Forum - View topicFan Translation Group Receives Cease and Desist for Starry Sky Patch
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Kougeru
 Posts: 5529 |
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They can legally force people to do this? I always thought it was more like a game "mod", where as it was fine as long as they didn't charge for it or supply the game itself. It merely translates the game they already (Assumingly) legally own.
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Schadows
Posts: 13 |
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In Europe, we have the "right of quote" which, I think, should be similar to what US call "fair use". You can freely quote or translate a limited portion of product, but you can't translate the whole product without the consent of the original author, or at least from the rights holders (hence licensing).
Otherwise, people would distribute translated novels, manga and animes preventing the real owners from make it a business (oups ;p) |
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mrsatan
 Posts: 909 Location: Olympia, WA, USA |
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You're correct. I don't think they have a case. But that doesn't stop a company from bullying people like this. Most people will back down after such threats. I could understand the company's concern if this was a brand new game and they had plans to export it, but this is an old PSP game from six years ago. |
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Aquamine-Amarine
Posts: 276 |
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If they're going to license it, fine. But if they're never going to license it, leave the fans alone. It's their own fault that fan translations have become so big, because they never license the things that people want, so people take matters into their own hands.
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Utsuro no Hako
Posts: 1035 |
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Unfortunately the DMCA contains provisions against circumventing copy-protection, which the translators would have to violate to extract the text and build a patch. (I'm assuming the game's protected by DRM, because really what game isn't these days?) |
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Animegomaniac
Posts: 4084 |
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No DRM on the ones I buy these days.... except Diablo III but I didn't really own that one at all. Anyway, I have the right to do whatever I want with them.... except resell them. Or give them away, maybe I should read the fine print... In this case, the only thing I can think of that they're worrying if the patch/mod gets released with a free source of the game... you know, the other half of fan subbed anime that few people like to consider as a problem. Other than that... wider audience sales point, further company exposure, addition market penetration of an unwieldy and hard to market product... Unless they want to release their own sub version, I don't see a real issue of why they wouldn't want this. Unless this is just another part of the "What's made for Japan, stays in Japan" mantra. All anime is for sale but games and music are trickier. Not just that they think there's no market for it but they don't want a market for it in the first place. |
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ximpalullaorg
Posts: 396 |
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I believe this was a game JAST wanted to localize but the licensor asked too much money.
Right now I think the money asked is sort of used as a deterrent to discourage possible localizations, like when Shueisha in the early 90s demanded the manga to be unflipped. |
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relentlessflame
Posts: 188 |
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It's distribution of the translation that's in violation of copyright. You're allowed to produce a translation for yourself, but you're not allowed to distribute it -- whether it includes the original game or not. The rightholders also aren't stupid. They know that even if a translation patch were released, most people aren't going to import the original. Plus many companies feel that it diminishes the value of their product and the amount they can ask for in licensing fees if the translation is freely out there. The climate in this industry is starting to change as the Steam on-ramp becomes more clear, so I expect more of this sort of thing going forward. |
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Hoppy800
 Posts: 3331 |
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Looks like the corporate tyranny in Japan are waging a war on fujoshi this week, please stop supporting companies who do this dogcrap, I would understand if the game were localized, that would kill sales if a fan translation existed for a non-modded game, but this isn't (and they weren't selling the patch), so they are tyrants.
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Chester McCool
 Posts: 322 |
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Yeah, what's up with all the crap being dumped on fujoshi this year? First banning Broccoli doujins and now this? They can't catch a break.
Plus this is why you never announce your fan projects ahead of time. Only do it once you release it so once you get told to take it down, it's already too late and spread on the internet. |
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Kadmos1
 Posts: 13558 Location: In Phoenix but has an 85308 ZIP |
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This is copyright infringement what they are doing. On the unethical/immoral part, sure, it's that to but the rights holders could do more about it. They could offer a paid download-to-own on their site. |
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mistress_kisara
 Posts: 210 |
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I wish they could have at least finished Ken ga Kimi or Black Wolves Saga..oh well..
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CoreSignal
 Posts: 727 Location: California, USA |
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Sounds about right. @Kougeru, it's my understanding that game mods have a different legal status than translation patches because the copyright holder gives permission for both the modding and the distribution. I know that some developers even release mod tools themselves. So it seems like fan translations are treated the same as fansubs or scanlations. What's strange is to see a smaller,niche publisher like Asgard do something like this. I completely understand why Square Enix shut down the FF-Type 0 fan translation, but Starry Sky Patch? Not exactly a international hit. They probably have their reasons, though. |
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Tanteikingdomkey
 Posts: 2346 |
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well atleast the pc versions of the games are still getting translated.
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Kadmos1
Posts: 13558 Location: In Phoenix but has an 85308 ZIP |
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There is at least 1 case of "approved fan subs" that I know of. The 10/6/09 Techdirt article "'Approved' Fansub Anime To Compete With Licensed Version' mentions how 07 Expansion approved of Higurashi fan translations and gave MangaGamer the official translation.
So, the claim of fan subs being illegal is not always true. I would say that 90-something % of the time they are. However, sometimes Japanese companies do give their approval to fansubs. |
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