Chrono Trigger Ultimania Announced for January 20, 2009 Release

[ZeaLitY]

BentStuff recently announced a Chrono Trigger Ultimania, complete with a new short story about the Chrono team, staff interviews, a "Secrets Corner", and a "special article" that reportedly can't be missed by fans. We know this because a Chrono fan named HartleySan volunteered to translate the promotional materials; everyone provide a round of applause! Here's the promotion in full, taken from here:

December 2nd, 2008

Fulfilling the expectations of all you "Chrono" fans out there!

"Chrono Trigger: Ultimania"
On sale January 20th, 2009

"Chrono Trigger: Ultimania" (published by Studio Bent, produced by Square ENIX, price unknown) is the definitive, one-volume guide for the wildly beloved Nintendo DS title "Chrono Trigger". Available January 20th, 2009.

"Chrono Trigger: Ultimania" is a full-color, 592-page guide. Inside the guide is a foldout poster and detailed explanations on every aspect of "Chrono Trigger".

"Chrono Trigger:Ultimania" covers everything in great detail, including all the new, DS-exclusive content: the three, new scenarios (I assume this is referring to the DVs) and the Monster Arena. This is THE essential guide for the DS version of "Chrono Trigger".

This guide also introduces a new "Secrets Corner" and a short story (written by Benny Matsuyama) spoken from the characters point of view. Further included in the guide are developer interviews and an additional, "special" article that no "Chrono Trigger" fan can overlook.

"By all means, anxiously anticipate the guide!"

HartleySan: That's it. I purposefully left the style of the translation not 100% natural, because I wanted to convey the feel of the promo to you guys. Because this is an advertisement, realistically, if this were to be "translated", it wouldn't actually be translated at all. Obviously, advertising conventions in America and Japan are different. Hopefully, my translation will illustrate my point, which is why I did it this way.

[FaustWolf]

Hurray!

I did this for GlitterBerri elsewhere, so here's the HartleySan edition:

DOMO ARIGATO HARTLEYSAN
DOMO DOMO
DOMO DOMO
DOMO ARIGATO HARTLEYSAN

Thank you very much, HartleySan
For doing the jobs that nobody wants to
And thank you very much, HartleySan
For helping us learn more Chrono when we needed to
Thank you-thank you, thank you
I want to thank you, please, thank you

YeeeAAAAAH~!

As you can no doubt tell, translators are the highest-valued people at the Compendium. If you know Japanese, please contact ZeaLitY or reply in this thread. There's so much awesome material hidden away in Japanese texts it's amazing, and "many hands make light work," as they say.

[Chrono'99]

Thanks for the translation, HartleySan.

592 pages I wonder how much of that is just walkthrough and gameplay stuff and how much is developer interviews and story-related information. I hope it has lot of nifty plot details like the Chrono Cross Ultimania.

[V_Translanka]

The special article had better be them telling us there's going to be a Chrono 4 coming out.

And why was that last update taken off...? If it was coming off as too brash or something, I think the wording could have just been changed around...I mean, it was still Chrono news, right?

EDIT: Nevermind, I just found it in the Chrono general discussion forum...My point still stands though (unless I read through it & find a reason)...>_>

[NaYA]

Holy Lavos! Almost six hundred pages! o_O
Is anyone going to buy it?

[HyperNerd]

Hopefully it'll clear up the stuff we've been discussing in the forums...

[chrono eric]

Hopefully it'll clear up the stuff we've been discussing in the forums...

And raise a thousand more questions.

[steampowered]

Hopefully it'll clear up the stuff we've been discussing in the forums...

And raise a thousand more questions.

Questions are the Compendium's only steady source of material to feed on. Without questions to answer, the Compendium may have lost its purpose long ago. :<

As a community, we are stuck in a never-ending loop of trying to justify our existence by probing what is best left unprobed. :<

[Nickolz]

Holy Lavos! Almost six hundred pages! o_O
Is anyone going to buy it?

I would, if I knew at least one or two words in japanese...

Now THAT's a so extremely much more than perfect reason to start learning.

[Kamiyu Bidan]

God Thank You, a Chrono Trigger Ultimania at long last, every question could be answered with this, and the little tidbits will never get away.

Can't wait for the Developer Interviews and that "Special" article (Rise of Porre anyone? or should i say Rise of Dalton?)

[Nexus]

I am quite looking forward to the Chrono Trigger Ultimania book. There is always so many questions concerning this game series I hope the book will clear some of it up. Not all of it mind you since if it did that the chances of another game become slimmer.

[The Entity]

I'm guessing there won't be an English-language version?

[Lord J Esq]

I am quite looking forward to the Chrono Trigger Ultimania book. There is always so many questions concerning this game series I hope the book will clear some of it up. Not all of it mind you since if it did that the chances of another game become slimmer.

On the contrary, time and money spent like this is a dead giveaway that the powers that be have this franchise on their radar, and it's a good sign that they're interested in developing the series further if they think it would be profitable for them to do so.

[HartleySan]

Well, since I live in Japan and know several places nearby that'll probably sell the guide, I guess I'll pick it up. I encourage anyone else that's interested to pick it up and translate away, though. Always fun to translate things together and discuss.

Also, I just checked Amazon Japan to see if the book has been posted yet, but unfortunately not. They did have the "Perfect Bible" though, and most Japanese people seem to have the same complaints: "Hardly any new material that makes it worth buying". Let's hope that's not the case with the Ultimania guide and the advertisement is not pulling our legs.

[The Entity]

Wouldn't it be more sensible to release an English-language edition, considering the numerous non-Japanese speaking CT and CC fans? They'd make a lot more money.