Little tidbits about Vanillaware's Muramasa: The Demon Blade keep popping up lately, the latest being that Ignition Entertainment (who are publishing the title in North America) have decided to keep the original moonspeak voice-acting and only localize the sub-titles.
Here's what Business Development Director for Ignition (and ex-1Up Yours host) Shane Bettenhausen had to say during an interview with SiliconEra:
“For Muramasa we decided to stick with the original Japanese voices and only localize the text.” “We felt the game was deeply steeped in Japanese tradition, mythology, and culture that trying to dub it, trying to make something more Western is really not a service to the product.”
Maybe I'm just a weeaboo, or a purist, but I wish more companies had a similar frame of mind. I'm just an altruistic hippy, but I like the idea that perhaps the "product" has some intrinsic value outside of the number of copies it sells.
Oh wait. That's not true at all.
Anyway, the translation is being outsourced to a "very high end" company, but hopefully a different one than whoever localized Ignition's Lux Pain, rendering it damn-near unplayable. Destructoid reader unangbangkay points out that Muramasa's release will create a three-way brawl for the title of "Best North American Publisher of a Vanillaware Game": Atlus and Nippon-Ichi brought over Odin Sphere and GrimGrimoire, respectively, two years ago.
So, let's have a chat: Do you prefer subs or dubs when it comes to Japanese games? And when Muramasa: The Demon Blade hits shelves in September for the Wii, are you buying it?
[via unanbangkay]
Contest:
4:40 PM on 06.12.2009
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For wanting a Japanese game (literally taking place in Eastern geography, not developed by a Japanese studio) to feel more authentic? Don't be ashamed!
To answer your bonus questions: If I had a Wii, I'd buy Muramasa, even though it's a poor man's Odin Sphere (from what I played of it at E3). Also, I'm not a purist per se, because I'll always try the dub out. Bringing anime into play for an easy example: in the case of say, Cowboy Bebop, the dub is fine. Some anime, like Kenshin (aaah Kaoru you're so annoying), I'll switch back and forth when it gets unbearable.
even when voice over is done well still i always like the original voices a lot more.
japanese original voices ftw.
So I go Dubs.
This for the lose.
And going Japanese with Valkyria Chronicles was a tad odd as well, since the battle noises and voiceovers were NOT subtitled. While I can understand some Japanese, most of what came over to me on the radio was strange moon gibberish. Furthermore, that game was "dubtitled", i.e. using the English voiceover script rather than a more literal translation, so some lines, naming conventions and such were changed slightly to better capture the "feeling" of the dialog, if not the accuracy. The editing of the script was great, make no mistake, but even a cursory glance at GameFAQs message board will show that it pissed off a lot of the hardcore purists.
There are times when I DO prefer English, though. I prefer David Hayter's version of Solid Snake rather than Akio Otsuka's, and Jennifer Hale's performance as Naomi Hunter compared to Hiromi Tsuru's.
I'm also much friendlier to an English voiceover if it's the FIRST one I heard when playing the game, as I can more easily see (rather hear) the best portions of both versions. For example, Tracy Rooney's work as Chie in Persona 4 is almost as good as Yui Horie's in my mind.
And good, I can't think of many gaming companies that care to hire decent voice actors so I'm all for leaving the voices as is.
But seriously, I don' care how "authentic" or "original" it is, give me dubs. I don't speak japanese.
Still want this game though.
Actually, I just thought about this the other day: everyone's hoping for a Japanese dub track in FFXIII, and they claim it would just need a bit more room for a second audio track. While dual-tracks would work in many more games than they're actually in, Square actually slightly reanimates the mouth movements in their big-budget games, so just swapping between two audio tracks would give results similar to dubbing live action films - a.k.a. horrible.
This isn't anything to do with "purism's sake", this is just them being too cheap to get a decent cast together. -_- This seriously, -seriously- pisses me off. Fuck Ignition.
Once again: you realize that this plays like a dumbed down Odin Sphere, right? Prepare to be disappointed.
Good on you for that, though you may well have contributed to the fact that Yakuza 3 may never make it across the pond. The English VO for Yakuza is terrible and more or less eliminates one of the biggest draws of the franchise in Japan - top-tier voice/acting talent.
If you still want to play, get your hands on Yakuza 2. It includes a VERY in-depth recap of the first game, and went all Criterion Collection on itself, with no English voice acting, only Japanese with subs.
I remember seeing copies at my local Best Buy for $10 or less.
I was all excited when I found out that Takashi Miike was doing the promotional movies or whatnot for Yakuza and I figured that they would try to keep that flavor for the American release of the game, but I was dead wrong.
I guess I can understand though. I've met many people in my day that refuse to watch a movie with subtitles. I do not associate with these people.
I did not know about the Yakuza 2 recap thing. That would be super-handy. I have found that most localized games have really shitty voice acting (I'm looking at you, Final Fantasy X) so I try not to support that. ESPECIALLY, when the subject matter itself makes the original Japanese voice acting seem so appropriate. Oh well!
Also, I apologize for the Yakuza 3 thing. That game looks rad and I don't know why they wouldn't release it here. How long could the localization take if they didn't have to add English voice actors?
And yes, I will be buying this frigging game. Anyone who doubts this games potential clearly doesnt know the pleasure of decent 2D gaming. This looks like pure, unadulterated, Nippon-ised, 2D Slashy/jumpy SEX, and most early reports suggest it is indeed a fine game. Ooooh yes please.