Japanese language support

[miva2]

it might be a nice extra but it's not useful to most people.
well since they already have the jap text to begin with it shouldn't be too hard to include if there's enough discspace left.
something in the options where you can choose between english or japanese text would be cool.
can't read japanese (yet)
can only read 'no', 'ku', numbers(but not al ) and a few more which i forgot

1 thing though, if there will be japanese text in the game, make it easy to change back to english without knowing japanese.
when i accidentally chose suomi as language for one of my games it took me a while before i found where i could change it back to english XD

[odinfan]

I'm pretty sure having Japanese text throughout the game would be impractical for most companies to implement. He's specifically asking for the whole game to have it, not just a few instances here and there. There's only so much data you can fit on discs, so it would be a pointless endeavor.

[miva2]

it should fit on a blue-ray disc for games like disgaea.
well i don't really know exactly how much discspace disgaea3 uses but i suppose it's not as much as graphically intensive 3D games. If i recall correctly, god of war 3 uses (some, i think, not all) high poly models which for as far as i know require more disc space than a spritesheet
BD's are big, normally some text can still fit in

[TheNecromancer]

I don't think any of you understand what he's trying to say.. Obviously the text cannot be in japanese, what would be the point on that?? All we ask for is that NISA keeps the dialogue in the original japanese voice and translate only the text. Not only because english voice actors are not that great for these type of games, but also because they would save so much money in doing so.

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This is a matter of personal opinion which tends to be voiced by the not so silent minority all too often.

Case in point: Record of Agarest War was a day one buy UNTIL I found out that it was going to be Japanese only dialogue. Japanese only dialogue released in a NA localized game? That's a damn insult to the English community. Especially to someone like me who has spent thousands of dollars on localized games.

Then we get the not so silent minority complaining that we should be happy to read the text while they merrily play with Voice options. This is where these gamers and gaming in general has taken a turn for the worse. The worst part is we know it's all about you and not all gamers in general. It's really sad to have to say.

If NISA did resort to using Japanese only dialogue in future localized releases it's a guaran-damn-tee they will no longer see a penny of my money.

[BigNutter]

Japanese font Sizes aren't that large compared to some games. The Windows Font that contains Most common Japanese symbols are 8 MB or bigger. (Most fonts are collections that make fonts bigger, Ooki.org state one is 7.45MB http://www.ookii.org/software/japaneseinput/font.aspx) It's also worth Noting that most of the Fonts have a Latin-based Letters already built in.

You can limit the size of the Font file, such as limiting Kanji. But that doesn't work well for a game already out in Japan.

Some PC game can do this ease.

That was the good news.. Here the bad.

There is a problem is that English Text is Taller than Wide.. where Japanese is roughly square.. (Actually 4 is square: 四) Also you can't fit in Japanese text in a single byte. So Japanese text can take up more space, in both in memory and on Screen.

In Japanese you can write a Popular Monster's name in 5 symbols, in English for the same sound, you need 7 letters. Most English games will alter the data tables, to make that you can have longer text boxes.

I know this sounds weird, but some Text may not be actual text but images, or worse, a 3d Model, and you'd have to tell the program to change images, or Models depending on Language settings. That could be difficulty if this image/Model is part of the "world," as you need to alter code that wouldn't normally be touched. Hey, If you're to find a message in the Landscape as subtle part of the plot, you really don't find the Clue in the wrong language, particularly if you needed to translate it for localised version, and can't change it. http://tardis.wikia.com/wiki/Planet_One (OK, the Tardis Translated that one.)

So far the only game that was released in Europe with Japanese Text and English Audio was Sin & Punishment on Virtual Console. They did Translate all text except for the cut scene subtitles.

Here is a Old interview. http://www.ffcompendium.com/h/interview.shtml This was done soon after the Release of FFX-2. With another interview linked to it.

An Interview about a Prinny: http://www.siliconera.com/2010/04/28/ni ... ns-part-1/ and http://www.siliconera.com/2010/04/29/ni ... ns-part-2/

Ok, Here's the Deal, with Not having English Audio, when subs are available. It cost time and money to ask Voice actors to come in to record the Audio. The only games I've fond this are RPGs that use little Audio such as Kingdom Hearts: Chain of Memories GBA, it used already recorded English lines for the returning Characters, and Some fighting games, such as Naruto Ultimate Ninja 5, which would need most characters to record new lines, Plus the fans like the Japanese Version due to a CrunchyRoll.

It's common for some European RPGS, to just to use the English Audio. Tales of Symphonia just altered the text to the Language, but keep the English Audio. There is a something that I've not checked, the German Version of Kingdom Hearts Translated from the Japanese text, but kept the English Audio, and in one scene the text said one thing, and the Audio said another.

As for NISA.. They know that the English Audio is high quality, and usually worth every cent they spend on it.

[magusgs]

As for NISA.. They know that the English Audio is high quality, and usually worth every cent they spend on it.

Wait, what?

[BigNutter]

I really shouldn't be posting at 2:30 in the morning.... but the Dub for computer games are can be off kilter... All the NIS games I've played so far are not off kilter.

Two games that I know that seem off are Pokémon Channel and Mystic Heroes. Pokémon Channel biggest offender is Meowth. Whist it's done by the same voice Actress who voiced Team Rockets Meowth, her performance seems off during the Pokémon News Section. The TV Episode in the game is only features her and the Narrator (except for Jessie and James Singing), and many Pokémon.

Mystic Heroes just seems off and you're expected to know the back story.. which you should do in Japan..

[james039]

I may be in a minority here, but what about people *learning* Japanese?

Also, let's be clear that the product in question starts off as a product with Japanese dialogue/Japanese Text for the sake of this discussion.

OP was suggesting that in the era of blu-ray, the space exists on the disc to produce full English dialogue, English text, and *retain* the original Japanese dialogue, text on the disc.

Now, for the Japanese beginner, importing the game is pretty much useless since their language understanding is insufficient to play the game with sufficient understanding. However, having a fully bilingual version would be quite handy.

I can't believe *anyone* would argue against a release which contained full English/Japanese dialogue and text, since you can pretty much use this anyway you want.

NIS Japan couldn't possibly have any issue with this since: The US release is generally the same price as the Japanese release, and it will NOT cannibalize their market.

NIS America has to add language options to the game to support Japanese dialogue, so it isn't much further a leap to add another option to select which text to display (and store both on the single disc).

[BigNutter]

The only Aurgument I have is the size of the extra Languages.. Which is important for some devices and other games. But most NIS games are small, and the space exists.

This is also the Era of the DLC, or Optional Downloads for your console..

[magusgs]

NIS America has to add language options to the game to support Japanese dialogue, so it isn't much further a leap to add another option to select which text to display (and store both on the single disc).

You make it sound like all they have to do is add a menu option and the game would be ready to play in Japanese. It doesn't work like that. Look at Sakura Wars 5 for PS2. They included 2 discs, one with dub and one with subtitles--and the saved games aren't even compatible. And all they did was switch the voice tracks, right? This implies a certain level of technical complexity "under the hood". And as Ar Tonelico 2 shows, localization isn't merely a matter of translation. The process itself creates bugs that have to be addressed. Your proposal to simply add a menu option could cost many hours of bug testing, in which they'd need to have testers play through the entire Japanese language version to make sure nothing got messed up. Why? All so a handful of hardcore otaku can play the game in both languages? I'd rather they focus their energy on more important tasks, like debugging the English version.

And I already mentioned the rights issues. Whatever their relationship with NIS Japan, for other companies (like Gust) they only have the rights to publish the English/French version. Negotiating rights to release the *Japanese version* overseas would inevitably prompt additional licensing fees.

[BigNutter]

I've got to agree with you there.. The Major problem with games that they use different types of text encoding..

In the Final Fantasy Interview I linked to (http://www.ffcompendium.com/h/interview.shtml) He Talked about Double Byte Text.. You can fit most Latin-based Characters (i.e. English, French, Spanish, German) in a single byte. Japanese has more Characters than English. There several ways to write stuff, actually I've seen a sentence written out of 4 different Character "sets." You need two bytes to fit most of the commonly used characters.

The other problem is that Japanese use less Character than English. You use 5 Japanese character and say something quite easy.. 5 Characters in English? "HekNO" Barely understandable at best.. It's easy to turn those 5 in to 10 by making the text single byte. Etna is 3 characters in Japanese, Megaman/Rockman is 5 characters.. two more well known characters.. If you don't know the first.. what the heck are you doing here?

Anyway, You can fit more meaning in to 5 symbols than 10 English Characters. http://www.siliconera.com/2010/04/29/ni ... ns-part-2/

Anyway, it's easier to slot in the Audio Language toggle than the text, in some cases, all you need to do is make the game play the other Audio files.

[Solice]

I've got to agree with you there.. The Major problem with games that they use different types of text encoding..

In the Final Fantasy Interview I linked to (http://www.ffcompendium.com/h/interview.shtml) He Talked about Double Byte Text.. You can fit most Latin-based Characters (i.e. English, French, Spanish, German) in a single byte. Japanese has more Characters than English. There several ways to write stuff, actually I've seen a sentence written out of 4 different Character "sets." You need two bytes to fit most of the commonly used characters.

The other problem is that Japanese use less Character than English. You use 5 Japanese character and say something quite easy.. 5 Characters in English? "HekNO" Barely understandable at best.. It's easy to turn those 5 in to 10 by making the text single byte. Etna is 3 characters in Japanese, Megaman/Rockman is 5 characters.. two more well known characters.. If you don't know the first.. what the heck are you doing here?

Anyway, You can fit more meaning in to 5 symbols than 10 English Characters. http://www.siliconera.com/2010/04/29/ni ... ns-part-2/

Anyway, it's easier to slot in the Audio Language toggle than the text, in some cases, all you need to do is make the game play the other Audio files.

The single simple word you're speaking of is unicode, which is basically double byte characters. Basically, if you start with unicode, you account for being able to replace any character set with any other, since its at that point, you're just replacing one unicode group with another. There's no engine rewriting to work out at that point. If the game engine is written in a manner that separates the text (media layer) from the engine itself (presentation layer), then its as simple as opening a text file and replacing strings.

That being said, games are often written in a manner that allows for multiple tables of media to exist in a game at once. For example, if the system is set to English, it will pull out text for an event using a (sample) function call: strGetTextEventText(12, intLangEnglish)... for Japanese, it could be strGetstrGetTextEventText(12, intLangJapanese)... you get the idea. The difficulty of implementation is all based on how the game was written (which would add a trivial amount of effort required on the programmers' part), let alone other factors that have been mentioned earlier in this thread.

Even with this being said, games that aren't written for multiple markets at the time of inception aren't going to have this nice feature of which media to select from. They might have implemented in a manner that only allows one media set at a time. A game of recent memory was NISA's Sakura Wars release. I haven't taken a look at the game save data, but I have enough reason to believe that its the Japanese release with the text replaced (thus the reason why game saves might not be compatible, it would be a different directory name). To this end, localization teams have to work with what they're given. There are generally few or no programming resources initially allocated for such projects.

[bloodyaftertaste]

Even with this being said, games that aren't written for multiple markets at the time of inception aren't going to have this nice feature of which media to select from. They might have implemented in a manner that only allows one media set at a time. A game of recent memory was NISA's Sakura Wars release. I haven't taken a look at the game save data, but I have enough reason to believe that its the Japanese release with the text replaced (thus the reason why game saves might not be compatible, it would be a different directory name). To this end, localization teams have to work with what they're given. There are generally few or no programming resources initially allocated for such projects.

Well since the PS2 version of Sakura Wars comes with two discs, one English and one Japanese, I would think that they replaced they text, same with the voice acting for the English disc if I'm understanding this correctly. Otherwise I think they would have also made the Japanese Text Stay on there as an option since they are letting you have the option to play it in Japanese. Though since it is an NA release they might just have thought that not much use would come of the Japanese text.

[Solice]

Even with this being said, games that aren't written for multiple markets at the time of inception aren't going to have this nice feature of which media to select from. They might have implemented in a manner that only allows one media set at a time. A game of recent memory was NISA's Sakura Wars release. I haven't taken a look at the game save data, but I have enough reason to believe that its the Japanese release with the text replaced (thus the reason why game saves might not be compatible, it would be a different directory name). To this end, localization teams have to work with what they're given. There are generally few or no programming resources initially allocated for such projects.

Well since the PS2 version of Sakura Wars comes with two discs, one English and one Japanese, I would think that they replaced they text, same with the voice acting for the English disc if I'm understanding this correctly. Otherwise I think they would have also made the Japanese Text Stay on there as an option since they are letting you have the option to play it in Japanese. Though since it is an NA release they might just have thought that not much use would come of the Japanese text.

Exactly what I said. I addressed the reports of the save game data being incompatible between the two discs included in the same package, which would suggest different encoding. Save games between different regions usually have different directory names under which they save the stuff on the memcard, usually only different by a couple of characters which denote the intended region and would prevent loading the data in a different region game unless other software was used to fool it.

[bloodyaftertaste]

Even with this being said, games that aren't written for multiple markets at the time of inception aren't going to have this nice feature of which media to select from. They might have implemented in a manner that only allows one media set at a time. A game of recent memory was NISA's Sakura Wars release. I haven't taken a look at the game save data, but I have enough reason to believe that its the Japanese release with the text replaced (thus the reason why game saves might not be compatible, it would be a different directory name). To this end, localization teams have to work with what they're given. There are generally few or no programming resources initially allocated for such projects.

Well since the PS2 version of Sakura Wars comes with two discs, one English and one Japanese, I would think that they replaced they text, same with the voice acting for the English disc if I'm understanding this correctly. Otherwise I think they would have also made the Japanese Text Stay on there as an option since they are letting you have the option to play it in Japanese. Though since it is an NA release they might just have thought that not much use would come of the Japanese text.

Exactly what I said. I addressed the reports of the save game data being incompatible between the two discs included in the same package, which would suggest different encoding. Save games between different regions usually have different directory names under which they save the stuff on the memcard, usually only different by a couple of characters which denote the intended region and would prevent loading the data in a different region game unless other software was used to fool it.

YAY I think I'm finally able to understand what you are saying more clearly! But thanks for that last part. I'm still trying to understand all this programing stuff and such. Why I have a hard time with it idk.