This is a rare, serious update that does not concern us. However, there are some who will inevitably compare it to what happened last summer, so please bear with me as I express my views. Thank you.

The To Heart 2 translation project was “completed” yesterday. By “complete”, I mean that they consider the current status to be final and have released something. However, their patch is non-public. Only those whom they trust have it. This appears to draw parallels to how we first handled Build A of the Wind patch.

Since their message board is now closed, I will respect them and not paste their verbatim statement, since it may have been retracted. I will simply paraphrase so that as many people can understand what is going on. All of the following points are their own allegations.

1) They have released a patch.
The FAQ claimed that it was merely a translation, yet they contradicted themselves and declared it a patch in the original statement. There are only three build possibilities for a game translation project: a translation such as a text file, a standalone, or a patch. Anything that modifies or intercepts game code is a patch. Therefore, by definition, their build is a patch.

2) They will not release it to the public.
Claiming that most people are jerks, they have only released it to people they know.

This is where the similarities between this project and the Wind project end. We allowed anyone to come into the channel and answer one question based on the game packaging. However, the hopefuls insulted our intelligence by giving answers that were not only a little off, but way off. After the Supah Hamonika Test was terminated, we administered the test in its entirety to Edward Keyes, our BitTorrent assistant. He had no prior knowledge of the questions beforehand, but he answered every question correctly.

We then put up a notice that the patch distribution would be terminated. This update occurred at 3AM. It was then retracted at around 5AM. There were less than one hundred hits to the web site during this time. However, one site attempting to pass off as a legitimate news portal pasted the update in its entirety, refused to remove it at our behest, and all hell broke loose the next day. I called an emergency meeting with insani and voted to release the patch to the public. Our intentions were given meticulously on our web site and insani’s web site, and anyone who claimed that we were not going to release it was simply lying. Five months later, we did.

On the other hand, the To Heart 2 translation project team has no further plans.

3) They are allowing the people who have the patch to distribute it to whomever they see fit.
All Build A patches of Wind were unique; they were individually watermarked for the person who originally obtained it. The perpetrator of any leak would have been instantly caught. Perhaps it was this, or the promise of Build C being public, that resulted in Build A not being leaked.

The To Heart 2 patch does not have these luxuries. It will inevitably be leaked, as there are people desperate enough to befriend someone for a few months, obtain the patch, and leak it anonymously. The project team is fighting an unwinnable battle. If they did not want the patch to be public, why publicize it in the first place?

Some people may think that translation is the most difficult part of a translation project. I disagree. There are a number of projects which are at the 80-100% translation point (Kanon, Cross Channel, Shuffle!, Men at Work 2) for quite some time. Why have they stalled? 2006 was set to be the year of bishoujo game patches, yet only Wind and Tsukihime came out. What set those two projects apart from the others?

Leadership.

Leadership is grabbing the reins, keeping your mouth shut, and focusing on the task at hand. It is about guiding everyone, including yourself, who may have conflicted views, into one solid compromise. It is about taking chances, slipping up, and having the wisdom to admit you’re wrong. We apologized for our brief update almost immediately, retracted it, and made a new statement. Had we lingered for a couple of days, the situation would have been much worse.

Also, the voting during the emergency meeting was secret, but I will reveal my vote: I voted to discontinue. I did it for my own selfish reasons. After the vote, I could have dismissed the whole process, but after a month of thought, I was able to understand the altruism of the others and begin the process of completing Build C. A firm choice was made.

The fact remains that the people in the To Heart 2 translation project are not obligated to give you anything. However, the signs for this project were rather conspicuous. Aside from a couple of screenshots, no one outside their clique knows if their project is for real. Programming has been mysteriously stuck at 0/100 for the entire duration of the project. In contrast, we proved ourselves by releasing the Wind demo, which turned out to be the most effective method of finding a person who was willing to translate the entire game. We showed many work-in-progress screenshots in our IRC channel to people outside the project, and our status report was accurate to the day that alpha-testing ended, chronicling our efforts down to the nearest percent.

I have never talked to the people in the To Heart 2 translation project, and I likely never will. But if they can’t be truthful to themselves or the ones who are patiently waiting, then perhaps the project was doomed to have this epilogue from the beginning.

One final thing: NNL does not have possession of the patch.

From the Leaf Game Translation Group:

We decided to give [the To Heart 2 Translation Patch] only to people we know extremely well and trust to not distribute to pirates, and have told them to distribute it, if they wish, to only others who are likewise familiar to them. Who are these people? Well, if you know them well enough, they might just tell you. Or even give you the translation. If not, well, too bad.

So, what? You release to channels so niche that if we don’t know them, we can’t get it? That’s pretty good… not as great as the Wind “BREAK THE SUPPORT DISC” e-drama though. If you’re going to cause e-drama with translation projects, you oughta do better than that.

Seriously though, once someone leaks it to a tracker, it’s all over. What “trust” is there on the Internet anyways? Someone is going to leak it, and all that hard work to keep it in “niche” channels will be all for nothing. And the only thing you’re gonna do is sit there and cry.

I know some people have been pissing you off in your forums, and I see generally speaking that there’s a lot of that hate coming from them, but that’s no reason to be doing this. All that’s doing is acknowledging their trolling and implying that their trolling will affect game translation projects. If you give in to them, then you take the Internet way too seriously for your own good.

During E3, we got the opportunity to sit down with Square Enix’s Koichiro Sakamoto, who just recently served as the producer on the company’s Front Mission DS, due for release in the US this October 23rd… we told Mr. Sakamoto that a fan translation had been done some years ago for Front Mission 1, and asked how he felt about such efforts. The producer replied that he actually found them very encouraging — it’s something the developers should be doing, but because they’re not, the fans are doing it instead. He stated that he’d like to be able to give something back to the fans, and would like to thank personally each of the fans that worked on the translation.

So before any of you people quote anything from the Berne Convention about copyright infringment… think of what the developers feel first. They want us to encourage their work!

Of course, if the big boys license it and want to get to work on it, let them. That’s their job, anyway.

As for how We Suck handles titles and Japanese honorifics – the No. 1 guideline that we follow is: location, location, location.We believe that an anime is in Japanese because:

1. It is set in Japan and is about Japanese people, or set outside Japan but with the setting dominated by Japanese people. Alternatively, the story takes place in a fantasy alternate-universe where the environment or people is supposed to resemble Japan.
2. It is set in a non-Japanese country and it is predominated by non-Japanese people. Alternatively, it is set in a fantasy setting which is an explicit simulation of a country outside Japan, and features characters that are explicitly not Japanese. (However, it is in Japanese because that is the language spoken by its viewers.)
3. It is set in a 100% fantasy setting, where it’s not explicitly obvious what real-life country is being simulated.

In Case A, it would make sense to leave in the honorifics, as well as keep certain terms and cultural references untranslated (but explained via translation note). On the other hand, in Case B, the sensible thing to do would be to translate the honorifics and translate any terms originally left in Japanese – because the anime is supposed to simulate non-Japanese culture (as opposed to Japanese culture) to begin with. To hear things like “Integral-sama” in Hellsing or “Emily-chan” in Emily of New Moon would be rather jarring, to say the least. As for Case C, we evaluate on a case-by-case basis.

The majority of the projects that we’ve worked on fall under Case A. (This includes Rocket Girls, because while the anime itself takes place in a space base in Solomon Islands, said space base is occupied by Japanese people.) The only two projects we’ve done which fall under Case B is Survive (for which I wasn’t part of the group) and Saiunkoku. In the case of Saiunkoku, while we’ve taken some flak for translating all titles and honorifics in the series, we believe that it’s the right path to follow because Saiunkoku is supposed to be set in a fantasy world in the style of ancient China – if it was set in a fantasy world in the style of Japan circa the Heian-kyo era, our decision on titles and honorifics would be much different.

As for the original topic: ○○-tachi can easily be rendered as any of:

• ○○-and the others
• ○○-and company
• ○○-et al.
• ○○-and his/her friends, or even
• ○○-and (insert names of whichever other specific people are being referred to).

But I suppose there could be worse examples… it could have been “Everything is according to keikaku” for 計画通り, with a translation note explaining what keikaku means. (For the record, keikaku (計画) is Japanese for “plan”).

Indeed. Though I don’t know about where keikaku comes from, I do know of certain groups that just purely follow Case C no matter what (changing common Japanese names to Mary and Joe, for one). And certain groups that leave -tachi and yatsu alone.

You do the math.

Anyone out there who can manage? Only needs to be a purely translated script; no timing, typesetting or any of that needed whatsoever. Preferably, be able to translate the script sometime within the 24 hours of the episode airing. Everything else will be handled. Thanks to anyone who can answer the rollcall!

First off, the initial translation project started in 2005. Approximately two years ago. Exactly how the project was handled and how it went around back then is beyond me. However, it seems that the open translation method may be the only way to actually have this project done, given the two-year delay. The number of routes and subscenarios are complex and have so many variations that, I wouldn’t want to wish this on a single translator to complete all of it (and still maintain consistency). In fact, it would be nearly impossible for even a single translator to maintain consistency across all the routes, let alone multiple translators (as it is right now). For a game like CLANNAD, a main editor (or group of editors) will be required, no matter how good the translator may be. Even if this were a closed project, the amount of editing required would be absolutely insane; try reading through one of the subscenario files that weigh more than 1000 lines and you’ll know what I mean. Now imagine that x 15, and you have one of the main heroines’ routes right there.

The second part is, exactly what is it that makes the open translation so capable of attracting translators? Does it bring ease of use? Or maybe because it’s so open people feel more encouraged to work on it? Or is it because the translated files are right there, and people can see it and make changes and feel like they’re part of a bigger whole?

The last part is, although translation consistency should be maintained as closely as possible, does it matter once the routes start diverging? From what I understand, up until April 25 the routes all mesh together and are somewhat interconnected, but after that, the routes separate and it’s everyone for themselves. It makes me wonder if this was the same with the original writing concept, in that Jun Maeda and the writers in Key all wrote together at one point, then separated when the time came? Should it be like that in the translation as well? Ideally though, consistency should be kept, but who knows?

It’s just something I’d want to keep in mind… should the time come for Tomoyo After or Little Busters! to be translated, would this be the same method of choice again…? It’ll probably depend on the final product of this current endeavor, wouldn’t it?

It seems that the currently existing translation community suffers from a very serious condition; it’s not just limited to one or two translators. And usually this group has a tendency to be snobs about the way current translations are being handled.

Baka-Tsuki is an open-wiki translation group that started back in April of last year, known mostly for the Suzumiya Haruhi novel translations. They’ve finished translating up to volume 8 and just started volume 9. Theoretically speaking, no other translation group or method has been able to reach translating this far.

Now the nitpicking begins; some of the seasoned translators from long ago come around and decide to mock the translations, nitpicking and claiming that the writing’s crap, some of the lines are missing the original meaning, and so on. Of course, that may be true, but are they actually going on to fix any of those lines? Answer is a very short no.

Needless to say, such people decide to continue on about how the entire content should be treated as fanfiction and the like, claiming that without a visual medium it could be considered as such. Apparently, without pictures or moving images, you have a harder time interpreting the original content and thus you’re not reading the original content.

I’m having a hard time following what these guys are looking for.

What these guys are looking for, is a paid and professional translator who’s seasoned and knows what the hell he’s doing. And he charges expensive prices. And of course, he’ll have it sent to an editor before he actually puts out the final product.

Open-wiki translations are translations that have not even been edited yet. In fact, a lot of it will end up being “Engrish”, but as you already know even professional translations end up like this before they get processed and ripped by the editor before they actually get published for money. Unfortunately, it appears the old chumps have trouble interpreting that, and instead of trying to be constructive and helpful, the statements they’ve been making end up coming off too much like the translation shouldn’t be happening at all.

Now I’m not saying that all of the seasoned translators suffer from this problem, but only some of them do. Which is better? A free translation that can be edited over time? Or no translation at all? You decide.

Funny that, I was planning on tacking a promotional video for the CLANNAD Game Translation Project at the end of the episode as well! For shame.

I’ll be posting both the karaoke’d version of the CLANNAD TV promotion by Kyoto Animation, as well as the CLANNAD Game Translation Project promotional video later tonight.

Sushi-Y says that insider information reveals an early 2008 release for CLANNAD TV. Hopefully by then I’ll be in at least internal beta with a 100% TL done for the game.

It’s been, I don’t know, maybe three weeks since I last updated this blog? A lot of changes in terms of software have come around recently, and although I’ve gotten around to updating, I feel like it’s not really a big priority for me to indulge in what I do around here.

Though, for the most part, the CLANNAD Game Translation project is going well. Kanon’s about to end at episode 24, and that’ll end my fansubbing run for the time being. I don’t plan on picking up any more fansubs for now, as the quality of anime in recent days has been few and far between. I can only pray that there will be better stuff out there soon. The good news is, once Kanon 24 is done and over with, I’ll have time to finish up the HQ prints for all the episodes I missed (that’s 18-24) and then I can get on with working on CLANNAD.

Speaking of which, the CLANNAD game translation is now around the 28% mark. rabidkimba has been pretty consistent and has been translating on a regular basis; he’s also doing Nagisa’s route, as well. I look forward to when that’s done; for the time being, I’m promoting him to main translator status. If you want that status, be like rabidkimba and commit yourself.

What routes are done right now, you ask? They’d be Miyazawa Yukine, Fuuko Master, Illusionary World (幻想世界), and the baseball scenarios. Though maybe about 1~2% of the lines are missing, at least 98% of the translation of those routes are done, and is most likely playable if I were to render a patch. To be honest though, I have no idea what Fuuko Master is all about. ^^;

Now the question is, how do you make this all go faster? Here’s a simple answer. Help with the wiki! That’s what it’s for, and although we’re working on a consistent basis to get this translation done, bitching and moaning about what we’re doing won’t help one bit. If you bitch and moan and don’t even bother to contribute constructively to the wiki, I doubt you’d be one of the people deserving the patch to begin with.

Clannad Game TL Wiki