Anyone else miss the European names?

[Jotari]

Shadow Dragon was localised in Europe before America. This lead to quite a few names being different between the two versions. Most notably the phonic spelling of Shiida and Akaneia (oh wait, do they proununce the ch like an actual ch in voice acted games? I can't quite remember). But there were also other stuff like Doluna for Medeus empire as opposed to the mighty Dollar and Nabarl instead of Navarre, which is probably less justifiable than the first two but still a name I prefer. They also kept consistency with Aimee by giving her the same name she had in Tellius, while Nintendo of America switched to calling her by her original Japansse name (Larabel). We did miss getting the hilariously named Hyman though, which is an incalculable loss. Can't quite remember how things were localized in Awaken's spot pass, but this game certainly reminded me of times long past when character names were easier to pronounce. Anyone else in the same position?

Edited September 1, 2018 by Jotari

[DemolisherBPB]

As European player No, I don't miss these names, To the extent that I read them as the more common or Official Translations used elsewhere. I mean I never got why we got Bern became Biran. In Melee Roys trophy called it Bern so it was really out of the blue, Then again going to Melee trophys is a whole other can of worms.

Shiida I don't really like because it feels far too hash to say. Caeda doesn't have the same "Sh" opening.

Navarre to Nabarl is just what. Nabarl is just odd to me, Navarre is an actual place in the world so It's just more recognisable as a word I guess.

Larabel/Aimee I actually don't mind either way. Both are fine. Though Aimee is a bit nice to say.

And Dolhr/Doluna/Dollar is just...Countries are the best part of FE translations because they go so far out of whack. Akaneia though I really don't like, Archenea it took me some time to learn you don't pronounce the ch as a "Ch" sound but after that it's been fine.

It appears that we are actually opposites here. Even though I'm a UK English speaker I found the EU names slightly harder to pronounce right. I'm going to just say it's because I'm from the north and we like to miss letters from the end of words and any excuse that doesn't work. Though even I agree that the loss of Hyman was a bit sad, Raynard is at least a bit more of a name though.

On the Awakening note, Mine have the PAL/EU names been a EU PAL copy of the game, I don't know if this extends to other regions but hey, my game says mum and that makes me happy.

[Punished Dayni]

26 minutes ago, Jotari said:

Shadow Dragon was localised in Europe before America. This lead to quite a few names being different between the two versions. Most notably the phonic spelling of Shiida and Akaneia (oh wait, do they proununce the ch like an actual ch in voice acted games? I can't quite remember). But there were also other stuff like Doluna for Medeus empire as opposed to the mighty Dollar and Nabarl instead of Navarre, which is probably less justifiable than the first two but still a name I prefer. They also kept consistency with Aimee by giving her the same name she had in Tellius, while Nintendo of America switched to calling her by her original Japansse name (Larabel). We did miss getting the hilariously named Hyman though, which is an incalculable loss. Can't quite remember how things were localized in Awaken's spot pass, but this game certainly reminded me of times long past when character names were easier to pronounce. Anyone else in the same position?

Definitely Shiida and Doluna I'd agree on (even if I'm more than used to them), while Archanea is something I also got used to and Nabarl, while apparently more accurate was always less sensible to me.

As for Spotpass, let us never forget how terrible Raquesis was. There's also Malice (I think it's Maris now), the uncertainty of Lewyn, Quan and Ethlyn (which might be on the next banner).... and just about everything else has been covered by now. Not a single Gaiden oddity.

[Jotari]

1 hour ago, DemolisherBPB said:

As European player No, I don't miss these names, To the extent that I read them as the more common or Official Translations used elsewhere. I mean I never got why we got Bern became Biran. In Melee Roys trophy called it Bern so it was really out of the blue, Then again going to Melee trophys is a whole other can of worms.

Shiida I don't really like because it feels far too hash to say. Caeda doesn't have the same "Sh" opening.

Navarre to Nabarl is just what. Nabarl is just odd to me, Navarre is an actual place in the world so It's just more recognisable as a word I guess.

Larabel/Aimee I actually don't mind either way. Both are fine. Though Aimee is a bit nice to say.

And Dolhr/Doluna/Dollar is just...Countries are the best part of FE translations because they go so far out of whack. Akaneia though I really don't like, Archenea it took me some time to learn you don't pronounce the ch as a "Ch" sound but after that it's been fine.

It appears that we are actually opposites here. Even though I'm a UK English speaker I found the EU names slightly harder to pronounce right. I'm going to just say it's because I'm from the north and we like to miss letters from the end of words and any excuse that doesn't work. Though even I agree that the loss of Hyman was a bit sad, Raynard is at least a bit more of a name though.

On the Awakening note, Mine have the PAL/EU names been a EU PAL copy of the game, I don't know if this extends to other regions but hey, my game says mum and that makes me happy.

Well Caeda doesn't have the Sh opening, but the original Japanese name does. It has this smiley face looking katakana シ , which is Shi. Pronounced like She. Don't really see how that's harsh. Only thing really wrong with Shiida is that double i thing it has going on. Can't think of any legitimate English word that has that going on. Still, better than the monstrosity of letters that almost anyone would think is Kayda on first glance.

[Interdimensional Observer]

1 hour ago, DemolisherBPB said:

Akaneia though I really don't like, Archenea it took me some time to learn you don't pronounce the ch as a "Ch" sound but after that it's been fine.

What?

It's Arc-can-neigh-uh? Or is it Arc-ken-knee-uh? 

Either way, it's better than the land of arches.

 

Larabel stands out more than Aimee, and Tellius has the issue of Aimee and Amy, so to avoid pronouncing the names the same, I say Ai-mee, which is a little weird.

[Jotari]

56 minutes ago, Interdimensional Observer said:

What?

It's Arc-can-neigh-uh? Or is it Arc-ken-knee-uh? 

Either way, it's better than the land of arches.

 

Larabel stands out more than Aimee, and Tellius has the issue of Aimee and Amy, so to avoid pronouncing the names the same, I say Ai-mee, which is a little weird.

Ar-can-neigh-ah. To be honest I'm not to fond of Akaneia myself, I like the R even if its not in the original Japanese name. Still, it makes more sense than Archanea's Ch that isn't a Ch. Like, would it really have been that bad to simply take out the H and leave it as Arcanea? Or better yet, just add an R to the European spelling, Arkaneia.

Edited September 1, 2018 by Jotari

[Tamanoir]

In Awakening (at least the French Version), we have a few changes. Some for obvious reasons (Cherche and Trouve Panne became  Zelcher and Palne. ), some for less obvious ones (Lon'zu, and Linfan for Morgan.), plus Inigo becomes Iñigo. The other are the same.

Though, of all of them, Zelcher is the ony one I could use, because Cherche is not a name. (I pronounced it Zel-Ker, so I can made the joke Belle Zelcher = Berserker)

[Slumber]

5 hours ago, Jotari said:

Ar-can-neigh-ah. To be honest I'm not to fond of Akaneia myself, I like the R even if its not in the original Japanese name. Still, it makes more sense than Archanea's Ch that isn't a Ch. Like, would it really have been that bad to simply take out the H and leave it as Arcanea? Or better yet, just add an R to the European spelling, Arkaneia.

Except "Arch" can be pronounced without the "Ch" sound, unless you're specifically referring to curved "arches". Things that are "arch" in reference to a name or a title are pronounced with the hard "K"/hard "C", like "Archbishop" or, in use of this series, "Archsage". Or DOOM's "Archvile".

And depending on the language, "Ch" never has a soft sound. For example, I don't think German(English might be the only Germanic language that uses soft "Ch" sounds) uses the "chuh" sound at all, and all instances of that come to mind "ch" are the hard "K"/hard "C" sound. Sometimes it gets soft-ish, but it sounds more like a slurred "K" sound than a "chuh".

Plus, if you were to spell it like "Arcanea", you'd get people doing the same here, where people might pronounce it with a soft "C", and it sounds more like "Ar-san-neigh-ah".

Then you get the Romance languages, where "Ch"s are even softer than in English, to the point where they're basically "Sh" noises.

Really what bothers me is the hard "neigh-ah" part.

Edited September 1, 2018 by Slumber

[DemolisherBPB]

7 hours ago, Jotari said:

Can't think of any legitimate English word that has that going on

Taxiing is one, but there the taxi and ing are very separate. In all honesty I'm just really bad at reading and pronouncing things in general so I don't have much faith in what I say most of the time. It's why SoV been 90% voice acted was a blessing for me.

[Re: The weirdo.]

oh i thought you meant how the names from fire emblem in general tended to get inspiration from mid-european countries, like how basically everyone is named germanically in FE4/5 and sort of tapered off in the pseudo-realistically based naming from mid-europe, and started to just be names in general after a while.

but in response to my own question, i did like there being a sort of internal consistency with who what names could be, it made fe4 feel more alive, and seeing that I've never actually noticed the naming changes thing, i wouldn't really have an opinion on it, so there's a tangent

[Jotari]

2 hours ago, Slumber said:

Except "Arch" can be pronounced without the "Ch" sound, unless you're specifically referring to curved "arches". Things that are "arch" in reference to a name or a title are pronounced with the hard "K"/hard "C", like "Archbishop" or, in use of this series, "Archsage". Or DOOM's "Archvile".

And depending on the language, "Ch" never has a soft sound. For example, I don't think German(English might be the only Germanic language that uses soft "Ch" sounds) uses the "chuh" sound at all, and all instances of that come to mind "ch" are the hard "K"/hard "C" sound. Sometimes it gets soft-ish, but it sounds more like a slurred "K" sound than a "chuh".

Plus, if you were to spell it like "Arcanea", you'd get people doing the same here, where people might pronounce it with a soft "C", and it sounds more like "Ar-san-neigh-ah".

Then you get the Romance languages, where "Ch"s are even softer than in English, to the point where they're basically "Sh" noises.

Really what bothers me is the hard "neigh-ah" part.

I don't think I've heard Archbishop or Archsage referred to as Ark Bishop or Ark Sage. They're certainly widely referred to as Arch. Look, here's the first video result I got searching Archbishop and they say Arch.

 

51 minutes ago, (s)ad touch said:

oh i thought you meant how the names from fire emblem in general tended to get inspiration from mid-european countries, like how basically everyone is named germanically in FE4/5 and sort of tapered off in the pseudo-realistically based naming from mid-europe, and started to just be names in general after a while.

but in response to my own question, i did like there being a sort of internal consistency with who what names could be, it made fe4 feel more alive, and seeing that I've never actually noticed the naming changes thing, i wouldn't really have an opinion on it, so there's a tangent

Fe4 is the game that randomly has a Muhammad mixed in with everyone else though XD. And he isn't even using the middle eastern aesthetic of the lopt church, he's just a reused Chagall.

[Slumber]

I've actually heard both Ark and Arch, but that doesn't prove my point.\

Mostly in reference to "bishop", though. Everything else I've heard exclusively "ark". "Archangel" being another one.

Edited September 1, 2018 by Slumber

[Interdimensional Observer]

6 hours ago, Tamanoir said:

Though, of all of them, Zelcher is the ony one I could use, because Cherche is not a name. (I pronounced it Zel-Ker, so I can made the joke Belle Zelcher = Berserker)

Cherche sounds like a bird chirping to me. And it looks quite different from her NoJ name of Serge, which is an actual name, albeit masculine in appearance to me. I don't like it.

However I could imagine Cherche is phonetically supposed to be pronounced the same as Serge. It'd be a very tortured and unintuitive pronunciation, but given the Sheeda-Caeda thing, it is possible. Cherche never actually says her name, right? Seh-air-chi I would hazard is how you pronounce it, and that can be done with both Serge and Cherche. How does Cherche pronounce her name in Heroes?

Likewise, Seti ("Sety" is just wrong, the Norse god of justice is usually translated as Forseti, like the tome officially is) being changed to Ced might be another case of NoA liking tortured S-C translations. Seh-ee, if that is how it is pronounced, can be done with both Ced and Seti, even if the temptation to make it -tee/-dee is strong.

[Light Strategist]

If anyone's still wondering, Awakening's Spot Pass for Shadow Dragon's listings kept the European names, though funnily enough, I'm fairly sure that characters that refer to Bern from Blazing or Binding Blade refer to it as Bern as opposed to Biran which it was localized as (despite the fun fact that it was still written as Bern on the World Map in Blazing Blade AND that the Map screen referred to it as Bern as well). Yeah... Elibe's something of a mess...

[Scoot]

Some I like, some I don't. I prefer Shiida or Sheeda to Caeda because it looks to me like they were trying to make the name look fancier. Or maybe to make it more different than Sheena/Sheema. I still pronounce it "shee-da" when I read it, out of habit I guess.

Nabarl was a biblical reference, if I'm remembering correctly? Navarre sounds more elegant, though.

I think Cherche is supposed to be pronounced "share-sheh". It's sort of psudo-French. Her Japanese name is written as セルジュ or "Seruju" (seen here, on the wiki) so I'm guessing "sare-jah" (like "Sarah") rather than "surge" would be closer to the intended pronunciation. Although I'm no expert in Japanese, so feel free to take this with a grain of salt.

[Jotari]

1 hour ago, Interdimensional Observer said:

Cherche sounds like a bird chirping to me. And it looks quite different from her NoJ name of Serge, which is an actual name, albeit masculine in appearance to me. I don't like it.

However I could imagine Cherche is phonetically supposed to be pronounced the same as Serge. It'd be a very tortured and unintuitive pronunciation, but given the Sheeda-Caeda thing, it is possible. Cherche never actually says her name, right? Seh-air-chi I would hazard is how you pronounce it, and that can be done with both Serge and Cherche. How does Cherche pronounce her name in Heroes?

Likewise, Seti ("Sety" is just wrong, the Norse god of justice is usually translated as Forseti, like the tome officially is) being changed to Ced might be another case of NoA liking tortured S-C translations. Seh-ee, if that is how it is pronounced, can be done with both Ced and Seti, even if the temptation to make it -tee/-dee is strong.

Ced is an abomination worse even than Caeda. The only way it can even half resemble Seti (assuming it is meant to be Set-tee, katakana can probably reveal that) if there is a massive focus on the lone D so it becomes Seh-DUH. Or, like Seed. Not sure how you can get Seh-ee from Ced. D as ee? Regardless I think most people would instinctively read it as Said.

Side note, don't really have any reason to complain about it being changed given its origin, but I really like Holsety as word. Kind of invokes the word Holy which is coincidentally fitting.

Edited September 2, 2018 by Jotari

[MisterIceTeaPeach]

I think the only European version I accept is Alja... because no one wants to be named Mist.

[Re: The weirdo.]

7 hours ago, Jotari said:

Fe4 is the game that randomly has a Muhammad mixed in with everyone else though XD. And he isn't even using the middle eastern aesthetic of the lopt church, he's just a reused Chagall.

oh i mostly meant the player characters, who from what i can tell, are european-ish in names, but yeah i fucked up lol.

[Tamanoir]

6 hours ago, Interdimensional Observer said:

Cherche sounds like a bird chirping to me. And it looks quite different from her NoJ name of Serge, which is an actual name, albeit masculine in appearance to me. I don't like it.

However I could imagine Cherche is phonetically supposed to be pronounced the same as Serge. It'd be a very tortured and unintuitive pronunciation, but given the Sheeda-Caeda thing, it is possible. Cherche never actually says her name, right? Seh-air-chi I would hazard is how you pronounce it, and that can be done with both Serge and Cherche. How does Cherche pronounce her name in Heroes?

Likewise, Seti ("Sety" is just wrong, the Norse god of justice is usually translated as Forseti, like the tome officially is) being changed to Ced might be another case of NoA liking tortured S-C translations. Seh-ee, if that is how it is pronounced, can be done with both Ced and Seti, even if the temptation to make it -tee/-dee is strong.

The issue with Cherche is that it is literally "search" in French. Search would an OK translation for her name as well, but it would looks pretty ridiculous.

[BrightBow]

Bern was not doubt changed because it's the name of an actual city. Kinda like how in Shadow Dragon, where Macedonia and Orleans got renamed. Quite frankly I'm surprised they still use the name Crimea considering that the real Crimea got invaded by Russia since then.

[Jotari]

44 minutes ago, BrightBow said:

Bern was not doubt changed because it's the name of an actual city. Kinda like how in Shadow Dragon, where Macedonia and Orleans got renamed. Quite frankly I'm surprised they still use the name Crimea considering that the real Crimea got invaded by Russia since then.

Valencia is a real place too. I find it a crying shame they called in Valentia (even though that is kind of a real place too...kind of). Valencia has such a nice ring to it imo.

[Michelaar]

I'm only annoyed that they changed Kysha to 'Kyza'. Kyza is factually incorrect, as in both versions of Path of Radiance, in a support between I believe Lethe and Ranulf, they refer to this character as 'Kysha.' The European version got it right but the NA version for some reason didn't. Overall I prefer the european names.

[Etrurian emperor]

1 hour ago, BrightBow said:

Bern was not doubt changed because it's the name of an actual city. Kinda like how in Shadow Dragon, where Macedonia and Orleans got renamed. Quite frankly I'm surprised they still use the name Crimea considering that the real Crimea got invaded by Russia since then.

Out of all the changes Orleans becoming Aurelis is one I actually like. Aurelis sounds more distinguished than the rather bland Orleans. 

I don't think IS could get away with changing the name of Crimea. Tellius has a record of great worldbuilding and randomly changing the name of a well developed country would be weird. It helps that Crimea seems based far more on France and the Low Countries than on Ukraine. 

[Etria]

Which European version have changed Bern to Biran? The german one of 7 definitely had Bern.

[Tetragrammaton]

12 hours ago, Jotari said:

Ced is an abomination worse even than Caeda. The only way it can even half resemble Seti (assuming it is meant to be Set-tee, katakana can probably reveal that) if there is a massive focus on the lone D so it becomes Seh-DUH. Or, like Seed. Not sure how you can get Seh-ee from Ced. D as ee? Regardless I think most people would instinctively read it as Said.

Side note, don't really have any reason to complain about it being changed given its origin, but I really like Holsety as word. Kind of invokes the word Holy which is coincidentally fitting.

Let's call the dragon Forced.