While doing research for my articles and books about bad game translation, I frequently found quotably amusing lines related to religion. They’re just sitting in a folder on my computer doing nothing, so I figured I should share them here!
Game Translations
"GOD IS ANGRY"
Devil's Heaven (MSX)
Devil's Heaven (MSX)
"Oh, well. God chose you, not some old pervert."
Dragon Warrior VII (PlayStation)
Dragon Warrior VII (PlayStation)
"There is a large desk. It has a drawer. It must belong to the devil."
Mio's Mystery Adventure (PC88)
Mio's Mystery Adventure (PC88)
"DON'T SERVE THE DEVIL"
Pokemon Vietnamese Crystal (Game Boy Color bootleg)
Pokemon Vietnamese Crystal (Game Boy Color bootleg)
"YOU ARE THE MESSIAH OF EARTH."
Zanac (NES)
Zanac (NES)
"God be with you till we meet again!"
Panic Restaurant (NES) - for context, you kill food monsters in this decidedly non-religious game
Panic Restaurant (NES) - for context, you kill food monsters in this decidedly non-religious game
"The God dispatches Kaby,Koby to Earth to judge a Satan."
Kaby Koby (Famicom, unreleased Korean game - source & more info)
Kaby Koby (Famicom, unreleased Korean game - source & more info)
"You will be servants of THE SATAN"
The Ninja Kids (Arcade)
The Ninja Kids (Arcade)
"Tough... Don't blame us. Blame yourself or God."
Final Fantasy Tactics (PlayStation)
Final Fantasy Tactics (PlayStation)
"God! excrement! I'm surrounded!"
SNK vs. Capcom: The Match of the Millennium (Neo Geo Pocket Color)
SNK vs. Capcom: The Match of the Millennium (Neo Geo Pocket Color)
Non-Game Translations
In the same folder I have some non-game translations which are also similarly amusing:
"Oh! Jesus!"
(source unknown)
(source unknown)
"Christmas is the day Jesus-sama was born."
(Jūken Sentai Gekiranger, fan translation)
(Jūken Sentai Gekiranger, fan translation)
Let’s Find More!
I’m sure there are many other good game translation quotes that belong here. If you know of any, let me know and I’ll update this gallery from time to time!
The DQ7 line is amusing, but is that actually a bad translation?
Yeah, that’s a good point. I wasn’t sure what to title the article as my folder’s title of “religiousjunk” doesn’t really work as an article title 😛 I’ll rephrase stuff better, thanks!
Similarly, from my memory, that line in FFT is fairly appropriate. I think it’s even pretty similar in the new retranslation?
The retranslation goes a different bent with the same meaning.
“Tis your birth and faith that wrong you, not I.”
That old hermit guy on the island is a perv though, I was disappointed that he didn’t go on about fun bags in the updated 3DS version.
idk saying イエス様 seems par for the course, though through a weeb lens it’s pretty hilarious.
Some of these don’t seem like bad translations. Like that FFT one is pretty badass, and aren’t religious tones really super prevalent in that game anyway?
Vietnamese Crystal has one much earlier that’s even funnier, to my mind. When your mom is explaining how the Pokegear works, she instructs you to “INSERT THE PIN OF XIUCI, SELECT THE HOLY FIGURE, OK?”
I’m not sure what “pin of xiuci” is referring to, but my guess is that what was meant by the other part was “select the icon” and something got scrambled, since an “icon” is a type of “holy figure”, isn’t it?
There’s also all the stuff about the monks practicing Buddhism in the Madapo Tower.
Vietnamese Crystal in general might make a good article; some of the stuff in there is super fascinating, like how at one point it correctly uses an archaic word for medicine, or how the comment about the Pokedex being created with “spiry technique” may or may not mean ‘a technique in the manner of a spiral’ which may or may not imply the Pokedex is just a spiral-bound notebook.
Xiuci… 十字? Press the D-pad?
The “Christmas is the day Jesus-sama was born” screenshot is from Jyuken Sentai Gekiranger, specifically the fansub by TV-Nihon, where 2000’s fansub trends thrive to this day.
I believe the exact episode was 43? At least, it’s been a while, but that’s what two separate episode guides said was the Christmas episode.
Ah yes, TV-Nihon. They would be idiotic enough to add a Japanese honorific to a person who’s not Japanese.
Yes. Yes they would. They’re the epitome of weebism.
The Jesus-sama line is from TV-Nihon’s fansub of Juken Sentai Gekiranger.
Semi-related anecdote:
One of my favorite anime movies is Saint Young Men. It’s a movie about Jesus and Buddha taking time off from their heavenly duties to vacation in Japan, so they take human form and get an apartment. It’s actually surprisingly wholesome for a religious comedy. No jokes about exorcising demons with a blessed golf club, but plenty of Dad-tier jokes about how the reason Jesus walked on water is because he can’t swim and he’s actually really embarrassed about it.
This is actually one of my favorite series! My Japanese friends wonder if certain things related to Jesus are true, like the crown of thorns. It’s pretty strange as it seems so natural to me as an American, so I only hope that Buddha is equally accurate.
What version is that Panic Restaurant screenshot from? That’s what the protagonist looks like in the American and PAL versions, but those versions don’t have that God message at the end.
It’s the NES version, but the credits actually are unused. To see the credits and that message you have to enter an emulator cheat to enable them.
That’s interesting. I guess that’s why the Western versions had the credits removed. Odd they would choose to just remove them altogether rather than edit that message though.
I’m wondering why some of the letters in that text are colored…
How could you have missed this gem from SNK vs Capcom for Neogeo Pocket.
https://78.media.tumblr.com/0fe793d3c52a1864a508338dc6ddf0fb/tumblr_ope1mxyzO51qd9g7oo1_400.png
God! Excrement!
Haha I can’t believe I forgot about it either – I even just mentioned it in the last article or the one before that!
I would like to submit the entire script of Xenogears, which is non-stop hamfisted religiosity.
… I guess I already signed up to submit the entire script of Xenogears, didn’t I. 😮
https://goo.gl/images/MK2itb
ninten screaming JESUS reminiscient of a scene in stand by me
Suck my fat one, you cheap dime store hood!
I guess Lufia 2 is a reverse example of this, where the localisers had to bend over backwards to avoid religious references. The antagonists are evil gods, but “god” is replaced by “super being” in the translation.
So when one kid speculates about whether evil gods means that there might be good demons, it comes out in this infamously mangled form: https://flic.kr/p/LnDmh9
The NES Dragon Warrior 2 called them “wizards”, which led to its own share of really clumsy sounding lines.
Correct. The Sinistrals were called kyōshin (mad gods) in Japanese, so any use of the term was changed to “super beings”. Honestly, they could have come up with a less generic and less chunky term for them, but those were the times. The last thing small localization companies needed was Christian mothers clutching their pearls in shock over a simple word that doesn’t always equate to their narrowminded definition of god.
It’s interesting how the ‘War of the Lions’ version of ‘Final Fantasy Tactics’ did that “blame yourself or God” line.
The more flowery script renders that line “‘Tis your birth and faith that wrong you, not I.”
Actually that entire “retranslation” is an interesting example of punched up writing. I’m not sure if you’ve ever gone indepth with it at some point but it’s definitely worth a look. I love how the Lucavi speak in iambic pentameter.
“Blame yourself or God” is the ultimate burn.
Hi! Can you explain why they’re bad translations and the original meaning?