I can completely understand not wanting to completely change someone's name or setting (e.g. pretending your clearly-based-in-Japan game is actually New York and protagonist Toshi is now named "Stan"), but the degree to which some of them attempt to preserve the Japanese is mind-boggling. To use a contrived example, let's say an RPG character has a special attack called 北斗の拳 (anime name, not an attack name, I know, just bear with me). Most people would prefer that the name be translated to "Fist of the North Star" so that its meaning is obvious. Nonetheless, there is a contingent of fans and purist translators that insist it is better simply left rendered as "Hokuto no Ken", where the pronunciation is left intact, and yet the meaning is completely obscured to the non-native speaker.
In which case, my question is, "If you believe your target audience knows enough Japanese to understand what the hell that attack is called, why do they need your translation?"