time." If this was simply WotC telling HJ that they haven't finalized their overseas strategy yet, HJ would not have made this announcement in this way. Because "no licensing plans yet" at least implies that long-term HJ could expect WotC to come to them with plans, so they could simply say, "No news yet. Please wait for more information." This was flat out, "Eigoban nomi wo hanbai shi, Honyakuban no raisensu wo hakkou shinai to iu kettei wo shimashita": WotC has decided to not issue a license and to sell only English versions.

That about sums it up.

I speak Japanese as a second language, and kanji is my worst area, but looking at this romaji transliteration (which is accurate; I double-checked it), Iosue is right: there's absolutely no ambiguity here. That literally says that they (WotC) made the decision to sell only in English, and not issue licenses for translations. Cybit's friend's wife is, from what I can see, finding meaning that isn't there.

I can understand people finding this to be so counterintuitive as to warrant disbelief - I do, too - but what we currently have is a statement of fact from a company that's in the position to know. Any presumptions made to the contrary are statements of faith (in WotC), not fact. (I'd say that Mike's Twitter statement is an exception, but as was pointed out before, it's over a month old, so it's not exactly a counterpoint as of now.)

 

[evileeyore]

What is counter-intuitive is that people are taking a statement from a 2nd party as though it were a statement from WotC.