Let's Localize the FE12 Cast

[Dark Sage]

FE11 names = official

FE3 names =/= official

No shit sherlock. When did I ever say otherwise?

You're also forgetting that a lot of people haven't played Fire Emblem 3 so they aren't familiar with those names. Hell I only know a few people who have played FE3, and I'm not one of them. On the contrary, many, many more people have played FE11--and more normal/average people, not internet-goers who post around on Fire Emblem forums debating characters and tier lists like us not that I've ever done that stuff.

When did I say more people played FE3 than FE11? Please show me where I said that. Oh wait, you can't show me where I said that because I never did.

Most of the people wanting the translation patch don't give a fuck about the names, especially if they haven't played FE3. They just want a translation out so they can play FE12 in english. So if they don't care, why is it a problem to use the FE3 names? People who have played the game are familiar with them and people who haven't would be satisfied anyway.

Do you see what I am saying? You could've saved yourselves so much time and effort just going with those names. But instead, for whatever reason (probably because of how swelled your heads are), you decided that's not enough and you need to play amateur localizers.

Blazer/Luffy only localizes text in that if there is an obvious grammatical or aesthetic error, he beats the shit out of it. Then he does hacking. I don't think you understand that this is not an official project. We aren't endorsed by anyone, we don't get paid, we only have the amount of authority we give ourselves, which I've had other people argue is not enough cough Furetchen. I don't translate shit, choose names (I give my 2 cents about what name might be good out of a list of possible names that I don't create, but that's nothing more than what you guys do), I do all the hacking and organizing shit that you won't ever notice or appreciate. Thus my role in this is minimal compared to say, TheEnd or Agromono. My point here is that you have to quit lumping someone me in the same category as the people who translate. Sure I explain decisions to you etc. all the time but I'm more or less only supporting others/relaying information unless I state otherwise.

I find it more funny how you're more concerned about protecting your good name (lol) than actually defending the quality of the work with worthwhile arguments (protip: strawmanning people's arguments is a nono).

@General audience, I think TheEnd and Agromono are better qualified than most people here at translating and localizing a Fire Emblem game, but if you still think it's amateur, that's too bad.

Why? Just because they know japanese better than a lot of people here do? We have people here who are not working on the project who have a good knowledge of the language. In fact, two of them, dondon and Serisu, are quite critical of the project (though I'd ignore Serisu since he's just a weeaboo).

My personal opinion, not even from the perspective of a member of the team, is that if you expect much better than someone's very best, you're being a spoiled, greedy, arrogant little... person who is too used to getting his way.

Wow really? Namecalling? I guess if you come under the subject of criticizing, you resort to childish namecalling. But then that's nothing different from what I know about you.\

Also god forbid people wanting a good translation instead of a bad one. If you can't take the heat, go talk to the circlejerkers on your blog who worship the ground you walk on (they call you guys FE legends. lol).

No one better decided to help out, so if you think there are people who could do better, it's irrelevant, because they ultimately can't and aren't.

You could've asked. dondon for example seems pretty qualified to me but you never approached him.

People could argue I'm a terrible hacker and there should be someone better doing it, and I would agree 100%, but no one else is willing to/can, and no one else is, so we have to work with what we have. The reason why no one debates that is because hacking is more scientific and most of the time no one notices it so there's not nearly as much to debate as long as the job gets done.

I don't think you're a terrible hacker. On the contrary, I think you're good at it and the team really benefits from your knowledge.

Also, I've seen certain prevalent... "schools of thought" so to speak here, but I might have missed one, so for my own curiosity of knowledge, if you've seen another distinct group of thought, please let me know:

1) Keep to the FE3 names that the small portion of people who have played FE3 are used to.

2) Edit names, but only where necessary, and don't go outside of the realms of the kana.

3) Edit names, but if they need to be localized, like Yumina -> Gemina, or Belf -> Vergil, then do so, because they sound better and more realistic.

Hey, here's an idea, why don't you keep the FE3 names because people who have played them are familiar with them and people who haven't don't give a fuck. You won't be stepping on anybody's toes that way.

Commonly used... on a Fire Emblem forum, yeah. Sadly, other people besides the ones that go on SF and have played FE3 will be playing this hack, so for them, they don't have the "commonly-used names" thing. Thus when they see names that don't sound very good, they likely wouldn't understand that the only real reason to keep them was that other people used them in the past. Also, it's a bit too late to go this route anyway, so trying to bring this back is just beating around a dead-horse. We already kinda decided on #2 because it satisfies the most amount of people and most importantly makes the most sense. A lot of the names will be what they were, assuming they were fine as they were, and names that suck will be changed to be better, but not changed too much in that they aren't viable names given the kana since the translators aren't giving themselves the authority to localize names like an official translation/localization group.

You can read the previous and the second response of this post for my arguments about this. I don't feel like repeating myself again.

And then the other people are the dissenting groups who hold firmly to their ideals, which is quite noble. Some of you would be great as politicans or something else, if for no other reason than I see the same qualities in many politicians and debaters (pride, stubbornness, and holding firm to your ideas) that I do in you guys. Well, just my opinion, anyway...

You could be a better politician man. I see far more of those qualities in you than I see in anybody else.

Mostly correct, except

1) that door might have multiple ways to lock it, and you might go back and choose another way

2) the time spent worrying about whether it's locked or not may not make locking the door slower, but you still lose time that could be spent on something else. back to the translating example, the time spent worrying--or posting here--might be better spent on hacking. The only reason we waste said time is that we think that someone might have something good to say here, so we check to see if something someone says can actually help us do a better job, in which case it wouldn't be a waste of time. Despite that we still get chastised for not listening to you guys, but that's life--we're not "listening" to anyone unless we literally play "Simon says" and do what you want us to (which is impossible with so many different opinions/ideas).

I don't actually expect to change anything here. I am merely calling you out because somebody needs to deflate all of your egos instead of having it built up even more by those circlejerkers on your blog (and some on here too).

This is just... Absolute horse shit. FE11's is FROM NINTENDO, it's a real localization that's been done by the actual creator company of the game already. Why the fuck would you use names from a game that's translated by fans when there's already OFFICIAL translations? That's the epitome of stupidity.

When I said use the FE3 names, I was talking about the book 2 names, which weren't localized by Nintendo. I think your post is closer to the epitome of stupidity than mine is buddy.

Edit: Also just wanna throw in the ever classic "they're translating it their way, if you don't like it make your own translation"~

Wow really? Newsflash, just because they're the only ones working on this translation doesn't mean they're free of criticism. This argument is one of the weakest and dumbest I've seen so far.

Edited April 1, 2012 by Dark Sage

[Jubby]

IF THEY'RE NOT LOCALIZED BY NINTENDO THEY'RE NOT LOCALIZED AS PROFICIENTLY

Your criticism is lacking in reason, as people've stated multiple times. FE11's names are official, FE3's are not. Suck it up, princess. And it doesn't mean they're free of criticism but it DOES mean they can do whatever the fuck they want while translating, and you can't do a damn thing about it. So GET OVER IT

[Renall]

That depends, actually. Everyone knows Tales of Phantasia's characters by the names DeJap gave them... because the game was unknown before they translated it, the patch reached a rather broad audience, and awareness of the Japanese language wasn't nearly a keen as it is nowadays (the mere knowledge of katakana does wonders).

And then we got an official translation of the names, and some people think Namco was wrong somehow. Hilarity ensues.

[Celice]

1) that door might have multiple ways to lock it, and you might go back and choose another way

2) the time spent worrying about whether it's locked or not may not make locking the door slower, but you still lose time that could be spent on something else. back to the translating example, the time spent worrying--or posting here--might be better spent on hacking. The only reason we waste said time is that we think that someone might have something good to say here, so we check to see if something someone says can actually help us do a better job, in which case it wouldn't be a waste of time. Despite that we still get chastised for not listening to you guys, but that's life--we're not "listening" to anyone unless we literally play "Simon says" and do what you want us to (which is impossible with so many different opinions/ideas).

Blazer, are you really that easily influenced, or believe people are? In any case, you're still not addressing the issue: that you (as in one) are the factors deciding what slows down, not others.

On top of it all, your majority perspecive also is a little hollow. A majority haven't played the game, you're right. A majority haven't played any video game at all and don't give a shit. So let's go the collection of people interested in this game--again, the majority don't care. the majority always won't care. Only those interested, by their own virtue, would care. But for some reason, you're saying you should ignore the only people that care because you can excuse yourself through the mindless non-caring majority. The much more reasonable choice is to listen to the ones that do care as the ones that don't won't mind anything at all. Your response is pretty blunt, effacious, and limited. If the group's aim is to please, as has been said now and again, the easiest choice in pleasing is continually avoided for reasons which go against that exact mindset.

We have people here who are not working on the project who have a good knowledge of the language. In fact, two of them, dondon and Serisu, are quite critical of the project (though I'd ignore Serisu since he's just a weeaboo).

I understand the morals of a faith-based mind ruled by fantasy--we call it religion. On that note, never have I demonstrated a knowledge of the language comparable with people who have actually studied it (let alone actually know how it works). I've studied languages, I'm immersed in literature studies, and I'm concerned with what people defend themselves in doing--I'm concerned with irrational actions which act out of selfish origins, yet are portrayed to be universals. Most of the problems continually pointed out since the project began are not about the translators--it's about the reasons they are choosing to change things. The names have been the most prominent feature, but Arch already revealed he was trying to change what characters are even portrayed at, through Maliesia. The concern is for the errant authority some individuals seem to wield at each corner, baseless and unnecessary, which contradicts their own confessed purpose.

IF THEY'RE NOT LOCALIZED BY NINTENDO THEY'RE NOT LOCALIZED AS PROFICIENTLY

Jubby, please tell me you're not saying Castlevania 2 is a proficient localization, and that all fans retroactive fixes are not. Please? You're slipping into that blind defense mode outlying of reasonableness.

Edited April 1, 2012 by Celice

[General Banzai]

People talk about knowledge of Japanese for translating, but what about knowledge of English?

That's just about as important.

[Renall]

People talk about knowledge of Japanese for translating, but what about knowledge of English?

That's just about as important.

Yes, but unfortunately opinions on translation fidelity differ to the point that some people will praise FFXII's translation as brilliant and others will deride it as Fauxspeare puffery. You just can't win on the localization argument, which is why I have some sympathy for Alexander Smith when he talked about localizing Tactics Ogre for PSP and basically said "This is what we decided to do, we did it, deal with it," even though I have my issues with Smith's use of English (as opposed to his ability to understand Japanese).

[Rewjeo]

Whether or not a translation is official doesn't change the fact that people are familiar with both FE11 and FE3's names.

[Renall]

Whether or not a translation is official doesn't change the fact that people are familiar with both FE11 and FE3's names.

Yeah but what are you supposed to do, use FE11's names for characters that existed in that and FE3's for the ones that didn't, just because you don't know what else to do? Seems inconsistent to me.

[Dark Sage]

Yeah but what are you supposed to do, use FE11's names for characters that existed in that and FE3's for the ones that didn't, just because you don't know what else to do? Seems inconsistent to me.

how on earth is that inconsistent

do you even know what the word means

[dondon151]

Edit: Also just wanna throw in the ever classic "they're translating it their way, if you don't like it make your own translation"~

I don't want to impart any credibility to one who actually agrees with one of Blazer's very frequent temper tantrums. Please realize that this is not a viable alternative because you'll have, among other things, instances like Serisu referring to every character by their direct romanizations while everyone else reads his posts in bewilderment because no one has any idea who he is talking about.

When a translation could not pass for an official one, it feels fake, disrupting immersion in the game or story. That is a huge loss.

This is true for dialogue, for story, etc. Names, however, are almost completely arbitrary, and the choice of a name is not going to disrupt "immersion in the game or story" (or whatever English major bullshit one could come up with).

FE11 would not be functionally different if blue-haired Jacob and his blue-haired love interest, Anna, must defeat the dark dragon, Leviathan, and his sorcerer crony Jafar in order to save the world and his beloved blue-haired sister, Ariel.

Yes, but unfortunately opinions on translation fidelity differ to the point that some people will praise FFXII's translation as brilliant and others will deride it as Fauxspeare puffery. You just can't win on the localization argument, which is why I have some sympathy for Alexander Smith when he talked about localizing Tactics Ogre for PSP and basically said "This is what we decided to do, we did it, deal with it," even though I have my issues with Smith's use of English (as opposed to his ability to understand Japanese).

This has nothing to do with the topic at hand. Please understand that no one has problems with the integrity of the script translation. The individuals handling that are more than capable of delivering a quality product.

The issue that people have is that there is no reason to implement arbitrary name changes because:

1. There is no objective criterion to judge the quality of a name

2. The only objective criterion that exists at the moment is whether that name is already currently used to refer to a character

By this metric, then the best option is to just keep the commonly used names. I do not understand what compels people to make everything more complicated than it needs to be.

Yeah but what are you supposed to do, use FE11's names for characters that existed in that and FE3's for the ones that didn't, just because you don't know what else to do? Seems inconsistent to me.

Is it any more consistent to make up names for characters that didn't exist? Do you even know what "inconsistent" means?

EDIT: Also as much as I dislike Serisu, what he said here is entirely accurate:

Most of the problems continually pointed out since the project began are not about the translators--it's about the reasons they are choosing to change things. The names have been the most prominent feature, but Arch already revealed he was trying to change what characters are even portrayed at, through Maliesia. The concern is for the errant authority some individuals seem to wield at each corner, baseless and unnecessary, which contradicts their own confessed purpose.

Translating this game is not a playground for creative writing.

Edited April 1, 2012 by dondon151

[Jubby]

Blazer, are you really that easily influenced, or believe people are? In any case, you're still not addressing the issue: that you (as in one) are the factors deciding what slows down, not others.

On top of it all, your majority perspecive also is a little hollow. A majority haven't played the game, you're right. A majority haven't played any video game at all and don't give a shit. So let's go the collection of people interested in this game--again, the majority don't care. the majority always won't care. Only those interested, by their own virtue, would care. But for some reason, you're saying you should ignore the only people that care because you can excuse yourself through the mindless non-caring majority. The much more reasonable choice is to listen to the ones that do care as the ones that don't won't mind anything at all. Your response is pretty blunt, effacious, and limited. If the group's aim is to please, as has been said now and again, the easiest choice in pleasing is continually avoided for reasons which go against that exact mindset.

I understand the morals of a faith-based mind ruled by fantasy--we call it religion. On that note, never have I demonstrated a knowledge of the language comparable with people who have actually studied it (let alone actually know how it works). I've studied languages, I'm immersed in literature studies, and I'm concerned with what people defend themselves in doing--I'm concerned with irrational actions which act out of selfish origins, yet are portrayed to be universals. Most of the problems continually pointed out since the project began are not about the translators--it's about the reasons they are choosing to change things. The names have been the most prominent feature, but Arch already revealed he was trying to change what characters are even portrayed at, through Maliesia. The concern is for the errant authority some individuals seem to wield at each corner, baseless and unnecessary, which contradicts their own confessed purpose.

Jubby, please tell me you're not saying Castlevania 2 is a proficient localization, and that all fans retroactive fixes are not. Please? You're slipping into that blind defense mode outlying of reasonableness.

No no, retroactive fixes are fine. But if it's a sequel, and there are names already officially translated, I mean that's just stupid not to use them :/

[Dark Sage]

No no, retroactive fixes are fine. But if it's a sequel, and there are names already officially translated, I mean that's just stupid not to use them :/

You must be clinically retarded. Nobody has suggested changing any of the FE11 names (which are the ones officially translated).

[Renall]

Is it any more consistent to make up names for characters that didn't exist? Do you even know what "inconsistent" means?

"Many of these names were changed in some fashion in FE11. They should remain changed."

"No information exists about these names. We should not assume they would have been changed."

These are not consistent positions, even if they aren't inherently contradictory. The "existing" FE3 translations are arbitrary fan-translation nonsense to begin with. They may, or may not, be considered perfectly acceptable the way they were translated (stuff like Abel and Julian seemed to be pretty consistently understood between fan translators and Nintendo's official ones). The mere fact that we don't know how Nintendo would've translated them doesn't mean we should assume they wouldn't. It's a false dichotomy anyway; there is nothing sacred about the FE1/FE3 translation patch names.

And given this, if the names we're "familiar with" are equally as arbitrary as any kana-consistent corrections translators for FE12 might work out, implying that we should "leave" the names the same as the FE3 translation lends weight of credibility to the earlier translations that doesn't actually exist. Even arguing that any translation would be "changing" the name from the FE3 name is silly. You can't "change" something that doesn't exist. Changing Marth's name in some patch would be a "change," because it's official (even if it's possibly "wrong"). Deciding that Yumina might actually be Gemina based on certain translation rules isn't a change, because "Yumina" was never official in the first place. ユミナ is official. "Yumina" doesn't exist anywhere but our collective convenience lexicon. If the translator can back it up, I'm fine with it. I don't see any reason to randomly decide I trust the credibility of a translator I've never heard of or read anything from justifying his or her decisions over a person who has at least explained why something was done. If somebody wants to come back with "the reason it was Yumina is the literal translation is 'Yu mi na' and suchandsuch pronunciation reason means we should continue spelling it with the 'Yu,'" well that's fine. The translators can consider that. But if they actually have a reason to say "No, we're calling her Sally because <incredibly convincing rationale>," I guess it merits being considered.

I'm not saying change somebody's name outright just because it doesn't sound good to you - although Nintendo does do that, we can't obviously guess when or how they would, so I agree with you entirely on that front - but if they want to go through and do a localization to something they can at least make the argument is closer to what Nintendo would probably do if they did it officially. That doesn't make it any "more" official than the FE3 translation, but it might at least come across as more consistent with the names already established. Whether anybody should be pulling a Vyland on us, probably not, just because I don't see the justification for it if a reasonably accurate and coherent translation can be made. "Belf" is weird and maybe doesn't sound good, but I don't see what's wrong with it, and until somebody can make that argument I'd probably agree with erring on the side of being closer to the kana.

[dondon151]

"Many of these names were changed in some fashion in FE11. They should remain changed."

"No information exists about these names. We should not assume they would have been changed."

But we cannot assume which names NoA would have changed in their hypothetical localization of FE12. Hence there is no inconsistency whatsoever. In fact the inconsistency arises when we do make that assumption because we are choosing to not use names that are already in common use for FE12-only characters.

The truly consistent position would be to use names that are already in common use for all characters. That is consistent, by definition.

Edited April 1, 2012 by dondon151

[TheEnd]

People talk about knowledge of Japanese for translating, but what about knowledge of English?

That's just about as important.

Because knowing Japanese, the source language, is a necessary first step few people reach.

If somebody who doesn't know moonspeak were t complain, in an English-based community, that the English knowledge is just as vital, chances are he'd just sound jealous. That's why nobody does it.

You must be clinically retarded. Nobody has suggested changing any of the FE11 names (which are the ones officially translated).

Clinically retarded?

Get the fuck at me

Flame war! Flame war!

Edited April 1, 2012 by TheEnd

[Jubby]

Edit: Meh you know what I've got better things to do

Keep your silly ideas

Edited April 1, 2012 by Jubby

[Dark Sage]

Oh just because people keep saying this

I can't exactly deny that. It would've gone quicker if every single fucking decision made hadn't been repeatedly questioned, as well. Can they just make this thing a total dictatorship to the peanut gallery, make the damned thing, then release a text editor so I can have Vergil and you can have Lawrence?

That's like saying that it doesn't matter that Gafgarion's first name in the PSX version (Gaff) is retarded and poorly translated because you can just change his name with a text editor. I guess we can get away with calling Yubello Ramza and it doesn't matter that it's completely inaccurate guys you can just use a text editor to change it back to Yubello

Edit: Meh you know what I've got better things to do

:lifecard:

Edited April 1, 2012 by Dark Sage

[Jubby]

:lifecard:

:jealous:

Edit: alright the standards of this argument have gotten pretty low so I'm gonna be the bigger person and leave now

Edited April 1, 2012 by Jubby

[General Banzai]

I agree with most everyone dondon has to say, except this:

This is true for dialogue, for story, etc. Names, however, are almost completely arbitrary, and the choice of a name is not going to disrupt "immersion in the game or story" (or whatever English major bullshit one could come up with).

I believe there are extreme examples where the names are so bad that they really do interrupt immersion in the game or story. For instance, Yurius. Names like that call attention to the translation as being particularly incorrect or inaccurate in regards to the original source material.

[Celice]

Yurius seemed just as accurate as Julius. Julius has the connotation of an emperor, on its own. I can't name from where, but Yurius connotes a bit of a negative feeling to me. Might be from Yuri. Since Yurius isn't exactly an imitation of Julius, nor does he exemplify any huge similarites with Julius Caesar, I don't really think the allusion is 100% valid--thus arguable as "valid."

Along with that, there are obvious names which are chosen because they allude to things--this is another way in which names are not merely arbitrary. Their allusions are functionary. Just read a little bit.

Also donny, I don't know if you happen to not see it, but I've already explained why I still call some characters by their Japanese names. It's not some infatuation with wapanese--though multiple people seem fine imagining this. It's actually that I don't know their English/European/French names (well actually, I know Gatrie is Gatorie now). I only can call them by the names I know them by. For the games I haven't played since they first came out, I forget some names, and I check on Serenes and end up using their localized names.

Speaking of French localization, I'm wondering how much of a difference FE13 will have between its NoE and NoA versions. Intelligent System games have been getting somewhat separate localization projects lately, with their past couple games.

[dondon151]

I believe there are extreme examples where the names are so bad that they really do interrupt immersion in the game or story. For instance, Yurius. Names like that call attention to the translation as being particularly incorrect or inaccurate in regards to the original source material.

Well, sure - no one's going to take the game seriously if the main protagonist were Timmy instead of Marth - but we have a clear idea of what the names are supposed to be already, and it's not as bad as picking between Timmy and Marth.

[Dark Sage]

Or Vergil and Belf :/

[TheEnd]

It's funny how people are still butthurt over Vergil. Arch quit the team, the current members are opposed to radical changes, and yet people cling to it for some weird, masochistic reason.

[Dark Sage]

Did you actually decide not to use it?

Because if so good and if not, you deserve whatever flak you get for following that tool's suggestion.

Belf to Vergil is a running joke basically.

[TheEnd]

We're likely keeping it out of spite, at this point.

Feel free do question my knowledge, fluency, maturity, common sense, upbringing, sexuality or whatever based on a minor character's name, if you swing that way - it doesn't really bother me. Can't say the same about the other team members though, the drama might just have killed their enthusiasm.

Or they might be busy. You better hope they are.

Edited April 2, 2012 by TheEnd