I've just about reached my breaking point with these people. They are responsible for almost every last single bit of confusion in the series. Every plot hole, every contradiction. They are also the cause of most of the appalling dialogue in the series. The fact that these people get paid to do atrocious, sub-par and inaccurate work is beyond me. I've been working on an editorial detailing all of their copious fuck-ups and it's still going strong with each new addition. It's simply mind-baffling how they mess up so much, the only conclusion I can reach is that they either rush, don't care, or are simply awful translators. Some of the stuff is like Google Translate material. Actually, that's being too harsh to Google Translate. Software translations are more accurate and, not uncommonly, tend to sound better. There is a lack of consistency between each game, even though the translators were.

There are exceptions. The script for BH4 was an okay translation, it remained somewhat accurate (probably because there wasn't a lot of plot to fuck with) although there were a few mishaps that led to parts of the plot being lost (when Leon meets Ada, he specifically mentions Wesker's organization, but it's missing in the English version) which is the last thing BH4 needed. The script for Separate Ways was translated pretty well, however, this is primarily because the script for Separate Ways was pretty to-the-point and at times, quite vague. There wasn't a lot to screw up. In comparison, they completely butchered Ada's Report. In fact, it is the plot-heavy material (namely files and such) that get screwed up the most.

Some things written in the Japanese version sound off when translated into English. This is generally natural, and it's up to the translators to make it sound right while ensuring that the original intention is kept. In this series, that's not an option, instead they tend to completely re-write it. This is a travesty when the people translating barely have a grasp of English themselves and are not renowned for their writing skills. In the end, the English version sounds worse than it would have if they just literally translated from Japanese. Most of the dialogue in the original Japanese script is straight-forward and quite to-the-point. In English, the dialogue is messy, vague, cheesy, and pretty far removed from the original intention of the writers. This leads to confusion and the plot simply doesn't get very well explained.

Perhaps the worst part about all of this would be that the translation does not actually have any oversight. The developers are Japanese, and very few of them have even a basic grasp of English. As a result, they cannot interject when something is mistranslated (because how would they know? as far as they know, they're perfect), and the translators have quite a lot of leeway when it comes to skipping over things, and often times, making things up completely just to fill the space. To be fair to them, the lack of any help from the Japanese developers would probably be a part of the problem. That would be the case... if the translators weren't Japanese themselves (Shinsaku Ohara, Takuya Shiraiwa, Manabu Takemura, Erik Suzuki, Dan Okada, Abu Takemura, Miki Takano). They just didn't ask.

The developers have never really raised it as an issue because they are oblivious. The only time the issue was raised was with BH1 (because localization ruined part of that game) and BH5 (because Just Cause Productions noticed that CAPCOM's translators can't write worth shit, and while JCP did a decent job, the effort was still sub-par). The only way the developers would be able to tell how bad the localization was, would be if the translators completely re-wrote the storyline. And even then, people would likely blame the writers for that. I'd sacrifice all of the stupid fucking Hollywood shit in BH5 just to fund an actual professional translation of the series. CAPCOM have their priorities completely skewed and it is a travesty that they still have not corrected it after 16 years.

I don't even know where to begin when it comes to examples... but here's a recent one.





One explains the origins of Crimson Heads. One doesn't. Crimson Heads are not called "V-ACTs", V-ACT is just the name of the process the virus causes.

I think that across the board sometimes alot of translators seem to want to translate based off of cultural differences rather than strait literal translations. Be it in movies, anime or games it can be pretty apparent. My only conclusion is that they take our abaility to understand something for granted so they turn it into whatever they want. Its annoying and sometimes a driving reason for me wanting to learn more japanese. (besides the fact i have a japanese wife and should already)
Ive never playn a biohazard game in japanese though so cant really comment on the above, but I dont doubt the inconsistencies. Especially when it comes to confusingly vague dialogue.

What? What is this?

The dialogue has always been quite cheesy and you can obviously tell that in those situations, the characters wouldn't be talking like third graders. It was part of the charm back in those days.

The dialogue itself isn't cheesy in the actual script. It's the translation and piss-poor voice over directing that makes them cheesy.

Localisation is about more than translation. A lot of japanese to english stuff get altered in books, comics, movies, games. In many cases it is not bad translations, it is the subject being made better suited for the intended audience. This doesn't make it wrong since it is intentional.

I acknowledged this already. It's wrong. There are no alterations in the series to make it better suited for the intended audience. The translation is very cut-and-dry, with the text sometimes being "dressed up" to sound more appealing in English. There are a few minor dialogue changes to some things which sound very unnatural in English, but aside from that, unless you think contradictions and plot holes are better suited for non-Japanese players, it's simply bad translation that leads to so much of the plot being skewed and rendered nonsensical.

What kind of things are you talking about? "This character died 20 years ago, but lets change the year he died for no reason because that's more suitable for English players"? If you're going to come up with bullshit, at least provide some evidence or examples.

Please don't try and go the Dracarys route to comment on something you know very little about with nothing to back up your claims.

News Bot, if you learn the art of game hacking, you can probably replace the text in the games and give the fans the translations they deserve. :)

By the way, you sure Manabu Takemura and Abu Takemura aren't the same person?

I'd love to do that, honestly. As they stand, the English translations in the series are practically worthless. It's astounding how much of the plot is either missing, made-up or contradicted.

And they probably are the same, they must've just shortened his name for one game credits and full name for another.

You have to consider though that you as a fan 'know' the source material very well and thus when translating, have a much better grasp of it to translate it properly. Translators being payed by capcom likely have very little knowledge of the game world and it's details etc. And so when they are translating, very little of it actually makes sense to them, so making mistakes or getting confused as to what is being said is far easier.

Like for example with the V-ACT thing you mentioned. For you, you understand they're talking about the process and not naming them because you as a fan, have an existing knowledge of what a Crimson Head is, umbrella's experiments etc.

The translator likely knows little to nothing about any of this and thus when they're translating this stuff, they might easily be confused as to what the writer is referencing V-ACT as. To them, they might get confused and think that they're calling the monster V-ACT and thus the english translation reflects that.

Again, translation is a large part interpretation. As I said in another topic, English has numerous ways to say the exact same thing. You can have 10-20 different words or phrases that all 'mean' the same thing. So when you see the japanese text for 'Traitor', the translator may interpret it as "Betrayal", "Spy" or any number of things based on their assumed context of the script, since as we've already established, a literal translation isn't always best in many cases. So that 'assumed' context plays a heavy role when twisting it into more common english.

So again, you as an RE fan know Wesker is a traitor to Umbrella and know his extensive backstory to translate and understand the original japanese much better than a simple payed translator who might think Wesker is a spy sent by Umbrella based on their limited knowledge of the script.

It's black and white to you, but, very grey to them. Get what I'm saying? I don't think they're 'stupid' so much as just ignorant. Look at how many different ways people interpret things on the internet all the time. We all see the same sentence and yet we all walk away with various different views on what that sentence implies. Look at how many different interpretations of the bible there are and so forth.

So I don't think the translators are lazy or stupid. I think they're just ignorant of the material they're translating and thus it's far easier for them to fuck up the intended meanings because of it, especially if they're told to spin it into more common english rather than direct literal word for word translations.

All of that is very valid and I acknowledge it, but I am hesitant to give the translators much credit.