Renaming Hakuoro was a mistake

[FlyingTorcensoredWhale]

And your own translation proves it in first 30 minutes.
https://steamcommunity.com/sharedfiles/filedetails/?id=2370344113

[Rykmentti]

Probably gonna be fan "fixes" to the translation soon on the internet. That should do it.

I really don't like when publishers/developers try to "westernize" (or something like that) content to the western consumer base, when we obviously want the original content of these games, that their original creators intended.

Have faith in the original content that you (developers) or original creators (publishers) created. Even if there are some cultural differences, that we might not agree with. (which is stupid, if you buy things based on that attitude) I think we are intelligent enough to understand, that these games were made in different culture than ours and that's why their view on things, on some things, are different from ours.

[FlyingTorcensoredWhale]

Originally posted by Rykmentti:

Probably gonna be fan "fixes" to the translation soon on the internet. That should do it.

I really don't like when publishers/developers try to "westernize" (or something like that) content to the western consumer base, when we obviously want the original content of these games, that their original creators intended.

Have faith in the original content that you (developers) or original creators (publishers) created. Even if there are some cultural differences, that we might not agree with. (which is stupid, if you buy things based on that attitude) I think we are intelligent enough to understand, that these games were made in different culture than ours and that's why their view on things, on some things, are different from ours.

It's not even about "westernizing" because how the hell Hakuowlo is more western than Hakuoro is beyond me. It just feels like... I dunno? Someone Welsh decided to add some celtic flair to a few names for no reason? So we get ro - wlo and ra - lau? Karura - Karulau.

But instead of changing EVERY name for consistency sake, they just changed some. And left others as they were. And that is weird to me.

[Rykmentti]

Originally posted by FlyingTorpedoWhale:

It's not even about "westernizing" because how the hell Hakuowlo is more western than Hakuoro is beyond me. It just feels like... I dunno? Someone Welsh decided to add some celtic flair to a few names for no reason? So we get ro - wlo and ra - lau? Karura - Karulau.

But instead of changing EVERY name for consistency sake, they just changed some. And left others as they were. And that is weird to me.

Well my main point was, Publishers/Developers/Translators shouldn't change content, on their own arbitrary reasons, to fit the consumer base, for any reason. Have same game for all, even if people from different cultures might not understand the whole meaning.

People will ask questions about stuff they don't know and other people will give them answers and help them understand culture/motivations different from ours. Which in turn, creates a better reading/gaming experience.

[Minneyar]

This is actually the opposite of "westernized." Many names and aesthetic details in this series are inspired by Ainu culture, which is an indigenous population from Hokkaido that is very distinct from Japanese. Names such as Hakuowlo, Karulau, Atuy, Ennakamuy, and so on are intentionally romanized that way in order to make it clear that they are not culturally Japanese in origin.

This distinction is actually important in the series because (major spoilers) it is set in a future, post-apocalyptic Asia; there are cultural influences and names in the series that are Japanese in origin (Genjimaru, Yamato, etc), and the characters speak Japanese but have a completely different written language.

Hakuowlo and so on have been Aquaplus' official English romanizations since Aquapazza, and I don't think anybody who is a serious fan of the series and its roots would change it.

[FlyingTorcensoredWhale]

Originally posted by Minneyar:

This is actually the opposite of "westernized." Many names and aesthetic details in this series are inspired by Ainu culture, which is an indigenous population from Hokkaido that is very distinct from Japanese. Names such as Hakuowlo, Karulau, Atuy, Ennakamuy, and so on are intentionally romanized that way in order to make it clear that they are not culturally Japanese in origin.

This distinction is actually important in the series because (major spoilers) it is set in a future, post-apocalyptic Asia; there are cultural influences and names in the series that are Japanese in origin (Genjimaru, Yamato, etc), and the characters speak Japanese but have a completely different written language.

Hakuowlo and so on have been Aquaplus' official English romanizations since Aquapazza, and I don't think anybody who is a serious fan of the series and its roots would change it.

That might have been a sound reasoning, but we stumble upon the screenshot that I've slapped on the opening post.

Hakuowlo but Teoro.

You either get Hakuoro - Teoro - Karura
Or you get Hakuowlo - Teowlo - Karulau

And when you aren't sure how to spell something, just go with "how it sounds" for words of foreign origin. Hakuowlo might be spelled that way to "represent" how it's from Ainu culture, but they sure as hell don't pronounce it as Hakuowlo. And that - together with inconsistent spelling of OTHER names - what bothers me. I can deal with one or the other issue, not both :D

[I>U]

Originally posted by Minneyar:

This is actually the opposite of "westernized." Many names and aesthetic details in this series are inspired by Ainu culture, which is an indigenous population from Hokkaido that is very distinct from Japanese. Names such as Hakuowlo, Karulau, Atuy, Ennakamuy, and so on are intentionally romanized that way in order to make it clear that they are not culturally Japanese in origin.

This distinction is actually important in the series because (major spoilers) it is set in a future, post-apocalyptic Asia; there are cultural influences and names in the series that are Japanese in origin (Genjimaru, Yamato, etc), and the characters speak Japanese but have a completely different written language.

Hakuowlo and so on have been Aquaplus' official English romanizations since Aquapazza, and I don't think anybody who is a serious fan of the series and its roots would change it.

If I was to speculate based on devs giving a ton of though to this, I would have said they choose American natives for translation's reference, because, well, they are the same austroloids pushed by the younger races into the corners of the world as Ainu (not absolutely sure, but there might be a reference to that in Itsuwari no Kamen).

Though it does looks to me like another Rakia to Lakia and Rohderon (ローデロン) into Louderon translations. "X"'es and "L"'s are Japanese second favoured dish after umlauts. Not questioning if that's become semi-canonic with "owlo", but it still looks like something originating from translation extravagance.

[FlyingTorcensoredWhale]

Originally posted by I>U:

Originally posted by Minneyar:

This is actually the opposite of "westernized." Many names and aesthetic details in this series are inspired by Ainu culture, which is an indigenous population from Hokkaido that is very distinct from Japanese. Names such as Hakuowlo, Karulau, Atuy, Ennakamuy, and so on are intentionally romanized that way in order to make it clear that they are not culturally Japanese in origin.

This distinction is actually important in the series because (major spoilers) it is set in a future, post-apocalyptic Asia; there are cultural influences and names in the series that are Japanese in origin (Genjimaru, Yamato, etc), and the characters speak Japanese but have a completely different written language.

Hakuowlo and so on have been Aquaplus' official English romanizations since Aquapazza, and I don't think anybody who is a serious fan of the series and its roots would change it.

If I was to speculate based on devs giving a ton of though to this, I would have said they choose American natives for translation's reference, because, well, they are the same austroloids pushed by the younger races into the corners of the world as Ainu (not absolutely sure, but there might be a reference to that in Itsuwari no Kamen).

Though it does looks to me like another Rakia to Lakia and Rohderon (ローデロン) into Louderon translations. "X"'es and "L"'s are Japanese second favoured dish after umlauts. Not questioning if that's become semi-canonic with "owlo", but it still looks like something originating from translation extravagance.

But that still does nothing to explain the inconsistency in the translation. In the OG TypeMoon (was that TypeMoon?) translation, be it "not fancy" enough, it was still consistent with it's transliteration of names. There were rules. Rules were followed. Now half names are this "yeah, very stylistic, very native, much adaptation" way of spelling (mind you, just spelling, Karura didn't start sounding Karulau all of a sudden) and half names are spelled how they sound (Teoro is the prime example).

If you want to introduce the gimmick you HAVE to go all in. You don't just do it half-way.

[OKIGorgon]

Originally posted by FlyingTorpedoWhale:

was that TypeMoon?

Nope. Type-Moon is a company responsible for making Tsukihime and Fate/ series.
VN fan tranlating group was called mirror moon.

[FlyingTorcensoredWhale]

Originally posted by OKIGorgon:

Originally posted by FlyingTorpedoWhale:

was that TypeMoon?

Nope. Type-Moon is a company responsible for making Tsukihime and Fate/ series.
VN fan tranlating group was called mirror moon.

Right. I smh always mix them up. Thanks.

[Chomp]

Originally posted by Prelude to the Fallen:

lmao

I do not like too about Yakutowaruto changed to Jachdwalt

but....it is kinda the same name? He is written in Katakana which probably means it is a foreign name...so this is not at all a localisation mistake i think.

[Minneyar]

Originally posted by FlyingTorpedoWhale:

There were rules. Rules were followed. Now half names are this "yeah, very stylistic, very native, much adaptation" way of spelling (mind you, just spelling, ... If you want to introduce the gimmick you HAVE to go all in. You don't just do it half-way.

No, you don't. Some of the names are Ainu-inspired, some are Japanese-inspired. They're intended to contrast with each other, and they shouldn't be romanized the same way. Unfortunately, going into details on why that's the case involves major, whole-series spoilers.

To be honest, it's just a weakness of the translation that Teoro comparing his name to Hakuowlo's doesn't make sense; it makes more sense in Japanese, since their names are written as テオロ and ハクオロ and thus both end in オロ in katakana. A more clever translator could probably phrase that in a way that made more sense, but NISA took the lazy way and so it looks weird in English.

[Silent Warrior]

I think Minneyar summarized everything I could ever have to say on the matter, and better phrased, too.
So, anyway, with the name 'Hakuowlo' in Prelude to the Fallen, at least the localization is consistent with Mask of Deception/Truth. Seeing as those games are more recent than the anime (and the ungodly effort I had to go through to get the DVDs in EU...), staying consistent with those games was a wise choice.

(And... Holy Pants, I just bought Prelude for the third time...!)

[I>U]

Originally posted by FlyingTorpedoWhale:

But that still does nothing to explain the inconsistency in the translation. In the OG TypeMoon (was that TypeMoon?) translation, be it "not fancy" enough, it was still consistent with it's transliteration of names. There were rules. Rules were followed. Now half names are this "yeah, very stylistic, very native, much adaptation" way of spelling (mind you, just spelling, Karura didn't start sounding Karulau all of a sudden) and half names are spelled how they sound (Teoro is the prime example).

If you want to introduce the gimmick you HAVE to go all in. You don't just do it half-way.

Mate, Minneyar had already explained that this is semi\fully canonic, and that naming sense was developed after PC release and independently from fan translation of it. To be absolutely honest, source swap had "Eruruw and Aruruw" and "Hakuoro" at the same time. I think, it's not a biggie if the rest of translation is fine. They couldn't have done it otherwise, because someone dropped a soap more than a decade ago.

Originally posted by Minneyar:

To be honest, it's just a weakness of the translation that Teoro comparing his name to Hakuowlo's doesn't make sense; it makes more since in Japanese, since their names are written as テオロ and ハクオロ and thus both end in オロ in katakana. A more clever translator could probably phrase that in a way that made more sense, but NISA took the lazy way and so it looks weird in English.

You've just made OP right all along. There could be no consistency when you translate one names by their "meaning" and others by pronounciation.

I seriously don't understand why are you trying to defend this "-owlo" panache. It could mean a whole lot of other things, like a strange ataji of Kyoumichi written with 悪路 for the -oro part, especially how you have unmasked Haku in the next game. You can give too many interpretations to this.

Don't really want to get this further, but, chances are, this is not NISA's fault, but just a big fat mistake from the past. Naturally, if it turns to be an actual NISA's fault when I would buy the game, I will return with every stone I would be able to gather along.

[Minneyar]

Originally posted by I>U:

You've just made OP right all along. There could be no consistency when you translate one names by their "meaning" and others by pronounciation.

There's no such thing as translating names by "pronunciation." There are at least three romanization systems for Japanese -- Hepburn, Nihon-Shiki, and Kunrei-shiki -- that are commonly used and in many cases would disagree on what the "right" way to write a Japanese name in English is. If you take a look at how other Asian languages such as Korean or Chinese, it becomes obvious that what you think is the "right" way to pronounce a romanized name is not consistent or well-defined at all. Heck, if you really wanted to make a pronunciation-based transliteration of his name, you could use IPA, and it'd come out looking something like Hakɯoɾo, and I don't think that'd make anybody happy.

The previously mentioned systems are specifically meant to apply to Japanese words and names, which ハクオロ isn't; those are just the kana used for writing his name with Japanese characters. In fact, there is no "right" way to write it in English, because Ainu has no native written script and there is no official way to romanize it. Deciding how to write his name in English by applying Nihon-shiki to the katakana is effectively doubly-localizing his name and makes it "look" Japanese to people who are used to reading romanized Japanese names, which is not the intended effect.

Aquaplus has been using "Hakuowlo" as the English version his name as far back as promotional material for Aquapazza, which was before either Atlus or NISA translated the games, so both of them are just following the established style.

[SourGummy]

Frankly, オロ can sound like "owlo" from some Japanese. "ow" can be read as "オ" quite honestly, and "ロ" often sounds like an L and/or an R depending on region. Whether it's Hakuoro or Hakuowlo, it makes sense... Especially when you consider katakana has many more "made up" sounds that Japanese doesn't have in it's hiragana alphabet. Also, reading it with an English approach is what seems like the bigger problem. Sounds SLIGHTLY different with a Japanese accent.

Minneyar is absolutely correct.... Like he said with other Asian languages, like Korean, you can read it in romanization and it just isn't consistent.