AdventSign

As a console chad, I feel good. Not gonna lie.

Edited

I think the fact that fan translations are still coming is very interesting, considering there's at least some market for translations to make money from. Tsurezurescans (who I do not really know much about) seem to be an anomaly in my mind in that I don't see many people really complaining about quality of translation, and they are working pretty consistently, when fan translations seem to be on the back burner/disappearing.

I honestly appreciate the effort by anyone putting in proper time to put out fan translations, even if they are poor quality, because I don't think they close any doors because there is no license and if they are poor quality then anyone can make a new one still.

That all said there are obviously merits and and demerits to official translation companies. I think ideally larger visual novel companies would themselves expand out from Japan and hire translators to ensure the quality of their products as I'm sure they care more about it and their brand than third party licencors. But as it is we really benefit from having so many companies translating visual novels for the obvious fact there are lots of them that might not get touched otherwise, or at least not for a long time. Though there's obviously the fact that this means if its a machine translation or a busted translation then we might not ever get a good one unless fans are really skirting on copyright infringement to do their own translations or fix the official one. So yeah, good and bad.

Just to chip in my thoughts on a couple of those points, since some I strongly agree with, and some I disagree with, and I think I have a somewhat balanced view having been on both the fan and pro side of VN loc...
Strongly agree with this one. You will see companies pick up things simply because of staff enthusiasm at times, but it's the exception that proves the rule. Generally speaking, fan translation is probably the best shot for localizations for much older, "classic" titles.
Official TLs are actually in worse shape here than fan TLs. It's far more common for fan TLs to have someone in a "translation checker"-type capacity than it is for official TLs, since fan TLs have the luxury of time and (oddly enough) resources. There's barely enough money in professional VN loc to pay a (not very good) rate for TL, edit, and QC; unless you're looking at a truly exceptional scenario (Muv Luv and Clannad come to mind as probably having had more resources available than most official loc projects), there's no money at all to pay for extra hands beyond that.
These are generally very light-handed, and ultimately more like guidelines than rules. Except in really superficial, stylistic ways, all the releases even from a single given company will vary wildly in their approach to various localization decisions, due to the influence of the many freelance translators and editors employed by each company.
Same. Though I'll caution by adding that, at least in my case, I only feel that way as long as the TL in question is delivered with care and quality, just like I'd want from an official TL. If it's a poorly edited google translate job, then it's worse than nothing, since it puts the nail in the coffin for any chance of a quality translation, and I wouldn't want that for any game I cared about. But that can obviously happen with either a fan TL or an official TL, as the recent Tenkiame release for example shows... Neither fan nor official TL has either a monopoly on or a guarantee of quality.

What happened with you, old man?
What a boring answer. You lost that spice.

To be honest, there's not too much up front. If there's usually drama, it's usually behind the scenes.
My advice: don't go looking for it and nod your head up and down when somebody is telling you stuff, but try not to take sides.
A lot of the times when people say shit, it's because they've felt wronged or treated unfairly and just want to vent.
Don't be me and be a jack ass. Sarcasm doesn't go too well in arguments and I'm pretty bad when it comes to dumb and pointless fights.
You'll be disliked quite quickly.  

There will always be people who don't like others for one reason or another. Doesn't mean you need to not like those same people.
Everyone is pretty civil on here either way and most of the times are friendly. Even fights on here are usually short lived. All in all, it's one of the better communities. 

I wouldn't pay Zakamutt's comments any mind; he's just fishing for a response. Very typical behaviour of elitist 'muh Japanese' NEETs that know nothing of the world beyond the walls of their parents' home.
That aside, I do understand your frustration, but I don't think taking it out on the team members, past or present, is a good idea. No, people don't always know their own limits. A lot of people that join projects are inexperienced, young, or unsure of their own capabilities. Things happen, and at the end of the day it's entirely a group of volunteers doing something out of passion. I'm sure most of the people that were once involved with the project would have liked to see it complete just as much as you do.
Rather, I would encourage you to put your energy to good use and focus on your current and future endeavours. You may very well be able to contribute to a new (or existing) project for this game, no?

I can do it if you can provide me a legal copy of the game.

I'd love to if you pay me for it or for my rent or schooling or food for who I have to currently support alone, etc.
Otherwise, I have other thing I *have to* learn and juggle in life with, oddly enough, don't make anything in life either.
I wouldn't have anything if I didn't pursue attempting to get better at English "rules" either. You can be a jack of all trades and a master of none, or you can specialize elsewhere in life. I've decided to in the medical field and humanistic field (which I does take a toll mentally being around death constantly). Ironically, I probably would have been better focusing on English and then moving on to Japanese instead of humanities/medicine. Wouldn't be as fucked up as I am now and the most I'd have to worry about is constant subjection to criticism and personal credibility.
Also, I'm *attempting* to improve in English writing as my TL is improving in Japanese. We wouldn't have a shot at what we're doing otherwise. Though at the rate he's going, he won't need me for too much longer. Once that happens, then I'd say that your comment holds more water than it currently does.
Now, please do on about my superiority to learning Japanese. Seems like comments like these always pop up when somebody has a stick up their butts. Kinda surprised it wasn't said sooner.

If you have time to write these posts you have time to learn Japanese

Thanks now learn Japanese to demonstate your superior commitment

Suppose I owe an apology to FRC. I do get why you dropped it. Guess I shouldn't be putting everyone into a single box and generalize things.
Still, my point stands regarding the commitment sorely lacking in TL groups nowadays, especially when you looked at the dropped and stalled projects as of late.

I'm dropping this project. My apologies to anyone who was looking forward to it.
Because the common route hasn't been edited, I won't release a partial patch (it wouldn't be enjoyable to read). Conversely, the editing in the heroine routes is so heavy (often replacing entire sections of narration by original text) that I also won't release the translation for others to pick up. If this game ever gets a full translation, it should be a consistent one.

I assure you that it's entirely good news. It means my work on Sanoba Witch will be over and I'll be able to take my first serious amount of time off from work in a very long time. You have no idea how much I'm looking forward to it.
edit: Also, in case you're worried, post-break my schedule is looking somewhat easier in the coming months as well, so I expect to be able to keep up with site stuff after its over too.

@Decay I messaged Tay about it over the summer. I just checked the message and he still hasn't viewed it yet so he probably hasn't even logged in since before I sent the message.
And yeah, I honestly wasn't actually expecting to be allowed to write the posts because no one really knows who I am, but I thought it was worth a shot. That said, if you're ever looking to expand the team, I'm ready and willing to learn.

What conclusion we draw about this? Regardless of translation quality people will never be happy, period.

Ah, it may be so.
Also, I agree with your 0-10 scale. Nice description.
As for reasons somebody gets angry with poor TL released - it may be kind of "disservice" to such reader. I mean - if translation is hard to read, it may serioulsy dampen enjoyment and impact of the story, yet if one decides to wade through it to the end, the story may be "spoiled" for them, so then even if improved release would come out, damage is done and they may lose interest in a game.
But yet again - my experience was different. I experienced only one such case - Konosora. I read Kotori's route from the initial release, then dropped it in the middle of Ageha's route. But when retranslation was released, I reread the whole thing, and enjoyed it. Ironically, in this case it was the official release that was bad, and fan-TL patch that fixed it, so the other way around Also, since I enjoyed Kotori's route even with bad original translation, and wasn't sure then when the patch would be released, that prompted me to start learning Japanese
So, what can I say - when you detect signs of poor translation to the point that it gets in your way, better to drop the title and hope for better release in the future? Or, learn you-know-what-language
 

To be honest, it feels that a lot of "poor translations" could have been avoided if the team (or individual) were more open to constructive feedback and were willing to redo some of their work.
It's definitely time consuming, but isn't it worth it knowing you did your best and learned a thing or two from it?

I'll do my all to stop the FD from getting localized

Being a part of a fan-tl, I can tell you first hand what I have an issue with. I have no experience working in a VN company, so I cannot speak for them. 
To be honest, I welcome any criticism to our project. The problem is when people shit on your work and then going and say "well it's your work" and then proceed to tell you to work on English/Japanese. That effectively stalls a project for months and months, which is why you're seeing a lot of fan-tls stall. Unlike when fan-tls first time into play, criticism is much more prevalent because of a "set" of rules and expectations set by the industry and the individuals that work within it. So now do you not only have less fan-tls because of them being merged into companies, you have people becoming demoralized and trying to learn a language, which that in itself isn't bad.
When you drill into somebody new that it needs to be "perfect", that's when problems come up. It can be very overwhelming to new people, causing them to write mistake after mistake or slow/stall their TLs/edits to a crawl in fear of looking bad. Logically, it's better to come back to it later when you know the language better to "save face", but people have lives and what might have been a completed TL with some mistakes is now an indefinitely stalled TL. I feel it would only be fair to have the same standards that were set in place when fan-TLs first started. Currently, the only people that are learning are those that have already learned from the mistakes years ago before people became more critical of people's work. New TLs/editors are actively being discouraged because of the hypocrisy that the community in general is showing. Expecting a good tl and then telling them to learn it themselves is a horrible message to give off, especially if most of the people in current projects learned by doing, rather than researching.
In all honesty, *WE* are the reason fan TLs are dying. There's a major experience gap between people who have done this for years and those that are just starting out and people aren't willing to personally mentor or become more active in current projects to share what they've learned from the mistakes they've made in the past and instead say they're shit, writing stuff in Japanese to make fun of them so people who are just starting out can't read it and only a joke that "experienced" people would get or just putting people down, saying that they'll help them if they "get better" (which makes no sense and goes back to the perfection piece I mentioned earlier).

The day a fan tl group selects something other than a regular moege and chooses something people have hyped up and have waited for for a long time to play, then i suspect you'll get quite the following.
You can have a masters degree in both japanese and english and people will still complain. But this is how the world is. Cant do anything about that.
Too bad about the translator though. I'm sure ambitions have been the death of many groups and translations. Both finished and unfinished. Important that everyone is on the same wavelength or drama and disolvement will likely happen.

You said it yourself, you cant please everybody and people will look for things to bring you down with. Screw industry standards. they get paid to work excessively on the translation, you dont. And the awesome thing about being a fan tl group is that at the end of the day you dont answer to anybody outside the group. Keep that in mind. Its always good to listen to contructive critisism and advice of course without feeling insulted and throwing a tantrum, but the obnoxious ones should be ignored.

Being a part of a fan-tl, I can tell you first hand what I have an issue with. I have no experience working in a VN company, so I cannot speak for them. 
To be honest, I welcome any criticism to our project. The problem is when people shit on your work and then going and say "well it's your work" and then proceed to tell you to work on English/Japanese. That effectively stalls a project for months and months, which is why you're seeing a lot of fan-tls stall. Unlike when fan-tls first time into play, criticism is much more prevalent because of a "set" of rules and expectations set by the industry and the individuals that work within it. So now do you not only have less fan-tls because of them being merged into companies, you have people becoming demoralized and trying to learn a language, which that in itself isn't bad.
When you drill into somebody new that it needs to be "perfect", that's when problems come up. It can be very overwhelming to new people, causing them to write mistake after mistake or slow/stall their TLs/edits to a crawl in fear of looking bad. Logically, it's better to come back to it later when you know the language better to "save face", but people have lives and what might have been a completed TL with some mistakes is now an indefinitely stalled TL. I feel it would only be fair to have the same standards that were set in place when fan-TLs first started. Currently, the only people that are learning are those that have already learned from the mistakes years ago before people became more critical of people's work. New TLs/editors are actively being discouraged because of the hypocrisy that the community in general is showing. Expecting a good tl and then telling them to learn it themselves is a horrible message to give off, especially if most of the people in current projects learned by doing, rather than researching.
In all honesty, *WE* are the reason fan TLs are dying. There's a major experience gap between people who have done this for years and those that are just starting out and people aren't willing to personally mentor or become more active in current projects to share what they've learned from the mistakes they've made in the past and instead say they're shit, writing stuff in Japanese to make fun of them so people who are just starting out can't read it and only a joke that "experienced" people would get or just putting people down, saying that they'll help them if they "get better" (which makes no sense and goes back to the perfection piece I mentioned earlier).

Now, it isn't entirely the companies and community's fault either. There's also those people with low self esteem who take constructive criticism as shit talking. NOBODY would spend an hour on a post unless they either hated somebody or genuinely want to help, regardless of why they would. Those that can't take constructive criticism have to accept that it's part of learning and if there's any help and knowledge to be gained. If anything will speed up learning more than looking at books, it's constructive criticism on your own work. Doesn't mean you have to go re-writing and re-translating the entire script or that it has to be perfect. That takes months and months and can kill projects. Yes, this makes it imperfect and puts the quality lower than an official TL. Here's the thing: does it still read well and get the meaning and characterization across? If so, you've done your job. People who know Japanese and English are the toughest critics, and it's understandable. But there's a fine line being being helpful and demoralizing the team.
I've seen so much destructive criticism from outside our project not for translation errors, but because they prefer literal over liberal, or something that's related more to preference. I trust my TL to do what he needs to do, and that could be why our project is still alive. He's come back after 2 years and is re-TLing it and he's actually pretty good with idioms and English. I encourage him to write liberally as I correct him or use more appropriate words. It's pretty interesting tbh how far we've come since our starting point two years ago. Some people like it more, some people like it less. But there's no doubt in my mind he's gotten better, and I also feel that I can match his expectations as the editor. If other people feel differently, then that's understandable. But that's life, and if people want to help, I'll listen. If people don't, then there's no point in listening. It's why I'm usually not demoralized, yet continue to learn what I need to for the team.
Also, it's a bit idiotic to use destructive criticism on a TL. Giving resources to help get better doesn't count as constructive either because of how overwhelming it can be learning English from textbooks, as well as some people learn more by doing rather than researching and studying. You lose TLs that way, and that's one of the ways projects can die.Take some time away from what you're doing and help out. They'll probably make the same mistakes over and over again, but that's learning and expecting people to pick up what others are saying right off the bat is ridiculous and unfair. 
Therefore, it's everyone's fault. Sure, there's some blame that should be placed more on others, but people also have to be able to take criticism, since there's people out there with patience who *are* actively trying to help and are pushed aside due to fear of destructive criticism from them. Some people are also truly stubborn and just don't want help, which can't really be helped by anyone. You gotta accept help in order to be helped, after all. It's just a big mess in general and there's so many ways you can look at it. My opinion is very unpopular though among certain individuals, but I consider it the reality we live in. There's so many other things I can say about this topic, but I'll save it for another day

That's a good idea, though you have to be careful. Dem localization companies might hit you with a Cease & Desist if they find out you're doing another variant of what Kiririri is doing. He is a well-renown translator in multiple companies. One of the biggest guys around. Even bigger than Moogy. If we are going to make a different varient, we should release it anonymously to avoid a C&D using a VPN.
We got dis boys. Sharing is caring, after all. People have forgotten how to share, so it's important to remind them.