Undertale's Toby Fox doesn't want to do translations in languages he doesn't speak: "I want it to match my vision"

Undertale and Deltarune developer Toby Fox has responded to "some frustration from Latin American fans" over the fact that his RPGs do not have an official translation for languages like Spanish and Brazilian Portuguese. Fox says that, while he's glad unofficial fan translations exist, he's currently only willing to okay localizations for his games in languages that he speaks himself.

"I know it sucks that there are no other official translations for UNDERTALE," Fox says in a Bluesky post. "But I want to make it clear that this isn’t because I have a grudge against other countries. It’s because, if I release something official, I want it to match my vision. I was only able to do this for the Japanese version because I know Japanese myself, and I worked very closely with our brilliant translator to thoroughly check the text."

The theory that Fox hates Latin America bizarrely began to take root in the Undertale fandom recently, building on the lack of official localizations, an Undertale concert that's skipping the region, and high shipping costs for Fangamer merch. Fox addresses all three points in his post, but the translations seem to be the biggest point of concern.

"I am not against official translations for other languages if we could make it work the same way" as the Japanese version, he says. "In the past I have looked into various options with my publisher, 8-4, but nothing has come of that yet. Maybe I should try a different approach."

Even with his reticence to do official localizations, Fox is "very happy that there are unofficial translations on PC. Considering I don’t understand other languages, letting fans interpret the game without the burden of being 'officially' perfect is amazingly helpful."

Deltarune Chapter 5 is closer than ever as Toby Fox confirms "most of the development team has moved on."