Comment on Final Fantasy Tactics Creator Reacts to Unicorn Overlord Localization Debate and Shares His Own Stories

• Even_Adder@lemmy.dbzer0.com ⁨8⁩ ⁨months⁩ ago

  His work on Vagrant Story was phenomenal. Japanese scripts tend to be really boring and samey. Without the work of a good localizer, you’d hear the same twenty anime one-liners interspersed throughout the entire game.

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  • Ashtear@lemm.ee ⁨8⁩ ⁨months⁩ ago

    Or in the case of his work on Ace Attorney, you wouldn’t understand any of the puns if they were translated literally!

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    • VaultBoyNewVegas@lemmy.world ⁨8⁩ ⁨months⁩ ago

      I used to see it all the time when I read unofficial transliterations of manga and the translator tried to make the pun work, they’d include a note explaining the joke. Personally I prefer localisation which keeps the spirit of what was meant but the text/lines flows in a much more natural way to a native English speaker.

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      • Ashtear@lemm.ee ⁨8⁩ ⁨months⁩ ago

        It’s a common fan translation technique, and–as far as the criticism sourced in good faith goes–I wonder if it’s the genesis of a lot of the grumbling. Back when fans had to rely on independent, amateur translating to have access to more material.

        Maybe some of them would just prefer the “literal with footnotes” approach.

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    • dojan@lemmy.world ⁨8⁩ ⁨months⁩ ago

      There are exceptionally few puns that can be translated literally. One that comes to mind is from a Lipton Limone advert, where Miranda Kerr says 「おいチイ」, when I first heard it I thought it was just an accent thing, but the second time I realised it’s a pun; Tealicious.

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      • Ashtear@lemm.ee ⁨8⁩ ⁨months⁩ ago

        Hah, love it. I’m sure there’s also one or two with 軍人 .

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  • xep@kbin.social ⁨8⁩ ⁨months⁩ ago

    I don't think anyone would've complained if the localization's quality was on-par with AA or Vagrant Story, but it looks to me like that isn't the case.

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    • Even_Adder@lemmy.dbzer0.com ⁨8⁩ ⁨months⁩ ago

      I still can’t find what people are taking issue with here. The article doesn’t really explain.

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      • Ashtear@lemm.ee ⁨8⁩ ⁨months⁩ ago

        The complaints are largely, as she says, “sacrificed accuracy for flowery prose.” Japanese games in this setting still often follow in the footsteps of early Dragon Quest and the Final Fantasy games set in Ivalice by not strictly using contemporary English.

        I think it’s an interesting conversation when it can be divorced from “removing insensitive language is censorship” crowd.

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