To Japanese speakers/learners

[gbuglyo]

I've been playing "Ghost of Tsushima" in "Samurai Cinema" mode, with Japanese audio and English subtitles. One thing that strikes me as odd is the decision to use contemporary colloquial Japanese instead of what I call "Kurosawa Japanese," which has a classical feel typical of real "samurai cinema." On one hand, it's great because I usually don't have to look at the subtitles to understand what's going on. On the other hand, I find it a bit off-putting and immersion-breaking.

However, if you think about it, "Kurosawa Japanese" is merely a cinematic trick (first used by Kurosawa to my knowledge and later adopted by others, including Miyazaki for "Mononoke Hime"). The (mostly) pre-WWII Japanese used in these movies is a far cry from actual Sengoku-period Japanese, let alone Kamakura-period Japanese (in which GoT takes place), which would be totally incomprehensible to modern speakers. So, it really just creates the illusion of a historical age.

What do you all think?

[平教經]

Saying that kamakura-era (which actually was not that different from Heian-era) Japanese is incomprehensible is a bit of a stretch. At least what concerns literary language, that is. Though there certainly are some differences in verb conjugation, particles and such, it's still not nearly as drastic as, say comparing Anglo-Saxon to modern (or even Shakesperean) English.

Besides, in Japan some oold classics like "Tale of Genji" or "Tale of Hogen Rebellion" are still read in school as originally written, so most Japanese (who did not sleep at their literature classes) would still have some exposure to Classical Japanese and how it was written.

Colloquialisms and slang would be a problem though, because there is little to none written documents that would depict the way, say, commoners would converse when drunk.

But as far as understandability is concerned, I do not think it would have made it any worse if localizers actually wrote Japanese lines in 100% bungo.

[gbuglyo]

Originally posted by 平教經:

Saying that kamakura-era (which actually was not that different from Heian-era) Japanese is incomprehensible is a bit of a stretch. At least what concerns literary language, that is. Though there certainly are some differences in verb conjugation, particles and such, it's still not nearly as drastic as, say comparing Anglo-Saxon to modern (or even Shakesperean) English.

Besides, in Japan some oold classics like "Tale of Genji" or "Tale of Hogen Rebellion" are still read in school as originally written, so most Japanese (who did not sleep at their literature classes) would still have some exposure to Classical Japanese and how it was written.

Colloquialisms and slang would be a problem though, because there is little to none written documents that would depict the way, say, commoners would converse when drunk.

But as far as understandability is concerned, I do not think it would have made it any worse if localizers actually wrote Japanese lines in 100% bungo.

That could be the case, but as a non-native myself I'm having a lot of trouble even with Edo-period Japanese texts. I once got my hands on an 18th-century handbook on shogi proverbs (kakugen), but barely understood any of it despite having read many modern shogi books (and some general literature) without trouble. :) It could be chalked up to the old usage of kanji rather than any serious differences in the spoken language, though, for all I know. So my comment on the incomprehensibility of such texts may have been overstated, but there must be some truth to it at least, as Kurosawa and other filmmakers usually opt for a mixture of classical and modern Japanese to create a historical atmosphere (even if the results are anachronistic or inaccurate from a linguistic point of view) rather than going with 100% archaic Japanese.

So what's your view on my main point? Would you have preferred a somewhat classical "Kurosawa Japanese" or do you prefer the modern colloquial Japanese as used in the game?

[平教經]

Originally posted by gbuglyo:

That could be the case, but as a non-native myself I'm having a lot of trouble even with Edo-period Japanese texts. I once got my hands on an 18th-century handbook on shogi proverbs (kakugen), but barely understood any of it despite having read many modern shogi books (and some general literature) without trouble. :) It could be chalked up to the old usage of kanji rather than any serious differences in the spoken language, though, for all I know. So my comment on the incomprehensibility of such texts may have been overstated, but there must be some truth to it at least, as Kurosawa and other filmmakers usually opt for a mixture of classical and modern Japanese to create a historical atmosphere (even if the results are anachronistic or technically incorrect from a linguistic point of view) rather than going with 100% archaic Japanese.

So what's your view on my main point? Would you have preferred a somewhat classical "Kurosawa Japanese" or do you prefer the modern colloquial Japanese as used in the game?

I would definitely prefer "Kurosawa Japanese" over modern.

By the way, were the books you read handwritten or printed? Because there also is this matter of old ways of handwriting, which was basically a form of calligraphy that would be notoriously hard to read (even to native speaker) unless you yourself practice calligraphy and know which characters would look how when handwritten.

[gbuglyo]

Originally posted by 平教經:

Originally posted by gbuglyo:

That could be the case, but as a non-native myself I'm having a lot of trouble even with Edo-period Japanese texts. I once got my hands on an 18th-century handbook on shogi proverbs (kakugen), but barely understood any of it despite having read many modern shogi books (and some general literature) without trouble. :) It could be chalked up to the old usage of kanji rather than any serious differences in the spoken language, though, for all I know. So my comment on the incomprehensibility of such texts may have been overstated, but there must be some truth to it at least, as Kurosawa and other filmmakers usually opt for a mixture of classical and modern Japanese to create a historical atmosphere (even if the results are anachronistic or technically incorrect from a linguistic point of view) rather than going with 100% archaic Japanese.

So what's your view on my main point? Would you have preferred a somewhat classical "Kurosawa Japanese" or do you prefer the modern colloquial Japanese as used in the game?

I would definitely prefer "Kurosawa Japanese" over modern.

By the way, were the books you read handwritten or printed? Because there also is this matter of old ways of handwriting, which was basically a form of calligraphy that would be notoriously hard to read (even to native speaker) unless you yourself practice calligraphy and know which characters would look how when handwritten.

Yeah, I can't read "sousho" at all, and also have trouble with some of the less cursive calligraphical scripts. But the book I read was a printed, modern copy of the original, so that wasn't the reason why I couldn't read most of it.

[regulus]

that's not where the immersion breaking starts with this game. I love the game, but the customs, gender roles and behaviour of all characters are not in line with what we have come to expect of the era. wonderful story none the less.

[平教經]

Originally posted by regulus:

that's not where the immersion breaking starts with this game. I love the game, but the customs, gender roles and behaviour of all characters are not in line with what we have come to expect of the era. wonderful story none the less.

That's true as well. Sadly its hard to find game dev studio that would have had the guts to make games historically accurate in that sense.

To give some bit of context, back in those days, no woman would have wanted to be seen as "manly". One peculiar thing is that reading and writing kanji was seen as "manly" and vast majority of women avoided learning it. And rather than "tyrannic men", those were other women who kept their peers in line. For example, it is said, that when famous court lady at the time, Seishonagon learned that aothoress of "Genji Monogatari", Murasaki Shikibu knew to read kanji, she gave her nickname "Miss Kojiki", which was treated as a huge insult back then. Onna-bushi were an exceptionally rare occurance and in this context were considered a whole another level of "stepping out of line" for a woman and faced a lot of loathing and adversity in society.

Also, as many have pointed out before - the honour they talk about in this game is not what samurai honour would have looked like. If anything, what Jin does would had been perfectly honourable from historical samurai point of view, because most important for samurai honour is to fulfill your duty, whatever it takes. For samurai, if enemy turns their back to you or lets his guard down - its on them, not you. Many historical ninjas were in fact samurai by social status.