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Mahou Shoujo Translation Project


Chronopolis

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Mahou Shoujo (Mahosho) Translation Project

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Progress

TL: 11/40 Chapters (updated 2/28/2016)
Editing: ~3/40 Chapters
QC: 1/40

You can always check the Live Progress Report on google docs. That page will always be up to date.

Project Introduction

Spoiler

Mahou Shoujo's a freeware VN/SRPG hybrid with an exceptional focus on character detail and interactions. I stumbled upon this game while browsing on the Japanese VN-site Erogamescape and was completely struck by it. I don't think I've ever seen a serious plot story with much attention payed this to the characters. Things also become very serious and heart-wrenching in places.

Chiyoko, the girl on the left, is technically the main character, but the spotlight is spread across more than 25 characters. Mahou Shoujo has a huge cast. There are about 15 major characters, and about a dozen or so more that stand out somewhat less.

It's like Corpse Party in that you have a bunch of characters in a tense situation where story depends on what how they react and their personality, except this is on a different dimension. If you games which revolve around the characters reacting to things and deciding what to do, you'll like this.

Mahou Shoujo's a very unknown game outside the Japanese free-game community, which is why I really want to spread word of it and give a chance for those would appreciate this uncommon type of story the chance to experience it.

Description

Spoiler

One day monsters appear in Kakyou City. The school Chiyoko and Haruka are in shakes like during an earthquake and the window panes shatter all at once. During the commotion, the two rush to the rooftop. What they see are bodies lying in the street and smoke in the distance.

There, a strange talking cat approaches them and asks them to become 'warriors' in order to fight against these 'Biomonsters'. Panicked, Chiyoko is first to agree. She receives a round gemstone-looking transformation device along with a rather painful needle to the spine. Now a 'warrior', she is able to travel faster than the speed of sound and put up a fight against the monsters. But it is no cakewalk. The first battles are panicked and teeth-gritting. Even with Haruka joining her, they barely are able to fend off the first wave.
The cat tells Chiyoko and Haruka they have to search for more students with the potential to become 'warriors' like them. Over the next few weeks they continue searching for members, however, Chiyoko's reputation as a dangerous person and her slight lack of common sense don't do them any favours, as she ends up frequently misunderstood. But besides that, not everyone isn't so willing to risk their life. Why should they be? This isn't the army. No-one is there to force them to join, or to maintain order.

How does it feel like to be part of a group with other students risking your life to protect your city? What are you going to think of the other people there? You share a secret in common with these people, you're risking your life beside these people. But are you really all just going to become comrades?

Some reach out and interact with others. Some reach out to their friends anew. Others sit back and watch anxiously, or perhaps in disapproval. Even while the threat of annihilation grows, their personal worries all remain in the air.

 
The days ahead lay filled with turmoil, large and small.
 
 

Game info (and screenshots)

Spoiler

Game creator: TS_tassan (Home page, twitter), solo developer of the circle Shinjita Ore Ga Baka Datta (信じた俺が馬鹿だった 'I was a fool to believe that'))
Game listing: (vndb, EGS, Free-game Mugen)
Aliases: Mahosho (まほしょ)

Long (30-50 hours), non-voiced.

Game has a median score of 90 on EGS and is rated 4th highest overall on Free-game Mugen

https://s.vndb.org/sf/33/92933.jpg

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https://s.vndb.org/sf/38/92938.jpg

Staff

Spoiler

TL, Editor: @Chronopolis

QC, Editing: @john 'mr. customer' smith

Image Editor: @Deep Blue
 

Timeline

Spoiler

I am planning to do a single partial release with about the first 16-17 chapters.

Timeline:

Partial release: Sept. 2017 (First 16-17 chapters)
Full game: 2019 Q1/Q2 Estimate

Edit: first estimate was optimistic~

Looking for: None at the moment

Spoiler

Image Editor - I'll need someone to do of the camp images which show up in between chapters. There textboxes of character introductions and of which units you can deploy for the next chapter. It shouldn't be too complicated. (good for now, thanks @Deep Blue)
QC's - Looking for someone to proofread for typos, and lines where things are unclear (mainly about conveying the emotions of the character)

Contact

Spoiler

 

Edited by Chronopolis
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4 minutes ago, Dergonu said:

That's an interesting title to TL.

Best of luck on your project.

Thanks, you too. I really like your dedication to yuri :). There isn't really any here, but at least there are a ton of pairings to be had. Only, it's a bit hard fantasize about the characters because the story is pretty serious and down to earth.

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9 minutes ago, john 'mr. customer' smith said:

I'd like to volunteer for QC.

could we see some screenshots/art though? Just curious

You can find screenshots on the vndb page:
https://vndb.org/v19011
The game was released in 2012 (a year after madoka), but it was made on a really old engine. Personally I think the art's cute though.

Sure awesome, I can put you up. Yeah, the game is pretty long, though shorter in line count compared to most visual novels because it's almost completely dialogue. It's about...15-20k lines in total? There's no irretractable commitment, so no need to worry.

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Thanks for the support everyone. I did not expect there to be people offering to help so quickly, thanks ^^.

5 hours ago, Deep Blue said:

I can help with the image editor position if you need someone, seems like a good game so best of luck!

Awesome, I really appreciate it. In about a months time I'll have like 10-15 images for the partial release (total game has around 55, plus a few fun explanation cut-ins and credit screens).

The camp images are like this. Only potential gotcha is that they are 8-bit, 256-color bitmaps.

Spoiler

NSK69vH.png

 

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10 hours ago, Chronopolis said:

Thanks for the support everyone. I did not expect there to be people offering to help so quickly, thanks ^^.

Awesome, I really appreciate it. In about a months time I'll have like 10-15 images for the partial release (total game has around 55, plus a few fun explanation cut-ins and credit screens).

The camp images are like this. Only potential gotcha is that they are 8-bit, 256-color bitmaps.

  Hide contents

NSK69vH.png

 

I think I can manage ^_^ (everything is a placeholder it's just to give a general idea) 

Spoiler

WECBwVh.png

 

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3 hours ago, Deep Blue said:

I think I can manage ^_^ (everything is a placeholder it's just to give a general idea) 

  Hide contents

WECBwVh.png

 

LOL, you had me at bla bla bla loli bla. It looks good, really similar the original. I kinda need more text to fit in though.

Here's how much text we're talking about. I could shorten this a bit, but there are profiles that have even more stuffed into that box.

Spoiler

Haruka Hinata 13y.o.  3rd year Middle School  Type-O
Her study and athletic ability are above average, she is also well-connected socially. At times she can be overly indecisive ― she also is has a mild fixation on cleanliness ― but she manages these well and fits in. Her personality is such that she rarely voices her inner thoughts.

Like this, maybe? This is Tahoma, size 7.4.

Spoiler

9d0f6205df.jpg

 

 

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Just now, Chronopolis said:

LOL, you had me at bla bla bla loli bla. It looks good, really similar the original. I kinda need more text to fit in though.

Here's how much text we're talking about. I could shorten this a bit, but there are profiles that have even more stuffed into that box.

  Reveal hidden contents

Haruka Hinata 13y.o.  3rd year Middle School  Type-O
Her study and athletic ability are above average, she is also well-connected socially. At times she can be overly indecisive ― she also is has a mild fixation on cleanliness ― but she manages these well and fits in. Her personality is such that she rarely voices her inner thoughts.

Like this, maybe? This is Tahoma, size 7.4.

  Reveal hidden contents

9d0f6205df.jpg

 

 

like I said before everything is placeholder, the font, the size, (the text written xd) I need to find something that even being really small looks good like the original text and at the same time can be readable (having miniature font is not a good idea sooner or later it will cause eye strain on the reader..), as you know the text written in english needs a lot more space than the same text in japanese.

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1 minute ago, Deep Blue said:

like I said before everything is placeholder, the font, the size, (the text written xd) I need to find something that even being really small looks good like the original text and at the same time can be readable (having miniature font is not a good idea sooner or later it will cause eye strain on the reader..), as you know the text written in english needs a lot more space than the same text in japanese.

Okay cool lolis I leave it up to you. Definitely don't want to blind people with the small font.

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10 hours ago, billybob300c said:

TL, Editor: @Chronopolis

This looks alarming.  No matter how good of a TL you are, it'll be tough to spot your own mistakes from your own point of view.  You should probably get another person for an editor, as they'll have a fresh set of eyes to judge your work with.  Good luck.

For the bulk of the editing work, I think it's reasonable doing it myself, since I'm doing the editing pass a week or more after the initial TL. I'm also doing multiple passes, usually two, plus one final check. Though you are also right, the fresh set of eyes are definitely valuable, since by myself I can't make sure it's all natural and not weird in places.

Basically, there's a lot an editor could do here, but it's spread out over a couple different things. It's more like fixing weird things here, improving flow, and creating a better version there, rather than generating all the natural English. If they came up with a nice edited version for a whole sequence, I probably wouldn't object to using that.

But in general especially for this work, I feel like there are so many nuance changes that it would take too long to consult with the editor and explain everything. I believe that for this, the unedited version isn't enough to convey everything to the editor in this case, unless they know Japanese. If the work was less nuanced, and my TL style more mechanical and consistent, I think an editor could roll through naturalizing all the lines accurately just fine.

Of course, you'll often be discarding little bits of nuance and that's perfectly fine, but what I'm talking about is the editor misunderstanding the English because it sounds like the English could be nicely improved to Y, where as it really is an semi-awkward representation of something different, X.

It would help if they knew Japanese, but good editing skills are primary. Basically, this is how I think an editor's role would look like in this project: they edit the stuff they notice, plus the stuff I think are questionable, while consulting with me. I'd welcome anyone sharing their experiences for how they handled TL/editing in their own projects.

By the way, if that sounds like something anyone would be interested in doing/trying out as an editing role, feel free to contact me.

 

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You'll also want a TLC to double check your TL, especially since you're bound to run into errors when working on a 30-50 hour long VN.  But yeah, you just need to consult with your editor until each 50,000+ sentences are right on.   

Here's an example of translation versus edit:

Translation Text:  Her father died, which only made her feel absolutely devastated inside.  Fate was not kind that day indeed.  And so, she stayed in her father's tree house that he made, and kept on crying without end.  Its name was... Avalon.

Edited Text:  She was torn apart by the passing of her father, damned by fate, consumed by emptiness, her eyes bloodshot, her heart broken, never wanting to leave the tree house he built just for her -- Avalon.

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Update and call for Chapter 1 testers

Work is slowly progressing. Now that we have a inserted and ready portion of the game, we are currently looking for a couple testers for Chapter 1.

Chapter 1 is about 40-60 minutes long, and your job will be to just let us know overall impressions, and if you noticed anywhere where the text was confusing or distracting. This is important cause it lets adjust our conventions before our QC goes further. If you spot any errors, that's great too (The script has been proofread and play-tested, but you never know.)

To repeat, this is just for chapter 1. A full call for testers will come later, when were are close to releasing our first patch (first ~17 chapters or so).

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