Macross delta Novel Volume 2 Translation.

[Captain Global]

Hi everyone, after finishing Gubaba’s translation of the first volume of the Macross Deta novelization, I decided to give it a go and try reading the rest.

After buying the novel on bookwalk and being able to read it in the form of some horrible translated images, I found It had quite a bit of interesting details and recontextualized some scenes with wonderful characterization. Hence, I decided to do a better translation and improve the presentation to share it with the community.

 

There are however two disclamers:

First, this is a machine translation, my only merit here is working on the presentation and revising errors and spelling. Full respect to all the guys that have been translating directly from Japanese all these years, you are my inspiration to bring this here.

Second, if this post violates any rules regarding copyright and piracy in the server let me know.

 

I plan on uploading semi-regularly the rest of the chapters once I can streamline the translation and revision process. I can also share the methods I use and the ones I’m trying, furthermore, I would like to see more people contributing to translations.

I’m aware the use of machine translation poses some dilemmas, but being able to understand the master file books, interviews and now Ukyo Kodachi’s novels has made me fall in love again with the franchise. Now I just want to share it and help enrich the fandom and the overall conversation.

Any sort of corrections critiques will be really appreciated as it is my first-time sharing content like this.

Avaliabe here: https://docs.google.com/document/d/1lUzru6LZZWIbHzAacsI8n-0ZYuW2_w-gt1OwkJ8v0mw/edit?usp=sharing

[Captain Global]

First Intermission is up, featuring a cameo from Macross The Ride and curious political thriller tone. 

Hope you enyoy it. 

https://docs.google.com/document/d/1KLpHzXEXkhn_IKHcN8Y-Xv4Ae4Np3zDPqorG5dg7D_g/edit?usp=sharing

[Bolt]

Intriguing stuff. Thanks for the reading material.

[Seto Kaiba]

Machine translation has clearly made some progress in recent years.  There's not nearly as much "my hovercraft is full of eels" in this as an attempt a few years ago would've had.

That said, I kind of feel like Kodachi is reaching way too hard to try to make connections to other Macross works in this one.

Spoiler

Chelsea Scarlett's story arc had a pretty satisfying conclusion in Macross the Ride with her finally settling into a career she loved as a successful professional air racer.  After she'd lost her career as an idol due to circumstances beyond her control and having her career at SMS cut short because she wasn't cut out for live combat.  She earned that closure at the end of her story.  Dragging her out of that career a few years later and forcing her into the role of a politician is kind of a dick move, narratively.

 

[Captain Global]

6 hours ago, Seto Kaiba said:

Machine translation has clearly made some progress in recent years.  There's not nearly as much "my hovercraft is full of eels" in this as an attempt a few years ago would've had.

That said, I kind of feel like Kodachi is reaching way too hard to try to make connections to other Macross works in this one.

  Reveal hidden contents

Chelsea Scarlett's story arc had a pretty satisfying conclusion in Macross the Ride with her finally settling into a career she loved as a successful professional air racer.  After she'd lost her career as an idol due to circumstances beyond her control and having her career at SMS cut short because she wasn't cut out for live combat.  She earned that closure at the end of her story.  Dragging her out of that career a few years later and forcing her into the role of a politician is kind of a dick move, narratively.

 

Yes indeed, with machine translation a whole world of possibilities has oppened, but I fear it kinda makes these fan works les valuable.

When it comes to Kodachi, I feel rather than adding new elements to the story the value of his novels is his ability to connect everything to past works. In the following chapters there are even more interesting stuff, but nothing new at the end of the day.  

Spoiler

I have yet to read The Ride, but from what I know it really is weird to see Chelsea as a politician. The idol to military contractor to air racer to elect official pipeline is strange indeed.

However, I really like this political take on the Macross Universe. There are some excerpts on the Master files when they talk about proposed bills for limiting abuse of less advanced civilizations that really seemed interesting.

Wish Kodachi had continued with this line in a hypothetical third volume.

 

[Seto Kaiba]

5 hours ago, Captain Global said:

Yes indeed, with machine translation a whole world of possibilities has oppened, but I fear it kinda makes these fan works les valuable.

Machine translation is a tool like any other.  What you can make with it will reflect your experience and the patience and care you put into its application.

I don't think it makes fan works less valuable in any way.  Careless use of it can create some frustrating misunderstandings... but so can careless manual translation.

Spoiler

For instance, the recent discussion of the correct designation of Aisha's VF-19 from Macross 30 as an example of machine translation fails or my own gaffe with the Master File statements about the VF-1's fuel system where I mixed up propellant capacity and reactant capacity as an example of a manual goof.

The risk of errors is higher with the machine translation, but for a quick-and-dirty summary it's at least "good enough".

One thing I really love is that it has driven a massive improvement in OCR capabilities.  There was a time, long ago, that I was stuck manually transcribing every book I worked on one character at a time (often with a magnifying glass).  Now I can just plonk the book I'm working on under my fancy laser book scanner and let the machine transcribe a whole page in just a few seconds that I can paste right into my working file and have the original text side-by-side with the translation with minimal effort.

 

5 hours ago, Captain Global said:

When it comes to Kodachi, I feel rather than adding new elements to the story the value of his novels is his ability to connect everything to past works. In the following chapters there are even more interesting stuff, but nothing new at the end of the day.  

  Reveal hidden contents

I have yet to read The Ride, but from what I know it really is weird to see Chelsea as a politician. The idol to military contractor to air racer to elect official pipeline is strange indeed.

However, I really like this political take on the Macross Universe. There are some excerpts on the Master files when they talk about proposed bills for limiting abuse of less advanced civilizations that really seemed interesting.

Wish Kodachi had continued with this line in a hypothetical third volume.

 

Perhaps the one thing that chapter does well that the series didn't (because the arc was jettisoned to a gaiden manga) is explain that Windermere IV's grievances with the New UN Government were legitimate.  

The TV anime and movies never really delves into why the Windermereans wanted out of the New UN Government as badly as they did, though even the novel here kind of glosses over that as frustrating as the Windermereans found the New UN Government's [restrictions on/control of] fold quartz extraction frustrating the restrictions were set for very good reasons like discouraging any more idiots from unsealing canned evil in Protoculture ruins and preventing the proliferation of a material that can be used to make planet-killing bombs.

[Captain Global]

46 minutes ago, Seto Kaiba said:

Machine translation is a tool like any other.  What you can make with it will reflect your experience and the patience and care you put into its application.

I don't think it makes fan works less valuable in any way.  Careless use of it can create some frustrating misunderstandings... but so can careless manual translation.

  Hide contents

For instance, the recent discussion of the correct designation of Aisha's VF-19 from Macross 30 as an example of machine translation fails or my own gaffe with the Master File statements about the VF-1's fuel system where I mixed up propellant capacity and reactant capacity as an example of a manual goof.

The risk of errors is higher with the machine translation, but for a quick-and-dirty summary it's at least "good enough".

One thing I really love is that it has driven a massive improvement in OCR capabilities.  There was a time, long ago, that I was stuck manually transcribing every book I worked on one character at a time (often with a magnifying glass).  Now I can just plonk the book I'm working on under my fancy laser book scanner and let the machine transcribe a whole page in just a few seconds that I can paste right into my working file and have the original text side-by-side with the translation with minimal effort.

 

Perhaps the one thing that chapter does well that the series didn't (because the arc was jettisoned to a gaiden manga) is explain that Windermere IV's grievances with the New UN Government were legitimate.  

The TV anime and movies never really delves into why the Windermereans wanted out of the New UN Government as badly as they did, though even the novel here kind of glosses over that as frustrating as the Windermereans found the New UN Government's [restrictions on/control of] fold quartz extraction frustrating the restrictions were set for very good reasons like discouraging any more idiots from unsealing canned evil in Protoculture ruins and preventing the proliferation of a material that can be used to make planet-killing bombs.

Yes, with the master files I've been experiencing a massive overhaul in OCR. However I find most models still have difficulties with verticaltext in japase, especially with images. I've been also translating some Kawamori interviews and sometimes it get's messed up. 

And regarding Windemere I agree, in their own manga motivations are way clearer. I supose like many thing with Delta there were a lot of ideas and chracters but not enoguh time or perhaps talent on the part of the several writers to get everything developped. 

[Captain Global]

Also, Chapter 2 is UP: Jungle Conspiracy 

With the infiltration in Voldor and some details about their feline phisiology. 

Hope you guys enyoy it 

https://docs.google.com/document/d/1ubS_ySYcrqW-RLZA2UUiiPghexhb6e5PuwHkpA-cbKY/edit?usp=sharing

Edited Tuesday at 10:11 PM by Captain Global

[Seto Kaiba]

On 11/11/2025 at 5:11 PM, Captain Global said:

Also, Chapter 2 is UP: Jungle Conspiracy 

With the infiltration in Voldor and some details about their feline phisiology. 

Hope you guys enyoy it 

https://docs.google.com/document/d/1ubS_ySYcrqW-RLZA2UUiiPghexhb6e5PuwHkpA-cbKY/edit?usp=sharing

There's a Macross 30 reference in there too.

The Dr. Blanchett that's mentioned in this chapter is none other than Aisha Blanchett, former director of SMS's Uroboros branch and lead developer of the YF-30 Chronos.  (So there's some incorrect pronouns in this translation where they refer to Dr. Blanchett as "he".  Machine translations do that a LOT.)

I do appreciate the fun little historical note Kodachi put in about the "comfort' features of naval warships like the soda fountains on IJN Yamato or the infamous ice cream machines on US Navy warships.  (They omit the most excessive version, the US Navy's Barge Refrigerated Large... often slightly inaccurately called the "ice cream barge", a massive refrigerator with an ice cream factory aboard able to produce 5 tons of ice cream a day.)

It is a bit weird that they have to have an "As you know" section devoted to explaining the events of Macross VF-X2 and dimensional weapons, though.

[Captain Global]

5 hours ago, Seto Kaiba said:

There's a Macross 30 reference in there too.

The Dr. Blanchett that's mentioned in this chapter is none other than Aisha Blanchett, former director of SMS's Uroboros branch and lead developer of the YF-30 Chronos.  (So there's some incorrect pronouns in this translation where they refer to Dr. Blanchett as "he".  Machine translations do that a LOT.)

I do appreciate the fun little historical note Kodachi put in about the "comfort' features of naval warships like the soda fountains on IJN Yamato or the infamous ice cream machines on US Navy warships.  (They omit the most excessive version, the US Navy's Barge Refrigerated Large... often slightly inaccurately called the "ice cream barge", a massive refrigerator with an ice cream factory aboard able to produce 5 tons of ice cream a day.)

It is a bit weird that they have to have an "As you know" section devoted to explaining the events of Macross VF-X2 and dimensional weapons, though.

Thanks for the correction.

Blanchet plays a huge role on the novels and serves as a reinforcement for the idea of dimensional resonance  between singers and Valks. However the characterization changes a lot from the M30 novel. 

Spoiler

At the end of the 30 Novel she kidnaps mina and goes on a monologue about how the academic comunity treated her wrong. In the Game however her implants are hacked wich I feel is an explanation more in line with her characterization. 

Anyhow in the novel she plays a greater role, especially explaning messer's var simptoms and retiring him from the Squad. 

 

[RangerKarl]

5 hours ago, Seto Kaiba said:

It is a bit weird that they have to have an "As you know" section devoted to explaining the events of Macross VF-X2 and dimensional weapons, though.

They should just do it for every side story. No matter how spurious the connection.

[Seto Kaiba]

5 hours ago, Captain Global said:

Thanks for the correction.

Blanchet plays a huge role on the novels and serves as a reinforcement for the idea of dimensional resonance  between singers and Valks. However the characterization changes a lot from the M30 novel. 

It's such a weird choice of character, if you think about it.

Aisha Blanchett was the director of an SMS branch and an aerospace engineer with a basically unlimited budget and a romance with a SMS pilot... so how'd she end up in the boonies working for a different PMC as a clinical pathologist?  Those aren't exactly related branches of science.  I guess she's become some kind of Star Trek-y omnidisciplinary scientist.

Spoiler

Sure, she may have witnessed one of the probable first cases of Var syndrome on Uroboros in 2060... but that doesn't exactly make her qualified to switch from engineering to medicine.

It's weird that they wouldn't just use the existing character that the gaiden manga already established was a Var syndrome researcher and the developer of a fair bit of the Tactical Sound Unit kit... Zola's Dr. Hoyly.  Doubly so given that Dr. Hoyly's mentor was one of the leading researchers studying dimensional resonance effects and she was heavily influenced by the work of Dr. Chiba.  

Edited 3 hours ago by Seto Kaiba