Asmodee Germany stopping translation on another game – OnTableTop – Home of Beasts of War

Asmodee Germany stopping translation on another game

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Star Wars: Destiny

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Asmodee

Tagged: Germany, Translation

This topic contains 21 replies, has 6 voices, and was last updated by sundancer 5 years ago.

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December 5, 2019 at 2:46 pm #1462454
sundancer
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So today Asmodee Germany announced that they would stop working on translations for
- Star Wars: Destiny
- Legend of the Five Rings: The Card Game
After Star Wars: Imperial Assault this is the next wave of discontinued products from Asmodee Germany and Fantasy Flight Games.

This really starts to make my wonder when Asmodee Germany will stop any translations. I couldn’t tell if SW:D was big in any way but SW:IA was and is. What do you guys think of this move?

Source: https://asmodee.de/news/star-wars-destiny-und-legend-of-the-five-rings-ende

Die deutschen Versionen von Star Wars™: Destiny und Legend of the Five Rings: Das Kartenspiel werden mittelfristig nicht mehr über Asmodee Deutschland zu beziehen sein. Beide Spiele haben uns und die Community begleitet, nun ist es an der Zeit für Asmodee in Deutschland, die Produkte auslaufen zu lassen. Das bedeutet auch, dass wir keine neuen Destiny- oder L5R-Produkte lokalisieren werden und keine News zu den Spielen mehr veröffentlichen werden.

Alle bisher erschienenen Produkte von Star Wars™: Destiny und Legend of the five Rings: Das Kartenspiel sind weiterhin vorerst noch über Asmodee Deutschland beziehbar.

Die bereits bestellten Organized Play Sets werden noch wie gewohnt ausgeliefert, danach werden keine weiteren Destiny- und L5R-OP-Sets von Asmodee Deutschland angeboten.

Translation:

The German versions of Star Wars™: Destiny and Legend of the Five Rings: The card game will no longer be available from Asmodee Germany in the medium term. Both games have accompanied us and the community, now it’s time for Asmodee in Germany to phase out the products. This also means that we won’t localize any new Destiny or L5R products and won’t publish any more news about the games.

All products of Star Wars™: Destiny and Legend of the five Rings: The card game are still available from Asmodee Germany.

The already ordered Organized Play Sets will be delivered as usual, after that no further Destiny- and L5R-OP-Sets will be offered by Asmodee Germany.

Translated with http://www.DeepL.com/Translator (free version)
December 5, 2019 at 3:05 pm #1462455

Anonymous
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Obviously accountants/executives believe that putting the resources into other things will be more profitable. If they are right, they will make more money, if they are wrong they will make less money.

December 5, 2019 at 3:08 pm #1462456

avernos
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It’s certainly an interesting move. Does it mean that the German language edition is being wrapped up completely? We’ll have to wait and see if suppose.

December 5, 2019 at 3:48 pm #1462458

sundancer
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@avernos yes, on short term that’s it. No new products in German. And no word on who *might* be an official distributor for the English versions. My guess: no one since a lot of shops already import English versions

December 5, 2019 at 3:54 pm #1462463

sundancer
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Question is: will the games loose players because the translations stopped? Or worse, will other comes not be picked up because Asmodee Germany stopped translating in the middle of the game?

December 5, 2019 at 5:17 pm #1462483

limburger
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I’m always jealous of German gamers who at least have a chance to see (board)games localized. Dutch is too much of a niche to receive that treatment.

There is nothing worse than a game where only the core rules have been translated.
So yeah, I’m pretty sure that it will have an impact. Especially if people who are used to have games localised are less likely to buy into a game if they can’t be sure if any of its expansions will be.

IMHO this is always a chicken&egg paradox, because if there are no (reliable) localised versions then people are going import the original versions.

I wouldn’t be surprised if the beancounters at Asmodee saw this trend and decided to stop localizing completely.
It’s weird to see this happen to a franchise as big as Star Wars, because with dubbed versions of the movies being standard I’d assume people are more familliar with the German texts of the series.

@sundancer are the German localised versions good ?
I’ve seen Dutch translations and especially science fiction techno babble tend to have terrible translations.

December 5, 2019 at 6:19 pm #1462490

avernos
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GW did something similar years ago. Closed the foreign language places and the white dwarfs and then started it all in house at Lenton in cost saving measures.

But I think you are right and this is just going away

December 5, 2019 at 8:16 pm #1462492

sundancer
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@limburger They have their spelling and translation errors but nothing *that* dramatic.

@avernos I don’t think FFG will do translations. After all FFG and Asmodee Germany are both daughters of Asmodee AFAIK.

Question is: what is worse? No translation to begin with and only a local distribution and support for OP or a very, very unreliable (always late and behind one or to versions of the English rulebook) translation and distribution and OP support?

Without translation it will be hard to get a foothold (as currently seen with Fallout Wasteland Warfare) but when the translastion stops or gets delayed it will generate a lot of bad press and will sour the whole program of Asmodee and not just this one franchise.

Hard to tell were this goes but my gut tells me, there is more to this. Especially considering that Asmodee Germany was “Heidelbär” (a very renowned publisher) not so long ago. Heidelbär was acquired by Asmodee and after the founder of Heidelbär died it became Asmodee Germany. Shortly after that a game studio “HeidelBÄR Games” split of from Asmodee and went independent. And not so long ago another ex Asmodee Germany worker started his own distribution Service “JoeKas WORLD” which then later bought the naming rights to the old “Heidelberger Spieleverlag”. So basically the “Heidelbär” is back, although in two parts and up and running. From an outside perspective Asmodee Germany looks more and more like a dead husk… but that’s just me rambling….

December 6, 2019 at 6:01 am #1462526

ced1106
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> If they are right, they will make more money, if they are wrong they will make less money.

If it wasn’t for the Marvel Card Game, I’d know which direction I though they were going. 😛

Translating has overhead costs, including *playtesting* the translation. Monolith’s Conan was playtested in French, but errors came up in the English translation, particularly in the cards. Does Germany still have a Star Wars game available to them? I’ve thought that FFG had too many “lifestyle” games (CCGs and LCGs whose customer spend a lot of money on expansion product lines), and this decision is a foreshadowing of product lines that aren’t selling as well as others.

Really, with Keyforge and Marvel, FFG has added *two* more lifestyle games to their product lines. How long can this really continue?

December 6, 2019 at 6:18 am #1462527

sundancer
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Does Germany still have a Star Wars game available to them?

You mean besides Star Wars Legion, X-Wing, Armada, Rebellion and Outer Rim? I don’t think so if you don’t count toys. Though I’m not sure if FFG SW RPG is translated…. (Edit: yes it is translated but not by Asmodee but by Ulisses.

December 6, 2019 at 10:16 am #1462582

captainventanus
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Last time Asmodee pulled German language support for an FFG Star Wars game it was discontinued all together shortly there after.

December 6, 2019 at 10:39 am #1462586

sundancer
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What game was that? The LCG?

December 6, 2019 at 11:13 am #1462591

captainventanus
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Imperial assault – now okay there were a few other things going on there too, but its a reasonable indicator of the health of a game.

It is a bit strange that they would can the German version of Destiny before the last of the current cycle is out though. The fact that they aren’t bringing it to a close strikes me as being an indication that this is a recent and wide-ranging change in direction.

December 6, 2019 at 11:18 am #1462592

sundancer
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Well with IA they announced (after it had leaked) that they wouldn’t continue to translate or distribute the game. But FFG is still supporting OP and is releasing mats. Latest release was from November 5th 2019.

https://www.fantasyflightgames.com/en/news/2019/11/5/raiding-the-opposition/

And I don’t recall FFG canning the game. Only Asmodee no longer distributing it.

December 6, 2019 at 11:36 am #1462603

captainventanus
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Imperial Assault is selectively available shall we say. FFG might occasionally be putting some items out, but in terms of most of the products they are hard to come by. Certainly not something you can just go an pick up in even a well stocked shop. You are going to get what’s left on the shelves. I’ve had two items on back order for 6 months and they are unlikely to ever show up. Nothing is listed on the FFG website as available right now.
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