Posted on August 10, 2018 by Clyde Mandelin‧17 Comments
Every speck in this photo is Breath of Fire II making a mistakeYou know how your brain just sort of fizzles out when you try to think about how many stars there are in the universe and stuff like that? At some point, it just becomes impossible for the human mind to grasp things at that scale.
Well, the same thing happens whenever I think about how many translation problems there are in the Super NES RPG Breath of Fire II. I even wrote a huge overview of the game’s translation issues, yet barely scratched the surface. Breath of Fire II is a miracle of bad translation.
However, Breath of Fire II is also one of those games with a “slow burn” bad translation, just like Twinkle Star Sprites and Harvest Moon. Basically, single problems might not seem too bad, but they come at such a quiet, steady pace that when you eventually look back on your experience with the game, the text nonsense is one of the first things to come to mind.
Without a doubt, Breath of Fire II deserves a spot on my all-time bad game translation list. So here are just a few examples of the game’s translation in action:
I don't think that's how sleeping works
Note: it's actually an upside-down uvula
Ah, yes, the sound all demons make
Sound effect words are all so weird in this translation
I love that band
???
That's an order
Clothes is good
Our new goal is clear: prevent demon wiggles
Note: I was not working
Uhh, I'm Ryu
Why thanks you
It's not obvious from this screenshot, but you can probably make a dangerous drinking game out of the word "umm" in this translation (note: I do not endorse any drinking game involving Breath of Fire II)
Word choices are so slightly weird
Yes, you, King Nina. Go to your father.
This guy really wants the one mushrooms
No, I'm Ryu
I'm Ryu
Wait, make up your mind
Yes, animal do
WHAT
Hello text editing mistake #80
That's not how switches work
I don't think anyone tested this to see if it sounded okay
I am the real
Behind what?!
"Tolen" instead of "Token"
Here's a tiny mistake that's not a huge deal by itself, but when the whole game is like this, it really adds up
Programmers were too busy that day
TANSFW (translation accidentally NSFW)
I... don't think that's a bear
I don't know what you're trying to tell me, game
The infamous "Equip lod" line is quoted all the time online
Reduce my casting?
What's that called when that mistake happens again?
Literally every line of text in this fishing mini-game has problems
Again, individual screenshots don’t really do the game justice. But if you want to see more details about the game’s translation issues here, see my review here.
The crazy thing is that this translation is actually an improvement. A beta version of the game shows that the script had even more issues.
Incidentally, Capcom re-released Breath of Fire II for the Game Boy Advance many years later… but didn’t fix a single thing in the translation. The script was edited for the game’s Virtual Console release much later… but it only changed two lines that didn’t really need fixing. Brrrr!
For Your Reference
Breath of Fire II (1995)
This entry in Capcom’s Breath of Fire is a solid JRPG with multiple paths and endings. The game is also famous for its poor translation into English.
I'm taking a relaxed break from Legends of Localization at the moment, but I still plan to add more articles and comparisons from time to time.
I'll also slowly be improving and updating various sections of the site. During these times, pages, links, and images will surely break somewhere - I apologize in advance. I've also turned off comments for now until I can reasonably keep up with them again.
In the meantime, check out some of these other articles:
> If you jump on the bucket at the windmill storage behind ,
Wait, windmill storage? I wanna see the place where they store the windmills!
Coda
Oh. It never once occurred to me that “Tolen” was a typo for “Token”! I thought it was just some random emblem with a special name.
Stuffgamer1
Wait…the GBA release DIDN’T fix the translation? I’ve played both versions and I would’ve sworn it did.
Zachary
Have you checked out the fan translation? It seemed pretty good to me, but I’d be curious as to how well they did with following the actual Japanese.
Lucklight
It’s okay, but they did do that thing that some fan translators like to do, they changed some NPC lines to reference memes. One NPC in particular in the Wizard School talks about Harry Potter. Oh, and the Gold Fly in Simafort has liberal use of the word “retard” which didn’t sit well with me either.
Midna
Fan translations in general (whether it’s video games, manga, or anime) have a major problem with rough language. It’s almost never handled well, and a lot of the time it ends up sounding less like a professionally-written script and more like some 15-year-old edgelord trying to be “adult.” Well, this guy is clearly yelling, and obviously he’s angry at this other guy, so obviously he _must_ be saying “shit”, or calling him a “son of a bitch” or whatever. For christ’s sake, there are scanslations of Dragon Ball Super where Beerus starts spewing four-letter words over not being able to eat some pudding. We’d like to _think_ the days of J2E are behind us, but… no, they’re really not.
Just a quick note: I’m in the middle of moving the site to a new server, so a handful of comments have vanished from the past 2 days or so. You haven’t entered an alternate universe. Trust me.
Mew seeker
Of course not. Pretending otherwise would make you end up beaten up with a big stick. 😛
aett
I hope one day we can get a translation comparison between the original SNES English version, the fan translation from several years ago, and the original Japanese!
BoF II Needs a Full Retranslation!
When BoF II got ported to the GBA, couldn’t those lazy morons have been bothered to retranslate the crap translation of the SNES version?
lan-vuhoang
Yes, they do. “Equip lod/bait” -> “Equip rod/bait”
Toei
The thing about the BoF 2 translation, though, is that it’s mostly still understandable, so at the time, it didn’t bother me. Compare this to the PSP Legend of Heroes games, for example, where there are entire passages that are completely undecipherable – that really ruined those games for me.
Zebulin
Compare to Suikoden 2 where certain NPC dialogue is literally nothing but garbage “text”.
I really wish I was joking.
Nyperold
Well come on, game. Even Rainbow Dash can tell that the Bum’sCL is clothes. Something more informative would be nice.
Axl Grease
As far as I know, “uparupa” is a synonym for “axolotl” (that critically endangered Mexican salamander species).
lan-vuhoang
Another one: “(name) tried to opened the door, but he can’t figure it out.” (“opened” is supposed to be “open”)
I forgot all about the salad tossing scene.
> If you jump on the bucket at the windmill storage behind ,
Wait, windmill storage? I wanna see the place where they store the windmills!
Oh. It never once occurred to me that “Tolen” was a typo for “Token”! I thought it was just some random emblem with a special name.
Wait…the GBA release DIDN’T fix the translation? I’ve played both versions and I would’ve sworn it did.
Have you checked out the fan translation? It seemed pretty good to me, but I’d be curious as to how well they did with following the actual Japanese.
It’s okay, but they did do that thing that some fan translators like to do, they changed some NPC lines to reference memes. One NPC in particular in the Wizard School talks about Harry Potter. Oh, and the Gold Fly in Simafort has liberal use of the word “retard” which didn’t sit well with me either.
Fan translations in general (whether it’s video games, manga, or anime) have a major problem with rough language. It’s almost never handled well, and a lot of the time it ends up sounding less like a professionally-written script and more like some 15-year-old edgelord trying to be “adult.” Well, this guy is clearly yelling, and obviously he’s angry at this other guy, so obviously he _must_ be saying “shit”, or calling him a “son of a bitch” or whatever. For christ’s sake, there are scanslations of Dragon Ball Super where Beerus starts spewing four-letter words over not being able to eat some pudding. We’d like to _think_ the days of J2E are behind us, but… no, they’re really not.
Just a quick note: I’m in the middle of moving the site to a new server, so a handful of comments have vanished from the past 2 days or so. You haven’t entered an alternate universe. Trust me.
Of course not. Pretending otherwise would make you end up beaten up with a big stick. 😛
I hope one day we can get a translation comparison between the original SNES English version, the fan translation from several years ago, and the original Japanese!
When BoF II got ported to the GBA, couldn’t those lazy morons have been bothered to retranslate the crap translation of the SNES version?
Yes, they do.
“Equip lod/bait” -> “Equip rod/bait”
The thing about the BoF 2 translation, though, is that it’s mostly still understandable, so at the time, it didn’t bother me. Compare this to the PSP Legend of Heroes games, for example, where there are entire passages that are completely undecipherable – that really ruined those games for me.
Compare to Suikoden 2 where certain NPC dialogue is literally nothing but garbage “text”.
I really wish I was joking.
Well come on, game. Even Rainbow Dash can tell that the Bum’sCL is clothes. Something more informative would be nice.
As far as I know, “uparupa” is a synonym for “axolotl” (that critically endangered Mexican salamander species).
Another one:
“(name) tried to opened the door, but he can’t figure it out.”
(“opened” is supposed to be “open”)