Okay it means nothing but "Attack on Titan" is still fucking rad.
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You have the power to undo ONE official mistranslation or localized name you hate.
- Thread starter Fj0823
- Start date
The title is clumsy but actually accurate.
Shingeki No Kyojin is the name of Eren's Titan form. It's sorta more like he/it is "The Titan who Attacks on".
That would actually be a less accurate title.
"Delicious Dungeon" is a great name, and a whimsical translation. The real name of "Delicious In Dungeon" just makes me sad.
The final movie's "Bye bye all of Evangelion" is the single most foreboding tagline in all of translation history.
It was renamed to "Slifer the Sky Dragon" to flatter Roger Slifer, the executive producer of the dub studio at the time. Without a single fuck given towards the original work
Now the "Egyptian god card" from Takahashi's original manga is stuck with the name of some random suit in the west. This is the actual english card
And with that the "Egyptians gods" are Obelisk the Tormentor, The Winged Dragon of Ra, and....Slifer the Executive Producer
Thank you both. That is very silly. What a tragedy.
For sure, it was just relevant in the context of changes made in localization for the original introduction of the character — that's what I had originally been talking about.
Yep pretty much. I think it was confusing even to the Japanese audience early on, but I might be wrong about that.
The name of the series (Shingeki no Kyojin) is the name of the titan the main character possesses. The name wouldn't be revealed until years later.
I wish Resident Evil was called Biohazard. First thing that came to mind. Fits better with the original narrative.
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Yep, once you learn the story of Slifer it's ruined forever lol.
Which reminds me of another popular Yu-Gi-Oh card which got a BS rename
The japanese name is close "Number 39: Hope, the Emperor of Wishes"
It was changed to Utopia because according to Konami's Kevin Tewart "Hope is a girl's name and kids would make fun it" so they went with Utopia because "An Emperor of Wishes probably rules over a Utopia"
With that said, I find this one several magnitudes less awful than "Slifer", but their logic behind it is total BS
It's been like 20 years and I'm still always surprised to learn there are people that prefer "Aerith" outside the pedantic "well actually in the original Japanese..." crowd.
I would compromise for Osiris the Sky Dragon.
Yeah, I guess I was just trying to say they did the best thing by making them both his name though they could try to call him Robotnik more often.
On a side note, is Princess Toadstool/Peach a localization thing?
The title of Attack on Titan is referring to a specific titan. The title is a mistranslation of "Attack Titan":
Peach was her name in Japan, while Princess Toadstool was the localized name during the 8 and 16-bit eras.
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Now that I think about it, if they ever add Eggman to Smash Ultimate, half of his alt colors should change his name to Robotnik lol
Oh so it's basically exactly like the Eggman/Robotnik thing.
Yes, this was added in the American script for Super Mario 64 by the woman who did the localization (as I recall).
Edit:
Oh, huh. Didn't realize that!
I feel like any time Japan (or presumably other cultures) use English words or phrases directly, you can't just localize it by copy/pasting the same phrase. My Hero Academia and Eggman are two great examples. They may sound cool and hip over there 'cause they're in English and that automatically gives it some extra spice, but over here... it's Eggman.
Call him Tamago-san and we're back in business, but what sounds like cool English to a Japanese speaker doesn't to an English speaker so, y'know, ya gotta change it. That's the job, localizers. Even when it's already in English, you can change it. Screw the fanatics who insist on aUtHeNtIcItY: if it makes the work better to the new audience, change it.
You'll note, people debate up and down the internet Aeris vs. Aerith, but nobody argues about the change they made to FF6's protagonist, because nobody in their right minds thinks they should've localized her as an authentic, phonetic translation: Tina. I'm sure that name worked great in Japan, but in America... it's fucking Tina. That's not a name for a half-Esper JRPG protagonist.
Call him Tamago-san and we're back in business, but what sounds like cool English to a Japanese speaker doesn't to an English speaker so, y'know, ya gotta change it. That's the job, localizers. Even when it's already in English, you can change it. Screw the fanatics who insist on aUtHeNtIcItY: if it makes the work better to the new audience, change it.
You'll note, people debate up and down the internet Aeris vs. Aerith, but nobody argues about the change they made to FF6's protagonist, because nobody in their right minds thinks they should've localized her as an authentic, phonetic translation: Tina. I'm sure that name worked great in Japan, but in America... it's fucking Tina. That's not a name for a half-Esper JRPG protagonist.
It's not pleasant to say, at least in English. I think it has to how your lips and tongue move to form the ending -th sound; it's starting from an unusual position compared to similar words.
Slowly say Aerith and pay attention to how your lips and tongue more from the r sound to the th, then compare that to Beth or Marth. The best I can tell, it's like -th ends words where your mouth is closing but the -i vowel causes your lips to expand instead causing the awkwardness.
I dunno, I'm not a linguist :D
Fun note, Roger Slifer co-created DC's Lobo. Not the 90s Lobo we all know and love, but his precursor:
But yeah, count me in for fixing that naming choice.
But what if I think Tamago-san sounds dumb as all hell? See, the trouble with localization is balancing authenticity with cross-cultural appeal and understanding, and there's always going to be a middle ground you're desperately struggling to achieve, and no matter where you end up on the scale, it's absolutely inevitable that someone else believes you should have gone further one way or the other.
Now, that doesn't mean localization can't be damn near objectively bad - look at Ace Attorney for a crash course in a "dude why the fuck would you do that" localization that negatively affects the very nature of the series - but I feel like people are too quick to take their personal aesthetic sense and run with it as what should be the standard for how localization is executed.
Outside of Zoro/Zolo, Funimation licensed "Case Closed" in America and changed just about every name under the sun: Shinichi became Jimmy, Ran became Rachel, etc. If only given one choice I want my favorite character changed back, give me Hattori Heiji instead of....ugh.....Harley Hartwell.
Oh, I can't believe I forgot this one:
It was the localization for the verbal tic Naruto has where he says "dattebayo" in Japanese. I get why they couldn't really just translate it since dattebayo doesn't really have a direct translation but "Believe it" was really clunky and was just obnoxious to the point that I think it put people off of Naruto.
The funny thing is the dub just made Naruto stop saying "believe it" after awhile because people didn't like it. Then years later, Naruto meets his mother who says "dattebane" making it some weird inherited verbal tic so they had to acknowledge it in the localization. Instead of bringing back believe it, they had Naruto and his mom say "ya know" or "y'know" which I feel is a much better localization. It's still clunky though because suddenly Naruto starts saying "ya know" out of nowhere. So if I had the power, I would got back so that it was always 'y'know."
It was the localization for the verbal tic Naruto has where he says "dattebayo" in Japanese. I get why they couldn't really just translate it since dattebayo doesn't really have a direct translation but "Believe it" was really clunky and was just obnoxious to the point that I think it put people off of Naruto.
The funny thing is the dub just made Naruto stop saying "believe it" after awhile because people didn't like it. Then years later, Naruto meets his mother who says "dattebane" making it some weird inherited verbal tic so they had to acknowledge it in the localization. Instead of bringing back believe it, they had Naruto and his mom say "ya know" or "y'know" which I feel is a much better localization. It's still clunky though because suddenly Naruto starts saying "ya know" out of nowhere. So if I had the power, I would got back so that it was always 'y'know."
Zolo bugs me quite a bit I guess, but thankfully it's really easy to just read it as Zoro.
I'm gonna argue that the dub attack names in DB are pretty okay though. The point behind many of the original attack names is that they are silly, dumb, or super plain, and that's something lost by leaving them as is. Despite all the issues with the early dub, the attack names end up fitting the spirit Toriyama was going for pretty well, and that's not a bad thing for a localization.
I'm gonna argue that the dub attack names in DB are pretty okay though. The point behind many of the original attack names is that they are silly, dumb, or super plain, and that's something lost by leaving them as is. Despite all the issues with the early dub, the attack names end up fitting the spirit Toriyama was going for pretty well, and that's not a bad thing for a localization.
Lies. Japanifornia is one of the biggest charms of Ace Attorney.
As someone who played Kingdom Hearts before ever knowing FF7, Aerith is very simple and natural to say and Aeris feels weird on my tongue. I think it honestly just depends on which one you're used to.
The naming sense is great. The translation quality is largely great.
Setting the series in Japanifornia is not great.
Add another one for correcting "Altria" to "Artoria".
Considering that the Fate version of Attila the Hun insists on being called "Altera" and the prominence of "Alter" versions of characters, I think someone high up in Type-Moon has a fetish for the letters "Alt" and doesn't care about whether or not they make sense.
Considering that the Fate version of Attila the Hun insists on being called "Altera" and the prominence of "Alter" versions of characters, I think someone high up in Type-Moon has a fetish for the letters "Alt" and doesn't care about whether or not they make sense.
these are my main ones. they came up in the same order before i clicked the thread. it's hard to pick one but i'd go with changing Esty's name to her original name. they did her dirty and basically made fun of her. at least with Aerith SE fixed it and i only watch subs for One Piece.
another +1 for the Latin American dub where they kept all these instead of making bad names.
Oh, I can't believe I forgot this one:
It was the localization for the verbal tic Naruto has where he says "dattebayo" in Japanese. I get why they couldn't really just translate it since dattebayo doesn't really have a direct translation but "Believe it" was really clunky and was just obnoxious to the point that I think it put people off of Naruto.
The funny thing is the dub just made Naruto stop saying "believe it" after awhile because people didn't like it. Then years later, Naruto meets his mother who says "dattebane" making it some weird inherited verbal tic so they had to acknowledge it in the localization. Instead of bringing back believe it, they had Naruto and his mom say "ya know" or "y'know" which I feel is a much better localization. It's still clunky though because suddenly Naruto starts saying "ya know" out of nowhere. So if I had the power, I would got back so that it was always 'y'know."
I mean...
The only one I can think of is from Rurouni Kenshin. (I loved it back in high school, before the artist was revealed to be a slimeball.) I hated that the American dub called him "Battousai the Manslayer." It's just... clunky. And I know leaving it as Hitokiri Battousai would still be clunky, but at least it sounds cool.
My understanding from Funimation was that the studio in Japan demanded the name changes to Detective Conan, not realizing that US audiences wouldn't prefer that. Not that it doesn't still suck, but that wasn't a change they just made for the hell of it.
(...as an aside...I admit that I actually like the Case Closed to title. I know I'm wrong to, but I do.)
Agreed. All the names were puns anyway, and it'd lose some of the fun if you couldn't understand them. Ditto with pokemon.
I'd love for Aeris to be erased from history so nobody would argue for that guy are sick name in 2021.
Yeah, my understand was they wanted it to be marketed towards kids but America is much more strict on violence and murder in kids shows than Japan. The dialogue is really snappy like the stuff kids would like and even the promo trailers are kind of...fun? I guess that's how I'd put it.
All of my post "Goku finally showed up on Namek!" action came from watching DBZ on Telemundo until Funimation finally started doing shit, so I agree.
Mine would have to be Dark Prince from Puyo Puyo, just doesn't have the same ring as SATAN, luckily we got this brief moment before Puyo games started getting localized
