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four-loose-screws · 10 months

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Hello there, I’ve been playing a lot of Engage lately and I’ve been really enjoying it a lot. I’m writing in to ask you on what your general stance is on the whole discourse that has surrounded how certain S-Supports were translated. As for me, after reading a couple of them through, both the original versions and the localization, I personally don’t see that much a difference or disconnect between the two. While yes it can be argued that the localization did toned down a couple in a few cases, but even still I don’t think the general tone is really lost and in most cases it seems the only real notable difference is the usage of some select words in place of others which in a couple of cases might skewed into something that seems more platonic, but the rest of the conversation still seems to generally be pretty direct with how it’s translated. I also feel that even the original Japanese conversations generally speaking don’t feel nearly as romantic as they’ve been in previous games which has given me the impression that relationships in general are just simply greatly downplayed in Engage, and while that’s definitely apparent in a few other areas of the game I’ve definitely noticed it a lot through those conversations. It should be worth noting that I encountered the original Japanese conversations through Google Translate as well as other people’s own translations, and even with Google Translate I was still able to see what the initial tone of the dialogue was generally supposed to be and personally speaking didn’t think to was all that different from the official localization (minus a couple of choice words). I do think it’s worth noting that the wake-up events generally are more romantic than the conversations, or at least have more direct implications of it which I thought was interesting. However even with all of that, I would like to hear your opinion on all of this, from someone who is a speaker of Japanese, to get a further perspective on all of this. Thank you for reading this admittedly super long question as well as all the hard work you do for this community, hope everything is going well for you.

Hi and thanks for the support! :) Things have been a wild ride for me for a while now, but in an alright kind of way.

I chunked this out into 3 parts, because my brain gets lost in a whirlwind if I don't chunk up my writings.

Pt. 1 - Opinion Time!

My own personal opinion, in its own tiny little vacuum, is that I don't really care what changes a localization makes, for the most part. I see some changes as unfortunate - like those that put in pop culture or meme jokes that won't age well, in a game not already dating itself on purpose. But I don't have reason to become emotionally invested when I can look up and read the Japanese in my free time, analyze the differences between JP and localization in my free time, and use my blog to share those findings to those who don't know both languages.

The downside is I'm not available to blog like I used to be, but there's always been other people out there who know Jp./Eng. and are filling in the gaps. It's not a fun time to be subjected to the "LOCALIZATION STUPID, LOCALIZATION TEAM YOU SHOULD FEEL BAD" tone you sometimes see, but sifting through good and junk information is how research has always worked.

Now, to add on some nuance, because the world is a complex place and simplicity is a rarity. I think that it is very very valid to mourn what is lost because localization teams are trying to sell a product to a different audience, and simply cannot commit to trying to directly convey the exact same experience the JP version offered.

Not everyone is going to see the positives of localization as worth the cost. I love seeing FE spread to people I never imagined it would, because localization teams work hard to make the text engaging for non-JP audiences.

But media preservation is important too. Heck, I'm basically devoting my entire life to preservation by translating a collection of 20-30 year old novels! It's perfectly valid to value preservation of media over maximum outreach (and the big profits that come with it).

Also, just because I feel like pointing it out, I don't see localization as censorship. I feel like censorship is much more violent - a group in power trying to entirely eliminate media that does not fit their agenda for the purpose of control, etc. It's not like Treehouse is going around the internet, trying to remove and hide any record of the JP script or anything - they're just trying to guess what will sell the game outside of Japan, and protect Nintendo's brand. Nintendo could stop fan JP vs. localization analyzers at any point, but they don't, our content is all still out there for those who want to know more about the JP versions.

Pt. 2 - Talking directly about Engage & the S support conversations

Now, as for the conversations themselves!

My initial impression - Wow, the localization of these S supports compared to the Awakening days, is so different I'd think Engage was from a different franchise entirely! (For those who didn't play Awakening - the localization entirely rewrote some lines in many S supports - particularly many of the CG image quotes, in which each character says their final romantic words to Robin.)

Depending on the exact conversation, Engage's localization takes slightly different approaches towards making conversations with child & teen characters more platonic. Framme's support changes 'partner' to 'ally.' Meanwhile, Anna's support changes 'partner' to clearly mean 'business partner.' Clanne says "all I think about is you" in JP vs. "all I think about is helping you more," to shift the focus from implied romance, to keeping his relationship with Alear strictly as a master / guardian relationship.

For characters over 18, their conversations were not altered to remove romantic implications.

And, that's about the extent of it. Anon, you are exactly right in the summary Google Translate helped give you - the localized conversations always follow the original Japanese, save for toning down any lines w/ under 18 characters, that originally felt more romantic than platonic.

There is one huge sign that even the JP version wasn't as serious about committing to every S support being romantic, though - the CGs. Every character under 18 wears the ring on their middle finger instead of the wedding ring finger. Now, one could argue that the CGs are only that way because the artist was told to focus on the NA / international release, and I think that is a very valid possibility, but... many of the characters of all ages don't even wear the Pact Ring at all, and just hold on to it in their CG. And then there's the fact that the emblem rings are all worn on the wedding ring finger, when no one in the game has a romantic relationship with an emblem, so... yeah. I still don't think we're meant to read too hard into what wearing any ring on any finger means in this game.

I don't see any reason to do a deep analysis on any of the conversations, the changes are really that simple. But, as I always say, if anyone ever wants to see specific conversation(s) translated, then just send an ask my way! Straight translations tend to take less time than answering questions because I don't have to organize my personal thoughts, so they tend to be addressed the fastest!

Pt. 3 - Talking about Engage's romantic aspects in general (or lack thereof)

Overall, it is pretty easy to pick up on the sense that the devs weren't as interested in the romantic features of FE this time around - and in fact as I was writing all this out, I found a dev interview that briefly confirms the development of the game centered around Alear and the Emblem mechanics. The wake-up events might have been written as a middle ground to balance between those who wanted more romance, while taking focus overall off of the romance, but I've seen no sign of that being true in dev interviews.

Fire Emblem is Fire Emblem, and each FE game is always a grab bag of "What's coming back?" So it was always inevitable that even the romantic aspects would be toned down at some point, despite them being so present and essential to the popularity of three whole games in a row (Awakening, Fates, and Three Houses). I'm a long time fan, who knows that's how FE operates, so I enjoy it. But understandably every game will cause some controversy with those who aren't used to, or don't like, the rapid changes.

To me, as a fan since the GBA/GC days, Engage feels kind of like a fun return to GBA form, where supports always felt like a roulette wheel. Which relationships would read romantic? Platonic? Would the relationship seem platonic in the A support, then the characters get married in the ending card anyway? Would family or platonic pairs get an ending card? Who knew!

That being said, make no mistake!! Engage leans as hard as ever into FE's main overarching theme about bonds - that bonds are strength, and the glue that carries all FE protagonists to victory! There's just not as much of a focus on the romantic bonds this time around. In true FE form, you never know when the devs are going to dump, or at least shift focus away from, previous features.

I think I've gotten all I had on my mind typed out now - but anyone can feel free to follow up the conversation if you want in another ask!

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(Note for full context: I read through about 10-15 or so of the S / Ring Supports before starting my reply to this ask, picking out some of the youngest characters, as well as a random sampling of others for balance. ...I didn't even try to read them all, I could only handle so many of essentially the same conversation in a row, before my head started spinning, ha ha.)

#fire emblem #engage #fire emblem engage #fe17 #alear #japan #japanese #translation #fe translations #support conversation #support conversations #s support

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