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[SPLIT] Bad Localizations - Why Do We Care?


TheMightyEthan
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The least they could do is give the game a decent box art after breaking their promise about a full localization. I'll never understand how a game with as much dialogue as Fallout 3 can receive full localization support, while a game as short as ME1 only receives some new cover art and a 20% markup in price and they call it a day.

 

"Don't speak English? LOL That's your problem, Japan!"

 

Then Bashcraft wonders why it doesn't sell well compared to the latest sequel of Super Idol Magical Girl Pedo Club, and concludes that it MUST be because the Japanese "just have no taste for our violent evil western games."

While I agree with you that it's strange and/or stupid, I must ask: why do you care? You're not Japanese. It seems like the extent of your Care would be "huh, that's weird, and kinda dumb."

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Why do I need to be Japanese to care? :scratch: I'm still a gamer.

 

Should I not care that other gamers in a different region are being left out to dry and getting ripped off?

 

I'm also an American. Should it not bother me that an American game/product is not being exported up to standard?

All of that would lead me to expect you to care about this much:

 

"huh, that's weird, and kinda dumb."

Your next paragraph explains why you care more than that, though. :D

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I never said you cared too much, just that you seem to care more than I would have expected from someone who isn't directly affected by it. I never even said that was a bad thing, just that I was surprised.

 

Calm down. :P

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Shitty localisations are shitty. No matter where you are. tbh if you're not going to put the effort in yourself on localising the game properly, just don't release it. The fans will no doubt to it for you, for free, and better.

 

FFXIV was one of the more recent titles I've come across. Odds n sods still in Japanese. It makes it hard to play the game. Sure if Pong doesn't get localised right, no biggy. But a fucking RPG? Those are more than likely next to impossible to play if not translated. I know I'd be pissed if I popped FFXIII in my PS3 and it was all in Japanese, I don't see why the Japanese wouldn't be equally as pissed popping ME in their 360 n it being in English. It's incredibly lazy and reeks of cash grab on EA/Biowares part.

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The Persona 4 American localization is probably one of my favorites. I like to use it as an example of a localization that's done really well and not "just good enough to get the point across."

 

What I really like about it is that you can tell some bits of dialogue probably had slightly different meaning in the Japanese version, but they managed to translate it without butchering it. There are also parts where it's obvious that a joke in the Japanese version couldn't easily be translated while keeping the humor (perhaps for cultural reasons). In those cases the localization team sort of went out of their way (I mean, they're job is to localize the game, but so often it's apparent that most teams are "phoning it in") to make jokes make sense to the American audience, and where they couldn't they just made their own jokes that perhaps shared some of the humor from the Japanese version, but re-written enough that it's actually funny (sometimes in a very ironic fashion) to the American audience.

 

The voice acting is pretty great too.

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Shitty localisations are shitty. No matter where you are. tbh if you're not going to put the effort in yourself on localising the game properly, just don't release it. The fans will no doubt to it for you, for free, and better.

 

FFXIV was one of the more recent titles I've come across. Odds n sods still in Japanese. It makes it hard to play the game. Sure if Pong doesn't get localised right, no biggy. But a fucking RPG? Those are more than likely next to impossible to play if not translated. I know I'd be pissed if I popped FFXIII in my PS3 and it was all in Japanese, I don't see why the Japanese wouldn't be equally as pissed popping ME in their 360 n it being in English. It's incredibly lazy and reeks of cash grab on EA/Biowares part.

I'm not defending shitty localizations. :P I was just surprised that she cared enough about the Japanese Mass Effect port specifically to go on a little mini-rant about it, given that it doesn't directly affect her. That's all. I'm not even surprised that she cares (though I realize my initial post wasn't worded properly to get my actual question across), just at how much she cares.

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Shitty localisations are shitty. No matter where you are. tbh if you're not going to put the effort in yourself on localising the game properly, just don't release it. The fans will no doubt to it for you, for free, and better.

 

FFXIV was one of the more recent titles I've come across. Odds n sods still in Japanese. It makes it hard to play the game. Sure if Pong doesn't get localised right, no biggy. But a fucking RPG? Those are more than likely next to impossible to play if not translated. I know I'd be pissed if I popped FFXIII in my PS3 and it was all in Japanese, I don't see why the Japanese wouldn't be equally as pissed popping ME in their 360 n it being in English. It's incredibly lazy and reeks of cash grab on EA/Biowares part.

I'm not defending shitty localizations. :P I was just surprised that she cared enough about the Japanese Mass Effect port specifically to go on a little mini-rant about it, given that it doesn't directly affect her. That's all. I'm not even surprised that she cares (though I realize my initial post wasn't worded properly to get my actual question across), just at how much she cares.

 

The real question is: why do you care that she cares?

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I care because I know there are games, Catherine off the top of my head, that I know I would like to be localized, and localized well. While it's clearly an exaggeration to say that any specific bad localization harms any other, I do know how markets are skittish, and executives prone to sweeping generalizations. And if, for instance, it's a game I like, I want to spread that joy of the game the same as I might give a positive recommendation of it in reality. To find out people hate it because it's been mistreated by some third party is...unfair, in that sense of not sporting.

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Localisation, which is fairly familiar to me, is the unwanted child of 90% of game developers and/or publishers who are often in charge of that. It's rarely accounted for properly in the development cycle, managed by people who have little to no knowledge of it and often rushed out of the house because ultimately "the customer doesn't care so much" or there is not enough money for it.

 

It's refreshing to see that people still care, even if they're linguistically not affected. <3

 

A different perspective than Derpy's, but still valid: I think Europeans who at some point in their life haven't spoken English (or still don't) appreciate the effort companies make in presenting their product in their language. There are even those who localise their US version for the UK market -- would you believe such insanity? :D

 

Funnily enough, those EU markets shrink from a localisation point of view, while new emerge, like Portuguese/Brazilian and Russian.

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