Does the information in a PSO Artbook mean anything to Engli

[HUnewearl_Meira]

This has become the subject of debate on the Phantasy Star Discussion Board. Evidently, the official PSO Episodes I&II artbook from Japan gives us the first name of Principal Colin Tyrell, as well as the last names of Irene Sepa and Ash Canaan.
So, the question is, does the trivial information offered in the book hold any bearing on the US/Euro releases of PSO, despite being available only in Japanese?

[Valleo]

I dont get the question. Why shouldnt it be the same? I understand the debate between the 2 versions of the original Phantasy Star series, because of the many differences in the games themselves. "Official" Japanese publications would then be more in question, since the differences between the Japanese and North American games are pretty significant.

However I dont know of any such differences in PSO. So I see no reason why not to take these publications at face value, since the games are exactly the same and im assuming the info comes from or was authorised by ST themselves.

My favorite series is Suikoden, and North American fans have been starved for info on this game since its release, having only the JP exclusive art books, novels and even games to get any info from. The games we do have are (as far as story goes) exactly the same, barring some translation errors. As far as I know there has never been a debate on whether or not to take the JP only Konami publications at face value.

Or mabye Mike Ripplinger just needs to get over his "2 different continuoms" theory.

[Logical2u]

This information is useful, and I assume you've read this yourself, so this is very informative for us Fanfiction writers, but I see one possible problem. I believe, in japan, there is no difference between R and W (or is it L and W or something like that) so it might not be the same names in english as in japanese.

[HUnewearl_Meira]

A2K recieved his copy (I ordered mine last night), and posted the information on the PSBD, which then lead to the debate.

I've not confirmed this, but because A2K was so specific in saying "Colin", it must've been in roman letters. There are two reasons for this. 1.) Reguardless of the language setting, NPC names are ALWAYS written in roman letters. And 2.) Had it been written in Japanese letters, the result would've been unrecognizable as "Colin", because L and R's switch (must make abbreviations of Left and Right quite confusing). Had it been written in Japanese letters, the results would've been more like, "Corono" or "Coronu", which even the most intelligent translator would be rather unlikely to derrive "Colin" from.

[_Sinue_]

It still boggles my mind how someone can take the word of a brain dead and underpaid translator over information officially sponsored by the creators of the series.

There are no two continuems. There is one storyline, and anything from the EU or US versions which contradicts that is in error.

[HUnewearl_Meira]

On 2003-10-24 09:41, _Sinue_ wrote:
It still boggles my mind how someone can take the word of a brain dead and underpaid translator over information officially sponsored by the creators of the series.

There are no two continuems. There is one storyline, and anything from the EU or US versions which contradicts that is in error.



Well... It's in error to the Japanese version, at least. I prefer to look at it like the difference between Greek and Roman myth. They both tell more or less the same stories, but they deviate from eachother in the details. Effectively, it's two representations of the same story that don't totally agree with eachother.

The original series DOES have significant differences, though. Most particularly, PS3 in Japan takes place, quite expressly, 1,000 years after PS4 (that's 200 years AFTER PSO, mind you), whereas the English versions place the game concurrently with PS4. Which most certainly makes things interesting for PSO.

Even still, there are no such differences within the confines of PSO, so it doesn't matter here.

[Greenie]

I would take the JP information on storyline and names well above the US translation. many games havecome across with horrendous translations and the only place to get the real informaiton is from the Lions mouth, from the source, which is the original JP language.

[A2K]

^ ^ ^Then again, sometimes the Japanese horrendously translate things on their own. There are multiple ways to inteperet and Romanize katakana names and whatnot.

For example: The book lists bosses called "Bal Ba Ray," "Gal Griffon," and "Olga Frow" of course, the game calls then "Barba Ray," "Gal Gryphon" and "Olga Flow". Who the hell is right or wrong? They're all basically the same, barring some extremely minor phoenetic differences. Is using their English names wrong? Hell no, if anything, the names in the book are wrong! Olga Frow? What, he has big hair? (It's Nabeshin!) The book is official and Japanese, that doesn't mean it's right... does that apply to the game itself, though?

But... like it's been said, none of that continuity stuff really applies to PSO, at all. The game is basically virtually 100% identical, no matter what langauge setting you have it set to...

[Nai_Calus]

On 2003-10-24 09:37, HUnewearl_Meira wrote:
A2K recieved his copy (I ordered mine last night), and posted the information on the PSBD, which then lead to the debate.

I've not confirmed this, but because A2K was so specific in saying "Colin", it must've been in roman letters. There are two reasons for this. 1.) Reguardless of the language setting, NPC names are ALWAYS written in roman letters. And 2.) Had it been written in Japanese letters, the result would've been unrecognizable as "Colin", because L and R's switch (must make abbreviations of Left and Right quite confusing). Had it been written in Japanese letters, the results would've been more like, "Corono" or "Coronu", which even the most intelligent translator would be rather unlikely to derrive "Colin" from.



Actually, they don't switch... They're interchangable, really. The 'truest' pronunciation of the ra/ri/ru/re/ro series of syllables is somewhere between an r and an l, but depending on accent, it can sound like either an 'l' or an 'r'. And abbreviations of left and right probably wouldn't be that confusing... Especially if one used the Japanese words, 'hidari' and 'migi'.(Hidoom and Migium, hmm...)
Er... NPC names are usually in kana, actually, not roman letters, when they're actually being referred to... Alicia doesn't introduce herself as 'Alicia Baz' if you set the language to Japanese, but rather 'ARISHIA BAZU', her name as set for determining her section ID is indeed ALICIA, though; Elly introduces herself as 'ERI PAASON', not Elly Person(Set character name - ELLY), and talks endlessly about 'KARUSU', not 'Calus'(Who's name as set in SotH is CALUS).(I wish I could use kana on these boards instead of romanization. I need to make gifs of all the kana, upload them somewhere, and then use them as images. Colour would be a problem, though...)
I suspect the translation of the game, but my Japanese jedi powers are weak - I read kana, some basic kanji, and know some vocabulary and grammar. Not enough to translate things accurately, but enough to raise an eyebrow at one or two things here in there. (Some stuff I'm convinced they just made up. Most of the quest names are just wrong, although that's semantics('Kokoro no katachi' does not translate as 'Knowing One's Heart', no matter how much crack you smoke, Magnitude of Metal is just... Obvious..., etc)... Some of the stuff you look at in English, and you look at in Japanese, and you can make enough of the Japanese to wonder about the translation. Hell, they seem to have invented an NPC(Not that this matters at -all-, since it's incredibly minor and said person is only ever mentioned once by a random NPC wandering about P2) in the English version...(Someone who knows more Japanese than I do would be able to tell better. Could be the name is in kanji in the Japanese version and I'm not picking up on it, but I doubt it, since there's no usage of kanji for person names at all.))
'Colin' in kana would be something along the lines of 'KORIN'
...I just made nearly an entire post in parenthesis. I think I'm going to go cry now or something. Maybe I'll just pipe a Hildetorr and bitchslap it when it gives me a monomate.

[HUnewearl_Meira]

On 2003-10-24 20:15, A2K wrote:
^ ^ ^Then again, sometimes the Japanese horrendously translate things on their own. There are multiple ways to inteperet and Romanize katakana names and whatnot.

For example: The book lists bosses called "Bal Ba Ray," "Gal Griffon," and "Olga Frow" of course, the game calls then "Barba Ray," "Gal Gryphon" and "Olga Flow". Who the hell is right or wrong? They're all basically the same, barring some extremely minor phoenetic differences. Is using their English names wrong? Hell no, if anything, the names in the book are wrong! Olga Frow? What, he has big hair? (It's Nabeshin!) The book is official and Japanese, that doesn't mean it's right... does that apply to the game itself, though?

But... like it's been said, none of that continuity stuff really applies to PSO, at all. The game is basically virtually 100% identical, no matter what langauge setting you have it set to...



lol... Olga Frow... Is this what Olga Flow would've been, had Flowen been a FROmar?

[Kent]

Let's see, do the official artbooks have any bearing on the English translations of the games?

Official Artbooks.

As if the answer isn't obvious...

[Shimarisu]

It's the English translation that's wrong, 90% of the time. On one of the new online quests (I forget which as I'm usually in japanese mode) the NPC said to me "Hello, Arion's Force." LMAO. Because, you see, Arion no foosu can translate as either "Force Arion" or "Arion's Force". But the translation is sloppy, and chucked together.

There's a reason why Dark Force/Falz is different in different games. It's because faced with the Japanese original, and the old artbooks with the correct names, the translators had to change it. Now I don't know what they are calling him in PSO artbooks, but from 1-4 his original Japanese name was "Dark Phallus".

- Shimarisu

[Erendell]

Dark Phallus.... I am NOT going to ask! No matter what the original names are, you couldn't have that in a game. If you did, i'd laugh at it as much as I am now
XDXDXD

[HUnewearl_Meira]

I dunno, in PS4, toward the end there was a monster you could meet in random encounters that happened to look very much like the original Dark Falz from PS1, and it was named "Prophallus". Kinda makes you wonder, doesn't it?
lol... "A King in the Wind and the Way", indeed!


<font size=-1>[ This Message was edited by: HUnewearl_Meira on 2003-10-25 09:56 ]</font>

[navci]

I've not confirmed this, but because A2K was so specific in saying "Colin", it must've been in roman letters. There are two reasons for this. 1.) Reguardless of the language setting, NPC names are ALWAYS written in roman letters. And 2.) Had it been written in Japanese letters, the result would've been unrecognizable as "Colin", because L and R's switch (must make abbreviations of Left and Right quite confusing). Had it been written in Japanese letters, the results would've been more like, "Corono" or "Coronu", which even the most intelligent translator would be rather unlikely to derrive "Colin" from.



I own this particular book. In the NPC section, what they did was listed the names by their roman character "COLIN TYRELL" as well as his name in katakana. So. Colin Tyrell he is.

That book has some really detailed information on all the NPC< background timeline. Even discrepancy between the "official" announcement the government made and what really happened and such. A very good read, I recommand to everyone, ... er, who can read some Japanese. =}

[HUnewearl_Meira]

Out of curiosity Navi, do YOU understand Japanese?

[Denny]

On 2003-10-25 10:35, navi wrote:


I've not confirmed this, but because A2K was so specific in saying "Colin", it must've been in roman letters. There are two reasons for this. 1.) Reguardless of the language setting, NPC names are ALWAYS written in roman letters. And 2.) Had it been written in Japanese letters, the result would've been unrecognizable as "Colin", because L and R's switch (must make abbreviations of Left and Right quite confusing). Had it been written in Japanese letters, the results would've been more like, "Corono" or "Coronu", which even the most intelligent translator would be rather unlikely to derrive "Colin" from.



I own this particular book. In the NPC section, what they did was listed the names by their roman character "COLIN TYRELL" as well as his name in katakana. So. Colin Tyrell he is.

That book has some really detailed information on all the NPC< background timeline. Even discrepancy between the "official" announcement the government made and what really happened and such. A very good read, I recommand to everyone, ... er, who can read some Japanese. =}



Where can this book be found?

[StryderPSO]

is the book worth buying? I was thinking about getting it, but its like $30.00

[AquaFlare7]

If I wrote a book here in america and then translated it roughly into japanese, it doesnt change what it was "meant" to be. If the game was created in japan with certain names then they are the correct names, no matter what you would like to think.

[navci]

On 2003-10-25 12:31, HUnewearl_Meira wrote:
Out of curiosity Navi, do YOU understand Japanese?



If I were finally to take that Japanese language standardize test I am prolly at least a Level 3 (with Level 1 being the highest), and the only reason I can't do any higher is because my writing grammar suck. Reading wise I am quite excellent. =}

As for where and how and if it is worth it to get the book. I got mine off eBay, about 30 bucks. I say it is great for Fan Arters who are concern about details. Otherwise.... well, there isn't many exciting new things in there... and this particular artbook has kinda horrible printing quality (as opposed to the Book of Hunters)

[A2K]

Oh? What do you mean by horrible printing quality, Navi? I have both as well

Oh, and, er, could you tell me what that "Race relation" paragraph in section 6 says? http://www.pso-world.com/psoworld/images/phpbb/icons/smiles/anime1.gif

<font size=-1>[ This Message was edited by: A2K on 2003-10-26 15:39 ]</font>

[navci]

On 2003-10-26 14:40, A2K wrote:
Oh? What do you mean by horrible printing quality, Navi? I have both as well



Oh? My copy of Ep I and II book just didn't seem very crisp like usual Japanese art books. So could it be just me who is so unlucky?




Oh, and, er, could you tell me what that "Race relation" paragraph in section 6 says? http://www.pso-world.com/psoworld/images/phpbb/icons/smiles/anime1.gif

<font size=-1>[ This Message was edited by: A2K on 2003-10-26 15:39 ]</font>


Okay. Let's see what I can do. Hmm.

--
The two races that were born from human are newman and andriod. Humans have long stand above them in terms of social status, it is probably one of the reason that they have created these two races in the first place -- to rule over them. This is more obvious as you go up to social classes (from normal to wealthier classes).

The only place where this social status thing is non existent is in the unique organization Hunters. That is why andriods and newman who has lost their place(or home) due to various reasons(who are more likely to lose a place to go back to, as well) make up a high portion of hunters.

---

Ooh. My English is so good. I hope I make sense. =}