Chrono Compendium
Zenan Plains - Site Discussion => Polling => Topic started by: utunnels on July 05, 2009, 01:04:11 am
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Well, just being curious.
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yes.
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The accent system was completely automated, which saved a lot of work but took most of the fun out of it.
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No, it was lazy. Most of the accents weren't even a part of the original game (in Japan). I place my trust the actual creators, not the local publishers and translators. In all honesty, I would prefer actual unique characters over a faux-unique way to say the same words which tries to trick you into thinking the characters are unique. They can speak differently, sure, but they should actually have something personal to say or else its a waste to change it at all. Chrono Trigger pulled it off remarkably well, making multiple playthroughs with various party combinations an alluring aspect (to see what who would say when or in some cases even in what party slot!), though I recognize it would have been more difficult to pull off with CC because of the large cast, I think MAYBE THAT SHOULD HAVE BEEN A FUCKING CLUE!! I don't agree with any of the poll options.
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I don't agree with any of the poll options.
WHAT, well, then add your option please. :lol:
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idk how to word it...literal translation would be closest, I guess...But mostly they should have just made the characters unique by giving them unique dialog rather than a different way to say the same thing...I'll see what I can do...
EDIT: Okay, I added two that I agree with and made it so you can vote for more than one (you can also change your votes if you want).
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Accents can be nice, but they shouldn't have focused more on that than what the characters said. Main reason it doesn't bother me is that's partially what I love bout Harle. :P
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Where's the option for 'No! Couldn't stand them!'? :lol: :picardno
I found the accents really irritating. Didn't add anything to the game for me.
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Maybe I'm misreading, but the first one and the last one seem to say the exact same thing.
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Unique dialog>Unique dialect
Accents and dialects aren't necessary to distinguish characters...I'm not saying that all the accents were terrible, but some of them were awful. Like the supposed French characters saying "moi is"....MOI IS?! What the fuck does that even mean? Unique dialog would have been more effective--and it is seen to a small degree--but it could have been utilized even more...
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Maybe I'm misreading, but the first one and the last one seem to say the exact same thing.
Um, which ones do you mean again...? The only ones I see that could be confused as being the same would be "Using different wording to distinguish characters is a better way." and "Unique dialog>Unique dialect", but 'wording' makes me think that they'd still all be saying the same thing...
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Maybe because of...
Yes, it makes the characters unique to each other.
Unique dialog>Unique dialect.
Both state that their way of talking is unique, even if using the same words. Maybe.
Anyway, I voted for the latter of the two.
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The first is in favor of the accents/dialects while the last clearly is not...I don't see the "uniqueness" of the accents as making the characters themselves really unique. It's WHAT you say, not HOW you say it that makes you truly unique.
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I see, then it wasn't referring to the dialect, rather dialog.
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I would'a voted for the last option, but I had already voted before it was added. =(
But I do think the accents themselves were done...somewhat poorly as well. Not in all cases, but to quote Mav:
...but some of them were awful. Like the supposed French characters saying "moi is"....MOI IS?!
Indeed. Moi AM, goshdarnit! At the very least!
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Um, even if you've voted, you can change your vote...
Harle didn't even originally speak with a "French" accent and I don't care how many people think it suits her because her name is Harle (which is another thing that was changed) and she's a clown. It was a dumb non-reason to change it.
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Changed my vote. Unique dialogue over unique dialect, FTW!
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The first is in favor of the accents/dialects while the last clearly is not...I don't see the "uniqueness" of the accents as making the characters themselves really unique. It's WHAT you say, not HOW you say it that makes you truly unique.
This, this, this!
Really, using accents to differentiate characters just came off as lazy. I don't even want to think how much depth may have been lost due to this little feat. Just imagine how they would have differentiated any character without accents, like Harle for example. I can't even fathom how different she'd be if they'd given her more unique dialog, as opposed to a unique accent. We lost characterization for dialects and accents...
I wonder if there was a Chrono Cross re-translation in the works...
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From what I understand, the Japanese version isn't all that better. Apparently, character lines tended to be rather generic over there too.
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The french accent makes sense to me, as she is not a clown; she is a harlequin. Harlequins are European jesters, mainly found in France.
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I loved the accents and don't get why everyone complains about them, without the dialogue modification we wouldn't have had ZOAH THE MIGHTY.
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The french accent makes sense to me, as she is not a clown; she is a harlequin. Harlequins are European jesters, mainly found in France.
How many people would have connected her to 'harlequin' if they didn't change her accent to pseudo-French and changed her name to Harle?
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The original harlequin: http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/thumb/5/57/Harlekin_Columbine_Tivoli_Denmark.jpg/488px-Harlekin_Columbine_Tivoli_Denmark.jpg (http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/thumb/5/57/Harlekin_Columbine_Tivoli_Denmark.jpg/488px-Harlekin_Columbine_Tivoli_Denmark.jpg)
Currently, the word harlequin is used to describe a jester in a play whose role is to distract the audience, or any fabric with that pattern. As Harle doesn't wear that pattern, and she serves purposes other than distracting an audience, I don't think she can be called a Harlequin.
Anyway, I can't stand Harle, mainly because of her accent (and also because she ran off with my best elements and armor). She probably would have been one of my favourite characters if she had unique dialogue instead of a horrid accent.
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With most of the accents I think it kind of adds to the character. Not necessary, but a bit entertaining. With a few exceptions. I would give a lot to have Poshul talk normally. And Pip gets annoying to me.
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Anyway, I can't stand Harle, mainly because of her accent (and also because she ran off with my best elements and armor). She probably would have been one of my favourite characters if she had unique dialogue instead of a horrid accent.
None of the 6 dragons has a French accent. :lol: I wonder why the localization team gave her a French accent.
I noticed the Ultimania states her class as "宮廷道化師"(court jester), according to the wiki, she's a Jester, like what is said in the English version. http://ja.wikipedia.org/wiki/%E9%81%93%E5%8C%96%E5%B8%AB
Occupation: Enigmatic Jester
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Harle didn't even originally speak with a "French" accent and I don't care how many people think it suits her because her name is Harle (which is another thing that was changed) and she's a clown. It was a dumb non-reason to change it.
It suits her because I SAID SO!
=D
You cannot deny the accents.
Well, excluding Leah's, Mojo's and some other ones that are just plain stupid. (Dont tell me that Harle's accent fits in the stupid catagory. You know what kind of "stupid" I am talking about!)
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Unique dialect add some life in the environment, not just an individual. Cohesive, and richness in social interaction, in term of massive variation though. In the bad side however, like most have covered, they lack depth of character. We can call that social gone wrong.
Regardless, I still think unique dialogue and more coherent dialogue should be what they have write. I like some of the accent, and some are annoying, but majority of them are neutral IMO.
I love the fact that Draggy got ''extended accent''. Dragggyyyy, it add some cuteness isn't it, just like his nature should be.
I also have no problem with Harle accent, just neutral. Her role and appearance in most of the scene are memorable, thus prevail her accent.
Although, I have some hard time with whoCHA did you refer?
Just go away to hell .......
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Actually I think Harle did a pretty good job, distracting the heroes from thinking of why exactly Lynx did what he did, not considering how maybe he's trying to stop something(cause c'mon, even bad guys are just people trying to do good, they just suck at it), like maybe dragons?
Besides, that's the original harlequin. Harlequin has come to more recognized as some sort of female jester. When appealing to the main public(how you'll make your sales)you gotta go with the most public version of something even if it isn't the truest meaning. I could've caught on to that.
In fact thanks to the Batman, I think it'd be easier for many people to recognize, what with Harley Quinn. Course, it'd be dead obvious if you gave Harle a Brooklyn accent. :P
But yeah, there are plenty of terms for Harlequin nowadays just as certain words originally had one meaning but overtime gained multiple meanings.
Harlequin is also disease, so if you want to compare her to the defenitions she could somehow be a disease to the team. Maybe it's just a name? You know like Solid Snake. That's his name but he isn't snakelike, and I don't see how solid would play in at all. Or Serge. His name is a form of water movement, but water isn't his thing.
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You're thinking of a surge (which was also the name of a pretty kickass drink that replaced Mountain Dew in popularity, here at least, for a while)...From what I see in muh dictionary, serge is a type of wool fabric. It says the name's word origin is from Seres, the Seres, an eastern Asian people...anyways, why give her a meaningless word when they could have just left it Tsukuyomi is beyond me.
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Maybe they thought the Japanese name would scare people off? I dunno. Just a guess, no sarcasm. For some reason typing this I feel like it could be taken sarcastically.
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Honestly, I'd prefer if they keep most Japanese names out. I have nothing against 'em. In fact there are quite a few pretty Japanese names, but like Onslaught just mentioned, it'd be off-putting and kinda weird. It's like how they kept the words "Hokuten" and "Nanten" in the original FFTactics release. I had no idea what those damn words meant, and it distracted me throughout the game. Harle's name fit (to me, at least). And you can thank Batman for that.
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Hokuten and Nanten? Are those contractions of Hokuto Shin Ken(Fist of the North Star) and Nanto Shin Sen(Fist of the South Star)?
You learn a lot from 80's anime.
BTW, V, it's my understanding that Tsukuyomi is the Boshidan Goddess of the Moon. That leaves a lot of spoiler potential for Harle in Japan, although, admittedly, not nearly as much in America, unless you happen to pick up on some of these phrases.
Besides, Harle is easier to pronounce.
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I think "Hokuten" and "Nanten" were replaced with "Order of the Northern Sky" and "Order of the Southern Sky", respectively. So, yeah, I think you got something there, man.
Back to Harle though, what was she like originally, in the Japanese release...or whatever you wanna call it? As annoying as her accent can be (really, it's just the way they used "moi" that pissed me off) and as strange as her name may be to some (I thought the name Harle made sense...), everything seemed to fit with her, in my opinion.
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Whether or not it makes sense in a different context is sort of the point...I mean, why is one name that comes from one culture more acceptable than one from another culture? Its her friggin name as given to her by her creator. I don't see how it is the right of the regional publishers or translators or whoever to change that...I think my feelings toward this sort of stem from part of The Crucible...
Because it is my name! Because I cannot have another in my life!...How may I live without my name? I have given you my soul; leave me my name!
It certainly would have spurned me into wondering what the name meant, which sure, might not have been the intended purpose...kids in Japan probably have a greater grasp of Shinto mythology (I guess...??)...but I would have looked it up and gotten myself cultured! I don't know how much of a spoiler it would have been though...I mean, you don't really learn a lot about the connections between the Dragons and the moons (& other heavenly bodies) for a while, and anyways, all of her Techs are moon-related...I don't see how the name "Harle" fits when her name is supposed to reflect her connections to the moon...Though I doubt I would be any more satisfied with the name Luna...>_>
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Here's another thing to take into account, V:
All of the names in CC, because of memory limitations, have to be seven or less characters. In CT it was five until Kajar Labs hacked it to make it 6.
Tsukuyomi is 4 characters when written in kanji: ツクヨミ, however, in romaji, its 9, so they couldn't exactly fit it in the NA release without using kanji, which they obviously cannot do.
So, they decided on Harle, because she's a harlequin. It has as much justification as "Luna" for the moon, and personally, I think it sounds better.
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Yes, this kind of "localization" is in principle bad, because it prevents the new target audience from getting to learn more about the other culture and tries to force the cultural nuances of the product into a mold that's familiar and easy to take in for said audience so that it's easier to sell. This leads to contradictions- the localisation of Gyakuten Saiban, "Phoenix Wright", takes place in America instead of Japan, and they change a bunch of names and characters who were overseas in America were instead overseas in Germany and so on... nonetheless, there are two cases in the series which revolve around japanese costumed action heroes (I don't even know what the right term is, because the localisation didn't tell me), which have nothing to do with american culture... The worst part is that the american localisation was retained for the european edition, so if you play the game in German, you're playing a translation of a localisation- the worst is when one of the characters says "Verstehen Sie kein Englisch?"
While I enjoy some accents, for example Poshuls (Poshul is a dumb, fat, pink dog, therefore a ridiculous lisp is fitting and contributes to his comical effectiveness), the idea of a french accent doesn't really make too much sense. Any accents that refer to different nations in our society aren't really logical because these nations don't exist in the world of Chrono. Therefore, it would be more interesting when within the original japanese version and within each translation, more original/unique accents would be present for people from other regions/lands- a Porre accent for example. Perhaps the Porres have another language altogether but speak the language of the inhabitants of El Nido (Japanese, English, French, etc.) with an accent, not a french, german, or italian accent, rather with a porrian accent.
On the other hand, I will admit that French is a snotty, arrogant sounding language and understand why they used the accent for Pierre...
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Another annoying thing about the accents is that most of them made little sense as accents. Kid's is self-consistent because it's based on a real-life accent, but the others are hopeless. Whoever wrote Pierre's and Harle's dialog had clearly never heard a real French accent and had only dubious familiarity with the French language (free clue: "moi" is "me", not "I", which means that "moi is" would translate as "me is"--am I the only one who sees a problem with this?). The other so-called accents are mostly either speech impediments or total nonsense.
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As I said before, they can't keep all of the longer names unless they wrote it in kanji or hiragana, something that would have turned away 99.99% of the NA Chrono fanbase that can't speak or read Japanese. Ken Narita(one of the visual developers and seiyuu for Sesshomaru) can't even read kanji, so Lord knows what kind of problems that would lead to.
And the Japanese Superhero thing is called Sentai, not to be confused with its better known and much uglier step brother....
In all fairness though, you can cry foul about changing a few names here and there, but this is stuff that has to be done for any profit seeking entity in the translating process. I'm sure if you looked at a German or Japanese version of the Lion King, someone's name got changed in the process.
But about the accents, I think they were running thin as they reached all 46 characters and started making things up.
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Whoever wrote Pierre's and Harle's dialog had clearly never heard a real French accent and had only dubious familiarity with the French language (free clue: "moi" is "me", not "I", which means that "moi is" would translate as "me is"--am I the only one who sees a problem with this?).
Mmmhmmm.
Obviously certain accents shouldn't exist in the Chrono world, but how the hell would we know what a Porre accent sounds like? If they patterned Porre's supposed accent off of, I dunno, an Irish accent, that'd be fine, right? So each region in the Chrono world could have some kind of specific dialect and on top of that certain characters with weird jobs (like a pirate) would have job-specific accents ("argh matey, lemme see your booty"). Assuming what I just said made sense, it would be a sensible way to create an accent system in CC...in my opinion.
They tried something like that with some of the Guldove people, but it turned out annoying...don'tCHA know.
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Whoever wrote Pierre's and Harle's dialog had clearly never heard a real French accent and had only dubious familiarity with the French language (free clue: "moi" is "me", not "I", which means that "moi is" would translate as "me is"--am I the only one who sees a problem with this?).
Mmmhmmm.
Obviously certain accents shouldn't exist in the Chrono world, but how the hell would we know what a Porre accent sounds like? If they patterned Porre's supposed accent off of, I dunno, an Irish accent, that'd be fine, right? So each region in the Chrono world could have some kind of specific dialect and on top of that certain characters with weird jobs (like a pirate) would have job-specific accents ("argh matey, lemme see your booty"). Assuming what I just said made sense, it would be a sensible way to create an accent system in CC...in my opinion.
They tried something like that with some of the Guldove people, but it turned out annoying...don'tCHA know.
It's still not a very good solution, because then the one immediately associates said accent with Ireland rather than with Porre.
Anyway, I didn't say it would be easy, but Square-America could have given a bit more effort, don'tCHA think?
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I think Pierre's was supposed to be bad French because he's really kind of a faker himself, or at the very least he appears that way because of his whole attitude.
Anyways, the fact that names are changed due to space limitations, while true, doesn't change the fact that its DUMB. PSX games AT LEAST should've been beyond this. Changing it to something short is a lame, lazy thing to do.
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V, if it were me, I'd be able to name my characters "Kyoka Suigetsu." RAM only goes so far, dude.
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From what I recall they barely used the 2nd disk at all...and there were really only a handful of FMVs...I don't see the big deal at least in making it so that the regional ports can sustain the characters needed for the characters' actual names.
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This is one place I must disagree with you, V.
Japanese names are hard to pronounce, but harder to remember (For an english audience). Especially for the casual player who doesn't research Japan just to play a game that came from there. The english names were just supposed to "fit" rather than be exact literal translations of the meanings of their japanese names. You're not supposed to think about the names that much, you're just supposed to play.
The accents were counterproductive in this sense, in that they made you think of why these people were talking this way, and why there were so many dialects in such a small archipelago. It takes you out of the game. Especially some parts where there are grammatical errors BECAUSE of the automated dialogue system. Some things the characters say are hard to understand because there's so much bullshit between what they say and how they say it.
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That's just a lame cop-out/excuse to me...Japanese names are going to continue to be harder to pronounce & remember by English-speaking audiences if they're not exposed to them. Plus, it's not like the localized names' pronunciations aren't being debated as-is...
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Recently I'm translating CC scripts into my native language, so I check both versions simultaneously.
Just noticed a while back that Mel's cat, a shadow cat, is called Lucha(Rucha) in the Japanese version, although it is renamed to Luna in the US version.
:picardno [/offtopic]
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That's just a lame cop-out/excuse to me...Japanese names are going to continue to be harder to pronounce & remember by English-speaking audiences if they're not exposed to them. Plus, it's not like the localized names' pronunciations aren't being debated as-is...
I'm just sayin the names were not my only or biggest problem with Cross. Now, if Glenn's japanese name is Chuck or something else unrelated to Trigger, I'd be kinda peeved. But it's not like I wouldn't play the game because of the names. The accents though? That took a while for me to be able to "get".
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I liked the accents but only for 2 people : Harle and Kid , they were special and the accents showed they were different and hiding something In my oppinion .
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HELL YES!!!!!!!!!!!!! :franky
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hell naw!!!!
the accents gave it a certain feel, but sometimes i couldnt even visualize their voices. when i read something i hear the character's voice in my head. with the accetns, i cant get the proper voice down. i cant hear what they say. i dont know how irenes pronounces her words. i cant imagine harles fake french accent. i can hear certain characters like kid, but not others.
if they had made them more believable... that would have been good.
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This is an old topic but I'll add my two cents.
It's an old tradition that in Latinamerica the videogames are distributed in the north american english version, no translation for us (Just very recently we have started to get spanish versions, at least for the Wii). That was ok for Mario bros. or Megaman games, there were not too many dialogues, just action action action. But the few of us who were discovering our love for RPG's were forced to play the games with a dictionary at hand (or worse, with your mom or your dad at your side, helping you translate :P ). When I first played the Chrono games (that was like, um, almost ten years ago), my english was so much worse than it is today. I played Chrono Trigger forcing myself to read through the dialogues, stopping every other line to use the dictionary, but I understood enough to love the game. When I played Cross... well... let me tell you this, the accents were A PAIN IN THE ASS. Most of Kid's dialogues were just guesses for me, I seriously hated Harle's accent particularly, i couldn't understand a word she said, because accents and weird speech patterns are not in dictionaries. I'm sure that was one of the reasons I ended up becoming a Cross hater, just very recently I re-played the game, now that my english is better, and discovered I actually love it now.
I'm not blaming north american translators for anything though, I mean, why would they consider the non-english speaker latin american market anyway? I'm just telling you my very own experience with the game's accents.
Nowadays, I'm actually from the generation of mexican gamers that cannot stand playing games in spanish. There are now fan-translated versions of many games out there in the internet, but I don't even consider downloading them, not even RD which is text based.
As a curious note, I recently started writing Cross fanfictions in spanish, and it's strange because there are no equivalents for many of the accents used in the game. For example in spanish there is not such a thing as pirate talk or an australian accent. Aussie characters in dubbed movies and series are translated as talking perfect spanish with neutral accent just as every other characters. So it's funny and interesting trying to figure out how to reflect that in spanish.
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If you hate accents, you're gonna hate my in-progress fanfic... heh.
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There should a switch to turn it off, hehe.
Hmm, you mean fanfic...never mind.
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If you hate accents, you're gonna hate my in-progress fanfic... heh.
Oh, no no no, don't get me wrong :D That was then, now I don't mind accents, I even like some of them... actually, there are still some annoying ones, but once i get use to them they are ok, he.
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I really like accents, but they have to be done properly, you can't just put in a little code in the game that switched things to fit whatever their accent may be. It's best, when written, to speak out with the corresponding accent and write what comes out. I've got a Soul Calibur fic I'm working on, and I have an accent for everyone where I know how to apply them (for example, I have no idea what a Greek accent is like). So far, I've got Siegfried (German), Raphael and Amy (French), and I plan on having Taki and Mitsurugi at some point, and even Maxi, although he'd only be a very temporary one to have in there. Tira I don't really give one; being an assassin, she would have to speak several languages, and mixing them all together in English gets you... American. Sort of.
I've also got Spanish characters, but their accents aren't very prominent in the way one would think, but how they speak their English sounds very Spanish.
Honestly, it all depends on how well it's written. How they tried to give Luccia's Dutch accent was clumsy, but others are very characteristic of them and help flesh them out. For example, there's Harle, who you can hear swear out loud in French, and Leah saying 'um' all the time is reminiscent of how many little children I've heard talk, having and 'um' between every two or three words. Grobyc's-funny-replacement-for-spaces gives him the feel of talking semi-monotonously, just like you would expect from a robot. Some of them were don well, and others... not so well.
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I know there are different dialects of Spanish you could try to emulate! Mexican Spanish is different from the Spanish someone from Portugal or Spain might speak. That'd be really interesting, though I think I'd suffer the same problem trying to translate that you did while playing Cross! :lol:
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I love Spaniard Spanish!(most mexicans don't, though). Even inside mexico there are different accents, almost every state has its own accent... I talk with a little of a northern accent myself ( with an intonation similar to the stereotypical speedy-gonzalez accent :picardno I hate to hear my own voice from a recording).
Mmmh, I think if abused the accents could lead to giving the characters bad stereotypical treats, but if used correctly... maybe spaniard spanish to replace some of the european accents in the game or caribbean or puerto rican spanish for Guldove characters to represent their more traditional relationship with the islands, umm... you really got me thinking there, it may actually work, thanks for the suggestion :)
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Exactly! That'd be sweet. It just takes a little creative tweaking. If it can be done in english and japanese, it should be doable in almost any language. probably not latin.
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I'm waiting for Thought to come to this thread and prove that Latin can have different accents. :P
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Of course Latin can have different accents: the Romance languages all got their start as regional variations of Classical Latin. So no accents in Latin = no French, Spanish, Italian, Romanian, Portugese, Catalan, Occitan, Romansch, Mozarabic, and several more that I'm forgetting.
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:-) Teeheehee good luck writing THAT game, is all I'm saying.
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I talk with a little of a northern accent myself ( with an intonation similar to the stereotypical speedy-gonzalez accent :picardno I hate to hear my own voice from a recording).
Now I'm curious of hearing my own voice to remember how I really sound like... :lol:
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Be careful, hearing your own voice is the most annoying thing :lol: agh.... it's funny one can't hear its own accent.
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For the most part I found the accents charming and an effective way to imbue the characters with personality, though some of them were definitely a little overwrought. I don't think the "should have used unique dialogue" option on the poll is really fair, though, since writing EVERY line of dialogue uniquely for each character wouldn't have been even remotely practical or, hell, even remotely feasible for the dev team - they clearly had enough problems with time and resources as it was. I guess you could go to the usual criticism of saying Cross should've had fewer characters, but that's a different discussion altogether.
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Did they program the accents in so that the same dialogue would automatically change for each character?
...otherwise it would not have technically been more work.
I discovered something dreadful in the french Fan-Translation. Harle and Pierre now insert random english words into their speech! Dreadful! At least the random french words in the english translation corresponded to our stereotypes about harlequins and cavaliers/french effeminacy. Flipping it around makes no sense and made me decide against choosing Pierre for the playthrough...