the problem with funny memes in localization:

[ei]

if i want to play this game in 5 - 10 years, all the memes will be outdated, and It'll be really akward and unimerssive to read "sus" or "chud" in the game

[Jouchebag]

I am reminded that Final Fantasy Tactics was retranslated into War of the Lions and completely abandoned "accuracy" or "faithfulness" to the Japanese text in favor of a significantly better pseudo-Shakespearean flavor. It was made way better by detaching itself from both the Japanese version and the badly translated original version.

There were still purists crying about it though. Everything from "it's not what the Japanese writers intended!" to "my nostalgia! MY NOSTALGIA!!"

Sometimes allowing the native speakers to wrangle the text in their own way can create something that rises above the original Japanese text. A more "accurate" translation it is not.

[IEatCats]

Originally posted by Jouchebag:

I am reminded that Final Fantasy Tactics was retranslated into War of the Lions and completely abandoned "accuracy" or "faithfulness" to the Japanese text in favor of a significantly better pseudo-Shakespearean flavor.

The original translation was quite good for some thing in the 90s

Not everything medieval has to be Shakespearean flavour, that is up to the original creators

A win-win situation would be to let people choose the old or new version just like River City Girls

Originally posted by Jouchebag:

It was made way better by detaching itself from both the Japanese version and the badly translated original version.

So these people are not translators but writers, got it

[UltimateTobi]

Originally posted by Jouchebag:

I am reminded that Final Fantasy Tactics was retranslated into War of the Lions and completely abandoned "accuracy" or "faithfulness" to the Japanese text in favor of a significantly better pseudo-Shakespearean flavor. It was made way better by detaching itself from both the Japanese version and the badly translated original version.

There were still purists crying about it though. Everything from "it's not what the Japanese writers intended!" to "my nostalgia! MY NOSTALGIA!!"

Sometimes allowing the native speakers to wrangle the text in their own way can create something that rises above the original Japanese text. A more "accurate" translation it is not.

Then why aren't these people writing their own stories instead of using someone else's as a template to mess with? Who is to judge whether the tempered version or the original is better. What matters is, it's not their job as a translator (or localiser). If they want to write their own stuff, they should; and not leech off someone else.

It irks me to no end how people try to justify effing with someone else's property.

[Jouchebag]

Originally posted by IEatCats:

So these people are not translators but writers, got it

Exactly! And that's always been the case with translation. Literal translations are almost always impossible. Languages don't work that way. Accurate translations still have to make adjustments in order for other cultures to even understand it. War of the Lions is an extreme example, but it shows great things can come from letting the translation team run with it.

[Jouchebag]

Originally posted by UltimateTobi:

Then why aren't these people writing their own stories instead of using someone else's as a template to mess with? Who is to judge whether the tempered version or the original is better. What matters is, it's not their job as a translator (or localiser). If they want to write their own stuff, they should; and not leech off someone else.

I feel like you folks don't understand how translation works. What people seem to be asking for is "transliterating" not "translation."

Translators have always had to be creative in order to do it well. In speaking or in writing.

[UltimateTobi]

Originally posted by Jouchebag:

Originally posted by IEatCats:

So these people are not translators but writers, got it

Exactly! And that's always been the case with translation. Literal translations are almost always impossible. Languages don't work that way. Accurate translations still have to make adjustments in order for other cultures to even understand it. War of the Lions is an extreme example, but it shows great things can come from letting the translation team run with it.

By now, "literal translation" is the biggest strawman ever created. You can't literally translate any language into any other. Grammar is your biggest obstacle. Followed by idioms or phrases (like "Frog in a well"). But that is not what we're talking about here in most threads and most cases.

[IEatCats]

Originally posted by Jouchebag:

Exactly! And that's always been the case with translation. Literal translations are almost always impossible. Languages don't work that way. Accurate translations still have to make adjustments in order for other cultures to even understand it. War of the Lions is an extreme example, but it shows great things can come from letting the translation team run with it.

Oh....looks like American English needs to be the special one

Chinese translations I read from the 90s have never done anything close to some of the English ones

[roachit]

Also the fact remains that in the case of Eiyuden, the changes are for the worse.

[The_Box]

Originally posted by roachit:

Also the fact remains that in the case of Eiyuden, the changes are for the worse.

In your opinion. Many others have said that they're for the better in their opinion. Art is a subjective enterprise.

[roachit]

Under the "everything is subjective" view, disliking the localization is equally as valid as liking it, so you'd have no leg to stand on in your continued attempts to discredit and silence the people who have issues with the localization.

[The_Box]

Originally posted by roachit:

Under the "everything is subjective" view, disliking the localization is equally as valid as liking it, so you'd have no leg to stand on in your continued attempts to discredit and silence the people who have issues with the localization.

I've routinely said it's perfectly valid to dislike the game's writing. Just that it's not inherently a problem with the localisation, and that claims that there was some malicious drive to destroy the game just cause is absurd.

[IEatCats]

Originally posted by The_Box:

I've routinely said it's perfectly valid to dislike the game's writing.

Originally posted by The_Box:

Just that it's not inherently a problem with the localisation

English line totally differs from the original, problem is with original, nice circular logic

[Minneyar]

Originally posted by IEatCats:

The original translation (of FFT) was quite good for some thing in the 90s

It absolutely was not, and I can't believe anybody who's fluent in English and has played the original game would say this. It's far from the worst translation of its era, but it was still filled with grammatical mistakes and outright mistranslations that resulted in plot holes.

Translations that were quite good for the 90's include games like Grandia, Final Fantasy VI, and Chrono Trigger--which still had problems, but at least were generally readable without being constantly assaulted by bad grammar--but definitely not FFT.

Originally posted by IEatCats:

A win-win situation would be to let people choose the old or new version just like River City Girls

You know the "literal" translation option in River City Girls is a joke, right? It's making fun of the stilted, wooden style of dialogue that was common in NES-era translations. No sane publisher would intentionally translate a game twice, but intentionally make one of them worse, for anything with as much text as a typical JRPG.

[Melodia]

Originally posted by Jouchebag:

I am reminded that Final Fantasy Tactics was retranslated into War of the Lions and completely abandoned "accuracy" or "faithfulness" to the Japanese text in favor of a significantly better pseudo-Shakespearean flavor. It was made way better by detaching itself from both the Japanese version and the badly translated original version.

FFT is a very weird case because the original translation was very rough, and at times just flat out completely wrong and the translators clearly had no context (translating 'breath' to 'bracelet' for instance). But a lot of the re-translations in WoTL just come across as needlessly flowery -- changing Algus to Argath or changing all the 'X Break' abilities to 'Rend X'.

[The_Box]

Originally posted by Melodia:

FFT is a very weird case because the original translation was very rough, and at times just flat out completely wrong and the translators clearly had no context (translating 'breath' to 'bracelet' for instance). But a lot of the re-translations in WoTL just come across as needlessly flowery -- changing Algus to Argath or changing all the 'X Break' abilities to 'Rend X'.

FFT's all the more interesting because, from one moment to the next, those issues come and go. Parts of the game got outsourced, those outsourced parts weren't actually outsourced to all the same groups, and then some was handled internally by Square USA.

Funnily enough (and this is of course just people's guesses since we'll obviously never get an absolute answer at this point) its known that Michael Baskett, Square USA's man on the job, was going with a very Old English style for the script, but it was having a negative effect on how understandable the game was and all the characters were sounding alike. So it got toned down heavily and it's assumed that was part of what led them to start outsourcing script segments, which got rid of the ye olde English, but replaced it with ye barely-comprehensible English.