Localization, Cultural Translation and Censorship Thread

[Extrasolar]

So after that fiasco of a thread in the Fire Emblem Echoes subforum (if you weren't there, don't ask), my itch to discuss this topic came up again, and I thought it would be prudent to create a discussion topic on the matter in this forum.

So what are your general opinions on the matter of localization of media, cultural translation, and censorship, be it through games, anime and manga, or any other forms of entertainment? Do you lean more heavily toward localization or direct translation and why? What are some of your favorite localizations, and what are some of your least favorite and why? What about stuff you're glad was changed and/or removed in localization from the original, and stuff you wish had stayed from the original? Do you think potentially offensive or insensitive content in a work should be changed or removed for sensitivity reasons? Why or why not?

(As a note, this is the right forum for this, right? I'm not breaking any rules with this?)

Edited March 9, 2017 by Extrasolar

[Res]

Most of the time I'd argue for direct translation. However, I think it's appropriate to consider the laws of that country; for example, adjusting ages as needed rarely really affects anything. 

I appreciate when the script is rewritten to accommodate puns/plays on words; I think the Ace Attorney series does an excellent job of translating the names of characters and much of the dialogue into English. However, the Ace Attorney series did fail in trying to relocate the setting from Japan to the U.S.; many of the cultural references haven't translated and it's become a big joke amongst fans (and doesn't make any sense to newcomers). So it's simultaneously one of my most favourite and least favourite localizations. 

Of course, translation is a tricky business and two people can interpret the same line in two completely different ways; I've been reading up on some of the translation differences in Fire Emblem Heroes, for example, and how a couple of word changes can convey something completely different about a character. Ultimately I prefer a translator to translate the lines in a way that preserves the character, so if a line sounds wholly different when translated than it does from the word-for-word translation but conveys a more accurate meaning, I prefer that.  

Sort of related: I'm a huge fan of seeing different interpretations on works, as long as one has access to the original alongside it. 

[maybe]

i think things should be kept as close to the original vision as possible, but I don't mind a few changes being made to benefit the overall experience

i can't really name any examples off the top of my head of really good or bad translations though

[Extrasolar]

On the subject of good localizations, one of my favorites is a localization that remains extremely controversial in the fandom in question. I vastly prefer the dub of the Axis Powers Hetalia anime to the original version. For those that don't know, Axis Powers Hetalia is an anime of a webcomic in which countries are personified as people (with their general personality and quirks being cultural references and/or stereotypes of the country in question). The original tone is very much cute, silly and whimsical, and when Funimation dubbed it, they made it more satirical, referential, and even culturally offensive in some places (not that it lost all of the silliness in the dub). The characters were exaggerated in some aspects to fit their stereotypes even better, and were even given heavy (using this in a good way) national accents.

One one hand, you had fans decrying that it "ruined the spirit" of the original work, and on the other hand, you had fans saying it made the series much funnier and more memorable for a western audience. I agree with the latter, since offensive humor in general is much more of a western phenomena than an eastern one, and westerns in general have less patience for "cute" and "whimsical" in comparison to Japanese works.
 

24 minutes ago, Res said:

Sort of related: I'm a huge fan of seeing different interpretations on works, as long as one has access to the original alongside it. 

Yeah, this is a big part of it. In the present, we're lucky, since we have more often than not have access to both the original works and the localized version through the internet. It was a bigger problem in the past, where the Japanese work was flat-out inaccessible by the western audience...and localizers would often use that to their advantage with the more questionable localization changes. (Thinking of DiC's Sailor Moon dub here, in particular, which is largely considered inferior to the original in terms of writing, characterization, and tone.)

As a side note, I'm definitely interested in everyone's opinions on the matter of characterization changes in localization. Do you generally think that it's a good thing to change the characteristics and personality of a character, even to make them more acceptable to a western audience?

Personally, I don't mind the change for the most part, especially when the original character embodies a concept or trope foreign to the west. I know that a lot of people don't like how, say, Henry or Izana were localized (both characters are more serious and understated in the originals), but I believe that was a good route. Henry's understated creepiness and general feeling of "off" that he has in the Japanese version wouldn't endear him to Western players nearly as much as the more fun-loving, silly Henry we got in the localization. And Izana is silly by a Japanese context in the original (he speaks much more informally than someone of his station and appearance would, he tends to use tildes and elongate his syllables), but not so much by a western one. Spicing up his excitement and word choice was the best way they could make the same feeling come across to us, imo.

On the flipside, there are those that say you lose the intention of the original work, which harms it.

24 minutes ago, Res said:

However, the Ace Attorney series did fail in trying to relocate the setting from Japan to the U.S.; many of the cultural references haven't translated and it's become a big joke amongst fans (and doesn't make any sense to newcomers). So it's simultaneously one of my most favourite and least favourite localizations. 

Oh, Ace Attorney! I've never played the games myself, but I remember reading an interesting article regarding its localization. Since the series is meant to be a satire of the Japanese court systems (which are different from the US court systems in a variety of ways), a lot of stuff gets lost in translation. Like how judges are much less trusted in Japan, due to the fact that historically, judges were often corrupt nobles, while attorneys were commoners.

Edited March 8, 2017 by Extrasolar

[SatsumaFSoysoy]

I don't mind localizations changing some of the flavour or adding a little bit humor where there originally was none and stuff like that. When done well, it can improve an otherwise mundane scene or line. What's problematic is that sometimes, in an attempt to achieve this effect, the translators end up leaving out character details. They may be just tiny details unrelated to the plot, but these quirks and traits are all part of the character, put in by the original writer. FE does this occasionally.

[Extrasolar]

56 minutes ago, SatsumaFSoysoy said:

I don't mind localizations changing some of the flavour or adding a little bit humor where there originally was none and stuff like that. When done well, it can improve an otherwise mundane scene or line. What's problematic is that sometimes, in an attempt to achieve this effect, the translators end up leaving out character details. They may be just tiny details unrelated to the plot, but these quirks and traits are all part of the character, put in by the original writer. FE does this occasionally.

Could you provide some examples of the missing character details? I'm interested in these kinds of differences.

Question: How about if certain character quirks are nonsensical and/or don't mean the same thing to a western audience that they do to the original audience? Do you think those should be directly ported over? (Referencing things like verbal tics that are common in Japanese character writing.)

[Res]

7 minutes ago, Extrasolar said:

As a side note, I'm definitely interested in everyone's opinions on the matter of characterization changes in localization. Do you generally think that it's a good thing to change the characteristics and personality of a character, even to make them more acceptable to a western audience?

 

Oh, Ace Attorney! I've never played the games myself, but I remember reading an interesting article regarding its localization. Since the series is meant to be a satire of the Japanese court systems (which are different from the US court systems in a variety of ways), a lot of stuff gets lost in translation. Like how judges are much less trusted in Japan, due to the fact that historically, judges were often corrupt nobles, while attorneys were commoners.

Mm, I'm not sure. I do like Henry and Izana in the localizations, but I also haven't read much into their original characters to make a true comparison.

For the example I was thinking of: here are two examples of what difference the slightest change can make to a character. In both those cases, a more faithful translation would've served Takumi's character better. 

And yes, I read the same (or a similar) article on the Ace Attorney games and it does make the games make a LOT more sense, it's a pity that that kind of background/cultural information is hard to translate. What is even more absurd, though, is how the games' physical locations were changed from Japan to the U.S.; it just about works in the first game, as the settings could be from almost any country, but the later games have very Japanese-specific locations, and so the translation tried to play this up as Awkward Zombie so aptly illustrated. 

[Party Moth]

Localization is a tricky subject, in that what sort of changes are "better" for a work can be highly subjective. A major example of this is Ghost Stories, an anime that was localized by Steven Foster to be more of a black comedy than a supernatural horror story due to ad-libbed lines by the voice actors. The original work is regarded as fairly dry and boring, especially when put next to the somewhat offensive dub. It's a completely different show in English than Japanese.

Is this a good localization change? Many seem to think so, even though it strongly refuses to remain faithful to the source material. But it begs the question of when such drastic localization measure should be called for, as I highly doubt people would enjoy, say, Ghost in the Shell if all of its ideas were replaced with crass humor. This is an extreme example, of course, but less extreme examples tend to be much murkier on their subjective worth.

[Thor Odinson]

I would definitely prefer to have the characters be as faithful as possible, though there's a few instances where changing something actually brings the idea of the character out better across culturally than not. Ex. Ryoma punches Shiro in his Japanese recruitment, while just yells at him in the English. I find this apt since, as someone from an East Asian (yes we are not all the same, but I will give similarities where it's due) background, corporeal punishment is fairly normal and comes off disciplinarian but otherwise normal dad behavior. Like I didn't even bat an eye at that until western fans are like "wtf" and that's when I remembered that westerners tend to be a lot more sensitive to corporeal punishment than the east, and to a western perspective it looks like abuse when that isn't the intent in the character*. The localization thus changed it to convey Ryo's character better in a cultural context, which I thought was well-handled.

*(my own opinions on corporeal punishment does follow the western model more than eastern but this is more to provide perspective)

Also if a character that's clearly an offensive stereotype in the target culture where it wouldn't be in the source culture then, well, best judgement is used.

[Topaz Light]

I suppose my feelings on this are a little complex.

On the one hand, I do think that it's absolutely possible to go too far in making changes, to the point where it kinda stops being the same thing anymore, thus killing the point of the localization to begin with. Ghost Stories is one example of this, in the sense that the dub is essentially an officially-sanctioned, professionally-cast abridged series rather than anything resembling an actual translation/localization of the source thing. Although, in another way, I also kinda consider this a bad example of a badly-done localization, because it's clearly not even trying to be a localization of the original work at all. Something that is trying to be a localization of the original work, but doing a poor job of it, would be a better example, I think.

However, it is also absolutely possible to have translations that are so direct and literal as to end up being inaccurate, too. Localizing a work is about a lot more than just translating words; you have to translate not only meanings, but entire concepts and experiences, to a new audience. The example of Ryoma hitting Shiro up there illustrates that pretty well. That scene would likely be interpreted by many Western players as child abuse, and cast Ryoma and Shiro's relationship in a decidedly different light, in Westerners' eyes, than the original creators intended.

It is a delicate balancing act, though. Even just within the original language version, the same character could come off a dozen different ways to a dozen different people, who all home in on different aspects of that character and lend different amounts of weight to different facets of their personality and motivations. Making tweaks to preserve the intended audience perception of a character can be necessary for a good localization, but changing them to the point of them being essentially a different character is going a bit too far, I think.

I'm really not opposed to localization changes on principle, but I do think that there should at least be some sort of good reason for them.

[Extrasolar]

47 minutes ago, Res said:

Mm, I'm not sure. I do like Henry and Izana in the localizations, but I also haven't read much into their original characters to make a true comparison.

Here is an interesting analysis of the differences between localization Henry and original Henry. 

Here's one for Izana.

47 minutes ago, Res said:

For the example I was thinking of: here are two examples of what difference the slightest change can make to a character. In both those cases, a more faithful translation would've served Takumi's character better. 

This is pretty interesting. I honestly do think that "vain" fits Takumi (on a surface level) in a lot of ways (at least, localized Takumi; admittedly I don't know about original Takumi, but the post exposits that they're very similar). Considering one of his battle quotes is "Not my fault you're weak!"  and considering he pretends/exudes a high opinion of himself while being secretly low self-esteem, I think that it fits well enough. "Obstinate" though, I agree, fits better, especially with his initial distrust of Corrin and his long-held grudge against them.

As for the second change, if it's indeed meant to be "Takumi being paranoid that people are judging him," then it fits his character fine. But if we're meant to take it at face value, then yeah, it is pretty inexplicable. Though the original line would have worked better in context, considering it would be a reference not only to "I'm stronger than I look," but be clearer in its intentions.

47 minutes ago, Res said:

What is even more absurd, though, is how the games' physical locations were changed from Japan to the U.S.; it just about works in the first game, as the settings could be from almost any country, but the later games have very Japanese-specific locations, and so the translation tried to play this up as Awkward Zombie so aptly illustrated. 

That's hilarious.

That's another interesting discussion. Some people think the location references and/or references to traditionally Japanese food should be updated for familiarity to an American audience. Right off the top of my head, I know that in the original Japanese Fates, Hisame was obsessed with some sort of traditional Japanese vegetable - can't remember the name off the top of my head, but I remember it being obscure enough that most American players wouldn't recognize it. The English localization changes it to pickles. I think this was a decent way to handle it, but I do think some of the nuance was lost (the Japanese vegetable is associated with older people, so it's another thing that made Hisame a "young old man.") Personally, I would have gone with something like prunes to keep the nuance. XD

Though, yeah, if the setting is as very clearly Japanese as that (I mean, that's Mt. Fuji in the background, for crying out loud!) then simply rewriting dialogue to reference America is inexplicable. If you're gonna do that, at least go the extra mile and actually design an American-style town or pull reference from one, because at that point, you're insulting the viewer's intelligence.

I'm reminded of a similar thing in older dubs, like how works that explicitly took place in Japanese cities like Tokyo had the location reference removed (Tokyo Mew Mew to Mew Mew Power, right off the top of my head).
 

36 minutes ago, Party Moth said:

Is this a good localization change? Many seem to think so, even though it strongly refuses to remain faithful to the source material. But it begs the question of when such drastic localization measure should be called for, as I highly doubt people would enjoy, say, Ghost in the Shell if all of its ideas were replaced with crass humor. This is an extreme example, of course, but less extreme examples tend to be much murkier on their subjective worth.

Question: Did the dubbers know that the original Ghost Stories lukewarm reception in Japan? Was the dub their attempt at garnering any sort of interest in it?

I think the debate on this one comes down to, "What's worse, being forgettable or being possibly offensive?" I would argue that the former is worse, as entertainment in general seeks to leave some sort of lasting impact on all who consume it. People remember localized Ghost Stories far more than original Ghost Stories (you could argue not for good reasons, but still). If the original was as bland as the Japanese viewers found it, it was only helped by the localization.

Ghost in the Shell in its original incarnation set itself apart for a variety of reasons, and thus, a more offensive localization was not necessary to garner attention.

32 minutes ago, Thor Odinson said:

Like I didn't even bat an eye at that until western fans are like "wtf" and that's when I remembered that westerners tend to be a lot more sensitive to corporeal punishment than the east, and to a western perspective it looks like abuse when that isn't the intent in the character*. The localization thus changed it to convey Ryo's character better in a cultural context, which I thought was well-handled.

I always thought this change was interesting, considering even a few years ago, stuff like this wasn't censored...it wasn't until very recently that corporal punishment became controversial in the west.

Edited March 8, 2017 by Extrasolar

[Captain Karnage]

to some extent I understand why some things get changed, such a verbal humor and refrences so obscure that no one outside the region will understand

I'm also ok with changing symbols if they mean the same thing, like changing the number 4 in a japanese to western game

 

I in general don't like censorship at all, thats why I give censored gaming $10 a month on patreon

[carefreejules]

Personally, it'll take a lot or something really offensive to make me change my mind about whether I want to buy a game or not. But say a character had a few more layers added on to them for the Western release in comparison to the Japanese - I do not care about that change in the slightest. I'm someone who looks at a piece of media as a whole - I can be critical on what works and what doesn't in detail but things like characters being more clothed is so minor in my eyes that I can't bring myself to make a big deal out of it (aka Tokyo Mirage Sessions. I actually like Tsubasa's re-designed outfit for her debut song "Feel". I pay pretty close attention to idols whether they be real or fictional and 99.9%, they would never wear outfits that show THAT much skin unless the song/MV takes place at a beach. Her idol outfit for that song in the original does not match the tone of the song imo)

Humor is very important so I appreciate the effort of including pop culture references and puns for the localization. One series that does really good with localization would be the Persona series. They keep the honorifics and everything and they do it in a way where it doesn't feel or sound odd when spoken in English. 

One of my favourite animes that I used to watch back when I first started watching anime was Keroro Gunso. It's a really funny show but a lot of the humor is targeted towards the Japanese audience so there's a lot of puns and inside jokes that I don't understand because they involve the language itself. The English dub for it does a pretty good job at trying to keep the comedic tone of the Japanese version, but it didn't receive as much popularity as it did for the original because of the way the Japanese version handled the humor.(there are over 300 episodes in the original and I believe the English dub only covered about a quarter of that).

[Extrasolar]

56 minutes ago, carefreejules said:

Humor is very important so I appreciate the effort of including pop culture references and puns for the localization. One series that does really good with localization would be the Persona series. They keep the honorifics and everything and they do it in a way where it doesn't feel or sound odd when spoken in English. 

Persona! How could I forget about that in regards to good localizations? (Other than the first two games, as I have very little experience with them.) I agree that they did a great job localizing it for a western audience, even with the honorifics intact, and it definitely makes sense to include them. Though...it begs the question, since Persona 3 and 4 were localized when manga and anime were already popular in the west, I'm sure they knew that the target audience/people interested in the game would know what each one meant. But should the game have been made and localized when anime was less mainstream, would the honorifics been kept? (I'm remembering some manga which would leave in the honorifics, but have a huge glossary in the back explaining what each one meant.)

I always thought the use of honorifics in a non-Japanese setting was strange; I always appreciated localizations that dropped them since they really don't make sense in the context of non-Japanese people, even if some of the nuance of a character using an honorific for another is lost in translation. It's something that can't quite be replicated in English; I mean, a character calling another "-san" at times carries a much different connotation than its usual translation/localization "Mister/Miss," especially if it's between two people of similar age.

56 minutes ago, carefreejules said:

One of my favourite animes that I used to watch back when I first started watching anime was Keroro Gunso. It's a really funny show but a lot of the humor is targeted towards the Japanese audience so there's a lot of puns and inside jokes that I don't understand because they involve the language itself.

I've never seen the anime you're talking about, but I know of a similar case. Gintama is a huge hit in Japan (the manga is fairly popular, but especially the anime), but a lot of its humor is similarly Japanese, with puns, references, and general Japanese humor tropes. Seems like there's just certain humor that doesn't click with westerners like it does with Japanese fans.

The manga was localized in the west, at first, but failed to meet even a fraction of the popularity that the Japanese version has, and was cancelled. We never got an English dub of the anime for those very reasons - except for the movie.

Edited March 9, 2017 by Extrasolar

[carefreejules]

22 minutes ago, Extrasolar said:

I've never seen the anime you're talking about, but I know of a similar case. Gintama is a huge hit in Japan (the manga is fairly popular, but especially the anime), but a lot of its humor is similarly Japanese, with puns, references, and general Japanese humor tropes. Seems like there's just certain humor that doesn't click with westerners like it does with Japanese fans.

The manga was localized in the west, at first, but failed to meet even a fraction of the popularity that the Japanese version has, and was cancelled. We never got an English dub of the anime for those very reasons - except for the movie,

That's exactly how it was for Keroro Gunso! It was such a popular show back in the 2000's - it had a manga, it had 5 movies, over 300 episodes but hardly any of that was brought to the West but for good reason. There's only so much they can work off of and doing it well to make it appeal is so difficult. 

That's one of the reasons why I feel sympathy for people in charge of the localizing content from Japan because, despite the localization being good or bad, it's not an easy job. You're not translating just the text, but you're actively analyzing the situation and context its being used in so you can break it down into English to make it understandable without sounding stiff. And even then, there's still so much that gets lost in translation. 

For example, in the current idol mobile game that I'm really into, some of the chats/messaging conversations you can get, the characters use the terms herbivore/carnivore to describe someone who is shy/aggressive respectively. But, instead of just saying "someone who is shy" or "someone who is bold and aggressive" they use those terms and Japanese people know and understand the context of how those terms of being used where it makes sense to them. 

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Herbivore_men

[The DanMan]

1 hour ago, carefreejules said:

One series that does really good with localization would be the Persona series. They keep the honorifics and everything and they do it in a way where it doesn't feel or sound odd when spoken in English. 

Eh, I'd argue that it feels a bit pandery; I've seen multiple LPs of 3 and 4 were people are immediately weirded out by the intact honorifics, make the obligatory senpai joke, and then just ignore them. Really, I don't think they add much as only a small fraction of its target audience really gets what they mean and seemingly more are left in the dust.

Anyways,

I'm largely apathetic on the matter-- yeah, I'd prefer direct translation, but as far as localization is concerned one really does need to ask about cultural differences as well as the language itself. I've heard that translating from Japanese to English is especially hard because there's little exact equivocation between them, compared to English and other Romance languages. Japanese literally translated to English can sound plain odd or easily be misunderstood. There's something I've heard thrown about from a youtuber I follow who's studying to get into Japanese translation (and considering he LPs stuff, presumably game localization-- he helped with the Ace Attorney Investigations 2 fan translation): focus on communicating the meaning and spirit of the original rather than trying find the exact word analogues.

That said, there have been times where I put my foot down. Or really, one specific time: the localization of the first Azure Striker Gunvolt. It was rushed out in the US with large swaths of dialogue left cut and 8-4 left to their own devices. The original (the "Japanese Voice Mode" that's in the Steam release and was patched into the 3DS one is much more faithful and restores the cut dialogue, along with Japanese VO) almost completely changes the game. I've typed it up in multiple PMs, so I'll just spoiler it here for length. In general though, I'm pretty chill about things. I was mostly fine with Fates' localization (and was all for skinship and the swimsuit removals), and what little I did dislike I didn't see any point in howling about.

The Gunvolt Rant

 

Due to the devs wanting the game out in the US as early as possible, a large amount of text was cut (said text was mid-mission banter and most of the conversations with NPCs in-between missions). Basically, it was like localizing a Tales Of game but cutting the skits.

But that's only half of it. What remaining text was almost entirely re-written. Virtually every single character except the titular Gunvolt (who's just going by a code-name) was re-named, with their personalities altered (Gunvolt basically went from a stoic Master Chief-esque "I'll get the job done" type of character to a generic sarcastic action hero, for instance), on top of extremely goofy censor-swears ("gack", "jitt") that weren't censoring anything, and a few random line changes that mean totally different things (one of which has gained a fair amount of infamy because it directly contradicts official dev bios and other side material).

And then there was a character whose main abilities was manipulation of people's senses, and had an extremely effeminate design.

Pre-release material said "nobody's knows their real gender except Sumeragi Group (standard ambiguously villainous cyberpunk corporation who are the antagonists)".

8-4 decided that they were bigender. They didn't even bother with hyphens in bi-gender. And even more hilariously, the sequel confirms that they're female through and through.

Edited March 9, 2017 by The DanMan

[shadowofchaos]

6 hours ago, Extrasolar said:

So after that fiasco of a thread in the Fire Emblem Echoes subforum (if you weren't there, don't ask)

Hahahaha. That was something.

Moving on.

As has already been mentioned, what's better or worse in localization is *HIGHLY* subjective in most cases.

...me being a Japanese speaker, it's pretty much me wanting direct translation as much as possible. But I can accept that nothing will ever beat me seeing kanji on the interface, especially for Fire Emblem. So I'm a lost cause on that one. As a result, I always try to look at it from the typical English speaker's perspective. I am of the opinion that the outrage is very much exaggerated when it comes to the word "censorship" that people always throw around with much emotional disgust. When they themselves, don't understand the process of translation and moving across cultural boundaries.

I mean you don't *HAVE* to have to know a second language to understand the process of localization... but it sure as hell helps your mindset be more understanding of the difficulties associated with it.

My favorite localization is Phoenix Wright as well. However, as I play the JP versions and watch the anime... I seem to laugh more at the problems they made for themselves as I go on. Haha.

However, with that said... that is one of the most... I don't know how to describe it... I guess... it has the "best flow" (?) of localizations I've ever seen. There is no choppy feeling that you get when you recognize something that needed some correcting for the typical English speaker. They did their job in that you were able to play the game like the native speaker of Japanese with the original version of the game with a level of satisfaction.

And while I have *many* gripes with FE14's localization... none of them are so major as they'd ruin my experience of the game. I'd say Fates was the same for most people. *ESPECIALLY* if they weren't aware of the controversy surrounding certain aspects of the game.

Which made me really laugh at the statement earlier in that crappy thread:

Quote

So, due to how universally hated Fates' localization is

Hahahahaha.

Edited March 9, 2017 by shadowofchaos

[Extrasolar]

25 minutes ago, carefreejules said:

For example, in the current idol mobile game that I'm really into, some of the chats/messaging conversations you can get, the characters use the terms herbivore/carnivore to describe someone who is shy/aggressive respectively. But, instead of just saying "someone who is shy" or "someone who is bold and aggressive" they use those terms and Japanese people know and understand the context of how those terms of being used where it makes sense to them. 

Yeah... That's really odd. I can't see any westerners knowing what those mean in context; I feel like that's a bit immersion-breaking and think it should have been adjusted accordingly. I know there's people who favor authenticity, but when you're leaving the player sitting there scratching their head about exactly what that's supposed to mean, I think it's a big mistake.

18 minutes ago, The DanMan said:

I'm largely apathetic on the matter-- yeah, I'd prefer direct translation, but as far as localization is concerned one really does need to ask about cultural differences as well as the language itself. I've heard that translating from Japanese to English is especially hard because there's little exact equivocation between them, compared to English and other Romance languages. Japanese literally translated to English can sound plain odd or easily be misunderstood.

This is very true. Japanese has a very different structure than in English, and that's not even beginning to cover all the differences between Japanese speaking style (which change depending on the sex and age of the speaker, and who they happen to be talking to). Even communicating character traits through dialogue is different: For example, in Japanese, a character who always refers to themselves in the third person is meant to be childish, immature and/or cute; in America, that same character is seen as arrogant or full of themselves. Way, way different.
 

25 minutes ago, carefreejules said:

That's one of the reasons why I feel sympathy for people in charge of the localizing content from Japan because, despite the localization being good or bad, it's not an easy job. You're not translating just the text, but you're actively analyzing the situation and context its being used in so you can break it down into English to make it understandable without sounding stiff. And even then, there's still so much that gets lost in translation. 

This exactly. I personally feel like localizers get far more flack than they deserve, because making something work for an audience with completely different cultural and entertainment tastes and even social values is a difficult, difficult process.

One thing that makes it harder is voiced scenes - while you can extend or shorten text in a box as needed, spoken dialogue needs to both fit the lip flaps and confer the meaning of the original.

18 minutes ago, The DanMan said:

Eh, I'd argue that it feels a bit pandery; I've seen multiple LPs of 3 and 4 were people are immediately weirded out by the intact honorifics, make the obligatory senpai joke, and then just ignore them. Really, I don't think they add much as only a small fraction of its target audience really gets what they mean and seemingly more are left in the dust.

Pandery? How so? I think they make sense, considering they take place in a Japanese setting featuring Japanese characters, who use honorifics with one another daily. I feel like it heightens realism.
 

Granted, your argument that they can still be obscure to a western audience has a point. Though considering how many anime influences are in Persona 3 and 4, I think they assumed most of the audience interested in picking it up (and Atlus games as a whole) would be anime fans and familiar with the material.

18 minutes ago, The DanMan said:

Pre-release material said "nobody's knows their real gender except Sumeragi Group (standard ambiguously villainous cyberpunk corporation who are the antagonists)".

8-4 decided that they were bigender. They didn't even bother with hyphens in bi-gender. And even more hilariously, the sequel confirms that they're female through and through.

I've never played the game in question, but could this be a problem of the lack of genderless pronouns in English? In Japanese, it's extremely easy to write around a character's gender if it's meant to be ambiguous (Crona of the anime Soul Eater comes to mind here), since in Japanese you generally don't use pronouns if they can be avoided.

English, on the other hand, is the opposite; you can't exactly use "it" to refer to an ambiguously-gendered person, since it's dehumanizing. Sometimes people use "they," but as that's considered grammatically incorrect, some shy away from that too. In Crona's case, they defaulted to male pronouns in the English dub just because of that.

Imo making the character bi-gender is an interesting choice; I feel it's better than defaulting to one or the other when the gender is unknown. I feel like they worked the best with what they got.

Edited March 9, 2017 by Extrasolar

[Jedi]

Localizations I like tend to be the ones Xseed does, especially for Ys and the Legend of Heroes franchises, they keep stuff intact, but remove redundancies along with putting some cool spins and mild needed changes so things flow better in English among other things. 

They are also really friendly and willing to talk to fans and such.

[SatsumaFSoysoy]

4 hours ago, Extrasolar said:

Could you provide some examples of the missing character details? I'm interested in these kinds of differences.

Question: How about if certain character quirks are nonsensical and/or don't mean the same thing to a western audience that they do to the original audience? Do you think those should be directly ported over? (Referencing things like verbal tics that are common in Japanese character writing.)

Hmm... It's hard to think of specific details atm, but I know they exist. Usually I see them, mention them to my friends, then I just forget about them.

In the M!Robin-Cordelia B Support, Cordelia mentions that her fellow Pegasus Knights often teased her for her flat chest by fondling them iirc. That was left out in the localization. Lol.

In Fates, if Jakob and Felicia marry in the Japanese version, Felicia has a special ending that says under Jakob's training, she managed to improve to the point of only breaking one plate every three times she carries one. That was omitted in the localization, I believe.

In the Birthright M!Corrin-Azura support in Japanese, Corrin confesses by telling Azura that he wants to show her that the world isn't as cold and cruel as she thinks, and is actually full of love; he thinks she grew up without experiencing that kind of love. Azura is happy, but she also thinks Corrin is just pitying her. That wasn't in the English support, which imo was rather plain. Also less important, but in their Revelation S support, after Corrin apologizes and says Azura has beautiful skin, she jokingly forgives him since Corrin praised her beauty, instead of being upset.

There are some character details that can only be learnt through skinship in the Japanese version; they're not super important, but I think they're pretty cool. For example, Kagerou says she can actually see perfectly through the hair covering her right eye. Sakura's miko robes were handmade by Mikoto. Hana actually protests a lot when you do skinship, but once you get A Support, she just gives up and says "if it makes you happy, then whatever".

Character attitudes do kinda change a lot from the source to the localization, though. Panne in the Japanese version is kinda refined and calm in her speech, in contrast the hot-blooded hostility she often displays in the English supports. She's still quite prideful, but doesn't sound as...arrogant. Azura feels much more distant in Japanese. She's not as excited about conversation as she seems to be in English, and doesn't speak in a perky tone ever. She does joke around sometimes, but it's extremely rare compared to the English version. Part of why I don't like the localizations is really just bias because of how...different the characters become.

I can see why stuff like verbal tics would cause problems in localizations. I think the translators should try to preserve the core of these tics: you can't directly translate them, but they can keep the point of it. For example, in Japanese, Peri often adds "nano" to the end of her sentences (it's even a voice line); Orochi and Kagerou both have very old-fashioned speech (but they don't share the same patterns). These were completely left out in the English version. If I were working on the translation, I'd try to find something to match these quirks, like having Peri say "Y'know" at the end of her sentences, and make Orochi and Kagerou use a bit of older grammar and formal word choice.

Edited March 9, 2017 by SatsumaFSoysoy

[Extrasolar]

2 hours ago, SatsumaFSoysoy said:

In the M!Robin-Cordelia B Support, Cordelia mentions that her fellow Pegasus Knights often teased her for her flat chest by fondling them iirc.

Oh. Ohh. Yeah...I can definitely see why they'd get rid of that one. Though it does make me feel sorry for her, just on how cruel that is.

Yeah, it is a shame that we lost moments like in the Corrin/Azura supports in the localization. As for the changed supports, the only one I really dislike is Saizo/Beruka C...which is nothing but a bunch of ellipses. I read the original, where they discuss both of them being assassins, and to change it just for the sake of a joke on both of them being stoic and quiet...yeah, I can't really get behind that. You lose too much character and development. Not sure why Treehouse went that way...

Though I also remember the Stahl/Kellam support where they made Stahl strangely dickish and insensitive to Kellam's invisibility problem, when in the original he was melancholy about how both of them tend to get overlooked and not stand out.
 

2 hours ago, SatsumaFSoysoy said:

Part of why I don't like the localizations is really just bias because of how...different the characters become.

Oh. I don't mind this for the most part, as long as the change is serviceable (I vastly prefer localized Henry to original Henry, for example), but when it's something completely different...but yeah, I can see how you could dislike the original intent being muddled.

Though some characters can be improved in localization imo. Another one besides Henry is Azama. I've read his dialogue and supports in the original, and he tends to come off as much more of a borderline-nihilistic dick (in the original Kagero/Azama support, he straight-up asks if Kagero is showing so much cleavage to distract men on the battlefield...like, dude. Rude...); in the English, they at least made his speech more lighthearted and teasing.

2 hours ago, Jedi said:

Localizations I like tend to be the ones Xseed does, especially for Ys and the Legend of Heroes franchises, they keep stuff intact, but remove redundancies along with putting some cool spins and mild needed changes so things flow better in English among other things. 

They are also really friendly and willing to talk to fans and such.

Xseed! The localized The Last Story. Love that game to death. Don't know anything about the original version, though, except that the main character's name was changed to be something a little more manageable to western audiences.

Speaking of which, name changes! I think FE is the very best in this regard, adjusting certain strange names to work for a western audience. (What in the world is a "Yofa...?" Oh, "Rolf" makes much more sense!) I remember reading an article where Treehouse says that they get the nod of approval from IS themselves on name changes, and they still often pull from mythological references like the original names to use in their renames. Aaand then you have the name changes which seem arbitrary...like changing Kilroy to Rhys. What's the deal with that?
 

2 hours ago, SatsumaFSoysoy said:

There are some character details that can only be learnt through skinship in the Japanese version; they're not super important, but I think they're pretty cool. For example, Kagerou says she can actually see perfectly through the hair covering her right eye. Sakura's miko robes were handmade by Mikoto.

Ohh, right. I remember these. It is a shame we lost little trivia details like this...though I am personally glad they got rid of skinship. Too bad they couldn't just insert them somewhere in-game to be viewable or something.
 

2 hours ago, shadowofchaos said:

I am of the opinion that the outrage is very much exaggerated when it comes to the word "censorship" that people always throw around with much emotional disgust. When they themselves, don't understand the process of translation and moving across cultural boundaries.

I know exactly what you mean here! I've talked to countless "purists" who fly into a rage at the slightest of changes, even if said changes were things that would make no sense or mean something different to a western audience. It's like, I don't know about you, but I'd rather not have my immersion broken while playing a game or reading or something, trying to puzzle out how "spider" and "cloud" sound the same and can be used for a joke (they're both pronounced "kumo" in Japanese).

2 hours ago, shadowofchaos said:

Which made me really laugh at the statement earlier in that crappy thread:

Quote

So, due to how universally hated Fates' localization is

Hahahahaha.

Same. Talk about somebody forcing their opinion onto everyone else...
 

2 hours ago, SatsumaFSoysoy said:

For example, in Japanese, Peri often adds "nano" to the end of her sentences (it's even a voice line); Orochi and Kagerou both have very old-fashioned speech (but they don't share the same patterns). These were completely left out in the English version. If I were working on the translation, I'd try to find something to match these quirks, like having Peri say "Y'know" at the end of her sentences, and make Orochi and Kagerou use a bit of older grammar and formal word choice.

With translating Japanese verbal tics, I always remember the example of Naruto's "believe it!" in the dub; in the original, he has a verbal tic of "dattebayo" (which doesn't really mean anything) that he often tags onto the end of his sentences. There's nothing really they could have created as an equivalent, but it seemed there to fill out the lip flaps of "dattebayo." But then they just kind of....dropped it suddenly as the series went on, even though Japanese Naruto keeps his tic throughout the entire series. Never understood why, unless viewers found it annoying.

Speaking of which, he refers to a much older character, Tsunade, as "Tsunade-baachan," which was localized as "Grandma Tsunade." It's probably the closest they could have gotten it, but -baachan has a much more affectionate tone than calling the middle-aged woman "Grandma." And considering he's poked fun at her age before... Eh. Just seems vaguely off if not a little bit insulting.

One verbal tic related localization I think they did really well was with Teddie in Person 4 (Kuma in the original); in Japanese he has a tendency to end his sentences with "-kuma"; in the English, they made the best possible choice and had him make bear puns with his words. So much better than just ending sentences with "bear." Not to mention, I can't resist the "Sensei! That was sensei-tional!" joke they inserted.

About Orochi and Kagero: It is a bit strange that they didn't localize their tone, considering they did it perfectly with Bastian speaking in Shakesperean Iambic pentameter instead of the overly flowery very formal Japanese he speaks in the original. Granted, Bastian was a comedic character and was mostly exaggerated in his speech, but kind of weird that they dropped that nuance completely in the localization. If anything, Orochi's speech seems to be one of the more relaxed in the game iirc.

2 hours ago, shadowofchaos said:

And while I have *many* gripes with FE14's localization... none of them are so major as they'd ruin my experience of the game. I'd say Fates was the same for most people. *ESPECIALLY* if they weren't aware of the controversy surrounding certain aspects of the game.

I'm interesting in hearing what you didn't like about it.

If it's not too much trouble. :3

Edited March 9, 2017 by Extrasolar

[SatsumaFSoysoy]

1 minute ago, Extrasolar said:

Oh. Ohh. Yeah...I can definitely see why they'd get rid of that one. Though it does make me feel sorry for her, just on how cruel that is.

She was smiling when she said that, though. Perhaps she didn't like it at the time, but now that all of them are dead, she thinks back on those times fondly.

[Acacia Sgt]

I'd say, to me, something like changing the original product to cater to a different audience has never bothered me much.

It's only those single cases where they seem to make changes without taking hindsight into account that I question why they thought it could be a good idea. Like, I know hindsight is 20/20, but one could at least think that when making a change, it has to be with the conscience that the original thing may be brought up again. Though sometimes I find that more hilarious than annoying. Like in Pokémon, when they decided to kill off Brock's mother, instead of keeping that both parents abandoned the family, like in the original Japanese. Seemed harmless at the time, because surely the mother wouldn't become relevant or actually appear, right? Yeah... about that... lol. I think they didn't bothered with that one, they just treated her like she had always been alive. Considering this was in the Battle Frontier Arc and the previous mention was ALLLLLLL the way back in early Kanto, I guess they thought it woulnd't be a big deal now to ignore the previous change (localization shifted to a new team around the BF arc itself, which probably also helped in that decision, but I don't know if that episode was before or after the shift).

Another opinion I have, is that sometimes localization is done with a wrong/misguided intent. Since different places will have different standards, what may be say, considered fine for kids in place A won't be in place B. But when B decides to bring the product over, instead of catering it to who it may be suitable for in place B (let's say teens for example), they won't do that. They'll instead change it so it can be suitable to their own kids as well. And depending on things, that can really hurt the product itself. Though I know sometimes they will have more than one version of the product available, the original and the modified one, so that can mitigate it.

[SatsumaFSoysoy]

1 hour ago, Extrasolar said:

Another one besides Henry is Azama. I've read his dialogue and supports in the original, and he tends to come off as much more of a borderline-nihilistic dick (in the original Kagero/Azama support, he straight-up asks if Kagero is showing so much cleavage to distract men on the battlefield...like, dude. Rude...); in the English, they at least made his speech more lighthearted and teasing.

I've always found the "rude" characters (Severa, Jakob, Azama) to just be funny. Nothing they've said has really made me go "that's too far", so far.

[Tetragrammaton]

Sometimes I think the localization team want to get rid everything from the original team.

That's why we have all the castle names, holy blood names changed in FE4 while they were already romanized in the original game, they want to remove all traces to Kaga.

Sometimes, before a game is official localized, there is some fan translation for the game floating around, because the fan translated names are so good that there is no way for the localization team to make a better name, hence we have stupid names like Seliph, Ced and Munnir.

Edited March 9, 2017 by hanhnn