[Spoilers, kind of] Characters who are completely different between JP/ENG

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Originally Posted by Nestama

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-paladins, especially in 2.0, had little lore beyond "pretty righteous knights." They aren't affiliated with any Eorzean churches. This was changed to add lore, not to reflect it, which I think is a bad practice. There's also some more to this change, though, because it happened waaaaaaaaaaaaaay back in 1.x. In datamining early 1.x files, an early version of HG could be seen that stopped working if you moved. This never made it live, but I'm like 70% sure they chose the name HG because of that effect. Also, HG protects you from everything in this game.
-Past FFs seem to have no bearing on how they name things if -aga spells and a ton of other stuff are any indication
-Defender: War's defensive stance from FFXI. http://ffxiclopedia.wikia.com/wiki/Defender
-You shouldn't give infuriate a pass. Go look at the animation. The warrior lets out a war cry - something you do before going into battle and unleashing your special moves and stuff. This change is one of the dumbest imo. Why change it to Infuriate of all things?
-Cleric/Crusade doesn't matter much but it's just another example of a why change. Religion actually is pretty big in FFXIV. You have to pick a guardian deity at character creation and every nation-state has its own patron deity, which leads to
-Shroud of Saints is another one that effectively accomplishes the same thing. Protection of the Goddess likely refers to Nophica in this case, since CNJ is from grid and all. You'd be Nophica's saint in this case. Also the shroud/her protection lowers your enmity by half, effectively protecting you from attack.

It all boils down to why fix what isn't broken for a lot of these. There are some changes that are good. It's hard to translate a lot of Monk's stuff or Chaos Thrust without just changing them outright, but the ones I've talked about, I think, are either unnecessary or actively bad.
(as an aside, speaking of saints, "The Wanderer's Shadow" title is "Oschon(?)'s Saint" in some of the other versions. For whatever reason the loc team almost always refers to the gods by their nicknames. Wanderer's Palace, etc.)
then they don't go and fix stuff like Dancing Edge/Armor Crush in loc. Why? It layers on top of other questionable loc changes (and lots of tooltip mistakes) and makes the game feel cheaper. All of this is my opinion, obviously, so you don't have to agree, but that's what I think of it.

Anyway the names are pretty much uniform since 3.x from what I bothered to look into. The bad deeds are done. I don't think we're going to agree so I'm just gonna duck out. good talk.

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Originally Posted by Brannigan

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jA6A-ySMHYI

I mean, just saying. It's a game about war. Referencing rape and atrocities but not depicting them is solidly in T territory. FFXIV does it all the time.

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YMMV, but their coversations in both versions, as bad as it is in the EN version, still covers the exact same topic and comes to the exact same conclusion.

Worth mentioning that other rough details like Jacob's abuse, neglect, and jealousy towards his children are left as is, just with different dialogue. Peri's character was not changed at all. Both of which are characters I can't stand, but both are faithful.

Compared to say, Effie, whom Treehouse opted to make her all about training and "gains" on top of her sweet nature and intense dedication to Elise. Both versions are very different in the end.

Treehouse just looked at the two scenes with men that our avatar is supposed to be having a personal moment with being turned into something a bit rapey as unnecessary and cut them.

I've had pretty intense discussions on the changes made towards Niles in particular, as his threat to rape you is just his attempts to deflect anyone growing too close to him, and making people as uncomfortable as possible tends to do that. EN version speaks in heavy innuendo and trolls Corrin instead. Same effect, less nightmare fuel inducing, but Niles "arc" is still rooted in the atrocities a poor Nohrian child had to face and how the trauma damaged him.

Despite finding the differences improve my PERSONAL experience, most I've discussed this with hate any and all changes.

That being said, I'm pretty comfortable saying I draw the line at a game that has a character reacting to a mechanic I'm encouraged to use to grow affection with them as me basically molesting them . That's too far. I don't see why this would be an argument, but I've done this song and dance before and know how people get over localization changes.

It's jelly donuts all over again.

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Originally Posted by Brannigan

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• Given they learn other 'Divine' and 'Holy' type moves, the name of the skill still works.
• Which is why Koji argued that the numbers indicate spells learned and not power. In past Final Fantasy's (excluding XI, which had its own system that worked), -ragaja spells indicated that the spell would be stronger. In this game, that is not always the case.
• Defender also raised a WAR's defence in FFXI. Defiance does not.
• Do they also look angry while doing it, though? People tend to yell when infuriated.
• And I chose Rhalgr, not Nophica. If I were expecting protection from someone, it would be from the deity I chose for my character, who is quite clearly not a Goddess (and that's not assumption).

I feel the localisation team knows what they're doing when it comes (came?) to naming abilities and such. I'm fine with how they look (and not everything needs to be a direct translation) as they do not impact my gameplay whatsoever.

I actually prefer the naming convention put towatds EN SCH over the JP one entirely due to ease of use and clarity, along with it giving SCH the feel of being highly learned. I'd rather not have sic skills with "tactics" in it's name.

AST skills give (gave, as some were cut) off that superior air that the ivory tower society of Sharlayan is oft hinted to have in comparison to the other healers. Esuna to Leeches to Exalted Detriment was always my favorite.

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Originally Posted by Ametrine

I've heard a few bad things around the German version being very crass and a bit unhinged. Lots of swearing for the sake of it, kind of thing.

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I am using German for the game and I am not really sure where it would be crass or unhinged. ö_ö And I also dont remember any unnecessary swearing.

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Originally Posted by Alleo

I am using German for the game and I am not really sure where it would be crass or unhinged. ö_ö And I also dont remember any unnecessary swearing.

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It may just be a few cases then, as the specific quest I recall the complaint geared towards was in regards to the Bard quest including an NPC that's quite foul. Lol.

Maybe unhinged is the wrong word. More that the German version holds nothing back.

The English version doesn't shy away from mature language, either. Though that is precisely what the game's ratings outline. If people are bothered by it, tough - there's plenty of family friendly games out there that they can play instead. FFXIV has a specific style and is tastefully mature and that is precisely what a lot of us want out of it.

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Originally Posted by eschaton

Major differences. This is not only in FFXIV... you get this in games, movies, anime, music, heck it is in everything.

Once you figure this out you are kinda screwed also; you've gotta choose to experience the original setting, or go with the translation. Or watch stuff multiple times. Personally I think this really blows, and when being serious about it the original always seems 'better'. (How strange, how the producer meant it to be, seems better?!)

Each their own, of course, some friends can't stand foreign languages / voices. (And I wish I knew more of them!)

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If you've ever watched an anime called "ghost stories" trust me, it's way better in english dubs than it ever was in japanese.

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Originally Posted by DarkSlayerGrimm

JPN Lalafells are the best <3

Tataru is cuter https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Ue4IS3DseyM

Pipin has a more Heroic voice that trumps anything we've heard in ENG https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gTWiGaOu2aU

and sometimes you get moments that are just plain hilarious https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bj6eQ7oitJo

I recommend if you are starting a alt switch it from ENG to JPN and you'll see a whole lot of differences in ARR & HW which are awesome

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it's like they took those voices straight out of Jojo's Bizarre Adventure

Someone mentioned Cleric making sense for attacker "if you like D&D I guess". Crusade is much more of a reference to paladins in D&D than any pure healer class. So Cleric makes perfect sense for the stance of a non-paladin healer.

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Originally Posted by TaleraRistain

Someone mentioned Cleric making sense for attacker "if you like D&D I guess". Crusade is much more of a reference to paladins in D&D than any pure healer class. So Cleric makes perfect sense for the stance of a non-paladin healer.

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The problem with 'cleric' is that anyone not familiar with D&D associates clerics with priests and succour and robes and general harmlessness. Anyone familiar with D&D and fantasy of that type has a very different image in mind and the rename makes logical sense, but I cannot count the number of times I've seen a new CNJ trying using CS to heal at first because the name confused them into thinking it must improve healing too. I got tired of explaining; thank goodness they just changed the skill.

The WAR name changes irritate me as they're counterintuitive. At least use words that are more visually different than D____ and D____ if the new words aren't as clear-cut as the originals, please! The rest are a mixed bag; some of the localised terms are inspired, others are clunky. It does make things complicated in mixed-client groups when names are changed though. Ruins lots of puns and chat.

(I laughed more about the post about 'The Meat Sword' title than I would care to admit. Crummy localised titles bug me, even if some are genuinely unavoidable.)

Well as I said in response to 'Defender' being changed to 'Defiance,' it makes more sense for the name change. Defender sounds like something that would boost your defence as well (as it does in FFXI), which Defiance doesn't do at all. It just boosts your HP and enmity gain. I'm unsure about Deliverance, though (unless someone on the localisation team saw the reveal trailer for Kingdom Come: Deliverance and just too it from there).

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Originally Posted by Averax

If you've ever watched an anime called "ghost stories" trust me, it's way better in english dubs than it ever was in japanese.

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Yeah, but Ghost Stories is a special case. Making it into the giant, ad-libbed, comedic masterwork was just the brilliant plan for the bad anime to actually make some of it's money back. The plan worked.

On FXIV's vocal work, I have zero complaints with the current English team for Stormblood. The current team is really good, and it's pretty nice to not hear the same 30 actors used in almost everything these days in the US.

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Originally Posted by Nestama

I'm unsure about Deliverance, though.

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My money is on that their thought process was this:
The JP names are Defender/Destroyer. D____er/D____er.
The EN name is Defiance, so we should match with another D____ance
"Jimmy, get the dictionary."
"You got it boss."

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Originally Posted by Urthdigger

Considering the english localizers actually help to create the lore in the first place, the japanese version is no more authentic than the NA version. Now, you can say you might prefer things that are localized for a JP audience over things that are localized for an NA audience (and yes, this may include altering character personalities to something that goes over better in a region), but neither version is the "original" version.

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This is a massive overstatement, and nothing they have ever said would point to the English localization team having even remotely an equal part in crafting the story of the game. Koji posted one thing talking about how they have more involvement than most localization teams, being called on to do things like create the dragons' language and most of the player titles that get used across versions, and for some reason a bunch of people took that and ran with it. For everything they help contribute there are 10 other examples of things they've had to double back on and change because they overdid localizing them.

The Japanese version is the original, they write it first, and then the localization teams, including the English one, localize it for their audiences.

Hypertuned Grynewaht's Japanese cutscene dialogue is significantly different to his English counterpart. The Japanese dialogue comes across as him being near-lobotomised instead of the Doom Marine-esque screamer he is in English.

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Originally Posted by Ametrine

It may just be a few cases then, as the specific quest I recall the complaint geared towards was in regards to the Bard quest including an NPC that's quite foul. Lol.

Maybe unhinged is the wrong word. More that the German version holds nothing back.

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But a handful of quests does not mean lots of swearing ^^;. Also I am happy if we get it more direct. This means no misunderstanding thanks to talking through the flower and its kinda realistic with the rest of the game since they kind of have topics like rape and other horrible stuff in there. And its also realistic since some people in real life do have some foul language too thus it makes sense that those exit ingame too. If everyone would speak "nice" all the time, then this would just feel off.

Middy is a good example for misunderstanding: In the Japanese version it was kinda direct that he was simply testing us, while the English one sounded more like he was an enemy. (I cant remember the scene in German but I never got the feeling that he was an enemy so it might have been a bit more like the Japanese one)

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Originally Posted by Alleo

Middy is a good example for misunderstanding: In the Japanese version it was kinda direct that he was simply testing us, while the English one sounded more like he was an enemy. (I cant remember the scene in German but I never got the feeling that he was an enemy so it might have been a bit more like the Japanese one)

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No, in English he was just very vague with his motive. He did talk about the dragonsong war and about how Ishgard will burn, but he was otherwise neutral toward us (after finding out we were chosen by Hydaelyn).

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Originally Posted by Nestama

No, in English he was just very vague with his motive. He did talk about the dragonsong war and about how Ishgard will burn, but he was otherwise neutral toward us (after finding out we were chosen by Hydaelyn).

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But it seems that thanks to being more vague with his motive, that this created some believe that he might not be nice to us.

At least thats how I remember it here in the forum, when some where surprised that he was just simply testing us.

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Originally Posted by Clawbriar

Hypertuned Grynewaht's Japanese cutscene dialogue is significantly different to his English counterpart. The Japanese dialogue comes across as him being near-lobotomised instead of the Doom Marine-esque screamer he is in English.

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I thought he already was the victim of a near fatal lobotomy as it was, at least he always seems to be suitably stupid and buffoonish which makes me really doubt the empire's quality control on their armed forces. Then again I play with Japanese audio and English subtitles. I frequently note significant differences in dialog between what's said an what's in the captions - and that's without being a fluent speaker of Japanese.

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Originally Posted by Alleo

But it seems that thanks to being more vague with his motive, that this created some believe that he might not be nice to us.

At least thats how I remember it here in the forum, when some where surprised that he was just simply testing us.

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I remember reading the direct translation from Japanese to English of those scenes and comparing it against the English transcript from the NA version. Everyone I have shown it to agrees that the direct translation is clearer and that the English version is very difficult to understand by comparison with the direct translation. Most think that the NA English version is actually misleading and makes the player think that what's going on is the opposite to what is really happening. The French and German dialog is (if I remember correctly) created from a direct Japanese to English translation and avoids the flavor text added to the NA localization, and is thus much clearer.

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Originally Posted by Kosmos992k

I remember reading the direct translation from Japanese to English of those scenes and comparing it against the English transcript from the NA version. Everyone I have shown it to agrees that the direct translation is clearer and that the English version is very difficult to understand by comparison with the direct translation. Most think that the NA English version is actually misleading and makes the player think that what's going on is the opposite to what is really happening. The French and German dialog is (if I remember correctly) created from a direct Japanese to English translation and avoids the flavor text added to the NA localization, and is thus much clearer.

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Whereas I find the provided examples upthread of "direct" translation to be dry, lifeless, and sometimes even boring, so I'm happy with the direction they currently take in localization.

The direct translation is often very clinical and leaves minimal room for mystery or nuances. FFXII is my favourite of the main titles for many reasons but one of the most prominent is that the characters speak in a manner that fits a fantasy setting. Many MMO's simply lean on a rather dull approach where even the wisest and ancient of elves speak in modern day slang. FFXIV does something different and it does not suffer in the slightest for it.

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Originally Posted by Theodric

The direct translation is often very clinical and leaves minimal room for mystery or nuances. FFXII is my favourite of the main titles for many reasons but one of the most prominent is that the characters speak in a manner that fits a fantasy setting. Many MMO's simply lean on a rather dull approach where even the wisest and ancient of elves speak in modern day slang. FFXIV does something different and it does not suffer in the slightest for it.

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I agree. Between the colloquialisms and accents, FFXIV's language manages to feel like a fantasy world without falling back on generic, fantasy, Tolkien-esque English or bashing thees and thous over our head at every chance and nothing more.

There is actual effort put into Eorzea's version of English, and with the lone exception of the mind-bendingly old Midgardsomr and verbose to the point of it being running-gag Urianger, I've never once had a hiccup in understanding what is being said.

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Originally Posted by Alleo

But it seems that thanks to being more vague with his motive, that this created some believe that he might not be nice to us.

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To be fair, I don't think he really liked us until near the end of the HW story (also, he did attack us on sight).

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Originally Posted by Tsukino

This is a massive overstatement, and nothing they have ever said would point to the English localization team having even remotely an equal part...

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Koji is literally both the English localization lead and the co-lead world and lore developer. I think that's nearly as equal as you can have. As for saying that nothing they've said indicates it, here's a quote from a dualshockers article from before arr even released

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One of the things that they do is instead of making things solely Japanese and then ask us to translate those, they’ll talk with the localization team and collaborate with us to get more western ideas in the game itself. This comes down to things like monster names, monster attacks, place names, item names… these are all conceived by myself and the other members of the English team and we work directly with the world lore planners to come up with these, and then help them translate them back into Japanese.

We make sure that there are stories connected with these as well, so it’s not just random names. There’s a reason why something is called an “Angry Gobbue” — the Gobbue’s angry for a reason. NPCs as well are actually a collaboration between all of the localization team members. For example, the hyur and miqo’te names for NPCs are all done by the English team, the Elzen names are all conceived by the French team, the Lalafell names come from the Japanese team, and the Roegadyn names are a joint effort between the German and English teams and so, again, you have all these aspects of the game that are being created by not just the Japanese side, but also by the localization side as well.

And then, again, a lot of the quests, when we do our translations, we will some times add things — Japanese can be a very vague language — a lot of important information is either cut completely or it’s implied heavily. It can be kind of confusing for western players and readers, so we’ll go in and tweak things to make it a little easier to understand and a little bit clearer. A lot of times the Japanese team will then go back and look at the English translations or the French translations and get ideas on how they can change the Japanese text in turn.

So a lot of stuff that we’ve done actually influenced the Japanese side as well. It’s going back and forth and there’s a lot of communication between us and the team. One of the greatest benefits of working on this project is being able to sit right next to the development team, so any time we have a question or any time they have a question, you just really stand up and walk for five seconds, and right there we’re able to have open communication and work together. I think it really makes the game that much better.

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Originally Posted by Theodric

The direct translation is often very clinical and leaves minimal room for mystery or nuances.

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Well it would be nice to be able to choose which one you want because I at least would find it quite good to get the direct meaning of things so one could discuss it without misunderstandings. Also imo one can still convey the same meaning with fantasy language but instead they make it more vague too.

Also lets not forget that its not always boring. Haurchefant was way more direct and "weird" in the Japanese version yet the NA translation changed him quite a lot. One could argue that they got a duller version of him thanks to that.

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Originally Posted by Alleo

Well it would be nice to be able to choose which one you want.

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I dunno how much the staff's salary is but that sounds very expensive for just a small percent of the playerbase that isn't keeping subs going.

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Originally Posted by Emstidor

Whereas I find the provided examples upthread of "direct" translation to be dry, lifeless, and sometimes even boring, so I'm happy with the direction they currently take in localization.

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Are they the direct translations used by SE, or the direct translations provided by Google or some anonymous player who claims to speak Japanese? A decent direct translation retains the meaning and mood of the original dialog without pandering to the localization niceties of recreating idioms and other colorful expressions in the target culture and language. I don't find translations to be dry or lifeless, just occasionally there will be a reference or cultural trope that I don't quite get.

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Originally Posted by Tsukino

This is a massive overstatement, and nothing they have ever said would point to the English localization team having even remotely an equal part in crafting the story of the game. Koji posted one thing talking about how they have more involvement than most localization teams, being called on to do things like create the dragons' language and most of the player titles that get used across versions, and for some reason a bunch of people took that and ran with it. For everything they help contribute there are 10 other examples of things they've had to double back on and change because they overdid localizing them.

The Japanese version is the original, they write it first, and then the localization teams, including the English one, localize it for their audiences.

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The English localization team does have input into the lore, but you are correct that the Japanese version is the primary version. If I remember correctly (and it's been a while since I dug up all of the information on this), the Japanese script is translated into English preserving the original intent and mood of the dialogue, along with all the Japanese idiom and cultural references. That original translation is where the localization team gets a chance to provide feed back into the Japanese version. When the final script is completed, the translation becomes the 'master version' of the script. That master is then used to create the foreign language versions (French, German, etc...) of the game script, and the full localization in English is also created.

This is where the Localization team can take some liberties with the original as they transfer idiom and cultural references into something relevant to English players. It's also where Dragon speak went from the more direct to the obtuse and flowery. It's also where we must needs interpret the intent of the script; mayhap the characters are a little chagrined by their odd phrasing at this point - or in other words this is where all the ridiculous "olde English" crap that people love to make fun of, is thrown into the mix.

I feel that too much latitude is given and taken by the localization team at this stage. A good translation preserves the original content and maintains the emotion of the original. A localization tries to make the script feel like it was created in the local language, including cultural reference and idiom. An overdone localization extends that further applying an entirely new cultural filter to add flavor or character to the script taking it 3 steps beyond the original, two steps past the translation and a step beyond a straight localization. I prefer a good translation to a localization. I prefer a good localization to one that attempts to get creative with things.

With as much work, time, effort and creativity as Koji Fox and his team put into the game I will give them major Kudos, but at the same time I will continue to beg them to steer clear of the creative localization and stick more closely to the original script. Otherwise we are not all playing the same game. All players in FFXIV should have the same understanding of the events and dialog as it unfolds. That hasn't always been the case. If the game were a solo game then the creative localization would be very much more appreciated because it doesn't matter if there are a few differences here an there, common experience and understanding is not needed.

But in an MMORPG we need a common experience; all players should be experiencing the same game, plot and dialog. That means less creativity in localizing the game. To be honest I would prefer a good translation over localization. To me a good translation works by translating the meaning and intent of the words, not simply by doing a literal translation, and not by changing things.

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Originally Posted by TheMax1087

Koji is literally both the English localization lead and the co-lead world and lore developer. I think that's nearly as equal as you can have. As for saying that nothing they've said indicates it, here's a quote from a dualshockers article from before arr even released

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Since then they've come back and admitted that they do not have a lot of input and future prospects told to them and have had to change many things (like monster names which has occurred many many times). Koji seems like a nice person, but he seems to be a bit of a fanboy of the game and what he says definitely reflects this so I kind of take what he says through a reality filter lol. He wasn't lying but it could be taken as more than it really was. I think also is during that time (in between 1.0 and 2.0) the team actually started taking input from the western side of the team when Yoshida came along, so to them it was like being a part of the process and is probably why it came off stronger than it really was. Also a part is probably they come up with scenarios and simply don't tell the west people as well lol. I don't really know, but with Koji sometimes I take the enthusiasm down a notch lol. He's like the opposite of Yoshida's "look forwad to it" lol.

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Originally Posted by Kosmos992k

But in an MMORPG we need a common experience; all players should be experiencing the same game, plot and dialog. That means less creativity in localizing the game. To be honest I would prefer a good translation over localization. To me a good translation works by translating the meaning and intent of the words, not simply by doing a literal translation, and not by changing things.

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And we technically are. Haurchefant is pretty much the only time I believe the localisation team has admitted they made a mistake (as his personality is different between JP and EN, FR, DE) and apologised. Ever since, they now work more closely with the scenario and cutscene teams, which implies that they're given the okay with what they do.

Midgardsormr was also explained.

A bit off topic since this is not about a character but I read on reddit that the Japanese version does not make fun of us having adventurers on our side at certain story points. So if I can thrust that person that means that all these mentioning of having adventurers near us (susano, dungeons) seems to be again a English version thing. At least in the German version we dont have the talk about adventurers fishing nearby too.

I am fine if they change things up a bit but these witty remarks in the English version about us having others on our side really was way too much in SB imo. Especially after they took their time to write in the lore book that we did most of the stuff in ARR and HW alone. (Sorry its a bit of a pet peeve of mine)

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Originally Posted by Alleo

A bit off topic since this is not about a character but I read on reddit that the Japanese version does not make fun of us having adventurers on our side at certain story points. So if I can thrust that person that means that all these mentioning of having adventurers near us (susano, dungeons) seems to be again a English version thing. At least in the German version we dont have the talk about adventurers fishing nearby too.

I am fine if they change things up a bit but these witty remarks in the English version about us having others on our side really was way too much in SB imo. Especially after they took their time to write in the lore book that we did most of the stuff in ARR and HW alone. (Sorry its a bit of a pet peeve of mine)

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People bring it up quite often, so I think he put it in just as a funny jab at the community lol.

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Originally Posted by Nestama

And we technically are. Haurchefant is pretty much the only time I believe the localisation team has admitted they made a mistake (as his personality is different between JP and EN, FR, DE) and apologised. Ever since, they now work more closely with the scenario and cutscene teams, which implies that they're given the okay with what they do.

Midgardsormr was also explained.

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Yes, there were mistakes with Haurchefant, they had no choice but to apologize when it became clear that they acted without the blessing of Yoshi-P.

No, I disagree with you completely on Midgardsormr. The explanation of Midgardsormr was nothing more than rationalization to cover and justify a mistake that altered the sense and meaning of the scenes and dialog and confused many players.

Midgardsormr is simply the most obvious example of excessive 'creativity' in the localization work that Koji Fox and his team do. As I said, I will give them plenty of Kudos for the work that they do the vast majority of which is excellent. But in fairness I will also happily point out the times when they deserve a rotten tomato or two.

One thing about the Dragonspeak excuse. That covers the style of speech that Dragons use, but it did not explain why the scene in the English version was so ambiguous and open to easy misunderstanding. I never understood that scene until I looked up the Japanese version. My wife and son were similarly confused by it and thought that Midgardsormr was acting against us as an enemy. Thankfully I was able to clarify it for them since I'd already researched it. That kind of nonsense is indefensible.

Some people understood what was happening immediately and others didn't (I didn't quite get he was testing us until later, but I knew he wasn't our enemy since he could have easily killed us right then and there) and personally, I prefer the English localisation of Midgardsormr over the Japanese script. I like a bit of mystery that leaves doors open for discussion.

At the end of the day, though, Midgardsormr in both versions got his point across. One was just more direct, while the other was a little more ambiguous (perhaps even more lore friendly. Excuse or no, I like they decided to take Dragonspeak into consideration and I feel that maybe the 'original script' should have maybe done the same. Why bother having Koji Fox create the language in the first place if it's not even going to be used?).

Well everyone will probably see this different but I agree with Kosmos. The dragon speech itself has nothing to do with the English text. The dragon language is probably the same in all languages since its simply "gibberish". Its the translation that came out of this way of speaking that created the confusion.

I am not saying that you are wrong to like it or something, just that such a difference can make lore discussions really "stressful" because you kinda have to look at all languages to see the true meaning if one is different. And I am not really sure if its a good job if quite some people misunderstood his intention, especially since this is only in the English version anyway. But its probably better to agree to disagree.

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Originally Posted by Nestama

Some people understood what was happening immediately and others didn't (I didn't quite get he was testing us until later, but I knew he wasn't our enemy since he could have easily killed us right then and there) and personally, I prefer the English localisation of Midgardsormr over the Japanese script. I like a bit of mystery that leaves doors open for discussion.

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Zenos could have killed us too easily, and he definitely is not our friend.

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Originally Posted by basketofseals

Zenos could have killed us too easily, and he definitely is not our friend.

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He thought he was. >_>

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Originally Posted by Alleo

Well everyone will probably see this different but I agree with Kosmos. The dragon speech itself has nothing to do with the English text. The dragon language is probably the same in all languages since its simply "gibberish". Its the translation that came out of this way of speaking that created the confusion.

I am not saying that you are wrong to like it or something, just that such a difference can make lore discussions really "stressful" because you kinda have to look at all languages to see the true meaning if one is different. And I am not really sure if its a good job if quite some people misunderstood his intention, especially since this is only in the English version anyway. But its probably better to agree to disagree.

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It's probably the only way, as I'll always prefer Midgardsormr in English over his Japanese script. I am going to have to say you are incorrect with assuming it's only in English, as I just checked the French cutscene (and lord loo my right hand hurts from writing that text down. In hindsight I could have simply video captured the cutscene, since handwriting in general hurts) and his dialogue is roughly similar to the English localisation, with the last two lines almost being word for word (and yes, I compared it to what people translated from Japanese). I've yet to check the German cutscene. Maybe tomorrow.