Introduction « Legends of Localization. Title Screens. Right off the bat we see that the title screens are different across all three versions of the game: The Japanese title screens also have some fancier animations and fade- ins while the English title screen just has a basic fade- in and no animation at all. Here’s a video of them for reference: Personally, I really like the font in the English title screen. The sword’s a little cheesy, though. The English version also has the bit of text about the licensing stuff, plus the company is called “Square Soft” rather than “Square”, as it’s called in the Japanese versions. There’s probably a good reason for this company name difference, but I’m guessing that’s an article for another day. ![]() ![]() Incidentally, this probably doesn’t need mentioning, but it was called Final Fantasy IV in Japan but Final Fantasy II in North America because the real Final Fantasy II and Final Fantasy III weren’t released in North America at the time. Nowadays all the games have been released over here, so fans call them all by their official Japanese numbers. The Story Begins. Because game localization was still in its infancy when Final Fantasy II was released, FFII’s translation is a bit dry, wonky, and strange in places. This is immediately evident as soon as the game’s intro begins. Before the short flashback starts, the character dialog goes like this: Japanese Version (basic translation)English Version. Soldier: Captain Cecil! ![]() We will arrive at Baron shortly! Crew: Captain Cecil, we are about to arrive! Cecil: Uh- huh. The English translation seems to skip over it. The “uh- huh” in the Japanese line is more of a distant, preoccupied response. Throughout the game’s intro Cecil’s internal struggle is a lot more obvious in the Japanese text – it’s clear he’s too preoccupied to give any real answers. While we’re at it, note how the Japanese text doesn’t use a colon to show who’s talking – instead, it uses a Japanese quotation mark, but doesn’t end lines with a closing quote mark. Also, whenever Cecil is speaking, it doesn’t show his name followed by a colon. Instead, it just uses a double Japanese quotation mark. Another change I didn’t catch right away is that the text box was made a tiny bit larger in the English localization. This makes sense, because it usually takes more letters to say something in English than in Japanese. ![]() Game Comparisons » Final Fantasy IV » Introduction. Reddit: the front page of the internet. Ask Your Final Fantasy XIV Related Questions Here! Rechercher : Actualit For Final Fantasy IV on the.Lastly, in Easy Type, it says “the king’s orders” and not just “orders”. From time to time we’ll also look at the translation of other versions of the game. Here’s a look at the Play. Station translation of this line: As you can see, there’s a reference to killing in the translation. As we’ll see over the course of this gigantic analysis project, the Play. Station translation is less of a translation and more of a “screw faithfulness let’s do whatever we want” type of thing. While we’re at it, I should mention that in general, the GBA translation is based on the Play. Station translation. It brings improvements to the translation but also introduces a lot of strange things like Internet in- jokes. Here, we can see how the GBA translation is a slightly- edited version of the Play. Station translation: So, the GBA translation is based on the Play.
Station translation. The PSP translation is based on the GBA translation, with some tweaks of its own! Here’s a look at the PSP translation’s take on this line: So there’s a sort of strange translation evolution going on, or a sort of translation legacy. I’m not fond of the Play. Station translation at all, so it’s kind of disappointing that they didn’t just scrap it altogether when working on the GBA translation, but oh well. I’m fairly certain the DS translation was done from scratch. I don’t have time to play through it (or any way to get decent screenshots) but here’s a look at this same line in the DS version: There’s also a port of the game for i. OS devices like the i. Phone and i. Pad. I definitely don’t intend to go through this version, but here’s a screenshot from the very start: Already it’s off to a less- than- stellar start, but I’ll just assume this “Load Captain” is a one- time mistake in the i. OS version, since the DS version goes with the more proper “Lord Captain”: On closer inspection, it looks like the DS version of this text has a comma in it, so perhaps the Load Captain mistake was a result of someone transcribing all the text into a new file but making typos in the process? The Text Flows. The intro then switches to a flashback of when they invaded Mysidia and took the crystal there by force. In FFIV, there’s no text at all – the entire thing is just sprites moving and doing stuff. In FFII, the Baron soldiers also shout and get rowdy while the Mysidians get killed and plead. FFIV Easy Type has this dialogue as well. My first thought was that maybe they added this text in for FFII and then used FFII to create the Easy Type version. The English text here is awkwardly phrased just like the rest of the translated text though, so I can’t tell if that’s the case or not. I don’t know which version came first. Of particular note, though, is that the English version calls it the “Crystal of Water” while the Japanese text simply says “crystal”. Flashing Back. The dialog after the flashback has some different nuances and such too: Japanese Version (basic translation)English Version. Soldier: We, the Red Wings, are a proud airship fleet! Stealing from the weak is unthinkable! Crew: We take pride in being members of the Red Wings! Looting is out of the question! Cecil: Stop it! Cecil: Stop it! Soldier: But, Captain! Crew: Captain! Soldier: We’re robbing from mages who don’t even resist! Crew: We can’t stand doing this anymore! Cecil: Listen, all of you! The crystal is absolutely necessary for the prosperity of our Baron Kingdom. Cecil: Listen! Possessing the crystal is an essential factor for our prosperity. His Majesty feels that the people of Mysidia know too much about the crystal’s secrets. Moreover, His Majesty judged that Mysidians know too much about the secret of the crystal. We are the airship fleet of the Baron Kingdom – the Red Wings of Baron! His Majesty’s orders are absolute! The Royal Command is absolute. Soldier: Captain! Monsters! Crew: Monsters!! Obviously my literal translation is pretty rough sounding, but here we can see some tiny changes in meaning and nuance. For Prosperity. There’s actually a slight difference between the two Japanese versions here too! FFIV (basic translation)FFIV Easy Type. Cecil: Listen, all of you! The crystal is absolutely necessary for the prosperity of our Baron Kingdom. Cecil: Listen, all of you! The crystal is absolutely necessary for our Baron Kingdom. His Majesty feels that the people of Mysidia know too much about the crystal’s secrets. His Majesty feels that the mages of Mysidia know too much about the crystal’s secrets. We are the airship fleet of the Baron Kingdom – the Red Wings of Baron! We are the airship force of the Baron Kingdom – the Red Wings of Baron! His Majesty’s orders are absolute. I don’t think I have the energy to document them all, but I’ll point out any that seem interesting. Part of the reason for these changes was to simplify the text for Japanese readers, presumably so that younger players could understand things more clearly. More on that later! Firebombs Galore. Here we see Cecil using a special item to kill some monsters. In Japanese, this is called “Red Fang” but in English it’s called “Fire. Bomb”. Incidentally, the enemies are called “Float. Eyes” in English but are called “Float. Eyeballs” in Japanese. Actually, the Japanese katakana spelling is a bit unusual for something like this, but it’s hard to explain unless you already know Japanese. Drat. Some more monsters attack, and in Japanese Cecil responds by saying something like, “Damn!”In English, he says, “Watch out!”In the Play. Station translation, the swearing is left intact: My general impression is that the swearing in the Play. Station is used when appropriate, or at least it’s nowhere nearly as crazy as the J2. E fan translation is with it. The Play. Station translation has many faults, but swearing seems to have been handled competently. The GBA translation handles this line by saying “Damnation!” which is an interesting way to approach the swear word issue: And because the PSP translation is based heavily on the GBA translation (which is in turn heavily based on the Play. Station version), the PSP version says “Damnation” as well: Litting Things Up. Cecil then fights another enemy and uses a different item to kill it. In Japanese, this item is called a “Blue Fang”. In English, it’s called a “Lit- Bolt”. Hello Condor. The giant bird enemy Cecil kills is called a “Zuu” in FFIV and a “Raven” in FFII. It has a different name in FFIV Easy Type too: “Hell Condor”. Clunky Times Ahead. Again, since this was before game localizations really got serious, the translated text in FFII is full of weird awkwardness. You can almost tell it wasn’t written by a native speaker. Despite the weird- sounding text everywhere, I absolutely loved this game. And being a kid, I probably didn’t care that the game had weird writing. I think it goes to show that the content of the text far outshone the presentation. Anyway, that aside, here we see that the English line again says “Crystal of Water” while the Japanese text just says “crystal”. This continues to happen a few more times in this intro. Someone must’ve been like, “All right, guys! Make sure to change every instance of ! Just do it!”Air of a Rebel. When Baigan talks to the king about Cecil, the text is a bit different in all three games. Note that his name is spelled more like “Beigan” in the Japanese version. FFIV (basic translation)FFIV Easy Type (basic translation)FFIIBeigan: Your Majesty! I’m afraid Cecil has developed quite a rebellious air. King of Baron: Truly?! As the head of the Royal Guard, you are as astute as I had hoped. You did well in informing me! King of Baron: Truly?! As the head of the Royal Guard, you are as astute as I had hoped.
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