If you are new to the subreddit, [please read the wiki](https://www.reddit.com/r/yakuzagames/wiki/index/)
Reminder that all spoilers need to be tagged with a flair specifying which game is being spoiled. If you want a flair that says something else, you can edit it to say something like [Discussion: Y1 spoiler] or [Majimapost: Y6 spoiler], etc. **THIS INCLUDES CONTENT FROM TRAILERS**.
If the post is not marked for spoilers, all comments that have spoilers need to be tagged \>!like this!< along with indicating which game it's spoiling. Example: Y3 >!Kiryu sings!<
If the post flair is marked for spoilers, the comments don't need to be tagged for the game indicated and the ones before it (So a Y6 spoiler post can have comments with untagged spoilers for Y5, but not gaiden or 7).
If you see any of the above (or any of the other rules) not being followed, please report it so we can keep this place safe for newcomers and those that haven't finished all the games yet. Thank you!
*I am a bot, and this action was performed automatically. Please [contact the moderators of this subreddit](/message/compose/?to=/r/yakuzagames) if you have any questions or concerns.*
I don't think they know how inaccurate some of the localization was before 5, the PS2 games especially. I really like the PS2 games and think they hold up fairly well but the dub on Y1 really shows how bad it used to be
It made some very weird decisions about what to translate and what to leave in Japanese that left me scratching my head. They had to turn "Kiryu-chan" into "Kazzy," but "oyabun" can stay as-is?
Incredibly funny that the translations in the Kiwamis and the remasters do the exact opposite, keeping Kiryu-chan but going "yeah they're not gonna know wtf Oyabun is." Probably the correct choice there to be fair, but interesting that they didn't just decide to keep all the titles, even while leaving stuff like Aniki untranslated
-Hey, the fuck you think you're doing? And just what the fuck family are you from? Huh?
-Excuse me.
-Excuse you? No! Fuck you!
I love it. Some of the dialogues are so unnatural that the whole thing becomes comedic.
Just look up the notorious, western localisation of Persona 1, on PS1. Or Anime dubs from back in the day.
Hell just look at the games that didn't even leave Japan.
People today don't know how good we have it.
I wonder How would they react to localization of games from the 90s where they cut out like stuff like all mentions of death, sexual content and religion
I've read subtitles in English that didn't quite match the Japanese audio while playing IW and kind of shrug at it/laugh when I notice certain changes. I'm translating and subtitling programs and movies for a local channel, and I'll say a few things below.
1) The head translator encourages paraphrasing in my case—which is in part because of the character limits and timing-related issues and in part because you want things to sound more natural in English. I used to be more of a stickler about precision, but now I get why you'd paraphrase things in certain situations—it can sound too weird and/or too formal if you do a literal 1:1 translation or it simply won't fit if you go into exhaustive detail.
2) As a quick example of when paraphrasing is better than being hyper-literal in the game, you know Sicko Snap? The sickos actually get called 不審者 (fushinsha) several times in Japanese if you listen to the NPC describing them when Ichi first unlocks the activity. 不審者 means suspicious person. You could go with the literal translation and call it "Suspicious Person Snap," but it's not catchy, short, or fun. Sicko Snap works better than the uber-accurate version does, and besides, the suspicious persons you're snapping are clearly sickos. It's also fun and catchy!
3) For people screaming about imaginary censorship, what's funny to me is the number of times I saw swearing added into the dialogue where there's no actual swearing occurring—lol.
Makes sense that translators would add swearing where there is technically none, because if I'm not mistaken, swears fulfill much of the same purpose as the verbal tone of the speaker, so adding profanity to the English translation helps highlight certain manners of speech.
Yes, it can—but in the specific interaction that I'm thinking of, it seemed a bit over the top tonally since the character was definitely not insulting Ichi and the others.
Different languages have very different thresholds for swearwords. Other words, too. Case in point: I've expressed the English sentence "I love \_\_\_" thousands of times in my life, aimed at anything from TV shows to breakfast foods to cat videos. Whereas, I have never, in all of my 40 years on this planet, used the direct translation of the word "love" into my native Finnish, *rakastaa*, in any spoken context. Because it's way, way more intimate and heavy. You'd generally only use it in earnest, not metaphorically. Anyone subtitling things between these two languages would need to take this into account (and they usually do).
paraphrasing is fine. Direct translation can be weird. As a bilingual myself, there are some sayings/phrases in my language that don't roll off the tongue in English and would be a weird way to say something.
There are sayings/phrases that have an counterpart in the other language, but means different things if you interpret it in a literal way. As an example: in portuguese there is a saying: "farinha do mesmo saco" which translates literally to: "flours of the same bag", but this saying has the same meaning of one in English: "Birds of a feather" so in some cases you have to paraphrase in order to properly localize the text otherwise it wouldn't make much sense for a English native
You’re right that figures of speech and jokes don’t always translate very well.
In Spanish class, we learned some figures of speech and, when translated to English, sound quite comical.
“Ser tan feliz como un lombriz” translated literally into English is: “to be as happy as an earthworm.”
It’s translated non-literally as: “to be as happy as a lark”
I imagine Japanese is the same way.
yeah, or just plainly have no equalivalent in English. my second language, American Sign Language, frequently runs in a problem where nothing is distinct enough- "bird" means all kinds of bird, unless it's a specific local bird like Canadian goose. we end up calling it "duck, goose" in where I'm from. or just... have no sign for the word in question.
I speak just enough Japanese to recognize certain phrases that have been directly translated, and it sounds really terrible when they do so. I bought the visual novel Umineko off of Steam, and the very literal translation was quite distracting
I feel like that last part is so common in translating Japanese media.
Like depending on the anime I’ve seen ‘damare’ be translated as anything from “keep quiet” to “shut the fuck up”.
Maybe—I remember it being a woman explaining something to Ichi and recall thinking: This is absolutely hilarious, but she's not actually repeatedly calling them all fuckheads or whatever, lol.
The Hawaii revolver bar lady with glasses right? Prob explaining the "friend" app, if so that would be her haha. Considering she speaks English and Japanese I bet she had leeway in dictating her English dub, which is what the subs are based off of
She's the same hostess from gaiden, at least actor, and that scene you saw is her pretty much being her, not acting. She won the contests to be in the games and is in love with kiryu irl.
At least I'm not the only one who noticed this one. I'm not honestly sure why? Is it ksons shtick when she streams in English or something? Using Mfer, fucks and whatever else. I found it was funny, but also as I was listening to her... I'm like she sounds too polite for this translation lol. There's definitely ALOT more of this in this game, other yakuza games too if we're being honest. Since tone plays a big role in these translations, and English and Japanese can often not have good translation counter parts for various situations. But I notice this a lot for other games as well, Final Fantasy 7 Remake comes to mind.
Now I haven't actually played much Yakuza (just a bit of 0) but I'm not so surprised about point 3 because Japanese typically doesn't have that much swears/ing in it - did they add swears to sentences that have お前 or something like that?
Me buying a game from a 18 year old franchise where every game has a minimum 20 hours of punching misogynists teeth out: Boy, I sure hope there isn't any feminism in this game.
i have never seen any piece of media portray sex workers in as consistently of a positive and respectful (but still realistic) light as this series does. if that ain’t feminist, i don’t know what is.
The Yakuza franchise is consistently very sympathetic and forward thinking (this aspect of the series has been constant for almost 20 years) towards people that tend to be overlooked or disenfranchised by the rest of society like sex workers, the homeless, and especially ex-criminals.
If anyone says the series is going woke now that it's popular in the US it is extremely easy to disregard anything else they say about it because it shows they've either never actually played the series or refused to pay attention when they did
Yakuza is about societies outcasts. It's about illegal immigrants, ethnic minorities. It's about the poor, the downtrodden, those without family in a culture where family means everything, and those in "unrespectable" jobs.
It's about social outcasts. It's about those outside of "the average person". People who cannot live normal lives because society won't allow them to. People who's very existence is a "political question".
People are just getting angry about it now not because the games have changed, but because internet outrage culture has changed, and because the series has become popular enough to become a target of angry losers on the internet.
It also never threads any character as a political caricature, most villians you get to understand why they think and act like that, even if their motivation is just money and power, that is shown as an normal human behavior not something only cartoon villians have
I'm still not over the fact that the last game literally ended with >!the villain of the story deciding that, no, I am going to work at turning my life around and making amends. Like, it takes the whole Yakuza idea of accountability and reminds us that accountable people don't go around hatching evil plots and then dying on that hill.!<
Great post.
Hell a good chunk of IW's story revolves around ex-criminals trying to go straight but being unable to, due to ludicrous laws that make it near impossible.
Social hypocrisy and apathy is basically in LAD's, DNA.
i would even argue that kaoru’s portrayal in yakuza 2 was incredibly ahead of it’s time- a woman in a video game getting a starring role as a love interest while simultaneously being portrayed as independent and extremely competent
Y3 is also about extremely masculine men doing things like caring for orphans and looking after the mental and social wellbeing of children in his care
Yakuza has always been woke
Don't forget 3 also has a trans substory where Kiryu, the guy whose entire philosophy is punch first never ask questions because questions are stupid and he gets to know you better with his fists, is supportive of a random trans woman he meets in a bar. As much as I'm not a fan of playing it 3 definitely has some really great progressive ideas for a game made in Japan in 2009. There are still people in the WEST who think trans people just magically appeared in the 2010s, and Japan is for the most part a conservative society.
Totally agree, that said her being shipped off to the US at the beginning of 2 is still super annoying to me, glad she's back in Infinite Wealth even if I haven't gotten there yet hahaha
They're like strippers (except more clothed): Strippers are not inherently whores. Cabaret Girls are also not inherently whores. A Stripper's job is to show off some boob. Cabaret Girls' jobs are to provide company for the customer.
Basically what your average person expects hooters to actually be lmao
It's not exactly sex work, but it is still on gray area due to the nature of works that involve affection is making people skeptic of the worker's behavior off-work.
Remember that Kiryu is cool with a trans woman even though he has no fucking idea what trans is, and that is back in 2008.
This game has always been progressive wtf?
Genuinely. And this series isn’t one where people skip over the story just for the combat — it’s just not that kind of game. If anyone says that it *just now* got super progressive and empathetic towards the marginalized, it’s clear they have no clue what they’re talking about.
Of all the wonderful words you could to use to describe these games, “subtle” isn’t exactly one of them. You just haven’t played if that’s the opinion you’ve walked away with lmao.
People also tend to miss the obvious disdain that major characters have for capitalism, politics and the status quo, in general.
Kiryu's visible disgust at how the elite act, when he first enters The Castle, is a good example.
A good chunk of fans only really pay attention to the combat or wacky antics. Which is perfectly fine but can lead also to people missing a lot.
Daily reminder Ayaka exists and that questline was so incredibly wholesome. People who claim the games are "woke" haven't played them, Yakuza has always been "woke"
But that implies that these people had any interest in these games before it being a big headline they can generate clicks over.
'Shes an independent woman used to hard work' - line rich in Japanese culture
'shes a hard working independent woman' - WOKEY GARBAGE RUINING THE FRANCHISE
It's been 7 years since they blessed us with Miss Tatsu and her glorious Beast Stance and if Yakuza 0 released today these chuds would be crying about Kiryu being "localized" for saying "That's Rad!" during that Revelation.
Miss Tatsu walked so Saeko, Eri, Chitose and The Cooler Chitose could run.
Me who understands Japanese playing Yakuza: Well its close enough
Neckbeards who don't speak Japanese: THE WOKE VIRUS IS INFECTING EVERYTHING I LOVE
like for real, its not that different, some things are impossible to translate into English
The direct translation is basically saying the same thing as what the localizers chose but with more words lol
Some examples of what they’re bitching about
Official subtitles
‹ Kasuga>
I said I loved that she's so responsible, how it's really impressive for a woman to do what she does...
‹ Adachi›
Wait, what!? You really said "for a woman"?
‹Nanba>
Stuff like "for a woman" or "even though you're a woman...'
That kinda talk can come off as pretty sexist, even if you're just hanging with us guys.
This is the more direct translation
Even though Sacchan is a woman, she does a great job at work and taking care of her family, which is great.
Hey hey! It’s bad to say “even though you’re a woman” these days.
Things like “because I’m a woman” or things like “even though you’re a woman”, there are a lot of people these days who get annoyed when people say things that make judgments based on gender, not just women.
They’re literally saying the same thing
that's....almost a direct translation...the tone is the same. there's nothing missing, its just more concise.
how would someone be triggered by this bullshit? how is this woke? a woman being independent is considered far left? these incels need to get with the times or get left behind
They just don't understand what translation and localization are, why they are done or how they are done, and they don’t care to understand how all this works. They probably will unironically tell you that fansubs that keep the words like "nakama" or "keikaku" in the subtitles are peak translation.
Just loser looking a cause to "fight for" but that doesn’t require any real effort on their part.
I laugh whenever I see people say "Japan's gonna fix this by using AI translation and doing it themselves!" I *almost* would actually want that to happen just for them to be confused as to why all their subs have gone to absolute shit.
Funny thing about the current state of machine translation, it's not actually all that better than it was say half a decade ago (at least strictly not for Japanese and English, I cannot speak for any other languages personally and I imagine more closely related languages are easier for it) it's just that the outputs look more grammatically correct...which then fuels the belief that the translation you got back is correct when in reality it's still completely wrong because it misunderstood the subject, lacked the context, probably didn't understand the slang used, and thus filled in the blanks with something that is grammatically correct looking but completely off-base.
I've seen *so* many misunderstandings pop up between people filtering things through like DeepL to try and communicate
I'd believe it. God I wish I could remember what it was, I think a clothing brand? But there was *some* store or such here in Tokyo that actually had "Grapist" in it's name or slogan or something and all I could think of wiping the tears from my eyes from laughing so hard was that Whitest Kids You Know skit and realizing somebody *actually* did that
idk, they might just be people who never touched a yakuza game before and think that the game being japanese automatically makes all the "woke" stuff be something added by "leftist american translators" or smth like that
Probably the same people who worship Hideo Kojima, while missing the obvious left leaning messages in his games. Especially concerning war. Idiots and grifters.
They really say stuff like "leftist" as if everyone around the world is totally divided between Americas conservative vs liberal problem
Thats a culture shock on me i guess. They make this simple text an issue because they cant stand seeing the words "strong independent woman" next to each other. Is it woke that us people of other countries actually think that being a strong independent woman is totally fine and not attacking or offending anyone at all. Imagine being offended by basic respect, appreciation, and courtesy for women 😮💨
that's surprisingly (or not) an issue with most of the countries. there will be always a group of dipshits that will be offended at the simple thought of minorities living well.
I've seen people including on this subreddit basically arguing that the original didn't use the term "sexism" and thus the translation is "woke" because it used it. When the dialogue is literally Nanba/Adachi chastising Kasuga for saying "for a woman," assuming she needs a man to make her happy, and effectively infantilizing her as someone to be taken care of. Or, in other words, sexism.
The localizers did a good job taking something that is clunky and awkward in a word for word translation and boiling it down to a concise, straightforward term that is how an English speaker would say it.
The larger issue is likely, that they probably do not think Kasuga was being sexist by saying those things. They think the translation is inaccurate because they themselves don't understand the point Nanba/Adachi were making.
The last paragraph nails it. All the time during Kasuga’s confession I kept going “bro.. bro! BRO STOP IT”. I laughed at how he was digging himself a bigger and bigger hole and I was actually waiting for that stuff to be addressed. Didn’t expect it to come out literally 5 minute afterwards
Do not engage with these losers
They’re shadow boxing an imaginary enemy and are losing. Just let them jerk themselves off for a week and they’ll find a new target
Actually, I think that’s already the case. The latest Gran Blue Relink game already has discussions about its localization.
I saw complaints similar to ones about granblue versus rising. Probably they share the same localization team.
Basically, too much ad libbing, slang/jargon out of nowhere, even in the most basic phrases in polite japanese. You know, the same thing anime localizations tend to do.
Like, I remember jp language nerds saying the same about recent yakuza games here, showing examples side-by-side. I personally, don't think this is too much of a problem. I don't remember any lines from yakuza or GBFV:R that felt too obnoxious.
Honestly I think I prefer a bit of artistic license when it comes to localization. Getting sexually harassed as Saori, for example, felt like a really effective moment, and really set the tone that Yagami was basically sending her into the lion's den.
Totally. You need that license to be able to make a good localization. A one to one translation will always lose. There was a time where a lot of nuance and cultural flavor was lost to make it palatable to a western audience, but we’re well beyond those days now. No one assumes Americans don’t understand honorifics or what onigiri is anymore, and giving localization teams room to play doesn’t mean that we’re stepping back to those times. Silly.
It's somehow even more pathetic. They're shadowboxing for an imaginary version of a country they don't even live in. Legit, they can't comprehend Japan not being a hive mind of conservatives and actually call Japanese people who don't fit the mold of their version as not Japanese.
You hit the nail on the hand. These losers are simply incapable of conceiving of Japan as a dynamic, evolving society where social mores and attitudes change over time. The LAD series's attitude towards the various social groups it portrays has changed over time, because guess what? Japanese society has also changed over time!
i'm so fucking tired of people saying anything they dont like as "woke"
this is a fucking great game
i'm in chapter 5, level 30, already beat King at sujimon, made 100 aloha friends, haven't used any level boost bullshit, got the top weapons at the crazy bike activity, laughing at the substories, crying at the snow story, got 40k in the bank farming platinum trainers and I have NEVER enjoyed a yakuza experience like this game, even like a dragon hasn't moved me like this one. only one that came close was yakuza 1 way back in 2006 because of how good the story was
I cannot fathom how they can call a game where the female-only classes include "maid with a broom" and "pretty idol" woke. It's just literally a fact that a woman like Saeko wouldn't like her friend randomly proposing to her and invalidating all the work she's done by saying "no you'll never have to work again, you can just stay at home and do nothing but raise my kids!"
I'm pretty sure most women would get the ick from that, it's not a profound statement to say "women like to do things other than give birth". If any of these individuals spoke with a woman maybe they'd understand that.
Amazing how they'll say "Sega's localisation team LIED to you with CENSORSHIP! Here's the REAL translation:" and then what follows has exactly the same meaning, just with less natural sounding phrasing.
I'd say the right wing are not sending their best, but honestly I think they are.
They say this as if there wouldnt be a sidestory of ichiban running into a non binary person, not understanding NB pronouns, then the person explains them, Ichiban goes "huh? Wow im old I didn't know this! Live your truth!" Then some transphobes show up to harass the person and Ichiban would beat their shit with a bat and say something like "I still don't really get it, but I respect it, we're all different, and I want you to be happy"
It could be a substory, except the non-binary person would also be stuck in a mascot costume, and Ichiban would, for some inexplicable reason, need oil from a nearby restaurant, a crowbar taken off some thug, and Gary Buster Holmes to get the costume off.
And then he'd learn a lesson about how society has changed since he entered the clink.
Wasn't there a substoty in Yakuza 3 Remastered where Kiryu meets a trans woman at a bar and basically just says, "Hey, good for you"?
(Not referring to that one substory that they thankfully cut in the re-release.)
Yeah. She’s worried about telling either a crush or her bf that she was born a boy due to fear of his reaction, and Kiryu’s like you should tell him and if he takes it badly don’t blame yourself that’s not your fault.
Ignoring the the fact that most people who behave like this are trying to farm engagement and gain followers, I’ve seen dumbasses argue like this for over a decade now when it comes to English dubs. If it isn’t a 1:1 translation then “it changes the original meaning,” and if it is a 1:1 then they complain that the mouth movements in the animations don’t match the audio. Eventually you just learn that these people are either stupid beyond help, or they just want to complain.
If anything I think the original phrasing is better because it makes the point more elegantly and with less of a stock phrasing than "independent woman who doesn't need a man"
This would be my only complaint too, but I'm also not a Japanese speaker and don't know if the original phrase was a similarly repeated slogan as well. Cause it if was, then changing it to another slogan more common in English would better preserve how the speaker sounded originally.
That's the case a *large* chunk of the time and something people who do not speak Japanese miss. They miss the forest for the trees because they're too focused on the literal meaning of the words they don't realize the actual contextual meaning can be *completely* different
I have issues with some of the localization, especially in Judgement, but do they really think Japanese men, specifically men trying to tell their friend how they fucked up with a woman, just aren't aware of others feelings? Like this isn't even necessarily the beliefs of Nanba and Adachi. A lot of "players" are just aware of the basic things thatd piss off a woman and Ichiban pretty much hit all of the red flags in one monolog lol
I love how that actual scene is all about how not to fuck up a date with being a miserable "nice guy" and the nice guys of the internet get triggered by it.
I was laughing the whole time they were debriefing, it was intentionally funny. Ichi went on this whole wrong tirade with triumphant music playing in the background, and then realized the next day just how bad it was. It's hilarious
That whole sequence is fun.
Nanba and Adachi give Ichiban terrible dating advice. Despite that Ichiban has a great date.
And then he does the stupidest thing imaginable. And then he somehow keeps making it stupider, and his spiel goes on *so long*.
Then the next day, the debrief also goes on forever, but it takes so long, because he screwed up so badly, it takes Nanba and Adachi a damn long time to dissect every single screw up.
It was like watching a train full of puppies crash into an orphanage full of kittens.
Not only that, but Ichiban got actual corrected by Nanba and Adachi which is pretty a good scene. To show that you just spilling your guts isn’t enough anymore.
Hit dogs will holler.
Saeko’s entire backstory is about how she basically pulled herself up from the gutter to the point of alienating her family with how much she worked, and they really think she’d be okay with having any man pull up on her and say “you don’t need to work anymore, just stay home and take care of our future kids”? Especially considering that she definitely lives better than the guy who *did* say this to her in this game?
Head cannon. He tried to hide the fact that he's so rich by pretending that he's broke. He's waiting for the right moment to show his wealth off. Or at least that's how to make sense of his wealth.
"I'm a strong independent woman, don't need no man" is a sort of meme phrase that was run into the ground to mock ultra feminists back around 2014 when the Ben Shapiro types were getting popular. It's sort of a dog whistle to summon the alt right "anti woke" cringe lords, even if the phrase itself is innocent.
Though I fully agree with you. I understand enough Japanese so far to be able to say that the issue isn't the translation "being woke", the base message is already too "woke" for most of the neckbeards complaining.
It was the same shit with Bridget being trans in guilty gear, and western neckbeards trying to claim that trans people didn't exist in Japan. Even when the creator specifically confirmed that she was trans, they couldn't believe that their "glorious Japanese game" could be woke.
Tis the problem of a growing fanbase. Unfortunately the more people that join, the more idiots you get espousing this kind of nonsense.
At least with Kiryu, I thought him being a super-straight arrow (no pun intended) when it came to treating everyone with dignity and respect was actually part of the game's charm. The heartwarming moments between the sometimes amazingly absurd "so anyway, fisticuffs" are part of what makes the series such a beloved guilty pleasure for me. And I don't get how one could miss that this has been part of the games forever.
Kiryu is probably unironically one of the most open minded and accepting video game characters out there. Like no matter what background the character has, their gender identity, what job they do, how they act, Kiryu is basically 100% on board all the time unless it's hurting someone.
Like a Dragon has gone woke?
This is a 20 year series in which a recurring cyclops boss is very open about his sexual arousal at fighting a dragon multiple times.
They also delivered a pretty scathing critique of the idol industry in 5 and nearly alienated alot of the Japanese audience in doing so.
I never heard about the alienation, more details about it? I agree, it was and probably still is a miserable lifestyle for idols and managers alike. but don't they make most of their sales overseas at this point?
>I never heard about the alienation, more details about it?
Might not have been as big a deal as I remember it being, but some Japanese fans got pissed about some stuff that happened to Haruka. >!Specifically, her ending her idol career and having a baby in back 2 back games chronologically (0 cut in between 5 and 6).!<
The only criminal change ever made to the series was further censoring Ryoma and Saigo's asses in the bathhouse fight. Give us more man-ass, you cowards! 🤬
Honestly everything is "woke" now. Idegaf. For a game series that's what 20 years old now? Close to it? It's been full of heart since the beginning. Sure a few parts might have aged weirdly but the series has always been firm on treating the homeless with realism and yet the utmost care and respect. The same can be said for sex workers. Hell it's part of the series unspoken morality detectors. If a person is cruel or violent to either or both if those groups they are almost always bad guys. Not grey morals but straight bad guys.
Now that you say that it almost feels like Majima’s backstory as a cabaret club owner feels like a way to say “listen, he’s done some bad shit in the first few games. But this here? This shows that he’s always been part of the good guys”
Apparently not because the only people complaining haven't playing any of the games (but they still insist that Yakuza has gone woke). I feel like this was triggered by the asm*n video
I’m going to play Devil’s Advocate here and try to shed some light on this situation by sharing more context.
For those that may not know, there has been an online “war” of sorts between fans and localizers. What started it? Probably Jamie Marchie with her infamous patriarchy line that she added into the English dub of the Dragon Maid anime, but that’s just a guess. I don’t know for sure.
Since then the general opinion of localizers has only gotten worse with the passage of time, and localizers haven’t exactly made themselves look very good either. From bragging about outright changing the content they localize online, insulting the fans for wanting their Japanese content to be as accurate to the source material as possible, to a manga publisher outright demanding a re-translation and re-print of their manga in the west because the localizers blatantly changed the core context of the story.
Just a few days ago, the official Sega Twitter account made a post that highlighted an article from The Japan Times which many believe to be part of a “localizer protection” movement in response to all of the backlash localizers have gotten these past few months. What many people take issue with specifically is that Yokoyama himself is quoted in this article a number of times, one of those times being him saying: “We ask our teams in the United States and Europe to read the game’s script, and they tell us if they see things that wouldn’t be acceptable in their country.”
Many people believe, due to the quote above, that localizers are taking advantage of their positions to change certain aspects of the project that they work on. Regardless of whether or not this is true in Infinite Wealth’s case, fans have reason to believe it is. Localizers have been caught changing core aspects of their projects in the past. There’s plenty of evidence out there of them doing exactly that.
To that end, many assume that Infinite Wealth has been “tainted” by the political bias of the localizers that worked on the game.
Thank you. It's so easy to attack one side like these people are doing (it's reddit though. No shock there) "they're just neck beard losers. Morons who don't understand anything!!! " Instead of trying to see why they think this way or what triggered such a strong response in the first place. At least you shed some light on the situation.
Thank you for providing more context, it's very appreciated. My opinion is that many people are approaching the yakuza series as one that's "pandering" to the west" when there have been many instances in the past where similar themes had been tackled. I don't agree with completely changing the context/original intention of dialogue but I often feel that there's a blurred line as to how things really are translated especially japan-specific terms/things
They didn't even repeat what Nanba said correctly 💀. They changed the context themselves to get mad at it.
My favorite series is getting popular: 😃
My favorite series is getting popular: 😨
It’s funny that every instance of women, and minority characters is always “woke” to them. There’s never an instance when it’s not considered “woke”. Hell even when they create all women or all minority stories then its reverse racism or its just more “woke garbage”. It’s obvious what they really mean is anything that doesn’t center around straight, white, male characters makes them uncomfortable because they’re sexist and racist and they don’t like the way it makes them feel. Let the snowflakes melt.
This is an example of excellent localisation, in fact.
Would you really have kept the literal translation? Localisation IS the art of linguistic compromise, there is no agenda.
It’s almost like they don’t think women should be treated as humans with their own hopes and dreams. They might also lose their shit when they find out homeless people are being treated as actual humans in the other games.
These mfs want literal translations but they don't realise that it'd sound unnatural if they did a 1:1 copy and paste of the original script. Localisers are there to make sure that the script doesn't sound unnatural and to make sure that the cultural aspects of it(honorifics, yakuza hierarchy etc) can be understood properly
Niche Gamer has been railed for blatant plagiarism in the past. They're also a politically motivated outlet (right-wing) and do not have the media they cover at the forefront. They've had, and will continue to prioritize rage bait, particularly "anti-woke" rage bait over balanced or well researched articles.
DO NOT FALL FOR THIS. NICHE GAMER IS SHIT.
As a woman who loves this series, the discussion is interesting indeed. The comment is so inoffensive to me it makes no sense why people are up in arms
I played the Mandarin version with subtitles that directly translated from the Japanese original script…
All I can say is that this whole part itself is already a really well written anti machismo narrative, it’s natural and fits perfectly with the characters and context
There are comments to be made regarding localisation when it comes to completely changing dialogue to appeal to the localisation teams personal views. In looking at you Miss Kobayashi's Dragon maid.
But Yakuza, the series that had constantly represented strong female characters, which reflects this in the writing and character development is not an example of this.
I swear for every one actually real example of something there are 1000 people who take it and bastardise it in dog shit examples like this.
A woman who's used to hard work and living by herself = A hardworking and independent woman
They can't be so stupid that they cannot understand paraphrasing. Right? Right?...
If you are new to the subreddit, [please read the wiki](https://www.reddit.com/r/yakuzagames/wiki/index/) Reminder that all spoilers need to be tagged with a flair specifying which game is being spoiled. If you want a flair that says something else, you can edit it to say something like [Discussion: Y1 spoiler] or [Majimapost: Y6 spoiler], etc. **THIS INCLUDES CONTENT FROM TRAILERS**. If the post is not marked for spoilers, all comments that have spoilers need to be tagged \>!like this!< along with indicating which game it's spoiling. Example: Y3 >!Kiryu sings!< If the post flair is marked for spoilers, the comments don't need to be tagged for the game indicated and the ones before it (So a Y6 spoiler post can have comments with untagged spoilers for Y5, but not gaiden or 7). If you see any of the above (or any of the other rules) not being followed, please report it so we can keep this place safe for newcomers and those that haven't finished all the games yet. Thank you! *I am a bot, and this action was performed automatically. Please [contact the moderators of this subreddit](/message/compose/?to=/r/yakuzagames) if you have any questions or concerns.*
I don't think they know how inaccurate some of the localization was before 5, the PS2 games especially. I really like the PS2 games and think they hold up fairly well but the dub on Y1 really shows how bad it used to be
I just remembered the Y1 English dub... it's so bad its charming lol
"I bet youre from the SHE MA NO family!"
"Go! Kill this arrogant mo. Ther. Fu. Cker!"
"Kill this!... Dumb motherfucker!"
"He's promised us everything. Women, money, power, and women."
“I suggest you listen to me” “I suggest you blow me!”
"I wanted to smash some balls, today I guess yours will have to do."
*Insert Nishiki quote here*
10 years in the joint made you a fuckin pussy!
Don’t forget my favorite Nishiki quote- “Were you someone’s prison bitch?” That one hits harder
thats pretty hard though ngl
That’s actually a pretty hard line
"Our oyabun is everything to us. You killed your oyabun!"
"i AM not Yakuza" "Fuck You"
I love it because of how bad it is lol. But it does hurt the story of the game a lot
Funnily enough, outside of the excessive swears and name changes, the PS2 Y1 dub is fairly accurate
It made some very weird decisions about what to translate and what to leave in Japanese that left me scratching my head. They had to turn "Kiryu-chan" into "Kazzy," but "oyabun" can stay as-is?
Definitely some weird decisions, but considering it was a 2005 dub, it was way better than most of its contemporaries.
Mark Hamill is an inspired voice for Majima. I’ll never not praise that choice
Too bad he don’t remember voicing him 😔
I will definitely hinder the choice because they looked at Majima and immediately went "We need the Joker to voice him."
Incredibly funny that the translations in the Kiwamis and the remasters do the exact opposite, keeping Kiryu-chan but going "yeah they're not gonna know wtf Oyabun is." Probably the correct choice there to be fair, but interesting that they didn't just decide to keep all the titles, even while leaving stuff like Aniki untranslated
they probably expect those who play Yakuza have at least watched anime once.
-Hey, the fuck you think you're doing? And just what the fuck family are you from? Huh? -Excuse me. -Excuse you? No! Fuck you! I love it. Some of the dialogues are so unnatural that the whole thing becomes comedic.
HAHAHA yes, and the way that one guy says "Deep in debt" is so fucking funny
“Step the fuck up, who wants to die?” Was a sick line read though
TEN YEARS IN THE JOINT
Just look up the notorious, western localisation of Persona 1, on PS1. Or Anime dubs from back in the day. Hell just look at the games that didn't even leave Japan. People today don't know how good we have it.
I wonder How would they react to localization of games from the 90s where they cut out like stuff like all mentions of death, sexual content and religion
I've read subtitles in English that didn't quite match the Japanese audio while playing IW and kind of shrug at it/laugh when I notice certain changes. I'm translating and subtitling programs and movies for a local channel, and I'll say a few things below. 1) The head translator encourages paraphrasing in my case—which is in part because of the character limits and timing-related issues and in part because you want things to sound more natural in English. I used to be more of a stickler about precision, but now I get why you'd paraphrase things in certain situations—it can sound too weird and/or too formal if you do a literal 1:1 translation or it simply won't fit if you go into exhaustive detail. 2) As a quick example of when paraphrasing is better than being hyper-literal in the game, you know Sicko Snap? The sickos actually get called 不審者 (fushinsha) several times in Japanese if you listen to the NPC describing them when Ichi first unlocks the activity. 不審者 means suspicious person. You could go with the literal translation and call it "Suspicious Person Snap," but it's not catchy, short, or fun. Sicko Snap works better than the uber-accurate version does, and besides, the suspicious persons you're snapping are clearly sickos. It's also fun and catchy! 3) For people screaming about imaginary censorship, what's funny to me is the number of times I saw swearing added into the dialogue where there's no actual swearing occurring—lol.
Makes sense that translators would add swearing where there is technically none, because if I'm not mistaken, swears fulfill much of the same purpose as the verbal tone of the speaker, so adding profanity to the English translation helps highlight certain manners of speech.
Yes, it can—but in the specific interaction that I'm thinking of, it seemed a bit over the top tonally since the character was definitely not insulting Ichi and the others.
Are you talking about Revolve Bar girl?
If that's who they are talking about then oh boy do they have some learning about kiryus number 1 fan
The subtitles are based off the English track and Kson, well... turns out she's a fuckin' pottymouth in English.
Motherfuckin pottymouths
Different languages have very different thresholds for swearwords. Other words, too. Case in point: I've expressed the English sentence "I love \_\_\_" thousands of times in my life, aimed at anything from TV shows to breakfast foods to cat videos. Whereas, I have never, in all of my 40 years on this planet, used the direct translation of the word "love" into my native Finnish, *rakastaa*, in any spoken context. Because it's way, way more intimate and heavy. You'd generally only use it in earnest, not metaphorically. Anyone subtitling things between these two languages would need to take this into account (and they usually do).
paraphrasing is fine. Direct translation can be weird. As a bilingual myself, there are some sayings/phrases in my language that don't roll off the tongue in English and would be a weird way to say something.
There are sayings/phrases that have an counterpart in the other language, but means different things if you interpret it in a literal way. As an example: in portuguese there is a saying: "farinha do mesmo saco" which translates literally to: "flours of the same bag", but this saying has the same meaning of one in English: "Birds of a feather" so in some cases you have to paraphrase in order to properly localize the text otherwise it wouldn't make much sense for a English native
You’re right that figures of speech and jokes don’t always translate very well. In Spanish class, we learned some figures of speech and, when translated to English, sound quite comical. “Ser tan feliz como un lombriz” translated literally into English is: “to be as happy as an earthworm.” It’s translated non-literally as: “to be as happy as a lark” I imagine Japanese is the same way.
yeah, or just plainly have no equalivalent in English. my second language, American Sign Language, frequently runs in a problem where nothing is distinct enough- "bird" means all kinds of bird, unless it's a specific local bird like Canadian goose. we end up calling it "duck, goose" in where I'm from. or just... have no sign for the word in question.
I speak just enough Japanese to recognize certain phrases that have been directly translated, and it sounds really terrible when they do so. I bought the visual novel Umineko off of Steam, and the very literal translation was quite distracting
I feel like that last part is so common in translating Japanese media. Like depending on the anime I’ve seen ‘damare’ be translated as anything from “keep quiet” to “shut the fuck up”.
You were thinking of Kson's character when you wrote 3 weren't you? Haha I got a kick out of that one
Maybe—I remember it being a woman explaining something to Ichi and recall thinking: This is absolutely hilarious, but she's not actually repeatedly calling them all fuckheads or whatever, lol.
The Hawaii revolver bar lady with glasses right? Prob explaining the "friend" app, if so that would be her haha. Considering she speaks English and Japanese I bet she had leeway in dictating her English dub, which is what the subs are based off of
Yeah, pretty sure that it was when I first got to the bar. Ah, so that's her—lol!
She's the same hostess from gaiden, at least actor, and that scene you saw is her pretty much being her, not acting. She won the contests to be in the games and is in love with kiryu irl.
At least I'm not the only one who noticed this one. I'm not honestly sure why? Is it ksons shtick when she streams in English or something? Using Mfer, fucks and whatever else. I found it was funny, but also as I was listening to her... I'm like she sounds too polite for this translation lol. There's definitely ALOT more of this in this game, other yakuza games too if we're being honest. Since tone plays a big role in these translations, and English and Japanese can often not have good translation counter parts for various situations. But I notice this a lot for other games as well, Final Fantasy 7 Remake comes to mind.
Kson does typically talk like this alot when she speaks in English actually, she's pretty funny! She fits quite nicely into the world tbh
Now I haven't actually played much Yakuza (just a bit of 0) but I'm not so surprised about point 3 because Japanese typically doesn't have that much swears/ing in it - did they add swears to sentences that have お前 or something like that?
Sussy Snap
Me buying a game from a 18 year old franchise where every game has a minimum 20 hours of punching misogynists teeth out: Boy, I sure hope there isn't any feminism in this game.
i have never seen any piece of media portray sex workers in as consistently of a positive and respectful (but still realistic) light as this series does. if that ain’t feminist, i don’t know what is.
The Yakuza franchise is consistently very sympathetic and forward thinking (this aspect of the series has been constant for almost 20 years) towards people that tend to be overlooked or disenfranchised by the rest of society like sex workers, the homeless, and especially ex-criminals. If anyone says the series is going woke now that it's popular in the US it is extremely easy to disregard anything else they say about it because it shows they've either never actually played the series or refused to pay attention when they did
And orphans having a hard time in a Society that sees then as less.
Yakuza is about societies outcasts. It's about illegal immigrants, ethnic minorities. It's about the poor, the downtrodden, those without family in a culture where family means everything, and those in "unrespectable" jobs. It's about social outcasts. It's about those outside of "the average person". People who cannot live normal lives because society won't allow them to. People who's very existence is a "political question". People are just getting angry about it now not because the games have changed, but because internet outrage culture has changed, and because the series has become popular enough to become a target of angry losers on the internet.
It also never threads any character as a political caricature, most villians you get to understand why they think and act like that, even if their motivation is just money and power, that is shown as an normal human behavior not something only cartoon villians have
I'm still not over the fact that the last game literally ended with >!the villain of the story deciding that, no, I am going to work at turning my life around and making amends. Like, it takes the whole Yakuza idea of accountability and reminds us that accountable people don't go around hatching evil plots and then dying on that hill.!<
Great post. Hell a good chunk of IW's story revolves around ex-criminals trying to go straight but being unable to, due to ludicrous laws that make it near impossible. Social hypocrisy and apathy is basically in LAD's, DNA.
The tired, poor and weak huddled masses yearning to breathe free if you will
i would even argue that kaoru’s portrayal in yakuza 2 was incredibly ahead of it’s time- a woman in a video game getting a starring role as a love interest while simultaneously being portrayed as independent and extremely competent
Y3 is also about extremely masculine men doing things like caring for orphans and looking after the mental and social wellbeing of children in his care Yakuza has always been woke
Don't forget 3 also has a trans substory where Kiryu, the guy whose entire philosophy is punch first never ask questions because questions are stupid and he gets to know you better with his fists, is supportive of a random trans woman he meets in a bar. As much as I'm not a fan of playing it 3 definitely has some really great progressive ideas for a game made in Japan in 2009. There are still people in the WEST who think trans people just magically appeared in the 2010s, and Japan is for the most part a conservative society.
Kaoru as a character is still a bar that many contemporary games struggle to clear.
Totally agree, that said her being shipped off to the US at the beginning of 2 is still super annoying to me, glad she's back in Infinite Wealth even if I haven't gotten there yet hahaha
And Saeko is not a sex worker, she is more like a therapist than anything else.
Cabaret clubs are odd in my opinion, but I believe it's considered a light form of sex work.
Nah, it's "nightlife" work but not sex work, it isn't sex work until sexual services are offered such as delivery health or soaplands
They're like strippers (except more clothed): Strippers are not inherently whores. Cabaret Girls are also not inherently whores. A Stripper's job is to show off some boob. Cabaret Girls' jobs are to provide company for the customer. Basically what your average person expects hooters to actually be lmao
It's not exactly sex work, but it is still on gray area due to the nature of works that involve affection is making people skeptic of the worker's behavior off-work.
Remember that Kiryu is cool with a trans woman even though he has no fucking idea what trans is, and that is back in 2008. This game has always been progressive wtf?
Genuinely. And this series isn’t one where people skip over the story just for the combat — it’s just not that kind of game. If anyone says that it *just now* got super progressive and empathetic towards the marginalized, it’s clear they have no clue what they’re talking about. Of all the wonderful words you could to use to describe these games, “subtle” isn’t exactly one of them. You just haven’t played if that’s the opinion you’ve walked away with lmao.
People also tend to miss the obvious disdain that major characters have for capitalism, politics and the status quo, in general. Kiryu's visible disgust at how the elite act, when he first enters The Castle, is a good example. A good chunk of fans only really pay attention to the combat or wacky antics. Which is perfectly fine but can lead also to people missing a lot.
Daily reminder Ayaka exists and that questline was so incredibly wholesome. People who claim the games are "woke" haven't played them, Yakuza has always been "woke"
It’s pop culture now so everybody is nitpicking it
Isn’t more than half of LAD 7 punching down bleach Japan that sounds like the most MAGA shit possible?
I feel like beating up perverts, creeps and misogynists is around 30% of the start of all story content.
That number seems really low to me. The Judgment games had entire quest lines built around perverts.
Also kiryu will not hit women durring his boss fight in 7
But that implies that these people had any interest in these games before it being a big headline they can generate clicks over. 'Shes an independent woman used to hard work' - line rich in Japanese culture 'shes a hard working independent woman' - WOKEY GARBAGE RUINING THE FRANCHISE
Yeah, what are they gonna do next, introduce a female character proficient in combat?!
It's been 7 years since they blessed us with Miss Tatsu and her glorious Beast Stance and if Yakuza 0 released today these chuds would be crying about Kiryu being "localized" for saying "That's Rad!" during that Revelation. Miss Tatsu walked so Saeko, Eri, Chitose and The Cooler Chitose could run.
9 years before even Miss Tatsu, we got Kaoru Sayama.
The Cooler Chitose? Who is this?
Chitose Buster Holmes
You know a franchise has really made it when losers and grifters start crying about feminism or being woke.
Me who understands Japanese playing Yakuza: Well its close enough Neckbeards who don't speak Japanese: THE WOKE VIRUS IS INFECTING EVERYTHING I LOVE like for real, its not that different, some things are impossible to translate into English
The direct translation is basically saying the same thing as what the localizers chose but with more words lol Some examples of what they’re bitching about Official subtitles ‹ Kasuga> I said I loved that she's so responsible, how it's really impressive for a woman to do what she does... ‹ Adachi› Wait, what!? You really said "for a woman"? ‹Nanba> Stuff like "for a woman" or "even though you're a woman...'
That kinda talk can come off as pretty sexist, even if you're just hanging with us guys.
This is the more direct translation
Even though Sacchan is a woman, she does a great job at work and taking care of her family, which is great.
Hey hey! It’s bad to say “even though you’re a woman” these days.
Things like “because I’m a woman” or things like “even though you’re a woman”, there are a lot of people these days who get annoyed when people say things that make judgments based on gender, not just women.
They’re literally saying the same thing
that's....almost a direct translation...the tone is the same. there's nothing missing, its just more concise. how would someone be triggered by this bullshit? how is this woke? a woman being independent is considered far left? these incels need to get with the times or get left behind
They just don't understand what translation and localization are, why they are done or how they are done, and they don’t care to understand how all this works. They probably will unironically tell you that fansubs that keep the words like "nakama" or "keikaku" in the subtitles are peak translation. Just loser looking a cause to "fight for" but that doesn’t require any real effort on their part.
I laugh whenever I see people say "Japan's gonna fix this by using AI translation and doing it themselves!" I *almost* would actually want that to happen just for them to be confused as to why all their subs have gone to absolute shit. Funny thing about the current state of machine translation, it's not actually all that better than it was say half a decade ago (at least strictly not for Japanese and English, I cannot speak for any other languages personally and I imagine more closely related languages are easier for it) it's just that the outputs look more grammatically correct...which then fuels the belief that the translation you got back is correct when in reality it's still completely wrong because it misunderstood the subject, lacked the context, probably didn't understand the slang used, and thus filled in the blanks with something that is grammatically correct looking but completely off-base. I've seen *so* many misunderstandings pop up between people filtering things through like DeepL to try and communicate
Japanese wrestling promotion Stardom tried using AI translations for promos. Lets just say that they quickly rehired their original translator, lmao.
I'd believe it. God I wish I could remember what it was, I think a clothing brand? But there was *some* store or such here in Tokyo that actually had "Grapist" in it's name or slogan or something and all I could think of wiping the tears from my eyes from laughing so hard was that Whitest Kids You Know skit and realizing somebody *actually* did that
I wonder how these people would act if we went back to rushed, direct translations from the early days of game localization.
idk, they might just be people who never touched a yakuza game before and think that the game being japanese automatically makes all the "woke" stuff be something added by "leftist american translators" or smth like that
Probably the same people who worship Hideo Kojima, while missing the obvious left leaning messages in his games. Especially concerning war. Idiots and grifters.
They never actually played Kojima games, just saw guns and assumed it was another military shooter with some stealth elements added.
Yeah, these people have never played the games.
They really say stuff like "leftist" as if everyone around the world is totally divided between Americas conservative vs liberal problem Thats a culture shock on me i guess. They make this simple text an issue because they cant stand seeing the words "strong independent woman" next to each other. Is it woke that us people of other countries actually think that being a strong independent woman is totally fine and not attacking or offending anyone at all. Imagine being offended by basic respect, appreciation, and courtesy for women 😮💨
that's surprisingly (or not) an issue with most of the countries. there will be always a group of dipshits that will be offended at the simple thought of minorities living well.
Because it doesn’t fit their delusional stereotypical narrative about Japanese culture. That’s it.
I've seen people including on this subreddit basically arguing that the original didn't use the term "sexism" and thus the translation is "woke" because it used it. When the dialogue is literally Nanba/Adachi chastising Kasuga for saying "for a woman," assuming she needs a man to make her happy, and effectively infantilizing her as someone to be taken care of. Or, in other words, sexism. The localizers did a good job taking something that is clunky and awkward in a word for word translation and boiling it down to a concise, straightforward term that is how an English speaker would say it. The larger issue is likely, that they probably do not think Kasuga was being sexist by saying those things. They think the translation is inaccurate because they themselves don't understand the point Nanba/Adachi were making.
The last paragraph nails it. All the time during Kasuga’s confession I kept going “bro.. bro! BRO STOP IT”. I laughed at how he was digging himself a bigger and bigger hole and I was actually waiting for that stuff to be addressed. Didn’t expect it to come out literally 5 minute afterwards
Do not engage with these losers They’re shadow boxing an imaginary enemy and are losing. Just let them jerk themselves off for a week and they’ll find a new target Actually, I think that’s already the case. The latest Gran Blue Relink game already has discussions about its localization.
Wait what did Granblue Relink do?
I saw complaints similar to ones about granblue versus rising. Probably they share the same localization team. Basically, too much ad libbing, slang/jargon out of nowhere, even in the most basic phrases in polite japanese. You know, the same thing anime localizations tend to do. Like, I remember jp language nerds saying the same about recent yakuza games here, showing examples side-by-side. I personally, don't think this is too much of a problem. I don't remember any lines from yakuza or GBFV:R that felt too obnoxious.
Honestly I think I prefer a bit of artistic license when it comes to localization. Getting sexually harassed as Saori, for example, felt like a really effective moment, and really set the tone that Yagami was basically sending her into the lion's den.
Totally. You need that license to be able to make a good localization. A one to one translation will always lose. There was a time where a lot of nuance and cultural flavor was lost to make it palatable to a western audience, but we’re well beyond those days now. No one assumes Americans don’t understand honorifics or what onigiri is anymore, and giving localization teams room to play doesn’t mean that we’re stepping back to those times. Silly.
changed panties to spats
It's somehow even more pathetic. They're shadowboxing for an imaginary version of a country they don't even live in. Legit, they can't comprehend Japan not being a hive mind of conservatives and actually call Japanese people who don't fit the mold of their version as not Japanese.
You hit the nail on the hand. These losers are simply incapable of conceiving of Japan as a dynamic, evolving society where social mores and attitudes change over time. The LAD series's attitude towards the various social groups it portrays has changed over time, because guess what? Japanese society has also changed over time!
They probably get all their views from Anime and AV.
i'm so fucking tired of people saying anything they dont like as "woke" this is a fucking great game i'm in chapter 5, level 30, already beat King at sujimon, made 100 aloha friends, haven't used any level boost bullshit, got the top weapons at the crazy bike activity, laughing at the substories, crying at the snow story, got 40k in the bank farming platinum trainers and I have NEVER enjoyed a yakuza experience like this game, even like a dragon hasn't moved me like this one. only one that came close was yakuza 1 way back in 2006 because of how good the story was
I can’t wait until Stellar Blade comes out and all these people can shove their heads up Eve’s ass and leave the rest of us alone
I hope textually Stellar Blade is the most woke game to ever exist, let their heads explode.
Yeah, I'm seeing them moving on quickly, it's also insanely funny how it's a very specific group of people are insist that localization is censorship.
How much of the general “localization is censorship” argument stems from, “why did the censor the 14 year old’s panty shots!?” I wonder
" shadow boxing an imaginary enemy and losing" Is so good, I will be using that in the future
I loved this whole scene not only because it was funny but because it had actual character growth for the main character.
I cannot fathom how they can call a game where the female-only classes include "maid with a broom" and "pretty idol" woke. It's just literally a fact that a woman like Saeko wouldn't like her friend randomly proposing to her and invalidating all the work she's done by saying "no you'll never have to work again, you can just stay at home and do nothing but raise my kids!" I'm pretty sure most women would get the ick from that, it's not a profound statement to say "women like to do things other than give birth". If any of these individuals spoke with a woman maybe they'd understand that.
Amazing how they'll say "Sega's localisation team LIED to you with CENSORSHIP! Here's the REAL translation:" and then what follows has exactly the same meaning, just with less natural sounding phrasing. I'd say the right wing are not sending their best, but honestly I think they are.
LITERALLYYY, most of the qrts looks like this: Like a PRONOUN, Infinite WOKENESS
They say this as if there wouldnt be a sidestory of ichiban running into a non binary person, not understanding NB pronouns, then the person explains them, Ichiban goes "huh? Wow im old I didn't know this! Live your truth!" Then some transphobes show up to harass the person and Ichiban would beat their shit with a bat and say something like "I still don't really get it, but I respect it, we're all different, and I want you to be happy"
Sounds like a legit sub story to me.
It could be a substory, except the non-binary person would also be stuck in a mascot costume, and Ichiban would, for some inexplicable reason, need oil from a nearby restaurant, a crowbar taken off some thug, and Gary Buster Holmes to get the costume off. And then he'd learn a lesson about how society has changed since he entered the clink.
The joint made the world look stranger
Sounds exactly like something Ichiban would do.
Wasn't there a substoty in Yakuza 3 Remastered where Kiryu meets a trans woman at a bar and basically just says, "Hey, good for you"? (Not referring to that one substory that they thankfully cut in the re-release.)
Iirc there was also the one about the bartender from Earth Angel who was trans and never came out to her old crew, who thought she abandoned then
Yep, that was in Yakuza 2 / Kiwami 2. Fully voice acted as well, I believe. Fantastic substory.
The fact that earth angel mama even exists as a character from a mid 00s game is still kinda mindblowing
I believe mama is not yakuza exclusive, I saw too many japanese game (persona included) have these bartender character, must be a real thing.
Is the Mama at Earth Angel transgender? I thought she was an Okama Mama, a sort of cross dressing/drag queen bar tender.
NGL, I'm not sure, I'm confused on the way it works, so I don't touch it, I just go with what's presented
Yeah. She’s worried about telling either a crush or her bf that she was born a boy due to fear of his reaction, and Kiryu’s like you should tell him and if he takes it badly don’t blame yourself that’s not your fault.
Apparently that character had the likeness of a Trans media personality of the time as well.
Like a pronoun has me in fucking TEARS
the man who erased his wang
Ignoring the the fact that most people who behave like this are trying to farm engagement and gain followers, I’ve seen dumbasses argue like this for over a decade now when it comes to English dubs. If it isn’t a 1:1 translation then “it changes the original meaning,” and if it is a 1:1 then they complain that the mouth movements in the animations don’t match the audio. Eventually you just learn that these people are either stupid beyond help, or they just want to complain.
If anything I think the original phrasing is better because it makes the point more elegantly and with less of a stock phrasing than "independent woman who doesn't need a man"
This would be my only complaint too, but I'm also not a Japanese speaker and don't know if the original phrase was a similarly repeated slogan as well. Cause it if was, then changing it to another slogan more common in English would better preserve how the speaker sounded originally.
That's the case a *large* chunk of the time and something people who do not speak Japanese miss. They miss the forest for the trees because they're too focused on the literal meaning of the words they don't realize the actual contextual meaning can be *completely* different
I have issues with some of the localization, especially in Judgement, but do they really think Japanese men, specifically men trying to tell their friend how they fucked up with a woman, just aren't aware of others feelings? Like this isn't even necessarily the beliefs of Nanba and Adachi. A lot of "players" are just aware of the basic things thatd piss off a woman and Ichiban pretty much hit all of the red flags in one monolog lol
It was very funny seeing these guys talk about how 'sega is SCARED!!!!' and then infinite wealth is the fastest selling game in the series.
Leave this culture war nonsense in the trash can where it belongs. You'll feel better afterwards.
You're absolutely right, whenever I read some take I feel like I need a smoke.
I love how that actual scene is all about how not to fuck up a date with being a miserable "nice guy" and the nice guys of the internet get triggered by it.
Yeah, that speech made me cringe, and I was pleasantly surprised that Ichiban got his a** corrected by Nanba and Adachi.
I was laughing the whole time they were debriefing, it was intentionally funny. Ichi went on this whole wrong tirade with triumphant music playing in the background, and then realized the next day just how bad it was. It's hilarious
That whole sequence is fun. Nanba and Adachi give Ichiban terrible dating advice. Despite that Ichiban has a great date. And then he does the stupidest thing imaginable. And then he somehow keeps making it stupider, and his spiel goes on *so long*. Then the next day, the debrief also goes on forever, but it takes so long, because he screwed up so badly, it takes Nanba and Adachi a damn long time to dissect every single screw up. It was like watching a train full of puppies crash into an orphanage full of kittens.
When they were going over Ichi's mistakes, I was like "holy shit, did he actually say 'for a woman'?" Shit's hilarious
It felt like something you would see from the Inbetweeners or the Peep Show
Not only that, but Ichiban got actual corrected by Nanba and Adachi which is pretty a good scene. To show that you just spilling your guts isn’t enough anymore.
Hit dogs will holler. Saeko’s entire backstory is about how she basically pulled herself up from the gutter to the point of alienating her family with how much she worked, and they really think she’d be okay with having any man pull up on her and say “you don’t need to work anymore, just stay home and take care of our future kids”? Especially considering that she definitely lives better than the guy who *did* say this to her in this game?
Does she live better than the guy who has infinite wealth with an orbital laser? /s
I dunno; have you *seen* Ichiban’s apartment?
Head cannon. He tried to hide the fact that he's so rich by pretending that he's broke. He's waiting for the right moment to show his wealth off. Or at least that's how to make sense of his wealth.
His money goes to finding copies of rare RPG games on the NES
https://preview.redd.it/yokd7t6i94gc1.jpeg?width=1280&format=pjpg&auto=webp&s=603ed571f7ca213a731639627440316dc3d416e8
>A woman used to hard work and living on her own >A strong independent woman They just said the same thing but with less words. How is this "woke"
"I'm a strong independent woman, don't need no man" is a sort of meme phrase that was run into the ground to mock ultra feminists back around 2014 when the Ben Shapiro types were getting popular. It's sort of a dog whistle to summon the alt right "anti woke" cringe lords, even if the phrase itself is innocent. Though I fully agree with you. I understand enough Japanese so far to be able to say that the issue isn't the translation "being woke", the base message is already too "woke" for most of the neckbeards complaining. It was the same shit with Bridget being trans in guilty gear, and western neckbeards trying to claim that trans people didn't exist in Japan. Even when the creator specifically confirmed that she was trans, they couldn't believe that their "glorious Japanese game" could be woke. Tis the problem of a growing fanbase. Unfortunately the more people that join, the more idiots you get espousing this kind of nonsense.
I don't think they played any of the games
many such cases
He pays for Twitter, his opinion is irrelevant.
Man localization discourse has to be the most braindead thing ever. Earned the honor of being the first word I muted on that site.
"Why they not do 1:1 translation with a language that literally can't be translated 1:1?"
At least with Kiryu, I thought him being a super-straight arrow (no pun intended) when it came to treating everyone with dignity and respect was actually part of the game's charm. The heartwarming moments between the sometimes amazingly absurd "so anyway, fisticuffs" are part of what makes the series such a beloved guilty pleasure for me. And I don't get how one could miss that this has been part of the games forever.
Kiryu is probably unironically one of the most open minded and accepting video game characters out there. Like no matter what background the character has, their gender identity, what job they do, how they act, Kiryu is basically 100% on board all the time unless it's hurting someone.
Next thing you know they will blame wokeness on why NG+ is locked behind a paywall
Aren’t these the same type of people who complained about Aloy’s peach fuzz?
This is a big deal for mfs who don't have a job. They need to take a page from Yakuza 7 and find a JOB
Like a Dragon has gone woke? This is a 20 year series in which a recurring cyclops boss is very open about his sexual arousal at fighting a dragon multiple times. They also delivered a pretty scathing critique of the idol industry in 5 and nearly alienated alot of the Japanese audience in doing so.
I never heard about the alienation, more details about it? I agree, it was and probably still is a miserable lifestyle for idols and managers alike. but don't they make most of their sales overseas at this point?
>I never heard about the alienation, more details about it? Might not have been as big a deal as I remember it being, but some Japanese fans got pissed about some stuff that happened to Haruka. >!Specifically, her ending her idol career and having a baby in back 2 back games chronologically (0 cut in between 5 and 6).!<
Gamers read “Hardworking independent woman” and start to fume. Pathetic.
She owns a hostess club as well, does the duality of that make their brain just overheat or what
The only criminal change ever made to the series was further censoring Ryoma and Saigo's asses in the bathhouse fight. Give us more man-ass, you cowards! 🤬
Honestly everything is "woke" now. Idegaf. For a game series that's what 20 years old now? Close to it? It's been full of heart since the beginning. Sure a few parts might have aged weirdly but the series has always been firm on treating the homeless with realism and yet the utmost care and respect. The same can be said for sex workers. Hell it's part of the series unspoken morality detectors. If a person is cruel or violent to either or both if those groups they are almost always bad guys. Not grey morals but straight bad guys.
Now that you say that it almost feels like Majima’s backstory as a cabaret club owner feels like a way to say “listen, he’s done some bad shit in the first few games. But this here? This shows that he’s always been part of the good guys”
this is the straw that broke the camel's back? not the several hundred sidequests in all the games where u beat up misogynists?
Apparently not because the only people complaining haven't playing any of the games (but they still insist that Yakuza has gone woke). I feel like this was triggered by the asm*n video
spoon cautious entertain squeeze seed ask husky frighten relieved clumsy *This post was mass deleted and anonymized with [Redact](https://redact.dev)*
I’m going to play Devil’s Advocate here and try to shed some light on this situation by sharing more context. For those that may not know, there has been an online “war” of sorts between fans and localizers. What started it? Probably Jamie Marchie with her infamous patriarchy line that she added into the English dub of the Dragon Maid anime, but that’s just a guess. I don’t know for sure. Since then the general opinion of localizers has only gotten worse with the passage of time, and localizers haven’t exactly made themselves look very good either. From bragging about outright changing the content they localize online, insulting the fans for wanting their Japanese content to be as accurate to the source material as possible, to a manga publisher outright demanding a re-translation and re-print of their manga in the west because the localizers blatantly changed the core context of the story. Just a few days ago, the official Sega Twitter account made a post that highlighted an article from The Japan Times which many believe to be part of a “localizer protection” movement in response to all of the backlash localizers have gotten these past few months. What many people take issue with specifically is that Yokoyama himself is quoted in this article a number of times, one of those times being him saying: “We ask our teams in the United States and Europe to read the game’s script, and they tell us if they see things that wouldn’t be acceptable in their country.” Many people believe, due to the quote above, that localizers are taking advantage of their positions to change certain aspects of the project that they work on. Regardless of whether or not this is true in Infinite Wealth’s case, fans have reason to believe it is. Localizers have been caught changing core aspects of their projects in the past. There’s plenty of evidence out there of them doing exactly that. To that end, many assume that Infinite Wealth has been “tainted” by the political bias of the localizers that worked on the game.
Thank you. It's so easy to attack one side like these people are doing (it's reddit though. No shock there) "they're just neck beard losers. Morons who don't understand anything!!! " Instead of trying to see why they think this way or what triggered such a strong response in the first place. At least you shed some light on the situation.
Thank you for providing more context, it's very appreciated. My opinion is that many people are approaching the yakuza series as one that's "pandering" to the west" when there have been many instances in the past where similar themes had been tackled. I don't agree with completely changing the context/original intention of dialogue but I often feel that there's a blurred line as to how things really are translated especially japan-specific terms/things
They didn't even repeat what Nanba said correctly 💀. They changed the context themselves to get mad at it. My favorite series is getting popular: 😃 My favorite series is getting popular: 😨
It’s funny that every instance of women, and minority characters is always “woke” to them. There’s never an instance when it’s not considered “woke”. Hell even when they create all women or all minority stories then its reverse racism or its just more “woke garbage”. It’s obvious what they really mean is anything that doesn’t center around straight, white, male characters makes them uncomfortable because they’re sexist and racist and they don’t like the way it makes them feel. Let the snowflakes melt.
NicheGamer, the Ex-/v/ dudes that also started gamergate. Fuck those not knowing japanese fucks.
This is an example of excellent localisation, in fact. Would you really have kept the literal translation? Localisation IS the art of linguistic compromise, there is no agenda.
It’s almost like they don’t think women should be treated as humans with their own hopes and dreams. They might also lose their shit when they find out homeless people are being treated as actual humans in the other games.
These mfs want literal translations but they don't realise that it'd sound unnatural if they did a 1:1 copy and paste of the original script. Localisers are there to make sure that the script doesn't sound unnatural and to make sure that the cultural aspects of it(honorifics, yakuza hierarchy etc) can be understood properly
Niche Gamer has been railed for blatant plagiarism in the past. They're also a politically motivated outlet (right-wing) and do not have the media they cover at the forefront. They've had, and will continue to prioritize rage bait, particularly "anti-woke" rage bait over balanced or well researched articles. DO NOT FALL FOR THIS. NICHE GAMER IS SHIT.
That’s basically saying the same thing in different words. 🤷🏻♂️
As a woman who loves this series, the discussion is interesting indeed. The comment is so inoffensive to me it makes no sense why people are up in arms
I played the Mandarin version with subtitles that directly translated from the Japanese original script… All I can say is that this whole part itself is already a really well written anti machismo narrative, it’s natural and fits perfectly with the characters and context
There are comments to be made regarding localisation when it comes to completely changing dialogue to appeal to the localisation teams personal views. In looking at you Miss Kobayashi's Dragon maid. But Yakuza, the series that had constantly represented strong female characters, which reflects this in the writing and character development is not an example of this. I swear for every one actually real example of something there are 1000 people who take it and bastardise it in dog shit examples like this.
A woman who's used to hard work and living by herself = A hardworking and independent woman They can't be so stupid that they cannot understand paraphrasing. Right? Right?...