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Post by Weasel on Sept 18, 2009 16:40:27 GMT -5
But people wanna be able to understand it. If it were really like Shakespeare it'd be all... confusing for most. Which is kind of what I was getting at in my last post.
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Post by Sketcz-1000 on Sept 18, 2009 16:49:21 GMT -5
Just to comment on Kobushi mentioning Tolkein... I don't like Tolkein's work. Any of it. He may have invented a lot of the high-fantasy we now take for granted, but countless other, more concise creators have crafted better works based on his foundation.
When I saw Lord of the Rings I was bored silly. I thought to myself, heh. I've seen all this a million times before in countless videogames. Sometimes worse, often better.
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Post by kobushi on Sept 18, 2009 17:27:29 GMT -5
spotlessmind,
I mention chocobos because, in a constructed fantasy setting, the appropriate historical period and prose style is highly debatable.
Your opinion seems firmly entrenched, so I will cede the argument and leave everyone to their opinions. I will also say that if your standards for game writing are as high they appear to be, you are in for plenty of disappointment. While I might wish that video game writing were equal in quality to Tolkien or Shakespeare or a good translation of Homer, I know it's just not there (yet). However, what we have in the meantime is more than sufficient, especially given the improvements in localization quality that have occurred in the last decade.
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Post by kobushi on Sept 18, 2009 17:32:41 GMT -5
Sketcz,
It pains me to hear that, but I completely understand. So much has been built upon Tolkien's foundation that when you dig back down to the original, it seems small and pedestrian in comparison.
So many video games are the same way: after Fallout 1 and 2, who can return to Wasteland?
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Post by Sketcz-1000 on Sept 18, 2009 17:43:13 GMT -5
Unfortunately I only discovered Tolkein after I had read books, seen films, and played games, dealing with material similar to his. So as you say, going to it, in my case for the first time, it didn't feel fresh. If anything, the horrible irony was, it felt derivative.
As a pointless side note, I seem to recall some French animation, set in a post-apocalyptic wasteland, with people riding on birds which to me resembled Chocobos.
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Post by wyrdwad on Sept 18, 2009 17:46:47 GMT -5
This.
I consider Alexander Smith's faux medieval English to be absolutely perfect. It's not about accuracy, it's about communicating the IDEA of old English. It feels period, without actually BEING period. And that, to me, is brilliant. I love reading works written in that fashion. You may find it juvenile, Spotlessmind, but I find it to be absolutely charming and wonderfully written. I wouldn't want it any other way.
-Tom
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Post by ryochan on Sept 18, 2009 20:32:59 GMT -5
As a pointless side note, I seem to recall some French animation, set in a post-apocalyptic wasteland, with people riding on birds which to me resembled Chocobos. I believe the animation you are referring to would be Wizards. It, at least as far as I remember, had a very unique sense of humor to it that went over my head at the time in which I saw it (I was very young). As for the FFT discussion, I haven't played the PSP game really, and only seen some of it in action, so I won't comment on that, however... Tolkien used a fairly easy to read writing style if one asks me, and as far as I know, Shakespare made up a lot of his stuff, or at least took the language had really messed around with it. Please correct me if I'm wrong. And it's sad that you couldn't enjoy Tolkien's works too much. I just try to remember, when I read an older novel, that these are kind of like playing a NES game compared to a PS2 game... before and afters
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Post by derboo on Sept 20, 2009 3:12:34 GMT -5
I think that is supposed to say "These are now a mainstream genre"...
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Post by kyouki on Sept 20, 2009 8:23:33 GMT -5
I have not yet played a game that is written in Ye Olde Japanese, so I don't understand the need to translate it into some half-assed attempt at old English. I just lied. Shadow Tower Abyss has some characters that speak in oldish Japanese so maybe you could translate their dialog like "Thou hast blah blah blah." From what I recall of playing Vagrant Story, the script was in modern Japanese.
Using old English gives games an air of sophistication that they don't even have in the land of their birth. No one would write a game in old Japanese in Japan, because very few people over there would even care. They all study old Japanese just like we in the US study Shakespeare and Chaucer in high school, but once you pass those classes you're not gonna remember any of that, unless you go on to study it at university of go on to pursue a career in it.
However, having said that, I felt the English translation of Vagrant Story read pretty well. Not as well as if it had been just done straight through in modern English, but pretty well.
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Post by Atma on Sept 20, 2009 8:36:20 GMT -5
Using old English gives games an air of sophistication that they don't even have in the land of their birth. No one would write a game in old Japanese in Japan, because very few people over there would even care. They all study old Japanese just like we in the US study Shakespeare and Chaucer in high school, but once you pass those classes you're not gonna remember any of that, unless you go on to study it at university of go on to pursue a career in it. And here's what depresses me about the world, all wrapped up neatly in a package with a bow. Nobody likes or cares about writing or reading or using language properly anymore. Nobody likes our roots. Sometimes it's much better to use certain styles or dialects than to use plain/flat modern language, and it pleases me when people put time into their scripts to make it sound better/more authentic/flow better. Literal translations/speaking for the instant-lose.
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Post by kyouki on Sept 20, 2009 8:38:39 GMT -5
Why? When a translation into modern English could be just as easy to read- and the source material was written in a modern language as well- why translate it into a made up dialect of English that sort of seems like old English but isn't really?
If this were some classical Japanese text we were talking about I could understand complaints. Translating The Book of Five Rings or Manyoshu (dunno what this translates into in English other than the literal meaning) or something into modern English (it has been done) would not seem quite right. But a video game? That was written in modern Japanese for kids to play? Why not use modern English?
In other words, just because it looks older doesn't make it better. People have a very good reason to forget about old English/classical Japanese after high school. It's nice to know the basics, but they are dead languages, they have changed. Leave old languages to the scholars and hobbyists, they are the only people that can properly appreciate them anyhow.
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Post by Atma on Sept 20, 2009 8:47:57 GMT -5
Leave old languages to the scholars and hobbyists, they are the only people that can properly appreciate them anyhow. You're talking to one right now, thus my anger.
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Post by kyouki on Sept 20, 2009 8:56:15 GMT -5
Well, the fact that video games do not tend to include fake old English even though the Japanese versions are written in language meant for children shouldn't bother you then because you can always read grown up books meant for people like you who can appreciate classical languages.
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Post by Atma on Sept 20, 2009 9:01:57 GMT -5
I like both modern and old versions of languages (Japanese AND English major, here) but I just feel I get something more if the language fits the mood/setting of the world in whatever I'm playing/reading/watching/eating/etc. I know old language wouldn't sound right in a super gritty futuristic sci-fi FPS, but it sounds quite at home in games like FFT, and it's that extra effort that makes me smile. If it's a fictional world anyways, the people working on it/creating it can have them speak however they want, because their world laws may state their language is not as advanced and such, so if the shoe fits... And yes, I realize I am a gigantic dork for spewing about language so much.
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Post by kyouki on Sept 20, 2009 9:06:10 GMT -5
It's a good point, but I guess I am more a utilitarian when it comes to language. I just want the information passed to me in as succint a manner possible, and if the translation reads smoothly, all the better.
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