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Ytlaya posted:The only thing that bugged me about Volume 1 is how they mention the truck hitting Mogi (or whoever tries to save her) being a rule of the box, but don't explain just how that rule would be forced if, for example, Mogi decided to just not go to school that day or go someplace that can't possibly be hit by a truck. I'm imagining Mogi up in her 7th floor apartment and this truck just flying up and smashing into it. Are her actions controlled during the morning of the second day or something? It's been a long time since I read HakoMari, but I remember thinking about this myself. Mogi believes she's stuck in a time loop, so if she does something that wholly contradicts that, her box collapses. Mogi doesn't want to die, but she's also 100% sure she died prior to the time loops. Therefore she must perpetuate the time loop (i.e. allow herself to get truck'd) in order to not die. For anyone who decides to mouse over that spoiler without having read HakoMari: yes, the entire series is full of ridiculous chains of logic like that. You gotta think outside the box.
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Sep 7, 2016 00:33
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Out of curiosity, at what point would you consider a fan translation not worth reading due to accuracy issues? And how would you quantify accuracy? For example, would you count incorrect sentences in a paragraph and calculate the percentage of errors? Does the degree of wrongness count? Or would you just go for individual words out of the total body of text, etc.
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Sep 7, 2016 00:50
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filthychimp posted:It's been a long time since I read HakoMari, but I remember thinking about this myself. Mogi believes she's stuck in a time loop, so if she does something that wholly contradicts that, her box collapses. Mogi doesn't want to die, but she's also 100% sure she died prior to the time loops. Therefore she must perpetuate the time loop (i.e. allow herself to get truck'd) in order to not die. Naw, patently untrue because there are several times where someone else takes the truck trying to save her. Your explanation is close, though: one of the rules set up by the box is simply "someone must get hit by the truck on the second day." That's what triggers the reset. Maria says outright that she's tried hundreds of times and it's impossible to stop. Someone always gets trucked. Edit: quote:"Didn't you wonder why I'm always run over by that truck? Admittedly, there were times when Aya Otonashi sacrificed herself for me... ah, by the way, there were also times when you sacrificed yourself. But most of the times I was the one who died, right?" Captain Bravo fucked around with this message at 01:18 on Sep 7, 2016 |
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Sep 7, 2016 01:14
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FriggenJ posted:Not that I'm trying to convince you to drop the novel. But, while the MC claims he wants nothing to do with 11 year old girls, the author spends a WHOLE lot more time sexualizing/infantalizing them for me to be comfortable with his motivations there. Like, after he buys one of the slave girls(literal girl, she's written as prepubescent) she jumps into his bed butt naked and uses mind magic to make him want to have sex with her. That's all kinds of gross. like i said, this is all accurate and I'm not trying to say it isn't problematic
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Sep 7, 2016 01:21
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i would argue that death march and web novels in general are not actually uniquely bad in this respect and are just in company with heinlein at his worst and most pedophilic or the sword of truth and similar fetishistic as gently caress sf but only in the context that is not any attempt to excuse it or downplay the problems with them, just that its a hugely widespread problem well ok lots of web novels are uniquely bad and are just nothing but intensely hosed up smut, just not all of them
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Sep 7, 2016 01:28
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darkgray posted:Out of curiosity, at what point would you consider a fan translation not worth reading due to accuracy issues? And how would you quantify accuracy? As I can't read the source material, what matters to me is how easy it is to parse the translation. If it's riddled with typos and clearly pulled straight out of Google Translate in terms of grammar and flow, it just becomes painful to read and I'll drop it. Accuracy in terms of following the story is something I can only observe secondhand.
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Sep 7, 2016 06:26
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darkgray posted:Out of curiosity, at what point would you consider a fan translation not worth reading due to accuracy issues? And how would you quantify accuracy? For me, I think the difference between a sub-par translation I can tolerate and one that I can't is whether I can comfortably read it and understand the contents. Some mistakes are okay as long as they're not causing me to stop or slow down my reading to understand. For example, misspelled words usually are't that big of a deal, but if the grammar structure of sentences has mistakes to the extent that I have to spend time thinking about the meaning of the sentence there's a problem.
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Sep 7, 2016 07:47
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Well, since we're posting stuff we enjoy intermittently I've been having a hell of a time with The Experimental Log of the Crazy Lich. It follows the madcap adventures of one of the world's most powerful undead while he's under house arrest in the city of the hero who defeated him, all with the end goal of getting a human body so he can finally lose his virginity... or something. He's not really good at planning these things. It's about as fun as "Running away from the Hero" with far faster/non monetized releases.
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Sep 7, 2016 08:00
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when i tried to read janitor is not a hero the poor translation drove me nuts and i had to drop it.
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Sep 7, 2016 09:26
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Translation quality is the main reason I drop things now, yeah. My standards aren't even high (I love Only Sense Online!), but god drat if the average translator can't meet them. darkgray posted:Out of curiosity, at what point would you consider a fan translation not worth reading due to accuracy issues? And how would you quantify accuracy? I generally don't care about accuracy much, because if I did I probably wouldn't read anything at all.
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Sep 7, 2016 10:36
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the current arc in issth makes the dull and repetitive blood demon arc seem like a bad dream
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Sep 7, 2016 14:23
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All I ask of translators is to translate it onto readable English. I'm not even asking for accuracy here, since I know that I would take liberties in translating Chinese to English just to make things flow better. However, having properly constructed sentences that tells the story in a reasonable fashion is a must here. Just stop, read back what you just wrote in the process of translating, and then think about if it makes sense or not. If it's something along the lines of poetry, I'll give it a pass, but improper English irritates me enough that I would drop something if it's everywhere.
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Sep 7, 2016 15:07
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Serious Frolicking posted:the current arc in issth makes the dull and repetitive blood demon arc seem like a bad dream It is wonderful in every way. ISSTH is always at its best when Meng Hao is being his charming, shameless self.
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Sep 7, 2016 15:25
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jwang posted:All I ask of translators is to translate it onto readable English. Most translators have English as a second language, so "readable English" doesn't mean the same thing to them as it does to you.
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Sep 7, 2016 15:27
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actually, i'm curious about something. in janitor, they kept talking about two completely distinct types of magic that are both called spirit magic. is that ridiculous bullshit the fault of the translator or the original author?
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Sep 7, 2016 15:29
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Serious Frolicking posted:the current arc in issth makes the dull and repetitive blood demon arc seem like a bad dream I just got past that a few days ago, I don't even remember much of it because every time I thought it would be interesting, it would be another "smash rocks until Meng Hao's rock breaks other man's rock" chapter. Honestly the most interesting part of that arc was knowing full well that the theme of messing with the natural order of Heaven's Rulers was not that uncommon a sentiment. I found the lightning pot arc a bit more interesting on the parts where Meng Hao got to reminisce with Xue for a bit and seeing others have the same level of forethought as he, before everyone's over complicated and elaborate scheme to go SSJ4 by way of feeding a jelly cube.
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Sep 7, 2016 15:35
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jwang posted:All I ask of translators is to translate it onto readable English. I'm not even asking for accuracy here, since I know that I would take liberties in translating Chinese to English just to make things flow better. Right, but what percentage of sentences would you expect to be correct when you're reading something translated? Correct as in not contradict what's in the original. Serious Frolicking posted:actually, i'm curious about something. in janitor, they kept talking about two completely distinct types of magic that are both called spirit magic. is that ridiculous bullshit the fault of the translator or the original author? You'll have to give me a more specific chapter or paragraph or something where it's mentioned, or I won't know where to begin looking. In other news, Isekai Shokudou is supposedly in the planning stage for an anime adaptation. It's ranked #11 on Narou overall.
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Sep 7, 2016 15:40
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BlitzBlast posted:Translation quality is the main reason I drop things now, yeah. I was looking at one random WN translation (forget which one), and at the top of the page the translator says "I wasn't able to schedule Elementary Japanese this semester, so I'll be having to rely on machine translations..." And I thought "Ah, it all makes sense" It seems like a lot of people are machine translating and attempting (and usually failing) to adequately correct it.
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Sep 7, 2016 17:09
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Machine translating isn't even necessarily bad. I grew up with English's 26 letter alphabet, I can't even conceive being able to remember 5000+ kanji. Being able to just use Rikai-kun to look it up for me is immensely convenient, and whenever I have to work with physical print I basically just hope the scan quality is good enough Kanji Tomo can decipher it because gently caress breaking out a kanji dictionary. Most WN translators I've seen seem to have a decent grasp of Japanese grammar too, at least to the point they can actually convey the meaning of the sentences in some fashion. They just spectacularly, spectacularly fail at the final (and most important!) step: properly rendering it in English. And that's pretty much down to them legitimately not having the experience of using English long enough to know how people actually talk and how the varying degrees of formality/tone in Japanese roughly match up. If I had a nickel for every time some gangster type spoke in super formal English with no contractions whatsoever I'd be rolling in moolah.
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Sep 7, 2016 17:42
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the guy who did ark and is currently doing lms does machine translations pretty well. the old kumoko machine translations were mostly comprehensible too.
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Sep 7, 2016 17:49
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filthychimp posted:It's been a long time since I read HakoMari, but I remember thinking about this myself. Mogi believes she's stuck in a time loop, so if she does something that wholly contradicts that, her box collapses. Mogi doesn't want to die, but she's also 100% sure she died prior to the time loops. Therefore she must perpetuate the time loop (i.e. allow herself to get truck'd) in order to not die. This got me to read volume one, and... man, that's a trip. It gets confusing, but it does a really good job of playing with expectations and letting you jump to wrong conclusions on your own--I kind of wonder how soon you could figure things out if you really buckled down on it. I especially like that Mogi didn't even actually die in the first place. You automatically assume that she did, because she got hit by a Japanese Truck, and then woke up in a strange blackness being offered a wish, and that is such a thing in WN/LN/manga/anime that you don't even think twice about it. Then you find out "Yeah, she got messed up really bad but was able to pull through with surgery" and you feel kind of silly for forgetting how the real world works. Plus, it means that Mogi is still alive and around, which is 100% a Good Thing.
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Sep 7, 2016 18:03
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Annointed posted:I just got past that a few days ago, I don't even remember much of it because every time I thought it would be interesting, it would be another "smash rocks until Meng Hao's rock breaks other man's rock" chapter. Honestly the most interesting part of that arc was knowing full well that the theme of messing with the natural order of Heaven's Rulers was not that uncommon a sentiment.
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Sep 7, 2016 18:16
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Algid posted:This is a problem near the end of ISSTH, it gets to something like 70% power levels and only 30% shenanigans. That's still a lot better than the 90% power level, 5% skin like jade, 5% revenge split most Xianxia runs with.
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Sep 7, 2016 18:21
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FriggenJ posted:Well, since we're posting stuff we enjoy intermittently I've been having a hell of a time with
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Sep 7, 2016 18:33
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Jackard posted:Blegh. This is mostly incoherent, maybe it's a culture gap. The first few chapters are kinda like that. But it picks up reasonably well.
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Sep 7, 2016 18:48
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I gave up on Experimental Lich after two chapters, but if you say it gets better I'll give it another try. Edit: Ytlaya posted:It seems like a lot of people are machine translating and attempting (and usually failing) to adequately correct it. I don't buy this, personally. I'm sure it's true for some translations, but on the most part the problem definitely seems to be lack of familiarity with english, or refusal to fully translate, rather than any errors from the machine translation. I'll use an example from the latest chapter of Swallowed Star: quote:A 20 thousand ton yield atomic bomb exploding a few 100 meters away was nothing than a breeze to the swallowing beast. "A few 100 meters away" is probably a faithful translation from the original chinese, I see little errors like "Tens of" all the time which makes me believe mandarin, japanese, and korean have a slightly different way of writing numbers than english. But no matter how confused the translator may be, I feel fairly confident that nobody fluent in english would accidentally write "a few 100 meters" instead of "a few hundred meters". Yes, this is a very minor thing, but it's indicative of the problem at large, which is being unfamiliar with the language you're translating something into. Personally, I think the best case situation is when a translator focuses first on making the story readable, and any context that is missed out on is added as a postscript or in parentheses as a TN. Captain Bravo fucked around with this message at 19:21 on Sep 7, 2016 |
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Sep 7, 2016 19:08
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Captain Bravo posted:I gave up on Experimental Lich after two chapters, but if you say it gets better I'll give it another try. Eh, the translation remains a little rough. But I found the series amusing, it isn't even close to my top 10 but it's a change of pace from most reincarnation novels. Give it til chapter 5ish, if you don't like it by then you'll probably not like the rest.
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Sep 7, 2016 19:27
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Captain Bravo posted:"A few 100 meters away" is probably a faithful translation from the original chinese, I see little errors like "Tens of" all the time which makes me believe mandarin, japanese, and korean have a slightly different way of writing numbers than english. But no matter how confused the translator may be, I feel fairly confident that nobody fluent in english would accidentally write "a few 100 meters" instead of "a few hundred meters". edit: I mean that sentence could be better even aside from '100 meters', but that specific part might just be because they were trying to convert units. I'd prefer it if they just used a near enough western unit, it even provides a proper sort of anachronism if you see fathoms and furloughs everywhere. Algid fucked around with this message at 19:45 on Sep 7, 2016 |
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Sep 7, 2016 19:38
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quote:Even a I'm glad they used the proper "than" though.
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Sep 7, 2016 19:52
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The one that makes me cringe the most is when they write "tens" of, because using "dozens" would make it sound so much better.  In other news, I'm super frustrated at Utsuro no Hako right now. Halfway through Volume 4, and Goddamnit Kazaki, pull your head out of your own rear end. He keeps saying "I have to win this round to protect Maria!" and pushing her away to 'protect' her. But the entire reason he thinks he has to win this round is to prevent Maria from having to kill someone in the next round... and the win condition is to make it a round without killing anyone... so it's pretty loving obvious that he's going to fail, someone will die, he will despair, and then Maria will succeed in the next round because she's better at this than him, and he needs to get that through his stupid goddamned head. Tell her everything you loving know, you goddamned idiot. She is the one loving person you absolutely can trust, tell her everything because there's no reason not to. If you win, congratulations! If you lose, she then has all the knowledge she needs to win the next round! Being vague and secretive and an rear end in a top hat isn't doing anyone any favors. Jesus. Like, as soon as Daiyo told him "I'll end the game if everyone makes it a round without killing anyone" that should have immediately reassured him "Oh, I don't need to worry about Maria being forced to kill anyone then." The absolute first thing he should have done is tell her everything as soon as they were alone. In fact, by not telling her, he's making things way loving harder for her if he fails this round! Who's to say that Daiyo will clue Maria in to the victory condition? If she thinks that she'll die if nobody kills each other, isn't that going to cause her a lot of loving distress in the next round? Sure, you want to win in this round, but hope for the best and plan for the worst you loving idiot.  Edit: Read ahead, aahhhhhh oh poo poo I was tricked. I fell for it completely. gently caress this series is so good. Double Edit: Just finished Volume 4, MOGI NOOOOOOO! WHY, KAZAKI! WHY!? gently caress this series is trash I hate it. Captain Bravo fucked around with this message at 21:31 on Sep 7, 2016 |
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Sep 7, 2016 20:43
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The LN character art for Utsuro no Hako bothers me. Kazuki looks like he's literally 10-12 years old and is wearing a gakuran, while all the other characters his age look like actual high school students and wear a dress shirt. I mean, he's supposed to be short (it explicitly states he's the same height as Maria, who is probably tall for a girl), but there is character art where he is a full head shorter than Maria, which is just silly. edit: Speaking of which, I really enjoy this series but the main character kind of pisses me off. I'm hardly the type of person who wants protagonists to be a hyper-competent badass, but too far in the other direction can also be a problem. I mean, it seems to be leading up to some sort of "I need to be less passive" revelation, but it's really frustrating waiting for it to happen. Supposedly Kazuki is this really interesting guy that O, who is some extra-dimensional being or something, wants to observe, but we're not shown anything about him that is remotely exceptional. It's been hinted at that he might be completely hosed up in the head (Daiya mentions finding him interesting because he's a weirdo who isn't willing to become too involved with anyone/anything) and obsessed with preserving his daily life for some not-so-pure reasons, and I kind of hope that's the case because it would at least make him a bit more interesting as a character. As he is right now, it doesn't make any sense for all the characters, including pseudo-God, to revolve around this guy. Ytlaya fucked around with this message at 22:26 on Sep 7, 2016 |
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Sep 7, 2016 22:22
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Captain Bravo posted:The one that makes me cringe the most is when they write "tens" of, because using "dozens" would make it sound so much better. "Dozens" implies slightly more than "tens," though. A minimum of 24, instead of a minimum of 20.
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Sep 7, 2016 22:28
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phrasing that flows well is more important than an exact translation of an incredibly vague statement. like, who gives a poo poo if the writer had an exact figure in mind if he didn't actually say it anywhere?
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Sep 7, 2016 22:32
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oh no, instead of (10x +10)100 meters that dastardly translator said (12x + 12)100 meters!
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Sep 7, 2016 22:34
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Does your mind theater use metric or imperial
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Sep 7, 2016 22:40
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Serious Frolicking posted:oh no, instead of (10x +10)100 meters that dastardly translator said (12x + 12)100 meters! That would completely destroy the work's artistic integrity. edit: I'm definitely suspicious of Yanagi in Volume 3. If not as a the box owner, then at least as a malicious actor. edit: Uhhh Volume 3 posted:At first, I only listened to what she had to say. But she gradually sought greater comfort from me. She made me stroke her head, she made me hug her, she made me sleep next to her and she made me drink her tears. I remember her saying something unreasonable like she would calm down when looking at my face while I was licking over her cheeks, though she had feelings of guilt towards Touji at those times. The poo poo? Ytlaya fucked around with this message at 23:13 on Sep 7, 2016 |
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Sep 7, 2016 22:54
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Ytlaya posted:Speaking of which, I really enjoy this series but the main character kind of pisses me off. I'm hardly the type of person who wants protagonists to be a hyper-competent badass, but too far in the other direction can also be a problem. I mean, it seems to be leading up to some sort of "I need to be less passive" revelation, but it's really frustrating waiting for it to happen. Ytlaya posted:I mean, it seems to be leading up to some sort of "I need to be less passive" revelation, but it's really frustrating waiting for it to happen. This statement describes roughly half of all the JP LN's I've read.
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Sep 7, 2016 23:13
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Ytlaya posted:edit: Uhhh Ytlaya posted:Supposedly Kazuki is this really interesting guy that O, who is some extra-dimensional being or something, wants to observe, but we're not shown anything about him that is remotely exceptional. It's been hinted at that he might be completely hosed up in the head (Daiya mentions finding him interesting because he's a weirdo who isn't willing to become too involved with anyone/anything) and obsessed with preserving his daily life for some not-so-pure reasons, and I kind of hope that's the case because it would at least make him a bit more interesting as a character. As he is right now, it doesn't make any sense for all the characters, including pseudo-God, to revolve around this guy. Ytlaya, I hope you realize that this was a terrible use for your box.
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Sep 7, 2016 23:28
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The Lord of Hats posted:Ytlaya, I hope you realize that this was a terrible use for your box.  Edit: Thanks to the replies in this thread, I've realized that Kazuki is actually kind of a tool, and I'm alright with Mogi not ending up with him. It's sad for her, but she'll find someone better. 
Captain Bravo fucked around with this message at 23:54 on Sep 7, 2016 |
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Sep 7, 2016 23:45
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I'm not a big fan of how the reader is obviously supposed to sympathize with Yanagi. Like, her actions are somewhat understandable*, but only in the sense that she's not a literal sociopath. Someone who actively chooses to murder multiple people (particularly through deception), especially when it's not 100% guaranteed that there's no alternative, is definitely not a good person. This is especially true if the threat of death is something less direct (for instance, as opposed to someone directly pressing a gun to your head). * Speaking of which, how does her "I had no choice but to kill a bunch of folks to survive" thing jive with the fact that she's clearly aware of there being multiple rounds to the game? Her attitude only sort of makes sense under the assumption that she believes death in the game to be final. edit: Okay, this plot twist about (end of vol 3)only one person each time being real is kind of interesting. Ytlaya fucked around with this message at 00:29 on Sep 8, 2016 |
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Sep 8, 2016 00:20
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