Your prayers are not answered!

[Aldora]

Devs don't speak English. Only people that can communicate with English and other language forums are community reps. There are far more Japanese devs who don't speak English than there are community reps. Thus, the Japanese posts get more responses. That, and the community reps need to run everything by their superiors before they post/give out information. Devs have a lot more freedom.

Actually, Yoshida-san has been commenting on a handful topics in English. Normally, when a formal reply has to be given on the English, German, French, etc forums, they will leave it up to the Community Reps to translate it to the designated language. But, if he wants to show his sincere thanks to his fans, he tends to reply in English in person.

Even though it might just be as a reply to threads dedicated to celebrating his birthday or a successful release, he still does it in English.

Also, during the Gamescom as well as Live letters, he does pop up on one of the live servers, addressing the players in English. For instance:

Both Yoshida-san and Foxclon have a fairly good understanding of the English language. But, they do feel uneasy replying in English. (^_~ )

Yes, that's why we have community reps who are suppose to relay information between the community and developers, it's quite literally their job. God only knows why they have to keep a "It's not possible yet" under wraps til a Q&A Live Letter.. And while I'm definitely simplifying the process here, I'm sure it doesn't take too long to translate "Is it possible to make the Au Ra horns an option? - No, it's not possible yet, memory issues are maxed", neither am I aware why incredibly minor information like that needs approval that'd take months to go through. Heck iirc the person even made a thread on the Japanese forums and there was still no dev response.

And really they do relay the information to the Developers. It’s not a matter that they can’t translate the Japanese text to English swiftly, but the Community Reps do need to get the verification from the Japanese office that they are allowed to post the text they’ve translated.

I personally believe that the English Community Reps don’t really contact the Developers nor Yoshida directly. What i believe is that everything they read on the forum is being discussed with the Japanese Community Supervisor, which will collect all of the feedback from all regions and send it to the Developers after filtering out the ridiculous requests, demands and complaints.

The Supervisor will receive word from Yoshida-san as well as the Developers, which will be edited and spread throughout the different regions. They will then translate it their own language and post it on the forums.

On top of that, Yoshida-san or even the PR department of SE can decide to keep their lips sealed on specific subjects, because it might be too soon to make an announcement or that they simply don’t have a clear answer on the subject at hand (like technical issues or timeframes).

The players would probably say, “Well, if you don’t have an answer, why not say so?”. They could do that. But, as a paying customer, would you want to hear:

“I’m sorry, but we don’t have a definite answer to that question.”
“We are still working on it. Please stay tuned for more info / look forward to it!”
“We can’t tell you more about it right now, but please stay tuned / look forward to it!”
“Your inquiry has been sent to the developers. Stay tuned for more info / look forward to it!”

After a while, this will get old and people would still complain about the lack of information. Yes, it’s better than staying quiet, but they have to be careful not to overuse it. It’s up to SE to find the proper balance between the two. But, it’s also up to us to remain calm, keep an object view on things and be patient.

The Community Reps are reading the threads on the forums and they are aware of our feedback and requests. They will do what they can (at the best of their abilities) to relay this to the developers, while keeping us up to date with the latest developments.