Honestly Nintendo has never thought RPG's sell outside of Japan. Look at Mother (EarthBound) other then Mother2 no EarthBound games were brought to anyone outside Japan. What I would like to see Nintendo do is outsource these RPG's to western studios for translation.
Nintendo's TreeHouse division which translates and localizes games for the US is only so large. I'm sure the european translating divisions are also only so large. Someone pointed out Microsoft translates alot of their games why can't Nintendo? Nintendo may be the most successful games publisher but when push comes to shove they don't have the resources Microsoft does. Also Microsoft's games are usually translated from english to european languages, english is a way more popular language and that means alot more staff can translate. The few Japanese titles that need translating can be translated by Microsoft's internal teams.
In the end TreeHouse is translating everything Nintendo makes (Almost all from Japan in Japanese) meaning alot less resources to translate other games. Also you'll notice he talks about 3DS and Kirby, fact is Nintendo knows they want to expand the Kirby franchise and push the 3DS, more competition for your dollars make that harder.
You may think these are bullshit reasons, as do I to a degree but they are logical. I just wish Nintendo liscensed these titles to publishers in Europe and NA to translate and localize. Third party publishers outsource all the time I think Nintendo would be smart to do likewise!
-JC7
"In God We Trust - In Games We Play " - Joel Reimer
