(lack of) Localisation - worst offenders.

[FAST6191]

Short version -- what developer, publisher or other relevant entity is worst for screwing up translations of games either by messing up the translation or by just not translating it.

Anybody that follows game news will probably have encountered much whining, moaning, gnashing of teeth when it comes to announcements of what game will and will not be localised. In many of those I see "? is the worst at this" which quite clearly can not be the case. I am also accepting bad localisations for there is a phrase among translators that reads "a bad localisation is worse than no localisation".
I recognise this can also be a somewhat fluid thing as well - Sega, Capcom, variously Nintendo, some of Sony and a lot more have criticisms, often reasonable, when it comes to localisation. However each of those has done some stunning work at various points when it comes to translations so none can be outright dismissed.

I am mainly concerned with ? -> English but having witnessed some of the butchery when it comes to North American French and Spanish translations it would cut off a decent chunk of good examples should they be excluded.

 

[emigre]

Grammer mistakes, text not matching the voice acting. A real poor effort in contest of contemporary localisation..

 

[Foxi4]

Grammer mistakes, text not matching the voice acting. A real poor effort in contest of contemporary localisation..

I tried to like this game, I really did.

I failed.

 

[Blaze163]

I'm playing through PS1 Classic 'Legend of Dragoon' at the moment and the script is pretty ass. Not sure if that's a translation issue or just incompetent writers but either way it's not very engaging dialogue. Thankfully the gameplay kinda makes up for it.

 

[emigre]

I'm playing through PS1 Classic 'Legend of Dragoon' at the moment and the script is pretty ass. Not sure if that's a translation issue or just incompetent writers but either way it's not very engaging dialogue. Thankfully the gameplay kinda makes up for it.

Dude, it was the 90s. Crap localisations were the norm.

 

[Gahars]

"Jill, here's a lockpick. It might be handy if you, the master of unlocking, take it with you."

"You were almost a Jill Sandwich back there."

"Here, take this. It's really powerful, especially against living things."

Proof that shitty localizations aren't always a bad thing.

 

[kupo3000]

Namco Bandai hasn't localized many of their Tales games.
Bampresto also has that localizing issue with Super Robot Wars titles due to it being a licensing nightmare.
Still waiting for Super Robot Taisen OG Saga: Endless Frontier EXCEED...

 

[Osha]

And it's just an example. Still a great series, but it had some of the worst typos I've ever seen.

 

[The Catboy]

I love the games, but the Ace Attorney games got really fucked when they brought them over because they did the same shit 4Kids did. They took out most of the Japanese references, changed the game's location from Japan to America, which caused more confusion with the Japanese styled building pop culture and other things they did leave in there, and countless other problems they caused in the American adaptation of the games.

 

[Arras]

And it's just an example. Still a great series, but it had some of the worst typos I've ever seen.

Not to mention the names of all sorts of things. Oh, there's no room for the proper name? Remove all the vowels! AssasinSwrd! NumberBl! GrabBnsh! ElmntMn!

 

[pasc]

And it's just an example. Still a great series, but it had some of the worst typos I've ever seen.

She was such a fine young man.

Some errors are hilarious.

Some even intented:
"Legs go Lan."

That however doesn't hinder it's playability.

<3 MMBN

 

[Celice]

Almost every Fire Emblem game localized has gone through arbitrary name changes. At times this has indirectly messed up some story content, such as name allusions to previous characters, or some of the mythological connotations being disrupted.

 

[Hells Malice]

This thread is now Bamco vs Sega

gogogo

Really I see no one else worth mentioning. Those two hold back excellent games all the time because they can't sell millions of copies with them, yet would still make a solid profit.

 

[MushGuy]

Grammer mistakes.

 

[Xexyz]

*snip*

Grammer mistakes, text not matching the voice acting. A real poor effort in contest of contemporary localisation..

LOL

 

[FAST6191]

Re Legend of Dragoon. Personally I really disliked the game, various friends loved it but it never did it for me..

I love the games, but the Ace Attorney games got really fucked when they brought them over because they did the same shit 4Kids did. They took out most of the Japanese references, changed the game's location from Japan to America, which caused more confusion with the Japanese styled building pop culture and other things they did leave in there, and countless other problems they caused in the American adaptation of the games.

Interesting. Normally I hold up Phoenix Wright as a top flight translation and definitely a translation done right. Similarly did they explicitly change the location to America? I always played it like a game set in Japan anyway.
However this risks turning into the accuracy vs effectiveness vs whatever else debate and I would really rather avoid going through that one again in this thread.

 

[The Catboy]

Re Legend of Dragoon. Personally I really disliked the game, various friends loved it but it never did it for me..


Interesting. Normally I hold up Phoenix Wright as a top flight translation and definitely a translation done right. Similarly did they explicitly change the location to America? I always played it like a game set in Japan anyway.
However this risks turning into the accuracy vs effectiveness vs whatever else debate and I would really rather avoid going through that one again in this thread.

Did you play the EU versions or the US versions? Because they might have different translation teams
But here's a quick mention about the changes to the US versions
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Phoenix_Wright:_Ace_Attorney#Localization_and_cultural_references

 

[Cyan]

I tried few times to play Breath of Fire III in french, but I couldn't play more than 30min because the translation is very bad. bad grammar and wrong word choice is just unplayable for me.
Wikipedia even says the labyrinth desert is impossible to complete if you follow the provided direction because of wrong translation.

I prefer playing RPG in english, but it's not always available or well translated either (but translation errors are less easily spotted when it's not your native language !)

 

[Rydian]

http://gbatemp.net/threads/gbatemp-recommends-revival-008.315188/

 

[FAST6191]

I can not remember what region I played at this point. The later ones that had English I played the spotty English in the Japanese games for but the first one escapes me. I do not think there were any great differences though as I do try to note such changes.