RGG studios, please get a new translator for upcoming releases

[OpiumHerz]

"Don't be so ageist."
"That's what I do in boomer terms, anyway."
"I heard that's becoming a "meme"..."

I don't know how this script could pass. Past games were never this bad, this is becoming worse by the hour and I feel the urge to start smoking like Kiryu because of it. I don't know who you hired this time, but for the love of god please get someone else for the future. This series deserves better.

[retsa2b]

Haven't played for more than an hour but I'll be keeping my eyes peeled for really egregious specimens. SEGA's localizers absolutely love to discard context and meaning, invent entire new sentences that never used to be there, and generally betray the original Japanese dialogue. Tapping memes and other crap is really just icing on that cake.

A fun specimen from Judgment: https://i.imgur.com/dLNOPDG.jpg

Anyone here know what "arigatou" means? Maybe you're thinking it means "thank you" or some modest spin on that? SEGA's localizers are here to disabuse you of that notion: https://youtu.be/tLKyA33pOUM?t=710

[Metal Izanagi]

Nah, localization is fine.

[retsa2b]

Of course there are bound to be people who come to a game's defense just because they believe somebody is belittling the actual game. You can usually recognize these kneejerkers by the way they completely ignore everything anyone had to say on the topic. Sometimes they're even lazy enough to keep their counter to a single, curt sentence, like their goal was to ensure what they had to say carried zero substance whatsoever.

[Le Hatch]

A series with dialogue that is all over the place has more dialogue that's all over the place, now featuring more current-era references as opposed to stuff related to the 60's.

Also the sky is blue.

[retsa2b]

Originally posted by Le Hatch:

A series with dialogue that is all over the place has more dialogue that's all over the place, now featuring more current-era references as opposed to stuff related to the 60's.

If the argument here is that it's what we should expect, then I can only guess you're not a consumer of modern anime. The anime industry, whether we're talking about subs or dubs, manages to provide localizations that are lucid, accurate, and, just for extra bonus, free of made-up dialogue like in-jokes or English memes. The whole industry—100s of minutes every single day of the week.

What SEGA's localizers do is unnecessary, and even if somebody wants to argue that it has to be that way if you want it to flow like English, there's a whole industry that proves that wrong.

[archonsod]

I get the feeling perhaps RGG are so tired of requests to bring Kiryu back they're now putting heavy emphasis on his age in the hope we take the hint and they're not forced to make Like A Dragon Gaiden 2 : The Man Who Forgot What He Was Doing Five Minutes Ago.

[Shinneh]

Kiryu "This takes me back" *switches to yakuza style*

Subtitles "This guy is really obnoxious"

Localisation to more western terms is fine, but losing meaning like that is actually quite annoying.

[retsa2b]

Originally posted by Shinneh:

but losing meaning like that is actually quite annoying.

Precisely. It's like SEGA's localizers are on a mission. Or they took a bet. "I bet I can rewrite this game better than SEGA themselves." You gotta love how they casually tweak characters' personalities by redefining what exactly they'd say in certain situations. Even in your example, what started out as Kiryu musing on the familiar past turned into him being specifically and verbally irritated by his opponents. To that I say, Nice one, SEGA's localizers. I mean, if you don't give a rat's a--, why should anyone else, right?

[kiteless 凧無し]

As a translator myself I just want to point out that this is most likely an editor issue.

They like to take raw literal translations and butcher them to sound more appealing to an English speaking audience because some hack writer thinks it sounds cooler.

Personally I hate it but not much you can do about it if the translator doesn’t have the final say. No translator with integrity would butcher the translation like that

[retsa2b]

Originally posted by kiteless 凧無し:

They like to take raw literal translations and butcher them to sound more appealing to an English speaking audience because some hack writer thinks it sounds cooler.

This is actually on the money. The localizers in charge of SEGA's releases did an AMA four years ago. Somebody directly asked them how the localizing process went down. You can see their answer at the top of the image I linked earlier. The short of it is that one guy handles translations and a separate guy handles sprucing it up for English audiences. As far as the elaboration reveals, the second guy likely doesn't understand Japanese themselves and is relying on the translation and, I assume, some relevant guiding notes.

Apart from the rubbish nature of this process, which should be a one-man job always, the most important takeaway is that they make a specific boast about "clarity and authenticity." Which is of course a riot. Other than 8-4, I can't even think of another localizing entity that does a more overwhelmingly poor job of being "authentic" to the original Japanese dialogue. I mean, the examples I linked speak for themselves and I can turn up more with every minute of dialogue I listen to. They're that consistent.

[Over Heaven]

I got the same problem, and I'm playing with the french sub, a lot of sub are really out of the character

[GamerXT]

Suprised these games don't have fan translations then, if the text can be edited that is.

[retsa2b]

Originally posted by gamerXT3:

Suprised these games don't have fan translations then, if the text can be edited that is.

Apparently fan translations for games are a thing, but it's such an undertaking that it's reserved for the true dumpster fire localizations that are borderline unreadable. Hyperdimension Neptunia, for example. And it helps that the dialogue quantity isn't all that high in those games—only a fraction of what you find in RGG titles.

I've been poking around, though. At the very least, I tire of the punctuation and grammar problems that regularly pop up in RGG localizations, so I'll be aiming to fix those. And I might plug in some spot translations where the subtitles are a gobsmacking mismatch for what's being said in Japanese. The difficulty of course is that there's no flowchart for this; it's not like working with a Bethesda game where everything's laid out for you.

[Hurykles]

Thank god i don't know japanease so i can live happily without knowing what was changed
Sometimes being clueless is a blessing

[Shodingus]

Originally posted by Metal Izanagi:

Originally posted by retsa2b:

You already got more attention than you deserved the first time around. If you legitimately don't understand why, refer to my first reply.

Ya know you could have just not said anything instead of being nasty. Do that next time.

You could've just not said anything instead of jumping to the defense of a multibillion dollar company. Do that next time.