"These repros are why we're going to have fewer translations done going forward"
I'm not sure I follow fully. I assume it is because people are not getting compensation or credit for their hard work to translate a game and somebody making a killer profit off everybody else's work? I assume that is what you are aiming at and I get that. I see it all the time with Mother 3 translations.
I'm not agreeing with anybody taking somebodys work that was given to the public for free, and then cashing in and not even give credit. I get that most people that did those translations are a member of this site and probably been burned on it and not want it to happen again or keep doing something that might be kept being used despite not giving there persmission to do so. But since nobody was making a profit really off these I figure it might be a different circumstance.
Just as people choose not to look into Tobias/Fudoh/PCEWorks/PCEngine20thAnniversary/animeforever/HudsonSoftofJapan, they also don't bother to do the most basic research into the origin of these translations. If PCEWorks says their team of fans did everything, then that all you need to know.
The person who organized the Drac X translation and Ys IV dub (which Tobias has already admitted to pressing) said for years that he would be done with PCE projects if anyone ever pressed discs of anything he worked on. Even if it was a community pressing sold at a loss or just given out for free.
It's all fine and well to speculate what he may or may not have done next otherwise, but at the very least a series of dubs would have been likely. Other hackers and misc dev scene people have also expressed that they are second guessing various projects because of Tobias' actions.
One particular slap in the face was Tobias' claim that he'd be lucky to afford to offer Nightwolve as much as $1 per set. But that if he accepted, then he'd officially be part of the "team" and it would likely have been advertised more specifically than the current bs description.
The damage is already done and if most of these loose discs make it into the hands of players, then hopefully far fewer will be flipped for profit. But it's definitely having the opposite effect of encouraging fan translations. It's not about what you or I theoretically think how fan translators might feel, it's what they've already expressed.
