Topic: The Nintendo Switch Thread

@StuTwo Putting aside any concerns about censorship, the localization in Fire Emblem: Fates was VERY sloppy. Consider this example, which compares a fan-translated Japanese version with the American release.

This doesn't even compare the quality of translated dialogue. In this instance, a character-building support conversation is replaced with "..."

Presumably as a joke?

This is not the work of people who respect or value the original work.

@StuTwo And yet Xseed can bring them over without "localizing" them, Marvelous can do the same, Fire Emblem: Warriors, despite being Nintendo's IP, has not been touched by "localization" either.

As for Nintendo's localisation, it's getting better and even if I understood what the team of Fates wanted to do with the game, people bashed the localisation effort into the floor. That, and Nintendo tends to give less care to voices, in my opinion, in the form of typecasting being off, sometimes changing entire characters for no reason in the sake of localisation (Effie in Fates comes to mind)

@Caldorosso-E And yet, there are more and more visual novels coming on Steam and selling pretty darn well so far I'm aware, and these games tend to be "waifu simulators" or "dating sims".

@MegaTen The VA in Zelda was passable, since it wasn't the core of the game (if you ask me). Just a couple of cut-scenes with voices, otherwise just the iconic Zelda reactions.

My brother has had a lot of trouble accepting his disorder, he's getting there, but he wanted to be "normal" for a long time and got himself a lot of stress fighting what is basically a part himself. I've heard stories of people who went through life, fighting themselves only to find their answers at the age of 60+, which is arguably far worse than an early diagnosis. But such is life, there's nobody who doesn't have a woe or 2 in their life, right?

@Ralizah I'd say that's up there, but the worst part of that game would be Effie. The archetype of gentle-giant, a strong woman with a sweet voice nevertheless isn't alien in the West, is it? Yet they've turned her into a muscle-jock who talks about biceps, triceps, eating and bench-pressing all the time, with a voice actress who was instructed to replicate the voice of a man, which comes off as incredibly forced and silly.

@UmniKnight Yep. Nintendo's "localization" altered characters, dialogues, all kinds of things! One of the worst I've ever seen from a large company like Nintendo, to be honest. I really hope these same people aren't "localizing" the Switch version of Fire Emblem.

@Ralizah And if they are, I duly hope they've learned to leave some things intact. As they say, don't fix what isn't broken.

That aside, I've heard many stories of people influencing that localization, people that have now, apparently, been replaced so who knows.

@MegaTen Have a good day!

@UmniKnight Xseed are not a multi-billion dollar company whos biggest single strength in the market is that they are perceived to be a family friendly company though. They are under a fraction of the scrutiny of a company like Nintendo.

English language voice acting in video games is terrible in general.

@Ralizah I don't think it's a sign of disrespect for the original work though. They've looked at what the original authors wanted to communicate and assessed that the biggest thing to take away from that conversation is that they were both guarded, slightly enigmatic and secretive characters with a quietly under spoken respect and understanding towards each other despite being rivals.

Yes the elaborate extended text makes that explicit but it also works against its effectiveness. Which is better is a matter of taste but I think they achieve similar things.

Well didn't this devolve into a hot topic we will never see the end of. Watch, as it spins in circles tirelessly everytime someone breathes.

Anyway, anyone expecting XC2 amiibo to be announced?

@StuTwo Depends, I've played a "niche" Japanese game that was localised on Wii back in the day, that had big-name English VA in it. The game's name is Sengoku Basara: http://www.behindthevoiceactors.com/video-games/Sengoku-Basar...

But Nintendo has already said that they're more open to receiving content that clashes with their "image". Family-friendly games are fine, and Nintendo should definitely continue making Yoshi, Kirby, Mario etc. But that doesn't mean they can't also take some other franchises in the other direction, like Metroid for example (let alone third-party content that does this, like DOOM and Wolfenstein). Nintendo is, in my opinion, at their best when they aim to make games for everyone, which they are doing right now.

@StuTwo They really don't achieve similar things. In the Japanese release, you get a sense of how harrowing their work is, their level of repute among others in their line of work, those sorts of things. In the "localization," you get elipses. No context, no replacement dialogue that communicates the same thing, just "dot dot dot." That's not a good translation, on any level.

I mean, I respect that this doesn't bother you, but I don't understand how you can say this is high quality work.

EDIT: I guess I'm just wondering what you would consider a "bad" translation.

@Ralizah In general it's a matter of preference. In Japanese you can densely adorn even a short passage of text with a lot of subtext and connotation - like the relationship between the characters, the degree of respect. Doing that in English is much more difficult.

In this particular case I don't expect hardened assassins who have been on rival sides of a conflict for years to suddenly meet and talk at length about their feelings. It would be a moment of silence where everything was said wordlessly. It doesn't work half as well in a game with static images as it would in a film but I think that's what they were attempting. Whether you think it's better or worse is a matter of taste.

As the French mathematician Pascal once said; "this is only so long because I didn't have time to make it any shorter".

A bad translation would be something of the type that we used to routinely get in the 8 and 16 bit days. Spoony bards and other such things that were outright wrong.

Now we're talking about how Nintendo handles translation, a form of localization.

Glad we moved on from that censorship nonsense.

@Caldorosso-E I'll say though, what they did to Tokyo Mirage Sessions was highly unnecessary. The way I see that piece of work, the team that was responsible had a very bad day, and felt like relieving themselves on that game.

@UmniKnight Remember that wedding dress where they covered up the shoulders? Like, who does that?

Also: "vagina bones." Never forget. Also, some people could afford to take a human anatomy course.

@Snaplocket The way it was, and no censorship, or at least an option. It felt like they were changing things, for the sake of changing things, not to adapt it to Western audiences, because they were mild things that didn't if barely mattered.

@Ralizah Ohh, I remember alright, even if I wouldn't want to. Changes to Lyn in XCX for her age? Sure, understandable and no problems there. But the changes in Mirage Sessions were to teenagers, who showed some here and there. What would happen to beaches in real life should these people get authority over there? Everyone has to wear a suit?

@Snaplocket I'd rather not have to choose between them, to be frank.

@Snaplocket Actually, that solemnly depends on the quality of the dub. Stella Glow was a game with an excellent (imho) piece of voice acting, so I didn't mind not having Japanese audio there.

An english dub has to be exceptionally bad for me not to prefer it by default in a game. I haven't heard legitimately terrible dubbing in forever in either anime or video games. The standards have improved in that regard.

At this point I really don't care what we think about "censorship", but you cannot infer motive to anyone.

@Ralizah Would you say Nintendo tends to skimp on VA in this regard? Taking Effie as the perfect example, I think so, because VA hasn't been an integral part of video games until recently, and Nintendo does tend to be a little slow on that front.

@Caldorosso-E I'm sure they did it because it was their job, but that doesn't change it being next to unnecessary.

@UmniKnight VA has never been an important element of Nintendo games, so it makes sense that NoA wouldn't worry about hiring A-list actors. The importance in these games is how they play.

Also, unpopular opinion, I guess, but I liked the voice for Princess Zelda in BotW. Not sure why people seemed so repelled by her voice.

With that said, I'm happy that the game has so many language options, and am looking forward to my Japanese-language playthrough on hard mode.