Truth. There really are so many reasons. I picked up MaHoYo/Mahoutsukai no Yoru/'Witch on the Holy Night' for language practice a few days back. My Japanese is a long way short of perfect, so occasionally when my dictionary-fu fails me I switch to the English script for a reference point. This turned out quickly to be pointless in MaHoYo because the English is brutally bad. Any reasonably difficult sentence will attempt to paper over the translation cracks with Flavour(tm) or else will have a coinflip chance of just being completely mistranslated.
This is a game that's Overwhelmingly Positive on Steam, with thousands of reviews, so as far as popularity goes it's stratospheric for a VN, knocking on the door of Saya no Uta level. But these reviewers aren't even really playing the same game. I've never heard about any translation controversies or complaints with this game (although that might just be because I don't poke my nose into circles where it gets discussed). I think for most people it just 'seems good enough', but really it shouldn't be and isn't.
Yeah most VNs aren't translated, and of the ones that are, the English translation is often quite poor.
Mahoyo, that takes me back! I love that game. I spent a lot of time trying to translate it back in 2014 but stopped because I just had so much other stuff going on between school and work, and the job is quite thankless. Looking back it is probably for the best, because my skills at the time still needed a ton of polish. But that saddens me that you say Mahoyo got a bad translation. I had heard it finally got an official release but never looked into it myself. I wish Mcjon from Beast's Lair had finished his translation....Mahoyo deserves better. Hope Type Moon releases the sequels after the Tsukihime remake finishes....
It really is sad though. EOPs have zero idea what the original is even like sometimes that's how different the translations feel. Anyone who loves VNs needs to learn Japanese, it's as simple as that.
I really wish I had the time on my hands that I had in high school and college because I love that medium so much, but I'll be damned if the average VN isn't a huge time sink. Would love to get back to the point where I could play them a lot again.
I mean, there is an outside chance that I'm being incredibly uncharitable to the MaHoYo translation because I'm not going through and doing a comprehensive comparison. I'm just using it as a fallback for when I'm lazy or brainlocked, so it's possible that the 3-4 times the Japanese temporarily defeated me are the exact same points where the translators chose to inject... flourishes, or else were defeated by the text themselves - but I doubt it.
The point where I decided it's 100% unreliable in general was this:
鳶丸(tobimaru, a char name)の推測だが、この少年は個人的に譲れない事のみ白黒をハッキリさせる気質らしい。
It's a reasonably twisty sentence, despite the brevity, which means 'It was just Tobimaru's speculation, but the boy seemed to be of a disposition where he only sought confirmation on certain things, ones which he personally couldn't let slip by.' (My own translation, ugly for the purposes of including everything said). In context, the 'shounen' just asked for clarification on something said to him, which is out of character for him to do.
The English has: 'Tobimaru had come to suspect that the boy had a very black-and-white way of seeing things.' Totally lazy, lacking insight and in fact gives the direct opposite meaning. It's a translation that kind of gives up on the entire grammar and tries to get by on latching onto the 'black-and-white' word used in the Japanese. The boy is clearly perfectly content for most things to exist in a grey zone, since despite being a fish out of water he only seeks clarity on rare, specific things. English only readers don't get told this. It just makes me wonder how much else they're not being told, or being told wrong, with every sentence that goes by.
The quality of presentation with the art and camera usage in the scenes is off the charts for a VN, still. On some level I'm glad that the officially translated game is, apparently, good enough for most to enjoy and love, but like you I've toyed idly with the idea of getting into this scene myself and setting the world to rights. The one I still toy with is the possibility of putting out the world's first and only worthwhile English translation of Cross Channel - although given the history of the different attempts to translate that one, it's probably cursed. The one on Steam is a foul travesty, anyhow, not least because it's so censored.
A while back, I got talking to a guy over our mutual enthusiasm for Full Metal Daemon: Muramasa. In the time it took me to finish reading through that VN a couple of years back, it got an official translation to English. From what I've seen, it's a pretty decent translation that captures the spirit of the original, although I can also testify by Parvati's tits it is heavily embellished in parts (the original Japanese in the pic is just 'nan ja?!?'). The English editor did however respond to a YT comment of mine and used it to make a correction to the script which was applied in a patch, apparently.
So anyway, the aforementioned Muramasa enthusiast at one point invited me to a discord server where several professional VN localisers supposedly hang out and discuss their work, including Moogy, the Muramasa guy who responded to my comment. I turned this invite over in my head and wondered if this might be my in-road into making some contacts and adding my own contribution - hopefully a better one - to this shit-stinking field. In the end I made my excuses and never clicked the invite. Because we all know what it's like - trannies and sexual degenerates. This would have been trannylation central. In fact I'm reasonably suspicious that Moogy himself is a tranny. If game translation can ever be redeemed, and I'm 80% sure it can't until there's a bigger cultural shift, it would take a lot more than me making friends on some dicksawed server, something which is probably only going to pose a challenge to my sanity and my retch reflex.
Anyway, if you ever do decide to take on the challenge of translating something independently, keep me in mind and shoot me a message lol. We couldn't possibly do a worse job than some of the stuff getting the highest praise.
so it's possible that the 3-4 times the Japanese temporarily defeated me are the exact same points where the translators chose to inject... flourishes, or else were defeated by the text themselves - but I doubt it
I don't know, that seems very sketchy. I've seen enough side by side comparisons, even ones done by very highly regarded translators in the VN community, where it's clear they did not understand the line they were translating.
Tobimaru had come to suspect that the boy had a very black-and-white way of seeing things
That is an inexcusably bad translation. I love that we are using Mahoyo as the example for this because I spent so much damn time scrutinizing that script that even without remembering that exact line it jumps out at me that that translation does not fit the character at all.
The one I still toy with is the possibility of putting out the world's first and only worthwhile English translation of Cross Channel
A very worthwhile endeavor. Never gotten around to reading it myself but hope to one day. Unfortunately it's such a thankless job. You'd be doing 10s of thousands of dollars of labor to produce something that the ungrateful EOP masses would never understand the value of. On the contrary, they might value the flowery translations that butcher the source material more.
Back a decade ago I would always hear people say that the English VN community was surprisingly slow to get fan translations because by the time someone got good enough to produce a translation, they realized just how pointless it is and how much the community doesn't deserve it. I didn't understand that in 2014 but I do now. I don't think it would stop me from attempting one again if I had the time on my hands, but to an extent the shitty localization companies and the EOPs that gratefully slop up everything no matter how shitty of a translation it is are a match made in heaven.
In fact I'm reasonably suspicious that Moogy himself is a tranny
Dude, don't even get me started. Like all localization fields it seems, the people who make up the more regarded echelons of the VN translation industry are retarded communists that would make Stalin blush. Like a combination of all the worst characteristics that people shit on localizers for on this board. There are only a couple that have seemed like I could get along with as people, and one of them, Conjueror, killed himself a few years back.
As an aside, I am registered with a big localizer of light novels and manga as a freelancer. It would make way less money than my real job and my side job of freelance translating technical documents, but there are a few white whales that I would love to translate myself if the opportunity ever arose so I just quietly wait for the 6 or so emails per year they send when they get new licenses.
But the point of bringing that up is, while I haven't translated for them officially yet, I was on boarded years back and am in their official discord. It's exactly what you would expect. The most radical of radical leftists, all the way up to and including the owner. I don't know what it is about this field that attracts the absolute worst of the worst of people, but either a lot more normies need to learn Japanese to make these people have less power, or there needs to be a major shift in the industry. I tend to encourage the former which is why I shill to people about learning Japanese whenever the topic comes up.
Truth. There really are so many reasons. I picked up MaHoYo/Mahoutsukai no Yoru/'Witch on the Holy Night' for language practice a few days back. My Japanese is a long way short of perfect, so occasionally when my dictionary-fu fails me I switch to the English script for a reference point. This turned out quickly to be pointless in MaHoYo because the English is brutally bad. Any reasonably difficult sentence will attempt to paper over the translation cracks with Flavour(tm) or else will have a coinflip chance of just being completely mistranslated.
This is a game that's Overwhelmingly Positive on Steam, with thousands of reviews, so as far as popularity goes it's stratospheric for a VN, knocking on the door of Saya no Uta level. But these reviewers aren't even really playing the same game. I've never heard about any translation controversies or complaints with this game (although that might just be because I don't poke my nose into circles where it gets discussed). I think for most people it just 'seems good enough', but really it shouldn't be and isn't.
Yeah most VNs aren't translated, and of the ones that are, the English translation is often quite poor.
Mahoyo, that takes me back! I love that game. I spent a lot of time trying to translate it back in 2014 but stopped because I just had so much other stuff going on between school and work, and the job is quite thankless. Looking back it is probably for the best, because my skills at the time still needed a ton of polish. But that saddens me that you say Mahoyo got a bad translation. I had heard it finally got an official release but never looked into it myself. I wish Mcjon from Beast's Lair had finished his translation....Mahoyo deserves better. Hope Type Moon releases the sequels after the Tsukihime remake finishes....
It really is sad though. EOPs have zero idea what the original is even like sometimes that's how different the translations feel. Anyone who loves VNs needs to learn Japanese, it's as simple as that.
I really wish I had the time on my hands that I had in high school and college because I love that medium so much, but I'll be damned if the average VN isn't a huge time sink. Would love to get back to the point where I could play them a lot again.
I mean, there is an outside chance that I'm being incredibly uncharitable to the MaHoYo translation because I'm not going through and doing a comprehensive comparison. I'm just using it as a fallback for when I'm lazy or brainlocked, so it's possible that the 3-4 times the Japanese temporarily defeated me are the exact same points where the translators chose to inject... flourishes, or else were defeated by the text themselves - but I doubt it.
The point where I decided it's 100% unreliable in general was this: 鳶丸(tobimaru, a char name)の推測だが、この少年は個人的に譲れない事のみ白黒をハッキリさせる気質らしい。 It's a reasonably twisty sentence, despite the brevity, which means 'It was just Tobimaru's speculation, but the boy seemed to be of a disposition where he only sought confirmation on certain things, ones which he personally couldn't let slip by.' (My own translation, ugly for the purposes of including everything said). In context, the 'shounen' just asked for clarification on something said to him, which is out of character for him to do. The English has: 'Tobimaru had come to suspect that the boy had a very black-and-white way of seeing things.' Totally lazy, lacking insight and in fact gives the direct opposite meaning. It's a translation that kind of gives up on the entire grammar and tries to get by on latching onto the 'black-and-white' word used in the Japanese. The boy is clearly perfectly content for most things to exist in a grey zone, since despite being a fish out of water he only seeks clarity on rare, specific things. English only readers don't get told this. It just makes me wonder how much else they're not being told, or being told wrong, with every sentence that goes by.
The quality of presentation with the art and camera usage in the scenes is off the charts for a VN, still. On some level I'm glad that the officially translated game is, apparently, good enough for most to enjoy and love, but like you I've toyed idly with the idea of getting into this scene myself and setting the world to rights. The one I still toy with is the possibility of putting out the world's first and only worthwhile English translation of Cross Channel - although given the history of the different attempts to translate that one, it's probably cursed. The one on Steam is a foul travesty, anyhow, not least because it's so censored.
A while back, I got talking to a guy over our mutual enthusiasm for Full Metal Daemon: Muramasa. In the time it took me to finish reading through that VN a couple of years back, it got an official translation to English. From what I've seen, it's a pretty decent translation that captures the spirit of the original, although I can also testify by Parvati's tits it is heavily embellished in parts (the original Japanese in the pic is just 'nan ja?!?'). The English editor did however respond to a YT comment of mine and used it to make a correction to the script which was applied in a patch, apparently.
So anyway, the aforementioned Muramasa enthusiast at one point invited me to a discord server where several professional VN localisers supposedly hang out and discuss their work, including Moogy, the Muramasa guy who responded to my comment. I turned this invite over in my head and wondered if this might be my in-road into making some contacts and adding my own contribution - hopefully a better one - to this shit-stinking field. In the end I made my excuses and never clicked the invite. Because we all know what it's like - trannies and sexual degenerates. This would have been trannylation central. In fact I'm reasonably suspicious that Moogy himself is a tranny. If game translation can ever be redeemed, and I'm 80% sure it can't until there's a bigger cultural shift, it would take a lot more than me making friends on some dicksawed server, something which is probably only going to pose a challenge to my sanity and my retch reflex.
Anyway, if you ever do decide to take on the challenge of translating something independently, keep me in mind and shoot me a message lol. We couldn't possibly do a worse job than some of the stuff getting the highest praise.
I don't know, that seems very sketchy. I've seen enough side by side comparisons, even ones done by very highly regarded translators in the VN community, where it's clear they did not understand the line they were translating.
That is an inexcusably bad translation. I love that we are using Mahoyo as the example for this because I spent so much damn time scrutinizing that script that even without remembering that exact line it jumps out at me that that translation does not fit the character at all.
A very worthwhile endeavor. Never gotten around to reading it myself but hope to one day. Unfortunately it's such a thankless job. You'd be doing 10s of thousands of dollars of labor to produce something that the ungrateful EOP masses would never understand the value of. On the contrary, they might value the flowery translations that butcher the source material more.
Back a decade ago I would always hear people say that the English VN community was surprisingly slow to get fan translations because by the time someone got good enough to produce a translation, they realized just how pointless it is and how much the community doesn't deserve it. I didn't understand that in 2014 but I do now. I don't think it would stop me from attempting one again if I had the time on my hands, but to an extent the shitty localization companies and the EOPs that gratefully slop up everything no matter how shitty of a translation it is are a match made in heaven.
Dude, don't even get me started. Like all localization fields it seems, the people who make up the more regarded echelons of the VN translation industry are retarded communists that would make Stalin blush. Like a combination of all the worst characteristics that people shit on localizers for on this board. There are only a couple that have seemed like I could get along with as people, and one of them, Conjueror, killed himself a few years back.
As an aside, I am registered with a big localizer of light novels and manga as a freelancer. It would make way less money than my real job and my side job of freelance translating technical documents, but there are a few white whales that I would love to translate myself if the opportunity ever arose so I just quietly wait for the 6 or so emails per year they send when they get new licenses.
But the point of bringing that up is, while I haven't translated for them officially yet, I was on boarded years back and am in their official discord. It's exactly what you would expect. The most radical of radical leftists, all the way up to and including the owner. I don't know what it is about this field that attracts the absolute worst of the worst of people, but either a lot more normies need to learn Japanese to make these people have less power, or there needs to be a major shift in the industry. I tend to encourage the former which is why I shill to people about learning Japanese whenever the topic comes up.