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NikkolasKing posted:Let's say for a moment that the translation was awful in both VII and VIII. VII is still the best selling JRPG ever and largely beloved. Why? The Materia system? The graphics? I don't think so. It's the story and characters. You probably shouldn't use FFVII of all games as your example there because basically no one who actually played it remembers what the characters were actually like. They remember what they were like in the EU stuff and things like KH. They remember it fondly because for a LOT of FF fans it was their first one and they played it when they were twelve.
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May 3, 2014 18:01
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You can't really put "awful translation" in quotations when a translation is as botched as FF7's. Like, it wasn't literally incomprehensible like Wild Arms 2, but it was still really loving bad. Grammatical errors, complete mistranslations, weird changes for no reason, etc etc. The story and the characters were what people liked about it, sure, but the story and characters were still being distorted through the lens of the translation.
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May 3, 2014 18:04
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ZenMasterBullshit posted:You probably shouldn't use FFVII of all games as your example there because basically no one who actually played it remembers what the characters were actually like. They remember what they were like in the EU stuff and things like KH. They remember it fondly because for a LOT of FF fans it was their first one and they played it when they were twelve. I know a few people in real life who have only seen AC and never played FFVII so there is some truth to what you're saying. However, I was posting on RPG boards years before AC came out. It's been so long that people forget there were many years separating FFVII and its EU. If FFVII was such a hit for all those years and there was no EU to butcher the characters, what were people talking about? [quote="Endorph" post=""4291364"]You can't really put "awful translation" in quotations when a translation is as botched as FF7's. Like, it wasn't literally incomprehensible like Wild Arms 2, but it was still really loving bad. Grammatical errors, complete mistranslations, weird changes for no reason, etc etc. The story and the characters were what people liked about it, sure, but the story and characters were still being distorted through the lens of the translation. [/quote] Any examples? Was Cloud not mentally hosed in the head from horrible experiments so that the Jenova Cells scotchtaped his mind back together with fantasies of being a SOLDIER? And wasn't Tifa so in love with Cloud, so worried about losing him again, that she kept quiet through all his delusions and fits because of said love? Was Barret not a man driven by hatred for Shinra due to what happened to his hometown? The only distortion I can think of is that Cid wasn't quite as verbally abusive to Shera in the original, or so I've been told. I just don't see the problem here. Are you telling me "this guy are sick" ruins FFVII? NikkolasKing fucked around with this message at 18:19 on May 3, 2014 |
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May 3, 2014 18:17
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Just because you can understand the broad strokes doesn't mean the translation isn't bad. Inconsistent wording abounds, there's a lot of moments where it nearly descends into gibberish (mostly relating to the more fantasy aspects, like the lifestream), sometimes the dialogue is just awkward and forced and a lot of characters have no real 'voice.' It's not the worst translation ever or anything, the story can be understood and it has its moments, but it's still far below par.
Endorph fucked around with this message at 18:32 on May 3, 2014 |
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May 3, 2014 18:29
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He's not arguing that the translation is great, he's saying it doesn't detract from the game. Which I mostly agree with, but there are still some parts that are distorted. Like Vincent's introduction.
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May 3, 2014 18:31
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Endorph posted:Not really. The problem isn't translation/localization itself, the problem is bad translation/localization. FF8's translation was bad. (so yeah, it's the quality of the translation, but some games are just unsalvageable, and I say that as a guy who has beaten ES twice.)
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May 3, 2014 18:32
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Endorph posted:Just because you can understand the broad strokes doesn't mean the translation isn't bad. Inconsistent wording abounds, there's a lot of moments where it nearly descends into gibberish (mostly relating to the more fantasy aspects, like the lifestream), sometimes the dialogue is just awkward and forced and a lot of characters have no real 'voice.' It's not the worst translation ever or anything, the story can be understood and it has its moments, but it's still far below par. haha i remembered ff7 for the gay rape, schizophrenia, and bestiality, i completely forgot about the living planet and alien (?) things. e: FF7's story seems like the kind of thing I would like ironically if so many people didnt like it unironically.
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May 3, 2014 18:50
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DACK FAYDEN posted:Eternal Sonata was perfectly comprehensible to an American audience, but it was still Eternal Sonata. But it's so pretty. But yeah, there's a scene in ES (a game I'm fairly generous towards) where a character is dying from a (completely invisible) stab wound and has a seven minute loving monolog as she dies that just goes ON and ON and ON and nobody is there at all, she's just talking to an empty room as she bloodlessly bleeds out. that game was weird.
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May 3, 2014 18:57
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BottledBodhisvata posted:But it's so pretty. That scene was goddamned hysterical. Eternal Sonata was one of the funniest games I've ever played for scenes like that scene. Plus the combat system was pretty darn fun. I liked that game. Though I did play the PS3 version, which along with apparently being a more fun game overall due to gameplay adjustments and adding two new playable characters, also made the story make more sense and did not have this... thing.
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May 3, 2014 19:06
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BottledBodhisvata posted:But it's so pretty. Am I remembering right in thinking that that death speech included multiple flashbacks to a conversation from like thirty minutes before? Cause that game was really weird.
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May 3, 2014 19:10
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Like I said though, FF7 hit the right demographic at the right time in their lives. The console generation that started out with the NES and SNES was at the perfect age for characters like Cloud and Squall when that game came out and the sketches in the margins of classroom notebooks everywhere at the time was probably a testament to that.
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May 3, 2014 19:10
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Eternal Sonata is pretty much the best JRPG ever for making me describe it to my brother as "It takes place in a world that is probably the fever dream of a bedridden, dying Chopin, where terminally ill people get magic powers." It is goofy as hell, and I love it for it. On the translation notes, FFVII has an astoundingly bad one, that still manages to be mostly comprehensible. FFVIII, while slightly better, had a similar problem, but was more poorly localized, I think, then poorly translated. I don't think the problem of people misinterpreting the characters is a product of nostalgia either. I got both when they were fresh off the presses, and the same sort of ideas about Cloud and Squall were floating around then.
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May 3, 2014 20:10
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AngryRobotsInc posted:Eternal Sonata is pretty much the best JRPG ever for making me describe it to my brother as "It takes place in a world that is probably the fever dream of a bedridden, dying Chopin, where terminally ill people get magic powers." It is goofy as hell, and I love it for it. A bad translation like VII's, though, has a lot of personality to it. It's part of the reason people like the Woolsey translations so much--it's kind of one guy hijacking a plot, but as a result it gives it a strange, incomprehensible sense of humanity.
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May 3, 2014 20:17
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BottledBodhisvata posted:A bad translation like VII's, though, has a lot of personality to it. It's part of the reason people like the Woolsey translations so much--it's kind of one guy hijacking a plot, but as a result it gives it a strange, incomprehensible sense of humanity. I definitely enjoy a lot of Woolsey's work, though I'd probably say I like the later retranslations better as a whole. I really respect the work he did, period, though. He gave a lot of games much better treatment then they would have given otherwise, and managed to do a good job with often very little time, very little resources, and limited space in the games. Super Mario RPG is probably my absolute favorite out of all his Square translations, as it's got a great personality to it.
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May 3, 2014 20:21
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AngryRobotsInc posted:I definitely enjoy a lot of Woolsey's work, though I'd probably say I like the later retranslations better as a whole. I really respect the work he did, period, though. He gave a lot of games much better treatment then they would have given otherwise, and managed to do a good job with often very little time, very little resources, and limited space in the games. Super Mario RPG is probably my absolute favorite out of all his Square translations, as it's got a great personality to it. Didn't Woolsey translate all of Secret of Mana in like a month deadline? Dude's a beast
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May 3, 2014 20:24
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Honestly the focus on good translation is kind of lame, a good localization is way more important.
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May 3, 2014 20:26
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Volt Catfish posted:Didn't Woolsey translate all of Secret of Mana in like a month deadline? Dude's a beast 30 days, just after the Japanese release, in order to make the holiday season. He also had to cut out like...half the script, because it just wouldn't fit due to the game having limited space, not using sequential text, and using a fixed width font.
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May 3, 2014 20:30
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forbidden lesbian posted:Honestly the focus on good translation is kind of lame, a good localization is way more important.
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May 3, 2014 20:30
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AngryRobotsInc posted:Eternal Sonata is pretty much the best JRPG ever for making me describe it to my brother as "It takes place in a world that is probably the fever dream of a bedridden, dying Chopin, where terminally ill people get magic powers." It is goofy as hell, and I love it for it. Well then, it sounds more like a personal problem. I'm not going to be rude and say people are stupid but some people just don't pay attention. "Broody Cloud" does not exist in FFVII and anyone who played the game to the finish, and heard his battle cry of "let's mosey," knows this. Sometimes it's okay to blame the people, not the game. As for Woolsey, it's all in what you prefer I guess. I've met people who say they loved SNES Kefka and how funny he was and GBA Kefka and how terrifying he was. I have heard that a later retranslation of Chrono Trigger is better though. I should probably play that game sometime and now I have a PS3 I was looking at the PSOne Classics and saw they had it on there.
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May 3, 2014 20:30
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forbidden lesbian posted:Honestly the focus on good translation is kind of lame, a good localization is way more important. Yes, but let's now be honest. Woolsey is a terrible writer. He's kind of cute in his ineptitude, but he's...he's just not that good. We like him for poo poo like "son of a submariner" but just LOOK at the FFV translation on the PSX port vs. the GBA one. It's an utterly different game. The plot in FFV is actually great--the characters have actual character and charm and there's a lot of laugh-out-loud lines, the whole game is goofy and campy and perfect comedic. It's night and day in terms of writing quality.
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May 3, 2014 20:34
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Wild Arms 2 translation's getting a lot of poo poo, but I'm playing through it right now and its perfectly comprehensible. Outside the somewhat odd moments best summarized in the screenshots that have been floating around, I'm understanding the core concepts well enough. Although, I'm still beating all the bosses of the four energy pillar things, so maybe things will go full Xenogears disc 2 later on...
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May 3, 2014 20:34
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A. The PSone classic Chrono Trigger has terrible terrible load times. Avoid. B. Ted Woolsey is a translating beast and any hate he receives is hilarious to me because it's almost universally out of touch nonsense.
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May 3, 2014 20:35
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BottledBodhisvata posted:Yes, but let's now be honest. EDIT: Also Wild Arms 2's translation starts out normal PSX bad and becomes full-out insane as you near the end.
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May 3, 2014 20:35
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So for those who gave me advice on Dragon Quest yesterday, I have managed to pick up 4, 8 and 9 so far I will probably get 5 & 6 when I get paid next and then maybe sometime after get 1-3 on GBC. I'm on the fence about 7. should I go for a PSX copy or should I still hold out hope for a localized 3DS version even though it's been a year since it came out in Japan over a year ago?
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May 3, 2014 20:36
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The only Final Fantasy games translated by Ted Woolsey are everyone's favorite FFVI, best rpg FF Mystic Quest, and technically not a Final Fantasy game Legend 3.
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May 3, 2014 20:37
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Endorph posted:That's a very good point. Woolsey didn't do the FFV PSX port's translation. Speaking of which, I heard the original "FFII" translation of FFIV was pretty lovely. I only ever played the Advance version and a fan retranslation of the SNES version though. (never beat the SNES retranslation)
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May 3, 2014 20:40
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Mr. Maltose posted:The only Final Fantasy games translated by Ted Woolsey are everyone's favorite FFVI, best rpg FF Mystic Quest, and technically not a Final Fantasy game Legend 3. I also think the GBA FF6 translation is better, although not as dramatically.
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May 3, 2014 20:43
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NikkolasKing posted:Speaking of which, I heard the original "FFII" translation of FFIV was pretty lovely. I only ever played the Advance version and a fan retranslation of the SNES version though. (never beat the SNES retranslation) The FFII US script is...bad, but not incomprehensibly terrible. It's stiff, and awkward, and not worth going back to, really. Pretty much every subsequent translation is much, much better.
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May 3, 2014 20:43
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NikkolasKing posted:Speaking of which, I heard the original "FFII" translation of FFIV was pretty lovely. I only ever played the Advance version and a fan retranslation of the SNES version though. (never beat the SNES retranslation) Here's a dude doing a complete rundown of the various localizations and translations of FF4. It's an interesting read.
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May 3, 2014 20:48
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AngryRobotsInc posted:The FFII US script is...bad, but not incomprehensibly terrible. It's stiff, and awkward, and not worth going back to, really. Pretty much every subsequent translation is much, much better. "Here, Cecil. I know you're worried about your king being a murderous psychopath, why don't you take this BOMB Ring and go over to this peaceful village I don't like."
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May 3, 2014 20:49
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It's important to note that localizations during Woolsey's era had to work under strict deadlines with minimal support from the developer. On top of that, they had to work around word and memory limitations by creating a succinct game script. It was also rare for them to have access to the game data or development tools. It wasn't unheard of localization teams having to use cheating devices to reverse engineer the game and access data files. Woolsey had to do the Chrono Trigger translation in a month. It's really incredible he was able to put out an intelligible script when most games had poor quality translations. Here's what FFXII translator Alexander O'Smith said about Woolsey and translating for Squaresoft:Alexander O'SMith posted:To set the record straight, from Brian Bell’s account on VII the head translator had only a month to do it. I’m amazed that Woolsey managed to do what he did, because in my first two years at Square much of my time was spent creating some semblance of order in the chaos and making sure development knew what we needed. Up until that point it was a free-for-all. We would get a copy of the game, and we would say, “Well, what about files?” And they would say, “Oh, I don’t think you need those.” So we all bought Game Sharks. http://www.gamesetwatch.com/2009/11/localization_tactics_kajiya_productions.php It's a far cry from modern localizations of Japanese games where translators work intimately with the creators during development and have easier access to game files.
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May 3, 2014 20:59
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AngryRobotsInc posted:Eternal Sonata is pretty much the best JRPG ever for making me describe it to my brother as "It takes place in a world that is probably the fever dream of a bedridden, dying Chopin, where terminally ill people get magic powers." It is goofy as hell, and I love it for it. AngryRobotsInc posted:30 days, just after the Japanese release, in order to make the holiday season. He also had to cut out like...half the script, because it just wouldn't fit due to the game having limited space, not using sequential text, and using a fixed width font. Fur20 fucked around with this message at 21:12 on May 3, 2014 |
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May 3, 2014 21:06
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Sunning posted:It's important to note that localizations during Woolsey's era had to work under strict deadlines with minimal support from the developer. On top of that, they had to work around word and memory limitations by creating a succinct game script. It was also rare for them to have access to the game data or development tools. It wasn't unheard of localization teams having to use cheating devices to reverse engineer the game and access data files. Woolsey had to do the Chrono Trigger translation in a month. It's really incredible he was able to put out an intelligible script when most games had poor quality translations. Here's what FFXII translator Alexander O'Smith said about Woolsey and translating for Squaresoft: Smith worked on VIII? That's pretty neat. Man, every account of translating JRPGs back in the day is a horror story. Woolsey doing all this stuff in a month, that poor guy who had to do Xenogears in a short span of time, and all with very little input or support. Although your comment about the translator not having anything to do with the creator, and thinking of the time period, reminds me of when I listened to a podcast interviewing the guy who translated MGS1. He hung out with Kojima, went out drinking with him and so-on. That and they would like, mail or fax information back to Japan and have them send back clarifications on certain things or whatever.
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May 3, 2014 21:12
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forbidden lesbian posted:Honestly the focus on good translation is kind of lame, a good localization is way more important. Good localization is a part of good translation.
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May 3, 2014 21:40
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The White Dragon posted:Nah, he didn't actually cut out very much. Woolsey did technically cut the script length in half, but if you play through the retranslation patches, the original script just takes twice as many words to say the same exact thing. It's kind of a problem we've started to see with modern games that don't have word count limits anymore. I'm just going off an interview I read from him, where he brought it up. He said he had to pare the script down to the bare essentials to get it to fit in, pretty much. ETA: Also, is there a retranslation out now? The last I saw was FuSoYa's, which really isn't a retranslation, so much as rewritting and expanding the English script to show off his variable width font patch. ZenMasterBullshit posted:"Here, Cecil. I know you're worried about your king being a murderous psychopath, why don't you take this BOMB Ring and go over to this peaceful village I don't like." Now, to be fair to the FFII US script, that's just how it goes down, awkward script or no. It's not really much better of a plot point in any of the translations. Then again, as much as I love IV to itty bitty pieces, none of the plot points are very good. AngryRobotsInc fucked around with this message at 21:47 on May 3, 2014 |
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May 3, 2014 21:44
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"Package" and "Carnelian Signet" are both honestly better choices than Bomb Ring even if Bomb Ring is literally accurate. That's a case where a localization change does improve the product without changing the actual story.
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May 3, 2014 21:46
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NikkolasKing posted:Speaking of which, I heard the original "FFII" translation of FFIV was pretty lovely. I only ever played the Advance version and a fan retranslation of the SNES version though. (never beat the SNES retranslation) The fan translation of the SNES version added pop culture references and a lot of swearing to the point where it seemed way too excessive. I don't know anything about the PSP version, but the GBA port had a really good translation.
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May 3, 2014 21:51
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AngryRobotsInc posted:ETA: Also, is there a retranslation out now? The last I saw was FuSoYa's, which really isn't a retranslation, so much as rewritting and expanding the English script to show off his variable width font patch. 
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May 3, 2014 21:53
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ImpAtom posted:"Package" and "Carnelian Signet" are both honestly better choices than Bomb Ring even if Bomb Ring is literally accurate. That's a case where a localization change does improve the product without changing the actual story. Yeah, 'package' is like the one change in the original FF4 translation that I actually legitimately like more than all subsequent versions of the script.
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May 3, 2014 22:00
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Speaking of bad decisions in games that are more than 10 years old: FFX really stops using the airship music once you get access to the last dungeon? That was cool music too 
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May 3, 2014 22:52
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