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The problem is that you can't actually get a lot of good criticism. Usually it's 99% vague autistic screeching. With that said I'd love for that autist anon on 4chan to go through one of my translations in case I let some mistranslations slip through, I can just ignore whatever things I don't care about in his evaluation. That's only the reading-the-japanese side of translation though which is not that big of a part of it. It is incredibly rare to get critique on an actually useful level, and it's certainly not going to come from the fans who actually get upset about most translations.

The problem with thinking 'prose' is all about muh chuunige or whatever is that much of comedy is just as dependent on good unmetered writing as whatever the so-called prose nerds like. Would Grisaia's common route, which could well have continued into moe style routes rather than what it actually does with a few tweaks, really have been close to as good with a lame translation? Good prose doesn't have to mean big words or descriptions tinted dangerously close to the violet end of the spectrum either. Nailing character voice, which seems to me like something you'd want in a character-focused moege to make the girls feel alive, is entirely a prose problem, and indeed a translation quality problem.

I flatly refuse to CHANGE TO IMPERIAL is what I mean. Haha.

My post was already deleted

I believe its time for us normal folk to abandon this thread before the folk that come comment to ruin sensible discussion decided to get even more aggressive than they already seem to have been on this thread. Easier to not feed them, since they thrive off potentially starting trouble .

that's very true but also remember that those are more likely to be the big ones that people like to say are good and that some people also like to translate poorly

Reading an Ernest Hemingway book would probably kill this man.

Maybe he meant that he refuses to change FROM metric while translating (which is used in originals, as Japan uses it)? EDIT: Looks like it BTW It seems that my memory of Fureraba wasn't as unreliable as I was afraid Unfortunately, probably because of aforementioned short deadlines and similar reasons, it doesn't work as it should - from the SolPress titles I've played so far (Sakura Sakura and Hitotsuba), it was always obvious which version was the "true" one, as the other one had various hiccups. Probably because nobody had the time and money to retranslate it using different style that would suit the selected option the best - there were just quick replacement-like edits, and IMO they were not enough.

Ungrateful was with respect to fan translations. If you pay for something you have the right to get what you paid for, but the problem is there are so few translators they get worked too hard with too short a deadline and in that scenario it's not their fault if quality drops off. Solpress does indeed have the honorific toggle option - which means we have to do even more translation for the same (very low) fee by the way. I'd love to translate in English instead of American, but that's not up to me. As for changing units, I flatly refuse to do that.

VNs were a mistake.

Triggered. Note the 'What you want.'

First off, I'm new to this forum, but i can't seem to solve my problems so I'm desperately making an account to try and solve all this. i apologize if i posted in the wrong forum. I'm attempting to translate "Torikago no Marriage" also known as Birdcage Marriage or 鳥籠のマリアージュ. The game was developed by Kalmia8. is listed to use the KiriKiri2 engine. VNDB page: https://vndb.org/v13849 First off: I am translating the .png images i have extracted from the game's data.xp3 with a nekopara bms script (http://aluigi.altervista.org/papers/bms/others/nekopara.bms), krkrextract is an absolute nightmare to work with and this script worked just fine. all the images extract as png. no fancy files to work with. but when repacking (i have tried this with krkrextract, it worked that one time, as well as the old xp3-tools) i thought xp3-tools didn't work due to how old it was, so i tried krkrextract and...? hooray! the same error. something about startup.tjs not being found. and who would have known...? there isn't a startup.tjs in data.xp3, neither is it anywhere else. Second off: People say that all the text is stored in scenario.xp3 with all the ks files... well guess what? this game doesn't even have a scenario.xp3! not even a single one of the files in any xp3 for the game has a damn ks file. and this is the same case for "Kami-sama nante yondenai!" which is also a game by Kalmia8, however, Fashioning Little Miss Lonesome, a game which was actually localized, did have all the files i'm missing. good to note that the games still ran with scripts so they are somewhere Third off: I heard that the missing tjs file error can be solved by removing the checks for the files, which could ultimately solve my problem regarding the missing non-existent file. but it involves editing a ks file. guess who doesn't have the ks file? other things to note, when the .xp3.sig files for the xp3 files are removed from the folder (as well as the tpm, which i heard was part of the protection), the game still runs. nothing stopped the game from running until i removed the original data.xp3 which didn't prompt an error for startup.tjs, only my modified data.xp3 prompted the error to show. I tried listing as much information as I can about the problem. I really hope someone can come over to this post and bless me with some help. this is driving me insane.

1. Nobody said you had to read books to be a "real" reader. You're making connections that aren't there. It was a jab at your "arguments" against prose mattering in a localization. 2. Yes. As you've shown in the past, you have no clue about what prose is and how it affects reading experiences, and people right criticized you for it. If you don't know what it is, just don't talk about it. Simple. 3. I'm aware. The prose argument doesn't even apply to those VNs. With those, it's more TL/editing mistakes more than anything. 4. That 5% consists of some of the biggest VNs in the scene, so obviously people will care if somebody unqualified tries to TL it. If you can't write at the same level in English as the original writer can in Japanese, what's the point? 5. Weren't you the one who said that prose is only in about 5% of VNs? Obviously if that were the case, their values wouldn't apply to everything. Plus, these "elitists" care about the source material and want to see it localized in the best way possible. The people who don't want anything they love localized are stupid, that's fair, but maybe don't fault people for being passionate about maintaining prose when you have no clue what it is by your own admission.

This is how your data.xp3 should probably look when extracted (except for some trash files.) Are you sure your extracted the data.xp3 perfectly?

>> saying prose, style & whatever linguistic subleties there are to literature do matter shit, as long as it´s written text, but on the other hand turning choleric upon translators/editors start using heavy swearing, memes, etc etc etc....... *sigh

Ever17's loc is actually the most amusing for using american units; it loses the different depths of the park differing by arc numbers. I think I caught it anyway using either the voiced line or dividing the feet by 3 or whatever, but it was still pretty funny. I wonder if 17 yards would've made sense?

Speaking of weight and measurement systems, a VN I used to work on had one of those lines where I had to make a choice regarding metric/imperial system. Let's just say I am too European to start using "feets" instead of "meters". I hope my American friends will be able to forgive me, for I cannot imagine in my mind what 26.2467 feets stands for, but I sure as hell can imagine how long 8 meters is. Actually, it was not one but a couple of lines. And there was also a line where I had to choose the paper format, LOL. I forgot what it was about, but I recall finding out that the standard paper format size in USA is not the same as everywhere else in the world, including Japan. I think I just left all units and sizes as they were in the Japanese script xD

Being a translator myself, I have no problem with rewriting a sentence to make it sound more natural in the other language, as long as the meaning stays the same. In Fureraba, however, I found quite a few instances which the English sentences were different, sometimes completely, from the original in term of meaning or, how do I say this, the "feel" of them? Like, the sentence was supposed to be quite polite, but the English one sounded pretty rude and forceful. Not to mention those very unnecessary translations of a simple yes/no/umm to a longass line of 5-6 words. They are not exactly bad, just, you know, unnecessary. About honorific, wasn't SolPress the one that "invented" the option that allow people to switch between with and without them? Why can't we just use that? I mean, I'm all for keeping the honorific, but obviously not everyone has the same opinion. And the thing about people being "ungrateful" toward translators, Idk what you mean, and not quite sure about your definition of "ungrateful", but taking in criticism is a really good way to improve your skill. Also, if you are doing a fan trans, then sure, since everyone is getting the patch for free, they just have to deal with it. However, when it's a commercial product and people are paying for it, then they have all the rights to demand the product to be worth their money. It's just common sense. One more small thing, please stop using imperial system in translation...............

Oh, it most definitely was. I thought I even had a screenshot of it, but apparently not. At any rate, it's the sort of think Kyousuke might say, occasionally. Most characters wouldn't say that and don't. BONUS:

Just listen to what majority of fans want and you have a ttanslation where half of the words are in romaji

I suddenly remembered our chat on Discord. And yeah, all your points stand true. Knowing all these things that I've come to realize after following this scene for so long, I dare not to publicly speak ill of any VN translation's quality nowadays, whether it be official or fanTL. The situation has really gone for the worse. It saddens me to say that most English-only VN readers will never understand what it looks like to be the one having to work on this stuff. The stuff you said are things only someone who has worked on visual novel translations can truly understand. All the time, I see VN fans complaining about the minorest of shit that they don't like in some translation works out there (from honorifics inclusion to whether there's too much swearing used in the translation and other types of silly shit), not realizing how difficult it really is to fulfill all of their selfish demands. The people they are looking for to do those "proper translations"... those people don't work on visual novels. I'd really like it if they could stop deluding themselves into expecting amazing translation works done by anyone who's working on VNs nowadays. Only hardcore VN fans and hobbyist type of freelancers work on VNs nowadays. Nobody who has any semblance of self-respect won't come anywhere near VNs. That word you just used in your post... "ungrateful"... that's exactly how I would describe working on VN translations. Ultimately UNGRATEFUL.

The text is long and presents a lot of unique challenges, the artform is lowbrow, the pay is shitful, the deadlines are punishingly short, and some (not all) of the audience is hypercritical and ungrateful. If you were a half decent translator, of all the translation gigs in the world why would you do it unless you loved VNs? Additionally since the pay is so bad one can only earn a living off it by doing vast chunks of stuff they don't like at all. I know many translators that started out loving VNs and translating them has killed their love of them. Luckily I can afford to just do it for fun and will only work on VNs I find appealing in some way. Not everyone is so lucky.

No I dont read books like that and apparently Im supposed to be doing so in order to be a "real" visual novel reader So Im supposed to know what this magical thing called prose that applies to MAYBE 5-10% of all Japanese based visual novels that have actual plot I dont know if these Ernest Hermingway fans noticed but most Japanese visual novels are high school romance comedy slice of life shit. I know you guys are in love with your plot VNs, which is fine, but you're forgetting the prose you care so much only applies to the 5% of VNs the faux-JOP raves about. Im sorry my IQ isnt 200+ to understand stuff stupid elitists like to brag theyre experts about but just think their values apply to everything

"Prose" has become my least favorite word in the VN community because it allows these poser weebs to do their 'holier-than-thou' act of what they think a real translation is (or parroting what people in elitist groups say is a good translation). Especially from those who haven't tried to learn Japanese at all.

Don't rewrite a vn to fit your idiotic humour, include shitty 4chan memes or make characters swear like low class american idiots etcetcetc It's important to know that the consumer base will be a lot larger and more diverse than the circle of fools you mess around with in your free time so obviously and quite logically the best course of action is to make it as widely acceptable as possible (General statement and not directed at you). The inclusion or exclusion of honorifics does not point to a translators skill as it's just a choice of style. I disagree with the removing them, but that doesn't mean i don't like the translation as a whole. A lot of translators talk about prose and keeping stuff in line with the original text, at the very same time as they're rewriting the entire fucking thing. Where is the logic in this? I'll tell you, there isn't any. A translator can be as skillful as he wants, but if his head is completely void of rationality and critical thinking then it's entirely wasted on everyone. If you find it funny and giigle when making every character swear and talk shit all the time and people at large complain about this, don't stand in your corner crying and making a tantrum like some entitled kid. Fix it and/or don't make the mistake the next time. Accepting mistakes made from faulty judgement and learning from them are not only important in this context, but in life in general. Ignoring complaints and pissing off customers is not exactly the brightest idea either. But expected of young and proud up and comers, just a shame they don't learn until they've made a shitty mistake which makes people refuse to buy a vn translated by them anymore and rather torrent or skip it.