English Translation Terrible.

[Atelier-Bagur]

Because that kind of character doesn't really sit well with everyone. Personally I find JP Haurchefant creepy and off-putting. The English version might just be a more "generic nice guy" character, but at least he's not actually offensive.

A pervy character would honestly be ok for as some random side npc, but for an important character whom you get to interact with multiple times and have a prominent role in an expansion's story, yeah no, Japanese Haurchefaunt is one of those cultural exceptions where people would not be necessarily happy over him in other countries.

Its the reason why they toned down those two pervy dudes in Persona 5 wanting to have relations with Ryuji. This kind of behavior becomes very creepy.

[Absimiliard]

Curious to know some notable examples

There's a pretty good one earlier in this thread. Horsefountain is very different in the EN localization. I'm pretty much in agreement with you on him, though. That would not have gone well with Western audiences. Dude had even less chill than G'raha, and that's a bloody accomplishment. Which, speaking of, JP G'raha is also a good bit worse.

[SassyAssassin]

I feel …so loved right now with all these npcs jumping on me, none of the ones I actually wanted to but eh…

[Kazhar]

Indeed, people still act as if the English version is a "translation" instead of the reality that the English and Japanese versions are developed together. The English version is not "mistranslating" anything; it is its own version.

And yes, some of the complaints still boil down to the OP's original issue with "What is wrong?" vs. "Is aught amiss?" (In other words, they're complaining about nothing of actual substance.)

You're still parroting this but this has been debunked multiple times. (Maybe this wasn't in your YouTube feed?)
English translation is not in fact being developped concurrently to Japanese translation, it's a misconception born from the role of Koji Fox as a lore lead. Everything is written in Japanese first.
This interview is relevant:

https://na.finalfantasy.com/topics/265

EN localization team has basically no involvement in the story writing itself, they just have an ongoing dialogue with the story team for some aspect (like naming various skills, objects and characters. Song writing and cutscene timing.). More importantly, it also happens with the entire localization team, not just EN like many believe.

EDIT: Here's also a video
https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=M_kVS46AfIs

EDIT 2: Here's another interview where former localization lead John Crow explains the process. He is in fact translating Ishikawa's work.
Yes, sometimes differences could happen because what was originally translated was just an early draft, but this is still very much a translation.

https://gamerescape.com/2018/04/09/p...and-john-crow/

EDIT 3: Or maybe you could just read the credits of the game and notice that none of the localization team are credited for story writing.

[Fawkes]

because otherwise his character and death would've lost a lot of that meaning if the character you're supposed to be personal connected too happened to be Glenn Quagmire.

Yoshi-P chose to kill him off to rectify the problem rather than try to continue writing a game with two vastly different versions of the same character.

The English version was changed by the localization team without permission and Yoshi-P didn't find out until later. They did not intentionally make him less pervy for plot reasons, the localization team just mistakenly thought the English playerbase wasn't thirsty AF and wouldn't like a guy making occasional sex puns.

Indeed, people still act as if the English version is a "translation" instead of the reality that the English and Japanese versions are developed together. The English version is not "mistranslating" anything; it is its own version.

They only started working closely together after what happened with Haurchefant, most likely to prevent the English team from going rogue again.

Over the months since, we have taken many measures to ensure that similar problems do not arise in the future, and I am proud to say that the LOC team works more closely with the scenario and cutscene teams than ever before.

[Renalt]

Believe me you do NOT want a 1 for 1 translation from Japanese to English unless you want the most nonsensical drivel ever. But hey if you don't like the english then don't use the english.

[Boblawblah]

The English translation is incredible. It's one of the few Japanese developed games that doesn't seem like they were trying to straight translate the Japanese to English, either sounding super stilted, or cringe. Instead they tried to convey a similar meaning/feeling and nailed it. This "The English team are a bunch of rogues" is laughable. Good lord people, just look at the English story of Lost Ark (yes, i know it's Korean), or Final Fantasy VII Remake.

Grunting compilation anyone? https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kpEd2yK8KzQ

[SassyAssassin]

They did not intentionally make him less pervy for plot reasons, the localization team just mistakenly thought the English playerbase wasn't thirsty AF and wouldn't like a guy making occasional sex puns.

Correct me if Im wrong but I often had the, well now I assume misconception, that Japanese people were less openly pervy and more “respectful”, somewhat reserved, as being openly pervy tends to make society cast them aside in a way, or so Ive seen in documentaries online over the years.

How did it happen that we are experiencing the exact opposite in ffxiv? I was surprised about the differences between both translations, unless online and in game is their only outlet since in reality it’s shameful to act that thirsty.

Im not trying to judge or anything before anyone jumps, Im genuinely curious, because I always expected us to be more open to such innuendos, and often when reading spicy dialogue I thought to myself there’s no way in hell it’s the same in japanese, boy was I wrong.

[Absimiliard]

Believe me you do NOT want a 1 for 1 translation from Japanese to English unless you want the most nonsensical drivel ever. But hey if you don't like the english then don't use the english.

I don't know of anyone that wants a 1 for 1 translation. That wouldn't work anyway, simply because there are some Japanese words and concepts with no English equivalents. There will always be a need to reword things to make sense when moving between languages, especially languages as dissimilar as Japanese and English. That said, it is entirely feasible to do this without losing the message. Unfortunately, the EN localization team tends to take some liberties at inopportune times. I don't know whether it's something Yoshi-P knows about or not, and frankly I don't care. I simply prefer the contents of the JP version, and apparently a not insignificant number of others do as well.

Instead they tried to convey a similar meaning/feeling and nailed it.

I encourage you to look into the differences in characterizations between the EN and JP versions of the game. G'raha and Horsefountain aside, there are quite a few other instances of it. Horsefountain simply happens to be the most notable as well as (in my opinion) the most egregious. You might also look into general differences between localizations in Endwalker if you'd like something more recent.

Correct me if Im wrong but I often had the, well now I assume misconception, that Japanese people were less openly pervy and more “respectful”, somewhat reserved, as being openly pervy tends to make society cast them aside in a way, or so Ive seen in documentaries online over the years.

How did it happen that we are experiencing the exact opposite in ffxiv? I was surprised about the differences between both translations, unless online and in game is their only outlet since in reality it’s shameful to act that thirsty.

Im not trying to judge or anything before anyone jumps, Im genuinely curious, because I always expected us to be more open to such innuendos, and often when reading spicy dialogue I thought to myself there’s no way in hell it’s the same in japanese, boy was I wrong.

It's one of those things where it's fine in stuff like anime and games but not anything remotely close to acceptable for real people to engage in.

[Striker44]

You're still parroting this but this has been debunked multiple times. (Maybe this wasn't in your YouTube feed?)
English translation is not in fact being developped concurrently to Japanese translation, it's a misconception born from the role of Koji Fox as a lore lead. Everything is written in Japanese first.
This interview is relevant:

https://na.finalfantasy.com/topics/265

EN localization team has basically no involvement in the story writing itself, they just have an ongoing dialogue with the story team for some aspect (like naming various skills, objects and characters. Song writing and cutscene timing.). More importantly, it also happens with the entire localization team, not just EN like many believe.

EDIT: Here's also a video
https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=M_kVS46AfIs

EDIT 2: Here's another interview where former localization lead John Crow explains the process. He is in fact translating Ishikawa's work.
Yes, sometimes differences could happen because what was originally translated was just an early draft, but this is still very much a translation.

https://gamerescape.com/2018/04/09/p...and-john-crow/

EDIT 3: Or maybe you could just read the credits of the game and notice that none of the localization team are credited for story writing.

The only thing being "parroted" is the truth, which you just seem to not like. Here's direct from MC Koji Fox, aka the English guy who wrote much of the lore: "Koji: 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."