Trying to translate Japanese games to a Western (as in English speaking) audience isn’t easy. It’s not just a different alphabet but a different set of rules as to what kanji is versus letters, plus the issue of an entirely different grammar system altogether. This usually makes it harder to simply change the words and send it on its way. There are serious technical issues involved in addition to the usual translation difficulties. They didn’t do it to show off or to make money (they legally couldn’t) but because they loved the game and wanted to share it with their fellow fans, to get to play games they otherwise couldn’t in the old days.
Since yesterday’s feature took longer than I thought and I really have no time today I’m just going to drop a filler by Austin Eruption and call it a day because I have no choice. Otherwise this would have been a daily quickpost. That’s how little time I have. In the following video, Austin goes over the trouble going into a Japanese game, hacking it, translating it, making the translations fit the proper spaces, and getting into the hands of gamers who have no other option because no official translation was coming. He’ll go over some examples, why no official release was ever coming (and still hasn’t), and whether or not they and the game itself was worth the trouble. Enjoy and sorry for the extra quickpost.
BW Media Spotlight 