Localization Controversy | A Discussion With Alexander O. Smith | State of the Arc Podcast

[@ResonantArc]

Hi, everyone! Just wanted to plug Alexander's Instagram page. He told me that if he wasn't a game writer, he would want to be a photographer. Also, please check out this Shogun breakdown that Alex mentioned by Hiroko Yoda. Alex's Instagram: instagram.com/aokajiya/ Shogun Breakdown: blog.hirokoyoda.com/p/jidaigeki-made-in-usa

[@sukashi_0901]

Really loving his photography work! Thank you!

[@restlessoblivion]

Regarding the conversation about how translation became more difficult with the highly articulated lip/mouth movements starting in FFX, at the point we're at today with technology and how many points of articulation exist for animating faces, I'm surprised that someone hasn't created a program that can model the primary languages used in the games and plug them in/swap them out based on the script. Maybe it's not worth the effort or I'm overestimating the technology we have, but if one of the big engines like Unreal could get something like that working it'd be a pretty big deal I would think.

[@kh2fan145]

@@restlessoblivion the thing with that is you'd still have timing constraints between languages, the scene will have to move forward at the pace of the original language, so translated scripts would still need to be written around that timing. That would take away a lot of the stress of either reanimating lip flaps for syncing, and would be a general boon, but not necessarily a be-all-end-all

[@jacobmonks3722]

@@restlessoblivion Xenoblade 3 actually accomplishes something like that for its English dub. Not for all scenes, but most of the important ones, especially when a character's mouth or face is the focus.

[@restlessoblivion]

@@jacobmonks3722 did they have to manually reprogram that for the important scenes or was it something they were able to automate to some extent?

[@Felipe_AC]

I'm from Brazil and Final Fantasy 12 is my favorite game ever. No, seriously. I played that game so many times. It was my childhood for real. In fact, the only reason as to why i'm able to write this comment today, is because of how much i learned english from playing the game. Thank you so much, Alexander!

[@CoffeePotato]

Hot damn, talk about a celebrity guest

[@paddyotterness]

For real...

[@RushStudios101]

OMG ALEXANDER O SMITH??? BRO! FINAL FANTASY XII IS THE BEST GAME LOCALIZATION OF ALL TIME. YOU ARE SUCH AN INSPIRATION TO ME!

[@mtburr1089]

Unbelievable guest. Alex’s ability to contextualize a story into English has created several of my favorite games of all time. I was glued to the screen the whole time. When apologized for being long-winded I literally said out loud “Go on, this is great!” and it was immediately followed by Casen and Mike saying nearly the same thing. I loved the Xenocasts, but these recent episodes have ignited a spark in the channel that I’ve really enjoyed! Thanks for doing these, guys. Your pods are the highlight of my week!

[@緑茶-z9f]

xenophobia

[@patrickholleman9323]

Smith's comment that Japanese pop media is written more for big scenes than for plot coherence is fascinating. Once up a time, a client of mine asked me to review a videogame outline from a prominent game/anime writer from Japan. You could tell the writer was a seasoned professional, but the outline consisted almost entirely of big scene moments, and very few connecting details.

[@OhJustSomeRandomGuy]

On the flip side, American pop culture has been like that for maybe 25 years? Look at Bad Boys II. This is the first time I noticed this. The movie solely exists as a vehicle to take characters from explosion to explosion. The peaks of western pop culture don't have this issue, but once you notice this once, you'll see it everywhere. Nearly every emotional beat they try to play up has not been earned. It's just thrust upon you.

[@alanreplicant]

That is because in japanese there is a lot of contextual coherence, you will never understand what are the real meaning of the word if you didn't look outside of what is being said. Even a casual talk in japanese you will never understand the conversation just by looking at what is being said. You need to look an each other emotion, imagine how they feel, the situation that they are...

[@FinalFantasyUnion]

What a fantastic interview, congratulations both! ~Darryl

[@ResonantArc]

Thank you, Darryl!

[@linnaealyn]

He did the translation of Melodies of Life?? I ADORE the english lyrics in that song! Its so beautiful, almost every single time I listen to it, it brings me to tears. And the original vocalist doesn't speak english?? You can definitely hear her accent, but she really sounds like she truly knows- in her heart, not in her mind- the meaning of the words she's singing. What a phenomenal vocalist! You two did great together on that song!

[@MarianHevein]

The game that made me fall in love with localisation was Final Fantasy IX in Italian. Every character has a different Italian dialect, or uses standard Italian according to the social context. That felt so organic and immersive as a young native speaker (even exposed me to dialects of parts of Italy I've never been/met anyone from). It was somehow "putting the right voice to the face" and giving characters "realistic" depth (meaning, a depth I could have understood). Still today, it is the only videogame I always replay in Italian. Really similar to the global Aristocats localisation strategy, but cranked up to 11.

[@hassanico9999]

FF9 is infamously poorly translated in English (see the complete removal of Zidane's catchphrase or replacing many of his introspective moments with shallow / sexual thoughts), but surprisingly has very solid EFIGS versions as the European teams worked based on the Japanese scripts. Nowadays, however, you would never get something as authentic as your example because many company simply pass an English script to European companies which is often translated with 0 attention to the target language.

[@緑茶-z9f]

>dubs cringe

[@shiken]

That is actually a great approximation of the Japanese script as most of the main cast speaks using Japanese from different regional dialects or time periods to really distinguish their characters and highlight in another way how they really were a ragtag team of misfits who came together for a common cause

[@2therecoop]

The Spanish translation of FFIX is perfect also. Is my favorite choice to replay the game too

[@DanielSantosAnalysis]

Incredible interview, I felt like I learned so much about localization. Alexander himself also came across as such an interesting dude, I would love to a part 2 where he talks more about the games he worked on.

[@mellybeannn14]

+100 to this!

[@MarkPTP7000]

The explanation of changing Yuna's 'Thank you' to 'I love you' (around 1:20:00) is such a well made explanation of why changes are made and why this is such a nuanced subject. 'Thank you' and 'I love you' are completely different to us as English speakers. If someone could of put up a comparison screenshot on social media before FF X's and say 'Look at how the translators butchered the original intent' I'm sure many would probably be baffled, perhaps angry. But it's the context that is so important, and not even just the context in that particular scene alone, but all the story that has occurred before and the characteristics of Tidus and Yuna themselves.

[@ViridianMaridian]

Yeah this is really important. A single out of context screenshot on twitter isn't helping anyone make an argument one way or the other

[@citizenchris2455]

This generally exposes a lot of these bad faith actors on Twitter whose purpose is to grift discourse because Twitter literally monetizes that shit.

[@Gigamokin]

nah, thank you is so much more meaningful, and even in lip syncing is not that far apart.

[@Norel_Nieves]

@@Gigamokin no is not

[@mattb6616]

@@Norel_Nieves it is. In context, it absolutely is.

[@Jiube000]

As a bilingual Russian-Ukrainian native speaker that knows English, studies Japanese, and has some experience with translations, I think I can actually offer an interesting perspective here from the point of view of a different translation paradigm. 41:20 - 42:30 Well, first of all, I disagree with the whole notion of "the translation is not beholden to be as close as possible to the original" and believe that it shouldn't be called translation if that's the case. You should call it "adaptation," perhaps. As for what's said after about marketing, that's actually the main problem. With all due respect, marketing specialists prove time and time again that they don't understand how to cater to audiences when it comes to anything more complex than a commercial break ad. In fact, when people try to cater something complex to fit the assumed "desires" of "a market" they end up completely tone-deaf. It kind of assumes a lot and kind of ridicules the audience implying it to be incapable of comprehending something even remotely foreign or unfamiliar. Dogen has recently made a video just about marketing decisions and how people view it: watch?v=WaKkhFMrN78 Just watch it, then read the comments. That's why I firmly believe that thinking about it from the marketing standpoint and letting marketing decisions drive the translation decisions is actually doing a disservice to both the new audience and the original work. During 20th century, USSR actually went through similar turmoils when it comes to how the translation theory developed, and I believe they have come to some really good solutions there. The translators of the time argued about whether a translation should follow "the letter" or "the spirit" of the original. While working on the translation theory they often took some good ideas from the lead western translators and developed on them further. By the end of 20th century they ended up with a solid translation theory, described in detail in the works of Yakov Retsker, Vilen Komissarov, and others. According to that approach, translation as a process is an act of creating a text in the target language that is equivalent to the original. In practice, it should strive for functional equivalency, meaning it must achieve the same goals. If we are talking about translating a work of art, it means it should convey the same meanings and messages that the original does, and evoke similar emotions. In order to achieve that goal, Retsker defines a variety of translation transformations and many other "tools" in the translators "toolkit." And Komissarov defines a whole system of "levels of equivalency": 1. Semantics (the words and their meanings). 2. Syntax (the sentence structure). 3. The way of describing the situation (the situation being described through the same contextual elements). 4. The situation as a whole (the situation is conveyed and understandable in the same way). 5. The goal of communication (does the translated text achieve the same goals as the original). A translation is supposed to reach equivalency on as many levels as possible, and if there are any conflicts, the translator can make an informed decision in favor of one of the levels, usually the "deeper" one with "the goal of communication" being the deepest level that must be reached pretty much always. There's a really good lecture about it on KZbin by Yermolovich; unfortunately, it's in Russian, but here's the link ID: watch?v=UUn9mAcRgCk There are many other things to consider, but I won't go into them now, because KZbin comments have too short of a limit. As for the translation of cultural elements, the main idea is that it should meet two criteria: 1. The text must remain understandable and as easy to read as the original (if the original is). 2. The cultural elements should be preserved (or conveyed through other means) whenever feasible without breaking the previous rule, especially if the cultural element is important to the goals of the text. The problem is, letting marketing related considerations affect this whole delicate decision making process is a recipe for disaster. For some notorious examples, I can recall the 4Kids censoring Pokemon case. There's an episode among the first dozens of the original series where villains get stuck in the snow and burn matches to stay warm. And the villainess says (in Japanese): "I'm just like the Little Match-Seller." Which is an obvious reference to the fairy tale by Hans Christian Andersen. But of course 4Kids had to replace matches with candies or something (and remove the reference as it no longer made sense), apparently because the marketing people of 4Kids at the time assumed (wrongly, I believe) that the american kids were too dumb to get the joke. Or maybe thought that simply showing burning matches would give the kids wrong ideas (how, exactly?), which is just... Yeah, don't let marketing decide how you translate.

[@hassanico9999]

"1. The text must remain understandable and as easy to read as the original (if the original is)." This is a fundamental failure of all American "localizations" whenever a medieval setting comes up. It happened with Unicorn Overlord here, it happened with FF14 (I highly recommend the "A Realm Retranslated" video series to see how much meaning is actively removed and failed to be conveyed due to the insistence on purple prose), and most damningly in Live A Live, where the entire Medieval chapter, written in basic, day to day Japanese that even a child could grasp, is instead converted into iambic pentameter poppycock that no 10 year old could ever grasp.

[@AroldoReiss]

I tend to agree that japanese games didn't evolve that much in terms of storytelling, but western media in general is also stuck with its own set of tropes. For example, it doesn't matter what setting the story takes place, the characters always act as if they are modern day urbanites, mock the absurdity of the situation they're in and every dialogue is delivered in five layers of irony. So it's kind of a pick your poison situation.

[@daddygrasshopper]

Yup, perfect calling out of the current "Marvel-ization" of a significant part of western media. But in the scope of evolution this little trope is something we've just been stuck in for about 15 years... hopefully we can evolve past it soon.

[@AlbanAwan]

Yeap I word it as acting like a Josh Whendon style smart ass from LA, NYC or one of the other big blue cities’ hipster district

[@travelsizedlions]

Guys I have an idea: what if Scooby Doo, but written like a bad sitcom and without the titular character?

[@salmark9080]

i dont think anything has touched the peak of gta or mgs 1-3 in terms of innovation except red dead 2, witcher 3 and p5. Might be narrow minded but doing replays of mgs1 and 2 for the platinum i'm blown away how much better it is as an adult

[@ZakuroTL]

I’ve been learning Japanese for about 12 years, have JLPT N1 certification, and have been translating as a hobby for around 4 years, and in nearly every one of his answers, Alex gave me an angle that I hadn’t thought about for how to approach a localization, or food for thought that I hadn’t considered before. It became clear to me over the course of the interview that even as someone who likes to claim that they’re competent with the language and has “experience,” I’d greatly underestimated what it takes to be a truly respectable professional in the field. Wonderful stuff, I’ll be thinking on this for a while.

[@DKZK21]

Melodies Of life has been making me cry for decades now, cool to meet the guy that's been technically doing that to me all this time lol

[@jacobmonks3722]

Absolutely, and don't forget the vocalist, Emiko Shiratori, who beautifully sang both the English and Japanese versions.

[@aarongogerty]

So cool you guys got him on the show, great conversation!

[@FlyingGerman]

When it comes to receiving text files where you don't even know who's speaking: Unfortunately that still happens to this day.

[@theme6530]

I've been waiting for this to happen for what feels like years. Kudos and congrats for pulling this off, one of the best channels on the platform!

[@MillenniumEarl014]

Younger audience would love Yuna saying "I love you" better because I do when I was younger. Now that I'm older I think a simple "Thank you" is also very powerful. We all know what happened right? Spira is a mess because of Sin. Yuna saying thank you is not just for herself but also for everyone, right? All the people, all the victims, the faith(souls?), everyone have suffered enough from Zanarkand timeline to the end of the game. So, thank you, Tidus. For everything. With all our heart, thank you. It sounds less selfish, right? You don't need to explain it just say: "Thank you". We've seen these two characters that sacrificed everything to end the cycle but what about the countless others that have done the same? So, yeah. The thank you is really, really powerful because they are also saying this to Tidus.

[@rdrouynriv]

Yeah, I also feel like Thank You would've made sense. But a thank you isn't something that earns a shocked reaction in American culture, so i understand why they felt like they had to change it.

[@MillenniumEarl014]

@@rdrouynriv Well, yeah. Most people will just focus on the 2 main characters. So "I love you" is the safer choice especially for young audience. But in the grand scheme of things, Yuna saying thank you is basically the rest of world saying that to Tidus.

[@EdreesesPieces]

If i were dying and a woman I loved told me thank you as her final words and she never told me she loved me, Id go to my grave confused. If her final words and first time telling me she loved me, id go to my grave happy. This is no different as an adult for me, so I dont think the scene lands as hard for me as an adult if its a thank you unless she expanded on it. I dont look at is as a Spira or plot issue, Im more focused on the personal emptions between the two characters because I spent most the game inserting myself into Tidus. And I would love to hear "I love you" from any woman I loved as I passed away a lot more than Id enjoy thank you, the older I get the better i get at directly conveying my true feelings with direct words.

[@MillenniumEarl014]

@@kulturkorv Not as powerful in the grand scheme of things. Powerful for the characters, yes.

[@MillenniumEarl014]

@@EdreesesPieces Well that's you. Other people are them. "I love you" and "thank you" both works. Ending the cycle is not just about these 2 people. Saying "thank you" gives voice to those other people. And again as Alex said no other Final Fantasy game has used "I love you" before. So we already know they love each other through their journey together. Relationships in other FF are not less impactful because they didn't say I love you. Maybe it's just me getting older.

[@quintec45]

This interview should have had a better representative of the opposing argument on or have made time for the submitted questions. In sifting through the core of the arguments I see online the issue is no longer about "what actually sells" and instead what established figures in the industry think "should sell." The Persona series is often criticized by other industry localizers for leaving in Japanese honorifics in their Western translations. Persona is at the forefront of JRPG discussions and does incredibly well in sales. The retainment of these in localization has led to a broader understanding of Japanese culture by its community and it provides context that cannot be conveyed as simply in translation. However, this decision is continuously criticized by a faction of localizers because it is "awkward" or requires work on the viewers part to fully understand. Presenting this argument like food makes more sense. People are upset that the representation they can receive of an award-winning Mexican dish is Taco Bell because "Taco Bell appeals better to the American palate than real Mexican food." Is it true in a broad sense? Yes. However, the thriving, melting pot food scene in America and other places is built on creating "Authentic" restaurants, and fans of such places often know that to get the "true" experience means actually going to those countries, but they ALSO appreciate getting as close to that as possible when they can. Many fans of Japanese games and other media have the same discernment in taste. They understand that wording will be changed, jokes translated, wordplay missed just because of the nature of most translation, but that does not include major changes in tone, theme, plot or characterization. They appreciate when the product makes an attempt to bring them closer to the original and educate them as well as entertain. They are coming to these games not because they want to play "a game" but because they want to play "a Japanese game." Hopefully this comparison also points out the absurdity of the suggested solution of "open your own restaurant" being presented to the average critic. Yes the ideal solution is to meet that market demand, but using that as a deflection of criticism is bad faith at the very least. I guess it also becomes easy to dismiss criticism when the assumption is that game writing is a lesser form of art 99 percent of the time as is portrayed by one side of this specific discussion. Something being produced on a strict deadline, in a workman fashion or for a specific audience does not make it lesser art. See: Fallout: New Vegas. Somehow I doubt this is the same lens used in analyzing American adaptations of foreign films like Oldboy or the reverse, even in the realm of games. A real, honest discussion about these issues needs to happen instead of circling the wagons whenever an opposing point of view is presented. Localization is important to art and to the market. What many on the other side are arguing for is not "raw translation," but instead a different standard of localization that brings the audience "into the niche" instead of converting it into a mainstream product.

[@stanm4410]

When did the conversation circle the wagons on the issue? Alex actually said that if there is a western market for more direct translations of Japanese media that companies should consider making one for that audience as well. And he said that he'd like to see the people who are very passionate about the issue "get a team together" and "buy the rights" (to whatever JP media they want to honor better). He's basically saying, "if you can't get the translation companies to create the products you want, then become the change you want to see." How is that "bad faith"?

[@Nipah.Auauau]

@@stanm4410 Fans have been very vocal about these points for over a decade but certain groups in the industry choose to dismiss any such criticism as mere insults.

[@quintec45]

​@@stanm4410 Fair questions. I think the "circling the wagons" part comes from the lack of discussion of notable examples of bad localizations or intentional mis-translation, or the dismissing of it as a thing that "used to happen" as he provides an example of the "names of family and friends" as being something that no longer happens, or as honest mistakes made by newbies. To be fair the discussion did simply run out of time, and I would have liked to have seen responses and further, deeper discussion. Clear examples of the type of behavior being talked about are available from modern, experienced professionals. See: an entire Fire Emblem Fates character's dialogue being cut for a "silent ninja" gag. The argument of "buying the rights" is in bad faith because its known how high/impassible that barrier of entry is to the average critic, and seems like passing the buck and dismissing the initial argument. There is nothing wrong with consumers expressing what they want and how the existing industry is failing to meet that demand. It feels like less of a call to action and more like an appeal to authority. Example: "You don't like Hollywood films? Well instead of criticizing them make them instead!" We know that a viewer typically wants to "view" good films not create them. Meeting that demand could be expressed by creating a new company, but it would be equally valid for the existing industry to hear criticisms and adapt. The argument being presented is about "rogue" translations. Which implies that, and I agree, it isn't the norm. What's being asked is for the industry to look internally and talk about potential flaws and controversy and to weigh potential solutions. The core of the calls for better localization aren't that it would make for a "good side-market" but instead that it would improve sales of existing media while increasing the authenticity of the product.

[@Larrue]

@@quintec45 I'm probably the most knowledgeable person regarding atlus and persona, outside of the early localization of p1/2 I've only seen complaints of localization that are down to taste when best case, pointing out actual errors in best case or doing weird culture war stuff at worst case. I think we should allow space for the former always because there can be improvements. This video just contextualizes the task of localization to provide more insight as to why things happen sometimes and ultimately the problem is that the culture war people drown out the actual criticism. You can see it very much in the comment section of this video.

[@quintec45]

@@Larrue Agreed. The discussions should center on which styles are better and on their strengths and weaknesses while correcting errors and calling out changes done against the spirit of the work. My want as a consumer is to experience something that is artfully localized while also being as faithful to the intent of the creators as possible within those bounds. I don't think its an absurd ask for the audience to have its cake and eat it in this situation.

[@Armoogeddon]

Insanely insightful video, could've watched this conversation for several more hours

[@TaylorWrightVA]

This was such a *fascinating* episode to listen to. I'm sure there was so much more that could have been talked about as well. I really hope he can come back at some point perhaps for an additional episode. Again, really fascinating discussion. I love learning about the process of all this.

[@fenrir3097]

Seems like the discussion went into the direction of how "direct" a translation is instead of how "faithful" it could be. I think it's fine not having a direct 1:1 translation, but a lot of localizers these days would change the meaning and tone of the story and/or characters.

[@mattb6616]

also fond of pretending Japanese is just a boring, inexpressive language that can't possibly be translated accurately or it sounds like a machine is speaking (the usual racism)

[@UltimateGattai]

This is my issue, I don't want the entire meaning or personality of the story/characters to change. Throwing gen Z language or western slang and memes isn't a faithful translation. Samurai Maiden is a good example of that where the dialogue was completely rewritten. However, the localisation team did re-translate/localise it after the backlash. I despise when the meaning/intent is unfaithful to what the creator's had intended.

[@zoricgames]

@@fenrir3097 yeah, that detracted hard from Eiyuden for me. Lian changing from a high energy optimistic girl to annoying reddit elemental was rough. Perielle turning into generic girlboss was another.

[@Norel_Nieves]

Give an example of a localizer who changed a game or anime for the worse.

[@MillenniumEarl014]

I think this video is a great parallel to the videogame localization. People want faithful adaptation but it gets lost to direct translation.

[@zoricgames]

I come down on this topic the same way I come down on general fandom gatekeeping. Join the hobby vs. change the hobby - it's a meme, but it's accurate. Was something translated with respect and understanding for the source material? Great, I welcome it. Was something changed because the localizer didn't like the original and wanted to "punch it up?" or worse, they dislike the source material and want to "fix" it?" no thanks. I saw the Unicorn Overlord controversy. I initially was annoyed by the changes, but I didn't mind them while playing it. I didn't mind the faux-Shakespearean dialogue one way or the other. Frankly, it didn't hurt that UO's story is really weak and pretty much an excuse for the gameplay. Eiyuden Chronicle's translation, though, oof. While I feel like it gets treated like every single line is an abomination, that's not really the case. But when it delivers cringe, it delivers cringe. Changing what's essentially "I'm having a hard time finding a worthy opponent" to something involving the words "a gnome doing the limbo" is just one of many examples where I got sucked straight out of the story. I'll just say there is a character you meet later - a boy who acts like a magical girl - where the localization definitely got itinerant. The localizers who decide to go on social media and brag about "fixing" translations are adding fuel to the fire. I'm sure there's plenty, like Mr. Smith here, who are just trying to legitimately do their job, and they're getting tarred with the same brush. I am all for calling out bad localizations, but I'd rather be more precise in my criticisms and not just knee-jerk label the entire field as rotten.

[@UltimateGattai]

Unicorn Overlord didn't annoy me that much considering the setting. But that Eiyuden one is something I really wish they would redo, if I had known prior to the Kickstarter, I would have reconsidered funding it.

[@dudemcguy1227]

​@@UltimateGattaiThere is a mod for Eiyuden Chronicles (PC) that retranslates some of the most annoying localization choices. It is not intended to be a perfect 1 to 1 translation to the Japanese script, just a clean up of the English version. (It's on Nexus Mods). Perhaps the best thing to do for these Japanese games is to just buy the PC version and rely on fans to retranslate for more accuracy.

[@citizenchris2455]

The Unicorn controversy came from a bad place where someone used machine translation to complain about something they clearly didn’t have the context or real understand of

[@clamjamison5941]

Can you elaborate on what was wrong with Eiyuden? Just that they took simple phrases in Japanese and tried to add cringey pazzaz? I haven't played it yet or heard anything about this.

[@zoricgames]

@@clamjamison5941 Sure! Like I said, it's not wall-to-wall terrible. The biggest offenders in the main plot are Lian and Perielle . Lian's a very S2 Nanami-like character. She's supposed to be perky and high-energy. They added a bunch of reddit jokes to her dialogue like "rub-a-dub-dub, don't be a flub" and made her come across more domineering towards the protagonist, when she treats him as a junior but equal member of the team in the original. Perielle is a noblewoman who reminded me a lot of S2's Anabelle, role-wise. She has some really bizarre changes, like a scene with her asking the main character to do something. It's a polite but determined request, but they adding her saying "yah mule!" and making whip cracking sounds. The thing about the gnome doing the limbo comes from a recruitment conversation later. Another one that made the rounds was a recruitment conversation that happens if you have a particular character in the party at the time, where she calls someone a " muscle-brained chud" rather than something less tinted with redditspeak, like "musclehead." The character you're recruiting is a jacked dude who thinks he's a wizard. There's more out there but it just gets really tiring after a while hearing the same "wacky" dialogue out of so many characters, regardless of how appropriate it is.

[@TheBeird]

So long as the general vibe of of the original story is captured in the translation, that's all I care about. The Yakuza/Like a Dragon games have brilliant translations, but there's no way it's a one to one deal. But it shouldn't be. Just give the gist of the drama or humour and we will feel the intent of the authors.

[@amanechan5405]

It's wild you're mentioning Yakuza games, that always have separate script for original voices and these translations are one of the most faithful official translations out there. Which is only proving the point of people who are option for translations not adaptations.

[@TheBeird]

@@amanechan5405 I wonder if the swearing is one to one 🤔 Plus wouldn’t there be lots of nuances to the Japanese language that’d make humour very specific to how it’s spoken? That would require some adaptation. Different type of game altogether, but I’m put in mind of Ni No Kuni and the stand comedy for the fairies. That kind of rapid back and forth of Japanese comedy must have had some jiggery pokery to make it work over here.

[@MasakanSolaris]

Honestly being part of the anti censorship crowd for the longest time i can give a little insight as to why this criticism is a thing as it basically boils down to a vehement resentment of any western influence on asian media. They have flat out declared localizers as "The enemy" to the point where any change, any deviation from the source material is honestly viewed as cultural colonization.

[@Kollieprime9]

We call that mental illness

[@Byakkoya11037]

Same here, it really is just another "Us vs Them" battle, and I can see why it's happening too. Some of the examples that these people bring up are pretty egregious.

[@Gigamokin]

japanese jelly donuts are delicious tho, they're my favorite

[@Y-two-K]

@@GigamokinPokémon English dub was actually hilarious. Not sure why people crap on it so much. Great humor and solid voice acting (mostly)

[@JameboHayabusa]

Gonna be honest, these arguments sound a lot like the insane left v.s. right debates going on right now. Its hilarious.

[@sagelord77]

Great interview, great guest. Loved this!

[@mineraljunction]

this was absolutely brilliant and i could have quite happily watched another several hours of it

[@CrowsofAcheron]

In light of Yuna's 'I love you', it would be interesting to look at Aerith's 'Thank you' in FF7 Rebirth. In this case, arigatou was directly translated, but many people think Aerith meant to say 'I love you' and site FFX's translation as evidence. It's kind of a bizarre take. But in the scene, Cloud looks shocked in response, in a way a simple 'thank you' wouldn't provoke. I wonder what Alex's thoughts would be

[@Frosfank3034]

Very thankful for the conversartion. This guy is clearly a master at the craft and im very grateful to see and hear from the guy that made/adapted many of the works i loved so much throughout my whole life That said, sadly, the main irk that probably is in everyone's mind felt "sidesteped"? It is clear thar you tried to address by trying to bring it to the discussion without being too specific (to not make anyone a target, which was wise) But, understandably, ppl will get frustrated that it was not discussed, ppl will feel baited Would love a 2nd try at the subject, specificaly focused at the contention of "are translations/adaptations being weaponised? What are the consequences if true and what are the consequences if not true but being percieved as such?"

[@DKCreo]

I do appreciate this discussion and I definitely learned some things having listened to it, but it does kind of (largely speaking) sidestep what is very clearly the bigger issues people have with localization and or marketing, particularly in the modern day, seemingly tackling very vulnerable strawman positions and not really coming from the position of a steelman. I'm relatively new to the channel but I believe it's pretty safe to say you guys are smart enough to know exactly what those things are and why people are sick and tired of it happening, and the fact that the conversation didn't veer in that direction beyond something very brief I'm certain was with intention (because the acknowledgement of some of these things was there), which, in my opinion, is a bit of a disservice to the totality of what the conversation requires. I totally understand not wanting to bring guests on to pummel them with culture war debates / narratives for example, but the crux of what's happening does involve those kind of things a bit more than I believe you guys were willing (or allowed?) to get into which is unfortunate, because I believe a lot of peoples frustrations simply has to do with the hiring and actions of unqualified persons being put into these kind of positions, and not so much people like Alexander himself. I'll just speak for myself in saying that I personally I do not full-champion the crowd that wants and only wants direct 1:1 translations (although I'm not necessarily against it in every scenario either), because I have seen localized product provide something I could argue ends up being better when not doing so (i.e. adding that "flavor."). That said, I'm almost entirely against the idea that something needs to be altered in a way that changes the intent of what is being shown and or what is being said. When I pay for a product that I'm very well aware is coming from a different culture (oftentimes the very reason WHY I'm paying and indulging in said product to begin with), I knowingly expect and willingly accept there to be cultural differences - humor, beliefs, commonplace idioms / phrases, etc. When I am interested in something foreign and I don't understand it, I simply take what is assuredly less than a minute of my time to quickly look it up, understand the context and then move forward. I don't really enjoy the idea, or perhaps the practice of "globalization", because I'm not trying to partake in a product that adheres to my normal, "western sensibilities", let's call them. I understand the vast majority of people do not and or will not take the lengths that I might to learn and understand something I previously hadn't, but where I sit I would much rather a foreign sense of humor (for example) not quite land on me than for it to be forcibly altered entirely into something that only resembles what the original version of the product was in that it's still trying to be comedic, but without the actual substance of the original at all. Now I definitely understand what I tend to prefer is not or cannot always be the desired outcome, but my overall point is kind of that however close you can remain to the actual material is what you probably should be doing and there are just way too many examples of this not being the case and for not good reasons. Beyond these things, it's very apparent the current industry is wrought with political idealists / elitists / activists (often very left leaning) that do not give a single damn about the work that they're localizing / censoring, and are looking only to impose their world views and sensibilities forcibly into places that are entirely uncalled for and unwarranted - this is especially egregious when it comes to already existing, legacy I.P, which is important to mention because I truly don't believe most people care, for example, if some developers want to make their own new I.P. that's heavy on being gay / LGBT or whatever (at worst you'll have a crowd crying "woke" that you're never going to be able to stop, same as not being able to stop people just immediately assuming your some kind of ist or phobe for not agreeing with their perspective; the vast majority are just going to speak with their wallets), but when it so happens you are, say, removing gender from an established game + franchise like Dragon Quest III, to which we now know for a fact that the creator [Yuji Horii] doesn't agree with either, people begin (or continue) to feel a type of way and I find it difficult to put the blame on them for doing so. I understand some of what I've said falls into the censorship debate (which I'm against on the basis that I believe that video games, and similarly anime + manga, are artistic endeavors, so unless something happens to be very, very beyond the pale in terms of what we could deem to be "acceptable", I don't think there should ever be a discussion about things having to be censored) more so than translations, which may come from the localization dept. or perhaps the marketing dept. as was suggested in the video, but ultimately I identify these things as hand-in-hand issues where you can't truly talk about one without the other. Alexander has a perspective that I do appreciate him sharing, but it does seem to actively reflect more on how things were in the past and how things were in his career specifically, which absolutely has changed in the modern gaming landscape in terms of scale, resources, communication and climate. The comments here are full of varied thoughts and responses (putting it lightly), but some in particular are taking the things he says as gospel while others are taking the things he says as a farce, and I do believe it to be necessary to remind ourselves that this is just one man giving his own perspectives on his experiences, at times with no real source to his claims which creates a bit of a toss up when attempting to parse what is absolute and what might be some exaggerative claims (not entirely ready to believe the extent of his claim regarding Japanese developers claiming their own writing sucks, though I'm not entirely dismissing that it probably has happened either, nor am I buying that he doesn't really believe that modern day rogue-translators are a thing either because that's an absolutely ridiculous thing to claim). Anyway, I enjoyed the discussion; have some of my own personal qualms (paraphrasing, but "go and learn Japanese yourself then if you want the actual story, guys!" really doesn't sit well with me) and still believe there's much more necessary discussion & improvements to be had when it comes to how the industry handles all of this, but even still, what we got here overall I thought was pretty fruitful and should give a bit more perspective to both sides. . . whether that perspective be for better or for worse I suppose is up to the individual.

[@Mikx100]

Yes, and if this is something they do not want to discuss and are saying doesn't exist. I'm all fine for the localization done in house with AI. F* their jobs.

[@82Jaster]

I'd say a big issue is that some have created this fictionalized version and actuality their idealized version of Japan in their heads that's just far from what the actual country is like. This is particularly true when it comes to subjects like LGBT people. Because you'll find many who'll decry that subject being brought up in Japanese games because they're convinced that it basically doesn't exist in Japan, so if characters pop up who do fall into that category then the translators are accused of inserting them in to push an agenda. I'll give you two examples of that, one from gaming and one from anime. Earlier this year Nintendo released a remake to Paper Mario: The Thousand-Year Door and in it there's a character named Vivian. There was an uproar because it's shown that she's trans. And inevitably Treehouse, who handles translations for Nintendo's games, was accused of changing the script to push an agenda. But here's the thing, she's always been a trans character going back to the original Japanese game. She describes herself as having a boy's body, but a cute girl's heart. It was actually the original English translation that completely removed all references to her being trans and instead just had her being bullied because she was ugly. But now that it's a more accurate translation they're upset. In 2018 there was an anime called Zombie Land Saga released. It follows a group of young girls who die in various ways and are resurrected to form a zombie idol group. Perhaps the most popular character on the show was a character named Lily. The show eventually got to the episode where it delved into her character and how she was killed. But aside from that it also revealed that she's trans. As you may imagine certain people didn't handle this well and of course accused the translators of pushing an agenda. This was propped up when a "Japanese" Twitter user began to push a story that the storyline doesn't exist in Japanese, and it was entirely something that was made up by the English translation team. But then an interview with the producer of the Japanese anime as well as the writer popped up where they explicitly talk about why they decided to make her trans as well as the challenges they faced in doing so. And after that people began to look into that Twitter user and discovered that he wasn't actually Japanese. He was a guy using Google translate to post in Japanese and was just angry that this character was trans. To wrap it back to what I started off by talking about people creating this fictionalized/idealized version of Japan, i'd like to bring up another thing that happened earlier this year. Which is that some people got ahold of an internal Nintendo of America document about how accepting they were to LGBT people. This was used as a means of pushing that Treehouse has an agenda in their translations, and in particular when it comes to LGBT people. But something you will not see from those same people is that in 2022 Nintendo of Japan stated that they recognize same-sex marriage even though Japan as a country doesn't. And as a result same-sex marriage employees would receive the same benefits as those in opposite-sex marriages. You won't see them bring it up because it puts a cloud over their idealized version of Japan where LGBT are non-existent or are purely portrayed in a negative light.

[@sirmiluch6856]

@@82Jastercrossdressing is not trans you 🤡

[@Pale_ghost]

@@82Jaster this a whole can of worms. And japanese trans and american trans can mean wastly different things. One of my favorite japanese character tropes is the macho gay guy, and i find them funny and positive, even when they joke that they are a "lady" - its light hearted and fun. Or trap characters or otonokos. All of them are their own thing and not the american trans that we know. But youre definitely right theres a ton of super dumb people that will shout woke or dei seeing this. At that point they even doubt weather it was 100% genuine by japanese developers or was it a marketing decision. Personally i dislike that bridget from guilty gear went from being a trap to trans :(. Trap to me is something japanese and positive, while trans is just what reddit moderators call themselves in their basements.

[@82Jaster]

@@Pale_ghost I don't think there's any real difference between trans in the West and in Japan. For example, "otonoko" aren't trans or even presented as such. They're more or less the Japanese equivalent of a crossdresser in the West. They're people who very much feel they're male, but simply like being feminine presenting. Which is obviously not the same as a trans woman in which they're born to the wrong sex. Actual trans people in Japan aren't something new at all. Since at least the 80's there's even been a derogatory term to describe them as "newhalf". Kayo Satoh, better known as Kayo Police, was a popular gravure model and TV personality in the early 2010's. You have a character like Erica in Catherine who's explicitly trans. People who tend to not like trans people, or LGBT people in general, find them "acceptable" when they're presented in certain ways. When they're sexualized or used as a punchline, then they're fine. But when they're depicted as being characters you're meant to empathize with they become "woke". You'll see the same with lesbians. They're fine when they're being sexualized for the pleasure of the audience, but when they're a fully realized character whose identity isn't built on sexualization they're a problem. It's why they tend to have an issue with Western games including LGBT characters. Because they're going to be actual characters rather than fap material for them.

[@nao3588]

A shame but 50 minutes in and the only real olive branch given to the people asking for more faithful localizations was snipped. To compare anime localization to game localization is more fair today than ever as one of if not the biggest company that brings anime to the west is SONY since they bought out Crunchyroll. It's an eastern/western collaboration in both cases, and possibly why both industries are seeing this controversy. If you saw rogues on one side, you should be able to believe they're on the other side too. "If you don't like it, it either isn't for you or go learn Japanese," while I probably paraphrased that, the sentiment is still rude and dismissive of one entire side of the discussion. If we want to compare games to art, as Casen seemed to do, imagine the Mona Lisa or Michelangelo's David. We wouldn't paint over or cover them up just to suit different audiences, nor would we paint or sculpt alternative versions of them just to be able to sell likenesses in a gift shop, at least, not outside of some gimmick. We expect art to be taken as it is and either appreciated or rejected on it's merits from one culture to another. It doesn't have to please everyone or be appreciated the same across the globe. Call it idealized if you must, tell me I'm comparing world famous pieces to consumable media but I didn't open the door for that. At least from an artistic standpoint, this is the argument for the faithfulness of localizations

[@mattb6616]

yeah. the argument for rewriting to this level has always sounded to me like they were effectively saying we need a different version of the Mona Lisa for every country. Some people want her to smile more, or show more or less skin, or maybe we should update her fashion for the current era. It's just strange. These are things acceptable when adapting or remaking a work, but *translating*?

[@stanm4410]

I mean... I don't think Alex was reallyrude or dismissive at all. He even chuckled at the "go learn Japanese" from Casen and said that suggestion was "so conceited". Clearly he doesn't actually think that is a perfect solution either. Alex even said in his FFX example that in an ideal world they could just leave Yuna's "Thanks/Arigato" as it was in the original Japanese script and everyone playing would hopefully be able to understand the cultural nuance of her response and realize the impact the line would have in Japanese. But we live in a world where 99% of English players wouldn't know that (especially back in back in 2001), so they changed the line to "I love you." And he even got the original writer's approval to make that change. Comparisons to art like the Mona Lisa don't exactly like up with this situation. Because we aren't talking about still images that can be interpreted differently across cultures. We're talking about differences in a language that could cause the artist's original intent to be lost in translation and how best to avoid that issue.

[@citizenchris2455]

The thing about video games is that they are generally commodities, unlike sculptures or paintings which I don’t think are apt comparisons. There is marketing, shareholders, so many are involved in game development and you have to sell these games to so many people of various cultures with different nuances, senses of humor that you’re never going to get a 1:1 work. Subtitles in movies with foreign languages are rarely one to one text for what is being said by the actors. Like I’m curious about what it is people mean when they say faithful translation, because it never seems to mean the same thing and rarely do I feel that translations aren’t being faithful to the text.

[@MillenniumEarl014]

​@@stanm4410Yuna saying "I love you" and not "Thank you" is pretty faithful. It's not direct but it is faithful to the character. It doesn't feel weird for Yuna to say "I love you" at that moment. Even a "Thank you" won't be that weird.

[@mattb6616]

@@MillenniumEarl014 these are very, very different lines. In both English and Japanese. This is weird, unnecessary rewriting that changes the tone and meaning of the scene. Just because he gaslighted a guy who doesn't speak English to get the changes passed doesn't mean they're good changes.

[@SooprTruffaut]

This was a riveting and very insightful watch. Very grateful to all concerned for putting it together. Great work indeed!

[@Dreadn0de0]

Incredible work guys! I was so happy to see the notification for this

[@Postumeartist]

I’m learning so much about my childhood! Western studios are the reason I ended up hating anime until I saw “spirited away” when I was in my teens. 150 episodes?!? I hated the way “anime” I was exposed to at the time had such slow moving plots. To me they had no real story because I grew impatient waiting for something to happen. I now realize why I wasn’t exposed to shorter more interesting anime that I probably would’ve liked. I was into video games at the time mostly for the story. That was an absolutely fascinating podcast. Loved it

[@Adam-zc3of]

As a resident of Japan myself and someone who works in the games industry, I used to hang out and play boardgames with Alex very regularly back in Tokyo. He's awesome!

[@samham1988]

Great interview! Was completely fascinated by Alex's story's and insights, could listen to this guy for hours lol

[@HaroldOgden]

Educational and entertaining. We owe this man a lot. Thanks for bringing this interview to us.

[@JohnBradyIRL]

simply great, looking forward to Alex being back

[@brandonsipes8028]

I don’t want direct translation and see the value in localisation but it is frustrating when the changes go too far (Fire Emblem). “Oh, it’s for the western audience” as if I’m not part of the western audience

[@runefaustblack]

What are we talking about here? If it's about the localization toning down the sexualization of a 9-year-old (-looking, but honestly same difference) character, there is no world in which being "faithful to the source" makes sense, either morally or economically. The original text SUCKS and it might make the publisher liable for legal punishment. Changing it is a net good.

[@brandonsipes8028]

@@runefaustblack there’s a long history of Fire Emblem changing scenes in the game, especially the Support scenes. Just because that’s the latest one you’ve heard about doesn’t mean that all the other changes have been of the same ilk. But bravo to you for jumping to the worst thing to downplay any other changes. Great job there

[@runefaustblack]

@@brandonsipes8028 Well then, give your examples, I'm waiting.

[@brandonsipes8028]

@@runefaustblack a support being changed from a dialogue to nothing but ellipses (many other supports have also been changed to be more jokey, which can be fun but makes characterisation and the relationships suffer), relationships being changed to be more platonic (not just the example you mentioned, but others with characters closer in age), the removal of mini games, characters would be flanderised so that one small quirk of theirs would become their whole personality (liking pickles is an example)

[@cloudd4062]

​@@runefaustblackstraight to calling people pedophiles very mature

[@Choojermelon]

Fantastic episode! What a treat it is to hear about the localization process from a legend of the craft, with some really cool tidbits about the translations of some of my favorite games. I can tell having him on board was a pleasure for you guys, too.

[@wegogiant]

Have people figured out what lines were changed for the mistake Alexander shares about in FFX? I think the corrected line as shown in the final product is one of the times Tidus says "this is my story" since that's Auron's pseudo-catchphrase. It's hard to imagine any of them being changed to quote a line from Jecht, but maybe

[@dudemcguy1227]

It's hard to know which scene it was just based on Alex's description, but my guess is that it might be the first Jecht Sphere scene in Macalania right after beating the Spherimorph Boss. That 1st Jecht sphere gives us a flashback of Auron, Braska, and Jecht leaving Bevelle and visiting Macalania 10 years prior. Part way through the scene, Auron looks at Jecht and says (in English version) "This is no pleasure cruise". Which perhaps in the Japanese version was something closer to "We need to consider all the options" or "We need to stay on our toes" or something like that. The flashback then ends with Jecht casually saying "What's the hurry man?" and then Auron chases after him and says with anger, "Let me tell you what the hurry is!" as Braska ends the video recording. (Maybe Alex remembers Jecht's "What's the hurry man?" as "Ah, it will all work out." in the Japanese version.) Then the scene returns to present day and Tidus asks the group "What's the point? He wasn't on some pleasure cruise." Echoing Auron's line in the middle of the flashback scene. It's possible that after Nojima asked Alex to change it back (so that Tidus echoes Auron instead of Jecht), they may have found a compromise were they tried to make Auron's line of "stay on our toes" a little more memorable in English ("Pleasure cruise" stands out and is an English phrase similar to "It will be easy" or "a piece of cake".) That way, when Tidus repeats Auron's line just a little bit later, it would stick out more to the audience more as "Oh, he just said exactly what Auron said to Jecht in the flashback". This is the only time I can remember Tidus echoing a line to Auron that Auron also said to Jecht earlier.

[@wegogiant]

@@dudemcguy1227 Ahh, yeah, that makes a lot of sense. Okay, new leading theory for me. Thank you for the breakdown

[@KoldoBearUkulele]

This is an amazing and informative episode. Love the new direction of topics.

[@1SpicyMeataball]

The localization in Vagrant Story is a thing of art.

[@Touyakun2]

Totally agree with the conversation here. I studied Japanese for a few years and spent time living there, and worked several years on a localization team for a game company in South Korea. Korean is also a high-context language, and having to go to great pains to even figure out the gender of the people talking was a normal occurrence. Despite working for the company in-house, the text we were given was literally just a file of text, and as Alexander mentioned, we would sometimes have no idea who was talking, what the situation was, or the greater context it fits in. Not only this, but there is so much assumed cultural knowledge that even simple phrases, like in the current Metaphor text being posted, can carry different implications and inflections that portray a different personality than what those words would imply for that character in another language. It definitely feels like a Dunning-Kreuger effect, as it felt very disingenuous to simply use literal translation differences to assume foul play was involved. Another large factor that got in the way of localization was that this Dunning-Kreuger effect goes both ways. There were people on non-localization teams who either spoke good English, or thought they spoke good English, who actively got in our way and told us what certain translations should or shouldn't be. Often, these people also only paid attention to literal translations and assumed any word choices that weren't what was in their knowledge or their dictionary was wrong. This would even go as far as basic grammar, and we'd have to argue the "correctness" of even fundamental English grammar to then get "permission" to keep it in the text. However, this also extended to the localization team itself, at times, as some translators were also only interested in literal translations, while others cared more for writing something that felt more natural and didn't feel "dead on the page," as Alexander noted. It was a mess of opinions among a company with ideals that too many people had their own interpretations of how those ideals should be represented. And lastly, it can't be stressed enough that the source text isn't always great, and can definitely be just bad. It could be either due to time constraints, or that the writers just aren't good writers (in my case, the dev team themselves often wrote text), but I lost count of how many times our native Korean staff had absolutely no idea what the text was even trying to say. With all of this in mind, I see posts like that Metaphor one and think there is a litany of details that need to be explored before its accuracy or "correctness" can even be assessed. Loved listening to this podcast, and love all of your guys' deep dives. Thank you!

[@faviann]

Big thanks for sharing. I truly enjoyed the nuances showcased by your example and gives reasonable expectations as to why localization turns out to be as messy/tangled/complex as game development.

[@Jiube000]

I think the problem is not the points related to the translation of the cultural differences. The problem is that some translators allow "marketing guys" decide how to change the original to cater it to a different audience. Yes, literal translations are usually bad, and you need to find proper equivalents to convey the same meanings and emotions; and working with cultural elements is a whole art form of its own. But having the original goal of the text or the effect it is supposed to have on the audience be deliberately changed on the whims of what the supposed "market" allegedly "needs" is... Well, it's definitely not translation at this point. It's "adaptation" at best. I'll quote a different comment, since somebody has put it nicely, "I have never heard a single person say that, for example, Gabriel Garcia Marquez' 100 Years of Solitude needed to have all the Mexican stuff removed so it could be localized to be about a small town in Wisconsin so white people could understand it better." I couldn't agree more. I have commented on the video itself too, I expand on that topic in more detail from the perspective of somebody who's familiar with a completely different translation tradition. It may be interesting to you.

[@siekensou77]

Let the author live or die by their work. Don't make it what it isn't. Your job is to bring it to a different language; it's not making it better or worse than the original work.

[@Touyakun2]

@@Jiube000 It was an interesting read, thank you! I definitely agree that decisions that veer away from the text in every way should not be left to those strictly catering to a certain demographic. An interesting note I forgot to point out was that, in beginning of my work, we actually had very little overhead. The work we did pre-launch was praised enough by fans online that they initially gave us the go ahead to continue our creative work and then some. But as its popularity grew, the exact situations you describe are what started happening, and there are few things more ironic than a company who saw success by giving its writers freedom, and then deciding that the path to continued success is controlling everything they write entirely (through the marketing team and everyone else who suddenly starts asserting more authority over all English choices than its own writing team).

[@Touyakun2]

@@siekensou77 Very much agreed, I remember a somewhat recent anime translation that went way off the rails and inserted commentary on the patriarchy when the character was just talking about something like how tired they were lol. That was just ridiculous.

[@TheNobodyNamedDubyaBee]

For quite some time, the "Are JRPG Characters Lost in Translation?" topic from the Dark Pixel podcast days was coming to my mind and hoped that the issue would be revisited... and here we are.

[@bluespaceman7937]

Sounds interesting, I should listen to it.

[@SoloRogueStudios]

This was an excellent interview. Alexander O. Smith was humble and informative, and he gave great insight into the localization industry, the process, and some of the challenges and decisions that he has had to make throughout his career. However, like others here, I can’t help but feel like the controversy that led to this discussion has been somewhat sidestepped during this interview. Perhaps this was due to time constraints, as the audience questions ended up being left on the table when the interview ran over time, or perhaps the scope of this topic is simply too great to be covered in just a single video. I also think the customer perspective on this issue was not quite represented accurately; discussions of this topic usually wind up assuming that the customers complaining want “1:1,” “direct,” or “literal” translations, when in reality what they want is faithful or accurate translations that still flow well in English, but stick as close to the original meaning and intent of the Japanese script as possible, without inserting references, ideals, or “current day-isms” that were not present in the source material. To the end of solving both of the above problems, I’d like to suggest a follow-up video to this discussion with guests representative of the customers’ perspective on this topic, so they can articulate exactly what the customers’ concerns and wants are in regards to this topic, perhaps even going over specific examples of controversial localization and the changes they’d like to see implemented to prevent such incidents going forward. One guest I would suggest is OtakuDaiKun, a KZbinr with a fairly sizable channel who has made numerous videos over the years covering various localization and censorship controversies in Japanese media brought over to the West. Another is a more modestly followed KZbinr, Japan Day Tripper, who has an entire video series on his channel going through the first Valkyria Chronicles game and retranslating the Japanese script to compare it against the official English release and highlighting the varying degrees of changes the localizers made to the script in the process; he is also currently doing the same to Valkyria Chronicles 4. This interview was an excellent look into the industry’s perspective on this issue, and I’m hoping a follow up can re-examine it more from the customers’ perspective to hopefully cover this topic from all sides of the discussion.

[@sirmiluch6856]

They won’t do it, because as you can see in this video, they are xenophobic narcissistic censorship apologists. They whiny be covering any other point of view except their own narrow xenophobic one.

[@Dracobyte]

​@@sirmiluch6856any proof that they are xenophobic?

[@doniarts]

@@Dracobyte If they agree that localization is needed to improve others' work, then that is the case where that word works. The same goes for people who inherently call Japanese works in their original form boring without even experiencing them, pretty much saying, "Yeah, these JP fans had trash while the localization made it good."

[@ryandude3]

Alexander O. Smith? What a get! Loved this conversation.

[@CandiBookCorner]

As a high school teacher of both English Literature and music, there is so much I absolutely love about this conversation! Hearing about lyric translation was especially interesting. Alexander's translation of Melodies of Life is masterful not only for capturing the song's emotion, but also for it clarity and prosody. Many popular songs originally written in English have pretty terrible prosody, with unstressed syllables landing on down-beats and muddying up the natural rhythm of the language. I'd expect additional challenges with that in a translated song and usually understand that would come with the territory, but Melodies of Life lines up every lyric perfectly with the melody. Clearly a lot of care, labor, expertise and artistry went into it, and I'd say it's one of the best vocal tracks in the series.

[@KaleSerpent]

He brings up the "Maybe it's not made for you." Well, the game companies, and some of the translators are indeed saying that now, and some of them seem to complain afterwards that their games aren't selling. So maybe people started to agree with them.

[@Kollieprime9]

Unicorn overlord just sold a million copies lol

[@ResonantArc]

This could be true, in which case, the companies will certainly shift with the new trends in the market. So keep supporting what you think is of value and avoid what is not!

[@KaleSerpent]

@@ResonantArc ​ Indeed I am, sadly that has lead me to play a lot less games. Like recently, I kickstarted eiyuuden, but then the translations stuff popped up, and it killed a lot of my desire to play it. @Kollieprime9 How is this in line with the translation discussion? I haven't followed Vanillaware's games in a long while, so I don't know where they stand or how this game in particular stands.

[@Kollieprime9]

@@KaleSerpentunicorn overlord was a game that was in the crosshairs for bad localization with people saying they weren’t going to buy the game But it sold a million copies, which is very good for a game from that company lol

[@KaleSerpent]

@@Kollieprime9 Well, that's not too much of a surprise. People who "boycott" often times don't actually boycott when the time comes, but just complain. Though I don't know if a million copies is exceptional. Personally, I like Vanillaware's works. Even if I only truly played Odin Sphere, the other games were just on platforms that I didn't own. I'd argue, with the Vanillaware name, it would boost sales despite the possible bad localization issues.

[@matten_zero]

1:16:00 Im skeptical of conventional takes on scriptwriting. Its art IDK if it has yo be that formulaic. Some professional writers also seem to be skeptical about the traditional formulas as well. Maybe this all sounds good at a board meeting but where is the art in all of that? Just saw Look Back in theatres. The film isnt very dialogue heavy yet this film which was aimed at Japanese audience was emotional as hell, and funny. I think there is timhis idea by the Hollywood types to think the aidience is one way. A lot of people enjoy the Japanese approach to storytelling and are getting used to the humor as well.

[@mellybeannn14]

Loved this guest and episode!!! Super interesting topic, loving the Monday shows!

[@spikevincent1990]

Really enjoying the last couple of episodes!

[@pauloninjinha]

Brazil mentioned! Que legal sua esposa ser brasileira, Mike!

[@ResonantArc]

Obrigado! Eu estou aprendendo portugues, e em augusto visitamos os pais dela em Mato Grosso.

[@acelee62]

wanted to say that the difference between working inhouse and being a freelance translator is vastly different and there are definitely more "restrictions" to what we can and can't do, not just in terms of language but other restrictions like budget and time

[@Arkholt2]

When Smith says that translation is "a lossy process," I think people need to pay more attention to that. People think of translation as like a substitution cipher, like A=1, B=2, C=3, etc, and all you have to do is stick the letters in the slots where the numbers are and you get something readable. Just look in the dictionary and find the corresponding words and stick them in the slots and you've translated it. But this is nowhere near how it works. Your language is how you interact with absolutely everything in your world. Every object, every person, every emotion, every part of your life is contained within the language that you speak, and it's inextricably connected to your culture. The same is true of every other language on Earth. And the way you connect with all those things is going to be different from the way people in other countries do. So you can't, you just can't fit an entire way of seeing the world into another way of seeing the world without losing something, without changing something. Even the most literal, direct translation will lose something. So when people get upset that "they changed it," they should realize that it just has to happen. The nature of language and culture necessitates it. There's no stopping it. So the only way to experience a thing purely in the original language is... to learn the language. If you'd rather not do that, then perhaps just trust that those who do speak the language and are translating for you know what they're doing.

[@MillenniumEarl014]

I don't think people think like that at all.

[@themeangene]

Everyone with a modicum of awareness about non Latin languages understands translations can't be 1 for 1. The problem occurs when a translator goes in with a preset philosophy of changing meaning for their own benefit. I've seen far too many translations that clearly changed entire events to avoid upsetting San Francisco

[@mattb6616]

@@ultrajari they should be proactive about making better choices.

[@amanechan5405]

Super twisted logic. Everyone knows that translation is always a lossy thing and is always inferior to original. But does it meant that you need to make things even worse by your garbo edits? No.

[@themeangene]

@amanechan5405 exactly. Imagine translating Tolkien to a different language and changing the references and plot details because you feel like non Anglos can't appreciate it. It sounds condescending. It should be the least changes possible. That's the philosophy most of us fans want.

[@adamscott5307]

Wow, that was phenominal! I love this topic to begin with but hearing Alex's side as an industry veteran is so far beyond my expectations. His stories, anecdotes and process all resonate with my own passion for game development and writing. Our only difference is that he actually got into the industry!

[@Riposte8]

Interesting conversation, but hardly tackles the nuance arguments against this - in fact this conversation feels like its talking about the state of localization over 10 years ago. The long and short of it is that very few translators are Alexander and his situation isn't easily carried over.

[@el_oh_ell]

Right? The problem isn’t that they are changing the words so it doesn’t read as “all your base are belong to us”. The problem is that the changes are being made through an activist lens. Instead of a summoned maiden saying “Master, you summoned me? How may I serve you?” She says “Oh? Can’t do it yourself? Guess you’re not as tough as you look. Epic fail bro, step aside and let me show you how it’s done” It’s fine to edit a line for translation, but can we address the purple haired elephant in the room?

[@leavenothingbehind1244]

Yeah, it an ok interview, but it doesn't add anything to the discussion. The problem to me is in AA and lower budget games, where localization teams have more power to do whatever they want.

[@neidhardt8093]

Guess you watched it on mute.

[@AnguishXA]

@@el_oh_ell Talk about agendas...I think maybe you may be making up enemies to be mad at. I'm assuming that example you gave it also likely made up,

[@el_oh_ell]

@@AnguishXA I wouldn’t call them enemies or that I’m mad at them. I’d say they are people I disagree with when it comes to the types of messages and imagery we would like to see in games, and other forms of media I’d imagine. I get to put forward my opinion as passionately as they can and do. I don’t think they’re imaginary, because they are also posting their views.

[@xikesgaming]

Thank you for this podcast! It gives an important perspective why localization matters and why you cannot just translate word-for-word. I wish more people would watch this. Especially today, when so many people are screaming for "faithful translations" without any understanding what they are actually asking and what consequences it would bring.

[@Duc1796]

You don't know how happy I am for this interview!! THE VIERA ACCENTS ARE BASED ON BJORK CONFIRMED!! Fran's voice acting has got to be the most unique and best in the series.

[@hayrogarciga924]

This was a great interview very much enjoyed it.

[@AzureBluePhoenix]

Ive been translating manga and games for abooout 7? 8? Years now. This was insanely insightful. I love how Alexander explains localization choices and the translation of *emotion*. I can never explain it in the eloquence that he can. I also learned a lot. His perception and wealth of experience is FASCINATING! I love the translation from ありがとう to "I love you." It really puts translation of nuance and emotion into perepective. Thank you so much!

[@yyoksetioxd]

I loved the episode guys

[@greatnovus]

Wonderful video i hope you all collaborate again, the insights were wonderful and i can tell everyone enjoyed the conversation.

[@ChaosAngelZero]

It'd be nice to get an interview with Thomas Lipschultz too. He's a stickler for accuracy in translation.

[@astrea555]

People aren't stupid. You see Katarina and you can instantly tell she has an agenda. You see her games' translation and listen to the JP dub actor saying "Sigh.. we finally won" but the ebglish text is some feminist manifesto (I'm barely exaggerating, see Metaphor) Those people need to get fired and get replaced by either AI or proper translation staff. "LOCALIZATION" shouldn't exist.

[@kosaki8274]

Katrina is an angel in comparison to load of bull* this guy said in this video. Hard to believe that Katrina actually can be so much better than someone, but this is the fact.

[@neidhardt8093]

You literally just made that up.

[@sirmiluch6856]

@@neidhardt8093stay ignorant

[@Dracobyte]

What agenda are you talking about?

[@mattb6616]

No one ever says these things about translating real literature. I have never heard a single person say that, for example, Gabriel Garcia Marquez' 100 Years of Solitude needed to have all the Mexican stuff removed so it could be localized to be about a small town in Wisconsin so white people could understand it better. The Brothers Karamazov has never had to be localized to be The Smith Brothers for Americans to relate to it better. No one localized In Search of Lost Time to take place in New York City. And yet, somehow Japanese writing requires this. This really doesnt just read as narcissism or racism to anyone else?

[@OveRaDaMaNt]

Well, actually these things happen all the time even outside of japan. For example, it's a common practice for countries to license and remake tv shows, like Colombian Breaking Bad aka Metastasis. Tons of other shows were licensed and remade in European countries. There's a famous translation of Everybody Hates Chris that changed the setting to be in Russia and basically rewrote all the jokes and names to work in the russian language. Also, in Russia, the most famous russian translation of Harry Potter takes some giant liberties by actually translating like 50% of all names, including the house names into russian words. When Robinson Crusoe was published in russian, it was rewrtitten to be a much shorter children's book, very different from the original. The Wizard of Oz was rewritten in russian as The Wizard of the Emerald City with big changes. Anyway, these are the examples that just come to mind and i'm very familiar with them. I'm sure that other countries have more example of this, I only know about russian stuff. Now, one could argue if these things are good or bad (I think there are examples for and against), but it's not just the japanese writing.

[@mattb6616]

@@OveRaDaMaNt All of this stuff is totally fine when you're adapting something or remaking it, because you're creating new art. When the end result is newly created from the ground up rewrites and changes are welcome, because the world understands this is a new thing. When you translate something from another author, and the only change is the script, rewriting and changing is no longer welcome. In these cases, as Edith Grossman one of the world's most famous translators said, "fidelity is surely our highest aim". Even if rephrasing might be necessary, you are attempting to make an original work understandable in a foreign language, not writing a new work. Those translations are so different they might as well be new things.

[@Jiube000]

It reads more like as tone-deafness and overvaluing the effect of the assumed "market needs" to me. I've posted a more detailed response to the video itself just now, with a lot of in-depth explanations from the point of view of a different translation culture common in a different country.

[@neidhardt8093]

This isn't true at all, lol.

[@kuku7732]

Difference is, making games cost a lot more than writing books so the marketing will have to play a larger part. You’re comparing pop to high culture as well.

[@Kiitepu]

I loved this episode! Thanks Alexander for participating and you guys for bringing such high quality content for us every week. Had no idea Mike's wife is brazillian. I hope she'll introduce him to brazillian strogonoff. Just had some a couple of minutes ago and it was awesome.

[@Burak_C]

Nice. I have been waiting for this video ever since you first mentioned it. Cant believe you actually got THE Alexander himself. This will be a fun 2 hours. Thanks a lot for doing this.

[@ChrisKondylis1]

This has been one of your best episodes ever. Thank you so much for the quality entertainment, and thank you Alexander O. Smith for your briliant contribution to gaming, as well your valuable insight.

[@BLACKDISC]

Great interview! Glad y'all were able to host Alexander

[@Miharu912]

I was so happy to see this thumbnail! Alexander did SUCH an amazing job on FF XII, it's my all-time favorite localization. And jeez, I wasn't even aware he worked on FF X - a game I've played dozens of times over the course of my life. Lots of interesting tidbits, thanks so much you guys!

[@SatiZakito]

All those VAGRANT STORY episodes podcast flashback... It's HIM! Alexander O. Smith!

[@Xaverrrrr]

Those who disagree with Alexander in the starting clip do not seem to realize how poorly thought out or improperly integrated into the English language many older game translations were. A translation cannot be considered successful unless it not only accurately conveys the meaning of the source language but also modifies it to make sense in the target language.

[@Schwazoom]

Are you arguing that older game translations, in the days of *Working Designs*, were too accurate?

[@KaleSerpent]

A lot of the criticism is that it changes the meaning of the source language. There is probably false positives, but those assumptions were earned due to previously poor translations and intentional mistranslations.

[@abysskun9518]

Those older games were not accurate because they did not have the momery to translate the entire text. This is not applicable anymore, there are no such limitations. As for a translation only being successful if it's modiefied to make sense in the target audience, I'm completely against this concept. When consuming a piece of media from another culture you are expected to learn about said culture, and by removing those quirks in the localization process diminishes from the experience. Removing all that is japanese from a japenese story removed the purpose of consuming a piece of media from somewhere that is not your own.

[@ResonantArc]

@@abysskun9518 I think many people who are super enthusiastic about Japan and its culture would agree with you. However, I also think it's important to keep in mind that people with that specific passion are a major minority. As an example from my own life, when I watch foreign films (something I do a lot and which MOST other people don't do) I watch in the original language with subtitles. I want that authentic experience because I enjoy learning about other cultures. However, my family members won't watch a foreign language film that is subbed. They don't want to "have to read" the movie. I have had to accept that I am in the minority of the larger audience in the U.S. The same principle goes here. There is a small, very passionate, fanbase that wants as authentic an experience as possible, but the larger gaming audience wants something that reads as naturally as possible in English. By default, large companies are going to cater to the larger audience and not the smaller one. However, as we discuss in the video, perhaps we are seeing that niche growing into something large enough to be worth marketing to in and of itself. That would be wonderful, if true, but it is a marketing problem to work out.

[@abysskun9518]

@@ResonantArc Indeed, I know that "people who enjoy japanese culture and therefore want japanese products to be as close as possible to the original" are considered a minority, and as someone who is part of this minority I hate it when something I like is altered in search of a new audience, an audience that dislikes the things I like. Altering a product that caters to me in it's original form just so it can cater to someone who hates the original (as it often happens with censorship of topics, themes and graphic content) does not please me. As I matured I've reached a state where I'm ok with the fact that things I like are not liked by more people, and I would rather they remained as such than have them altered to cater to new people in detriment of my enjoyment. This whole process is akin to throwing away your audience in search of a new one. The notion that the fandom that was there from the start has to be discarted in order to reach a new audience irks me. It infuriates me first with the notion that fans of a product are expected to like the modified version of it, and second with the fact that they are ok with discarting the original audience, in favor of finding a new one

[@RetroFrito]

This is an incredibly interesting episode, thank you both for putting this together and thank you Alexander for being a guest. Mike and Casen I hope you will accept this feedback: consider a three-camera screen layout for when either of you are speaking, and then focus on the guest when they are speaking. What I'm seeing in this video is when Mike is speaking, the camera often changes over to Casen or vice versa. Since the guest is the star of the show here, it might be nice to just have all three of you on the screen at once when either of you are talking. This way the viewer can see all of you at once, can see everyone's reactions to whoever is speaking, and there's no jarring switch of the camera view until focus goes on the guest. Just something to consider. Thanks again, love your show.

[@SymmRTA]

Ya know when I really think about my favorite RPGs retrospectively, I am always thinking about those big moments and how they emotionally impacted me. I have seen alot of western criticism of JRPGs that focus alot on small things that happen in the plot and how they don't make alot of sense. But at the end of the day I never really remember those things looking back.

[@johnmcternan4157]

EFAP and Mauler crowd are screaming internally at this thought.

[@mietek7068]

Top tier episode. Great work

[@nickburose8286]

Awesome interview only made better by the briefest mention of Brave Fencer Musashi. Now that is a localization I would love to hear more stories about.

[@WinkleAbiding]

Was very much looking forward to this podcast

[@geoffreychauvin1474]

I have a hard time stomaching the stance that "this isn't for you" if I have been a fan of a series since its inception and the translation takes a drastic departure from the previous entries, I feel like myself and any other fans have every right to be upset by it and complain.

[@orpheus4769]

Fantastic episode. I love the idea of involving experts into these discussions to provide much needed nuance.

[@cid_xexyz]

What a wonderful and enlightening conversation. Y'all knocked it out of the park with this one.

[@edwardaminov58]

I wonder what Alex's take is on the voice direction and localization choices in FFXIII

[@RobbyHuang]

Man, I cannot tell you how much fun it was to listen to this. I too could listen to him talk for another five hours about anecdotes from his work. By all means, if you can get him on for another, I will listen to the crap out of that. (Also, fantastic job on just letting him talk and getting to the end of all of his stories)

[@cycloneofsouls]

hell yeah, I've been waiting to hear your guys take on this latest "translation issue" as someone who had very minor issues with some of the examples use, and loved your unicorn video about it.

[@Garlic-Baguette]

I learned a lot from this and thoroughly enjoyed the interview! Thanks to Alexander for their time and you both for putting this together!

[@matten_zero]

The compromise here is leave the editorializing for Eng dubs, but leave the subs as similar as possible to original. Edit: as an add-on Id say subtitle localization made sense before VA (PlayStation days). There is a lot of acting direction goven to Japanese VAs, and when the subtitles dont match the word and also dont match the vocal performance, thats when people begin to wonder if the localizers are becoming "rogue". For Dubs it makes sense to add some spin because the English actors are getting acting direction to make the localized script work, but for subtitles its doesnt make sense.

[@stanm4410]

Perhaps it would be more productive for people on social media to request more accurate, less-localized, English subtitles for the Japanese audio option. But instead they are calling for the translators/localizers to all be fired and replaced by AI... which makes it easier for the company to label their complaints as "harassment" or whatever and just ignore them.

[@Densetsu13]

It is content like this that is the reason I'm happy to be a Patron. Thank you for this insightful interview!

[@Darthnacho75]

I think alot of this is spillover from anime where the localization did take massive liberties and change some stuff completely with a political edge to it. That kind of stuff I have issues with

[@Savin877]

Long time watcher. I've wanted to see a video like this for a long time. I have to say I am coming away from this a little disappointed though. I feel a good amount of this video was delegated to "praising Alexander" rather than actually discussing any of the nuances around the current examples and reasons why others might be upset at how localizers are translating today versus Alex's time of 20 years ago. To be fair, his work is great, but thats not what we are here to discuss. Might I suggest another round of this with other current and or even ex-localizers if you can find them? I feel like this issue won't be put to rest until a honest and nuanced conversation is had in regards to the actual changes/edits/updates/formatted works we are seeing released in today's market. You all spent literally less than 5 total minutes discussing the examples you've brought up in the past and I feel that really needs to be the crux of the discussion if you're going to make a video like this. It may help to even have more than one guest and have an individual who is "pro-change" and one who is "anti-change" in the conversation. I don't want you all thinking I hated this video, but again just slightly disappointed. Regardless, keep up the great work and can't wait for the next one.

[@dudemcguy1227]

Mike did reach out to another (active) localizer in the industry to join them for this episode, but I believe they either declined or there was a scheduling conflict.

[@PepsiMan666]

The interview was never gonna be honest when the changes to Phoenix Wright were described as simply changing Japanese humor.

[@Savin877]

@@dudemcguy1227 I would love to know who it was. There are bout 3-4 I know who are very much anti-censorship even if the market/producers demand for it and would love to hear their opinions on this kind of stuff.

[@Savin877]

@@PepsiMan666 I am almost positive there was a website/article that actually showed a lot of the original JP jokes and how their truly was 100% no global equivalent. That being said I am sure there were some were they could have probably managed but as I do not have copies of the original JP script in front of me I can't confirm. And while I disagree that the discourse will never be honest I did feel that this video was way more skewed to the side of "change whatever we want" because thats the angle Alexander believes in the correct one. Thats why I feel in these situations we really need two experts with one from each side to have that honest discourse and discussion with each other.

[@PepsiMan666]

@@Savin877 You missed my point entirely. The jokes and puns being changed in Phoenix Wright is the LEAST of its problems. The localization changed the entire settings and characters from Japanese lawyers in Japan to Americans in Neo Los Angeles. The fact this wasn't even glossed over is impressive.

[@celeschan90]

I probably wont notice when they "don't do enough". But I can notice when they change the meaning to something completely different. And this has been something I'm concious of since the PS2 era, where I've seen characters get different personalities, and have knowledge they should not have of future events in English, but not in Japanese, etc. In Final Fantasy 7 Remake, in Jp when Aerith gives the flower to Cloue in the beginning, she simply says "this flower represents a reunion", (or more literally "in flower language it means to meet again"). But in English? They added that LOVERS used to give these to each other, implying a lot more than what the original writer intended. And when Cloud gives that flower to Tifa a few minutes later, I've seen people mention the lovers part, even though that was made up by the English translator. That's just one of many examples in FF7 Remake. I wanted to play the game in English (because its hard for me to read what background NPCs are saying in Japanese while the main characters are also speaking), but I feel like i can't because then I would be missing out on the 'real story'. There has also been a trend recently to 'romantisize' language in games with certain settings, to the point where I as a native English speaker can't even understand what theyre saying at times. An example from Unicorn Overlord. Jp: "Decided to quiet down at last, hm?" EN: ”So the foul has finally ceased braying, hm?” The recent Yakuza: Pirates in HAwaii trailer also had this, where Majima just said "Yosha!" (ようしゃ) which basically just means "Alright!. But in English he said: "Avast ye, scallywags! Hoist the colors!" I think pirate speak can be fine if they don't go overboard. But I only understood the second half of that sentence.

[@stanm4410]

"So the foal has finally ceased braying." Foal = a baby/young horse or donkey. Braying = a loud/unpleasant sound that is typically made by a donkey or horse. So both lines are conveying the same idea, it's just in a version of English that isn't very common today. The English version of the line makes it more clear that they are also insulting the subject of the sentence. Which is probably the same sentiment conveyed in the Japanese text or voiceover. (Since they are talking about their hostage.) This style of English localization isn't really a recent trend at all. Several JRPGs with medieval Europe inspired settings use that kind of language for their English translations. Like FFT, Vagrant Story, FFXII, Odin sphere, and now Unicorn Overlord too. To not use that style of English, and instead use more common, modern American English in a European fantasy setting would probably sound more awkward. So it's a balancing act between keeping the text understandable to the average English speaker, but also writing it in the style that feels more authentic for the setting. They don't always get it right for every reader or every line. They are human after all. But it's also a mistake on the audience's part to assume that this style of English localization is chosen by the translator themselves as a way to show how they can write it "so much better" than the original Japanese or whatever. I think people are just more fixated on any kind of change to the Japanese text because of some recent bad faith localizations in anime. And so they assume incorrectly that any and all changes to a Japanese script is done in bad faith. But that's not the case. It's painting with too wide a brush.

[@celeschan90]

@@stanm4410 Foal I was aware of. Especially since it sounds similar to how you say it in my second language. But I don't believe I've heard the word braying before. I assumed it was something like a neigh. By recent trend I meant it's somethign I've observed in several games released or revealed recently. Eiyuden Chronicle is another game from this year, except it wasn't medieval language there, but something else instead. JP: "Look! Come on, come on, come on! EN: "Rub-a-dub-dub, don't be a flub!" I have played FFT and FF12. I don't recall the language used in FFT to make use of uncommon termonology that heavily. And I just re-watched a scene to refresh my memory. But I do seem to recall FF12 leaning more heavily into it. Which may also be why it had the story I understood the least from the series. I did really enjoy the way Balthier sounded when he spoke though. I don't disagree with the idea of making the language sound more medieval in such a setting. Recently finsihed watching House of the Dragon Season 2, and I think they handled it pretty well, and it made sense. My issues are when native speakers commonly can't understand key words, or when meaning changes for no apparent reason, or when sentences are made much more complicated or less accurate. A couple more examples from Unicorn: JP: (しゃあねえな) Oh well/Can't be helped. EN: Missed this somethin' fierce, y'know. JP: And you were always eager to join in, right? EN: Harsh words from a man who thinks hatching a plan means a trip to the chicken coop. JP: But the village was overrun by Zenorian soldiers.... EN: But those dogs still bear down on the hamlet, using their hunt as an excuse to tear its walls appart board by board. Yasumi Matsuno, FFT creator, recently commented on this regarding Unicorn Overlord's English translation, and said "I believe that it is unacceptable for someone to alter a work without considering the original author's intent". The original intent of Aerith flower was clearly disregarded in the English version. If he wanted it to signify an exchange between lovers, he would have put that in himself. Rather, I think the emphasis was supposed to be on 'Reunion', which is a reoccuring theme throughout the FF7 series. Matsuno also brought up the question of whether the translation was approved by the author. Which is important. But one also has to consider if the author knows what they are consenting to if their grasp on the English language is limited? Which is commonly the case. So whether this is done through a middle hand that understands both languages better, I imagine it usually comes down to whether or not they decide to trust the vision of the localizer, after they pitch the idea. The original writer is not going to go through every single line of text in the translated version, and have it somehow expained to him in Japanese, even when there's no direct equivalence to it in their language. And I wasn't implying that translators typically do these things because they "think they can write it so much better" than the original. Rather, I believe some of them do it because they see this as their chance to 'leave their mark on history' so to speak, because they're not able to become successful published writers on their own. And for me this started becoming an issue I noticed from the PS2 era when I started (very slowly) learning some Japanese. Here's one of the first examples that made me distrust English translations. Remember how one of the strongest weapons in Final Fantasy 6 was called Atma Weapon? (Short for Ultima Weapon, due to character limit) FF7 = Ultima Weapon FF8 = An end game boss was holding Ultima Weapon FF9 = Ultima Weapon FF10 = Japanese: Ultima Weapon Italian, French, Spanish, German: Ultima Weapon English: Caladbolg (???????)

[@mattb6616]

@@celeschan90 the ff7 remake translation is surreally bad. There's a ton of stuff in that games script that is just katakana of English or Latin words and they just change all of it for no reason. Even completely minor stuff like a boss's moves will all get renamed even though they were already in English, and the renaming sounds more boring and less creative.

[@legodawg2001]

A source that I can’t plug enough is Clyde Mandelin’s books “Legends of Localization” there’s ones on the JP to English localization of Zelda 1 and EarthBound and there’s one on the English to Japanese localization of Undertale. The EarthBound one I think is particularly poignant as Clyde includes his early reactions to the earthbound translation as a young adult, before years and years of professional localization experience on different games and anime. That combined with talking to the EarthBound localization director himself informed so much about how localization is done and I think is incredibly enlightening

[@BartolisHideoutGaming]

Loved this interview. I always enjoy to hear about people that somehow worked on games that I love. Great job guys! I really appreciate this 🙏

[@citizenchris2455]

The thing I think is really important to note, which is something Mike Drucker also said in Simon Parkin's podcast My Perfect Console, is that people tend to underestimate just how well the Japanese devs understand English to be able to give feedback to the translators. Mike Drucker said in that podcast episode that Sakurai understands it very well, and even Alex says the same thing here in this video: He even makes the point that someone on the Vagrant Story team speaks native English. It's not a case of rogue translators, it's always the intent that the English text is going to be different because the languages are just so different, and the Japanese teams seems to understand this and support it. Examples like the change between "arigatou" & "I love you" in Final Fantasy 10 which Kazushige Nojima gave his approval. I also like that Alex repeats his point that he made on the tofugu podcast a few years ago of how important it is for you to be a good writer when working in localization.

[@vinaly]

I see a lot of people saying as a main argument that they want a "faithful" translation but they completely miss this point. In most cases is not the translator who decides the changes, there are many limitations when you translate a text. The most common is space, i have found so many times that a text has a much bigger and deeper meaning in his original language (L1), that i can't just find a word that conveys all that information in the second language (L2). In most case i only have 3 options: 1. To just find whatever word or phrase that is the "closest" to the original (and many times the closest is super far away from the goal) and use it 2. To add a type of note, side note, bottom note, translation note at the beginning or end of the chapter/book 3. To change the whole word or phrase to better try to convey the same message In most cases the ideal case would be to go to my editor or if i have access to the author even better, to present the situation and let him choose. I rarely, in my whole time as a translator, have call the shots, normally someone else do it. I have had the editorial call the shot, or my direct superior or the author itself. In books is hard enough, now imagine in video games where you don't have a place to add notes, where if is text you only have a limited number of characters to convey the meaning or if is voice you have things like time, mouth movements, and so on to limit even more what you can do. Finally people forget the other sad reality, as much as we like to think in videogames, manga, anime and other things as pieces of art, and we have this romanticized idea of letting the author express himself and respect his work, that is rarely the reality of the world. In most cases entertaining media are first a product, created by a company to make money. Nor the developers, or the writer, or the translator or even the director have the final word. All of them are at the end workers, and if the big shots said change this or that, they will do it, because they want to keep their jobs. Many times people blame the workers, for the decision that the company made. Matsuno may have wrote the story, but he doesn't own it. Alexander may have translate it, but he also has no right over it.

[@Batterydennis]

Amazing episode. Thanks for the effort! Gentle suggestion: Casen please steady that camera 🤢 😅.

[@bullshooter4040]

That final FFX line story is wild! It's like the reverse scenario "I Love You / I Know" line in ESB. In English, "I love you" hits way harder emotionally than "Thank You", unless you add parenthesis such as, "Thank You (for Everything)", which they were painted into a corner with the lip flaps.

[@shadowsquid1351]

I'm a translator although not from/to Japanese but the 1 thing that is paramount to this line of work is to keep the same message intact no matter how weird/offensive it is, but some of these translations in videogames are just..stupid & I think a big part of it is disrespect to the medium itself as it's looked at as childish. Marketing interference can ruin translations, but let's not blame everything on that, there are personal intentions & certain political leanings that are not forced by the marketing team but by the individuals who disagree with what they read & want to "fix" it. Sometimes it's multifactorial but it doesn't matter, what most ppl are against is butchered translation, it doesn't matter what reasons are behind these changes, alot of the changes are annoying & with enough criticism things will change for the better hopefully. Alot of fallacies are used by the "pro localization" crowd that are really just ego fueled, people don't want "Google translations" nor do they want cringy "Americanized" shit as translation, also there are changes that make no sense! An example is Zelda BotW/TotK when they changed Link's notes from 1st person to 3rd person.. things like this just make no sense! Yuna's final words to Tidus should've remained as "thank you" & not changed, the English audience do not have allergies to other cultures/traditions, one of the coolest things about works from other cultures is getting info/look at that different culture & learning about them, changing onigiri to burgers is just stupid 😂

[@Roosevelt716112]

i have been waiting for this cant wait to hear more but this topic and not from twitter

[@Metro4466]

I love you guys, one of the best podcasts ever! Keep it up

[@LS1Highwind]

Fascinating podcast, especially the end discussing the voices of the characters and regions of XII. I didn't look into it much but I always enjoyed Frans accent - I never knew they used Icelandic for the Viera, thats awesome.