Phoenix Wright or Ryuichi Naruhodo? Localization or pure translation?

[revenant_k]

Which one is more preferable to you? Also, is it just me or the DS version look much better?

[revenant_k]

It's just weird to me that characters obviously Japaneses and living in Japan pretend to be Americans living in California (maybe, I don't actually remember the exact place).

[Blue_Glasses]

i personally prefer localisation, because imo a lot of jokes, puns, meaning in their names, etc would be lost in translation

[revenant_k]

The meaning of their names already change greatly during the localization process. A long with all the jokes, puns, etc.
Also, what about other languages? Would he's named Christophe and live in Paris? Or he's named Sheng Long and live in Shanghai?
A translator note is more preferable imo.

[Blue_Glasses]

If a joke had to be explained through a translator's note, i feel like it won't be funny anymore (I've experienced this with subbed anime)

Also for the character's name meaning, it is changed to something understandable to Western audience

Like most westerner won't get "Naruhodo" which means "i understand/i see" and that specific meaning would be hard to make an English name of , so they choose another meaning which is "Phoenix" which is a mythological creature known to rise from the ashes (turn the tables, metaphorically speaking) and "Wright" which could be either a pun for "right" or simply a common Lawyer name. There's a lot more characters with pun names that wouldn't translate perfectly from Japanese

[revenant_k]

I see. Guess it is something to expect when it come to Japan to English translation.

[revenant_k]

Still, "The great ace attorney" did not choose such an approach. And I had yet to see anybody come out to demand the main character to be "something" Wright, despise he is the forefather of Phoenix.
The meaning of their Japanese names is also lost to most western audience too. Not much of a big deal as I can see it.
I do wonder if that game do come out first, would Phoenix still be Phoenix, or would he be Ryuichi Naruhodo instead?

[Blue_Glasses]

Originally posted by revenant_k:

Still, "The great ace attorney" did not choose such an approach. And I had yet to see anybody come out to demand the main character to be "something" Wright, despise he is the forefather of Phoenix.
The meaning of their Japanese names is also lost to most western audience too. Not much of a big deal as I can see it.
I do wonder if that game do come out first, would Phoenix still be Phoenix, or would he be Ryuichi Naruhodo instead?

That's because it's inevitable for the game to be set in Japan, especially with Japanese historical higures like soseki natsume

[revenant_k]

I guess they don't want to turn him into Mark Twain, among many other things. It's still possible if they really want to. Outfits and hairstyles are also changeable, as so dialog. If you think the essence of this game is about solving the cases. Then anything else aside from that can be rearranged.

[Fronzel]

Could translation notes even be added? Could the program be altered to add additional text boxes to contain the notes? Unless you mean to require the player to have a written guide while they play the game?

I haven't played Great Ace Attorney yet but as I understand it there's no way to continue the localization approach seen in the earlier games as the state of Japan in the late 19th Century having only recently joined the "modern world" is too important and impossible to replace with anything else.

[revenant_k]

You have a point. But they can also ignore all the jokes that loss during translation instead of inventing new ones. Still, what's done is done and people are used to Phoenix, so I guess Naruhodo will only appear in GAA now.

[Blue_Glasses]

Originally posted by revenant_k:

But they can also ignore all the jokes that loss during translation instead of inventing new ones.

I feel like if they did that, Ace Attorney wouldn't be as popular as it is today

[revenant_k]

Maybe, we have noway to find out. But I would argue that Western people interested in Japan because it's so different from them. If it is the same as the West, its products would be much less popular.

[Blue_Glasses]

Originally posted by revenant_k:

Maybe, we have noway to find out. But I would argue that Western people interested in Japan because it's so different from them. If it is the same as the West, its products would be much less popular.

I doubt that.
Ace Attorney now sold over 8.1 million units, while Danganronpa (which basically has the same concept) sold over 3.5 million

Of course, it's unfair to compare a 2001 ongoing game series to a 2010 game, so i looked up the data for the units sold for Ace attorney at 2010 ish, which is around 3.9 million

The reason for this is because, yes, some westerners are interested in Japanese culture, but there's not that many.

The only "rival" ace attorney series ever had is the professor Layton (also takes place in the west) series, which sold over 17 million copies.

P.s they aren't really rivals, i mean, they did a crossover once. And to my recollection, the creator of the Layton series is a fan of the ace attorney series

[revenant_k]

Danganronpa is much less popular than AA in general, and Layton is about Western people and take place in the West. While AA is Japaneses turn into Westerners. So I can also say that localization move may end up hurting the sale numbers.

[Blue_Glasses]

Originally posted by revenant_k:

Danganronpa is much less popular than AA in general, and Layton is about Western people and take place in the West. While AA is Japaneses turn into Westerners. So I can also say that localization move may end up hurting the sale numbers.

I'm fairly confident that the localisation did the opposite of damaging the sales.

The 2 biggest selling point of ace attorney are the writing and characters.

Even when it comes to the anime adaptation, many fans prefer the dubbed version as the writing is more akin to the original ace attorney than the original subbed version