Do you think characters should have localized English names?

[大西王张献忠]

Character names are originally from Japanese. But I read that they have different nationalities. So do u guys think localized english names are necessary? For example, ace attorney's main character Phoenix Wright(English version) is Naruhodo ryuichi(jp version)

[Po]

No.

[Mysti_Fogg]

No.

In fact, I think Phoenix Wright shouldn't have had an English name. (Though in that game the localization staff went crazy tearing out the Japanese influences to the point a lot of things don't make sense, so the name issue is really a drop in a bucket.)

Anyway, the Japanese names aren't that hard to learn, and at least in the US we do have actual Japanese Americans walking around with Japanese names, so it might be nice to treat them like it's something normal, not something weird. No one complains about European language-based names needing to be localized. Let's give all cultures the same treatment.

Note: My family is filled with German names because we came from Germany 200 years ago and settled in a German community in the US. While various names get mispronounced by Americans of different backgrounds, and we did have someone get their name changed at Ellis Island (because O'Dell made more sense to the English than Judel), the modern day largely privileges my background and I don't think it's fair and I don't need it. I'd like equal treatment for everyone's culture.

[Hurkyl]

It does make sense sometimes. For example, the infamous case of Final Fantasy 6 where the mysterious, plot-central girl had the exotic and foreign sounding name... "Tina". Obviously that had to change if they wanted to provoke similar sorts of feelings in the American audience.

I did some binging, and it seems like Phoenix Wright got his name because the source material used a punny name and so the localizers wanted to try and retain that humor.

[大西王张献忠]

引用自 Hurkyl：

It does make sense sometimes. For example, the infamous case of Final Fantasy 6 where the mysterious, plot-central girl had the exotic and foreign sounding name... "Tina". Obviously that had to change if they wanted to provoke similar sorts of feelings in the American audience.

I did some binging, and it seems like Phoenix Wright got his name because the source material used a punny name and so the localizers wanted to try and retain that humor.

Actually, many danganronpa characters names have puns too. But puns are for japanese and kanji. Like makoto can be female and male name. Naegi means "newly-sprout wood/tree". And some plot depending exclusively on japanese makes localization more difficult.

[大西王张献忠]

引用自 Mysti_Fogg：

No.

In fact, I think Phoenix Wright shouldn't have had an English name. (Though in that game the localization staff went crazy tearing out the Japanese influences to the point a lot of things don't make sense, so the name issue is really a drop in a bucket.)

Anyway, the Japanese names aren't that hard to learn, and at least in the US we do have actual Japanese Americans walking around with Japanese names, so it might be nice to treat them like it's something normal, not something weird. No one complains about European language-based names needing to be localized. Let's give all cultures the same treatment.

Note: My family is filled with German names because we came from Germany 200 years ago and settled in a German community in the US. While various names get mispronounced by Americans of different backgrounds, and we did have someone get their name changed at Ellis Island (because O'Dell made more sense to the English than Judel), the modern day largely privileges my background and I don't think it's fair and I don't need it. I'd like equal treatment for everyone's culture.

I don't think English players could find the hidden meaning in japanese names. It's better to give new and different meanings to names than having no meaning at all.

[Radene]

引用自 zshjohn：

引用自 Mysti_Fogg：

No.

In fact, I think Phoenix Wright shouldn't have had an English name. (Though in that game the localization staff went crazy tearing out the Japanese influences to the point a lot of things don't make sense, so the name issue is really a drop in a bucket.)

Anyway, the Japanese names aren't that hard to learn, and at least in the US we do have actual Japanese Americans walking around with Japanese names, so it might be nice to treat them like it's something normal, not something weird. No one complains about European language-based names needing to be localized. Let's give all cultures the same treatment.

Note: My family is filled with German names because we came from Germany 200 years ago and settled in a German community in the US. While various names get mispronounced by Americans of different backgrounds, and we did have someone get their name changed at Ellis Island (because O'Dell made more sense to the English than Judel), the modern day largely privileges my background and I don't think it's fair and I don't need it. I'd like equal treatment for everyone's culture.

I don't think English players could find the hidden meaning in japanese names. It's better to give new and different meanings to names than having no meaning at all.

Actually, names not having meanings at all is pretty awesome, because then the character isn't railoaded.

[The Wolf Steel]

So long as someone says the name out loud so I can pronounce it right I don't see an issue with it. I don't know anything outside of the English language, but your name is your name regardless of language.

The only reason a name should change is if they're going to change everything else as well about the setting. An example would be I'd find it very strange for characters to have all English, American-culture oriented names in a place where all the characters/text/voices/ect in the art/TV/ect are in Japanese. It's just jarring and distracting in that context.

[Mysti_Fogg]

引用自 zshjohn：

I don't think English players could find the hidden meaning in japanese names. It's better to give new and different meanings to names than having no meaning at all.

Alright, without using Google or a baby name book, please tell me what these common English names mean:

Brian
William
Jessica
Sarah

Because I know that *I* don't know what any of them mean off the top of my head, only that they do have meaning. We don't generally pay attention to meaning in day to day life the way some other cultures do, such as Japanese where the kanji used in the name can provide obvious meaning.

引用自 The Whiskey Sierra：

So long as someone says the name out loud so I can pronounce it right I don't see an issue with it. I don't know anything outside of the English language, but your name is your name regardless of language.

The only reason a name should change is if they're going to change everything else as well about the setting. An example would be I'd find it very strange for characters to have all English, American-culture oriented names in a place where all the characters/text/voices/ect in the art/TV/ect are in Japanese. It's just jarring and distracting in that context.

This is part of the problem with Phoenix Wright: They turned Japan into Los Angeles, which suddenly has ancient enclaves of Shinto priestesses and their families living on the outskirts and maid cafes and so on and so forth that don't fit. The localization is just a huge mess.

[MrCoasterBrain]

引用自 zshjohn：

引用自 Hurkyl：

It does make sense sometimes. For example, the infamous case of Final Fantasy 6 where the mysterious, plot-central girl had the exotic and foreign sounding name... "Tina". Obviously that had to change if they wanted to provoke similar sorts of feelings in the American audience.

I did some binging, and it seems like Phoenix Wright got his name because the source material used a punny name and so the localizers wanted to try and retain that humor.

Actually, many danganronpa characters names have puns too. But puns are for japanese and kanji. Like makoto can be female and male name. Naegi means "newly-sprout wood/tree". And some plot depending exclusively on japanese makes localization more difficult.

And "Makoto" in japanese literally translates as "Truth"

[flarefan]

I agree with Hurkyl that there are occasions where it makes more sense. One situation that I've seen more than once is where all the characters in a Japanese work have Japanese names, even those which are explicitly born and raised outside Japan. It's rather weird when you have an African-American man named Kadowaki or a blue-eyed French girl whose friends call her "Hatsumi-chan".

[Kristoph]

No. Not everyone speaks English as their first language so it would require changing their names over and over so it would cause more confusion instead of being helpful to anyone. Plus, the characters are Japanese so it's simply useless.

[featherclaw]

I agree with Nagito. Localizing the names of japanese characters who live in Japan from a japanese game is just as white-washing as changing actors of POC characters to be caucasian.

[Hurkyl]

引用自 featherclaw：

I agree with Nagito. Localizing the names of japanese characters who live in Japan from a japanese game is just as white-washing as changing actors of POC characters to be caucasian.

The irony of this virtue signal is that one of the examples in the thread was specifically to make a character less 'white'. But I'm sure you can come up with some excuse to blame that on 'white-washing' or something too.

[flarefan]

引用自 Mysti_Fogg：

引用自 zshjohn：

I don't think English players could find the hidden meaning in japanese names. It's better to give new and different meanings to names than having no meaning at all.

Alright, without using Google or a baby name book, please tell me what these common English names mean:

Brian
William
Jessica
Sarah

Because I know that *I* don't know what any of them mean off the top of my head, only that they do have meaning. We don't generally pay attention to meaning in day to day life the way some other cultures do, such as Japanese where the kanji used in the name can provide obvious meaning.

I meant to address this before, but there are far more English names than the four you list. Here are just a few of the common English names with meanings which would be obvious to anyone who has had an elementary school education:

Mark
Sellers
Wisdom
Smith
Hope
Stark
Karen
Drew
Moore
Wright
Prudence
Burrows
Hart
Harry
Belcher
Bush
Angela
Woodburn
Hammer
Winehouse
Ash
Rich
Robin
Little

Indeed, even in works originally in English, names are often chosen for semantic reasons.

引用自 Nagito：

No. Not everyone speaks English as their first language so it would require changing their names over and over so it would cause more confusion instead of being helpful to anyone.

First of all, why do you say "would"? This has already been done in hundreds of works. Second, how could it possibly cause confusion? It's not something that someone would even know about without research.

EDIT: Fixed typo.

[Hurkyl]

The biggest example I know is Street Fighter. The dictator, Vega, the boxer, M. Bison (M for Mike), and the claw user, Balrog, had their names rotated in the English localization -- presumably to avoid some sort of complication involving Mike Tyson.

So it's not even a matter of having to learn the new names if you want to talk to someone in a region that got a different localization -- you have to figure out which character is meant by the existing name you already know!

Since cross-locale communication is common with the franchise, people have just started calling them Dictator, Boxer, and Claw.