[RAILGUN] General translation comments thread

[samthenayru]

The guys in these threads are just fanboys of Eclipse's incredibly literal translations. I remember gg and UTW using another term for "Fukou da!" for Index II and boy, they all went into rabid fanboy mode. Same when they translated Biribiri as Sparky (Eclipse left it at Biribiri, surprise). Oh man, there was a serious sh*tstorm on gg's and UTW's site.
I saw this coming a loooong time ago.

Anyway, I think the manga's translation is great. Only thing that sounded weird when I read it was "psychics" instead of "espers", but that's about it. I'll get used to it. Thanks for the release, I'm definitely pre-ordering the next volume ASAP!

[Riccha]

No one in here is being rabid about it, samthenayru, so please don't try to invalidate our comments by making assumptions like that.

Plus, "such misfortune" is catchier.

Besides that, like GenericUser said, it's not really as catchy as 'such misfortune!'.

How is "such misfortune!" catchy, of all things? It might be catchy in Japanese, but in English it just sounds silly.

Well, I find it catchier than "I have no luck!". I mean, both sound a little odd to me, but, of the two, I think "Such misfortune!" sounds a little better; which is quite probably because I'm used to it, so I'm happy enough to admit that this one might be simply a matter of me needing to get used to it rather than an actual problem.
Besides that, ProvidenceBreaker is right anyway.

[thewizardninja]

Same when they translated Biribiri as Sparky (Eclipse left it at Biribiri, surprise)

Actually, Eclipse translated Biribiri as "Shocker". Also, gg wanted to translate "Fukou Da" as "fuck my life", which was hardly appropriate. The more you know.


Anyway, the deal with translating "Fukou Da" as "I have no luck" isn't that it doesn't sound any good, or that it isn't catchy enough, it's just plain incorrect. Touma doesn't have "no luck", he has more luck than he knows what to do with, and it's all BAD luck. If I had to take a guess, I'd say that your translator was probably going for something along the lines of "I have no good luck" but thought that by simply saying "luck", "good luck" would be implied. It doesn't work that way, not in this context, at least.

It doesn't have to be "Such misfortune", it doesn't even have to mention the word "misfortune", but the translation needs to imply that his luck is BAD. Something like "I have such bad luck", "My luck sucks", or "How unlucky" would all work better than "I have no luck".

As for the ESPer vs. Psychic debate, I'm on the ESPer side but I can deal with psychics. Quite frankly, I would have called them ESPers and called their powers "psychic powers" rather than "ESPer powers", but that doesn't really matter. Calling them ESPers just makes it feel more science-y to me and seems a lot less likely to make people think of fortune tellers and mediums, rather than of a blanket term used for people who can use their minds to do stuff that shouldn't be possible.

[Lean Pocket]

So I heard from an unreliable source that Funi will release Railgun anime first. Does seven seas know anything on this?

[ProvidenceBreaker]

So I heard from an unreliable source that Funi will release Railgun anime first. Does seven seas know anything on this?

That was always their plan from the beginning. They announced Railgun at AX and didn't admit to also having Index until being pressed by some fans. As much as you want to read too much into this, don't. Railgun was released by GU post-merger, so it probably isn't being held up for the same reasons Index is. My guess as to the delay of Railgun is that they possibly planned to save some time and money by having both shows localized together, but Index hit a snag in licensing negotiations. If there is any grain of truth to your rumor, then it's just FUNi moving forward on the only GU license they can release at the moment.

As much as I hate to admit it, Railgun needs to be released first for Index to succeed. The first season of Index did rather poorly in Japan. Season 2 would have never happened if it weren't for the Railgun manga/anime making Kamachi's novels relevant to mainstream Japan. Index still isn't as popular as Railgun, but the anime now makes enough money to at least avoid cancellation. I don't expect the situation will be much different in the states, so this is entirely expected.

[Lean Pocket]

I don't know about which is more popular since they are the same series. Though Index 2 anime is selling more than enough to get another season.

[Lord Styphon]

I don't know about which is more popular since they are the same series.

Two series sharing the same storyverse does not make them the same series.

[Adam_Arnold]

I don't know about which is more popular since they are the same series.

Two series sharing the same storyverse does not make them the same series.

Correct. It's like Buffy: The Vampire Slayer and Angel (and Fray). They share the same universe and even crossover, but they're different parts of the same franchise.

[DueLearner]

There was quite the bottleneck caused by Japan's earthquake/tsunami earlier this year as far as licensing and materials are concerned. The ripples (i.e. delays) are still being felt even now, sadly.

So is there any other information about when the dub might get released? Some kind of time frame we can look forward to? Or is everything just on hold indefinitely?

[Adam_Arnold]

There was quite the bottleneck caused by Japan's earthquake/tsunami earlier this year as far as licensing and materials are concerned. The ripples (i.e. delays) are still being felt even now, sadly.

So is there any other information about when the dub might get released? Some kind of time frame we can look forward to? Or is everything just on hold indefinitely?

Your guess is as good as ours. All I know is what I've read on Anime News Network from the FUNimation con panels. Let's hope we'll see something by this time next year.

[DueLearner]

You probably don't know this either, but is there a chance the sales of the Railgun Manga could influence the release date of the dub?

I'm not too sure how the Manga is doing in sales right now, but if it's doing well enough I'd think that'd catch FUNi's attention.

[ProvidenceBreaker]

You probably don't know this either, but is there a chance the sales of the Railgun Manga could influence the release date of the dub?

I'm not too sure how the Manga is doing in sales right now, but if it's doing well enough I'd think that'd catch FUNi's attention.

I'm pretty sure both shows would be out by now if it was as easy as all that. Something unknown is complicating the license negotiations, and the prospect of actually releasing them gets fainter as the episode count increases. Raildex stands at about 72 episodes, with both shows pretty much guaranteed another season each. FUNi may be looking at the prospect of localizing something that is potentially 120+ episodes and thinking to themselves: "NOPE".

Let's be real, though. These shows aren't going to get touched until Shana II is released. Until you see a solicitation for that, don't even think about Index or Railgun.

[Adam_Arnold]

Let's be real, though. These shows aren't going to get touched until Shana II is released. Until you see a solicitation for that, don't even think about Index or Railgun.

What does Shana II have to do with the release order of the delayed Geneon titles?

[Lord Styphon]

Let's be real, though. These shows aren't going to get touched until Shana II is released. Until you see a solicitation for that, don't even think about Index or Railgun.

What does Shana II have to do with the release order of the delayed Geneon titles?

It's been stuck in the pipe longer?

[Riccha]

There was quite the bottleneck caused by Japan's earthquake/tsunami earlier this year as far as licensing and materials are concerned. The ripples (i.e. delays) are still being felt even now, sadly.

So is there any other information about when the dub might get released? Some kind of time frame we can look forward to? Or is everything just on hold indefinitely?

Your guess is as good as ours. All I know is what I've read on Anime News Network from the FUNimation con panels. Let's hope we'll see something by this time next year.

I can't give a source since it was heard purely through word of mouth, but someone was saying on a certain other website that when they asked someone from FUNi about it, they were told that it wouldn't be any time soon because it isn't at the top of their priority list. Going by that, I'd guess that they don't do things based on how long they've been 'stuck in the pipe', since it seems that there are a few other things that were announced later, but are being released sooner.