Mato hasn’t played the game since 1999, so I took the reins and sped us from the start of the game to shortly after Link wakes up in the future. All together, this little eyeball hunt took about 6 or 7 hours. There were lots of fun conversations and graphical glitches along the way too!
About Stream Recaps
Mato and I do a lot of game streams for Legends of Localization projects. These streams always include interesting topics that we think readers might enjoy – viewers ask localization-related questions all the time, Mato often points out neat stuff that’s not in any articles yet, and sometimes we discover new things nobody’s really noticed before. And, of course, we’re always encountering unexpected in-game situations that lead to enlightening conversations.
Since most of this gets lost forever in the giant YouTube black hole, we thought it’d be helpful to start summarizing and sharing these topics with site readers too. So with that in mind, we’re planning to recap most of our streams and point out all the best info. Hopefully these recaps will lead to even more conversations and new stuff to learn!
Stream Archive
Note that originally we streamed on two separate days, but for easier viewing they’ve been combined into a single video here.
Localization Discussion
- 00:36:55 – “Coup de grace” is a weird phrase for a Zelda game. What could they have used instead?
- 01:01:32 – Talon says, “What in tarnation?!” We discuss if anyone’s ever used that phrase in real life.
- 01:04:33 – Someone is trying to figure out how to translate a king with a Kansai dialect. Mato gives some advice.
- 02:20:20 – Someone asks for Mato’s thoughts on fan translations. He remembers people criticizing him for taking a “long time” with the MOTHER 3 fan translation. He also talks a bit about his partnership with DeJap Translations and old drama in the fan translation community.
- 02:34:39 – Mato discusses the origin of Gato’s name in Chrono Trigger.
- 02:58:07 – The characters in the Hylian language correspond to real Japanese kana. The milk bottle says “Lon Lon Milk”, the sign above the horse pen says “Lon Lon Bokujyo (Ranch)”, and the sign above Talon’s door says “Yadoya (Inn)”. More info on the Hylian script here.
- 04:46:00 – Mato discusses an English game that got a bad Japanese localization. “Hell yeah/yah” was translated literally.
- 05:29:49 – We discuss the meaning of Cojiro’s name and ponder why it was left unlocalized.
- 06:07:06 – Everyone has a different opinion on what “localization” is. Lots of discussion with the chat on this subject.
- 06:11:19 – Mato talks about his work on the Shin-chan series.
- 06:14:29 – Some discussion on how Mato localized Panty & Stocking.
Game Discussion
- 00:04:21 – We discuss our first memories of the game. Mato tells his story about Circuit City screwing up his pre-order reservation and how he almost drove into a fence.
- 00:15:54 – We meet the Deku Tree and talk about his unique speech style and how moons in games and movies are usually always full for some reason.
- 00:40:55 – The Deku Tree tells us the legend of the three goddesses. We discuss Triforce rumors, Mato destroying the Zelda timeline, and how people pronounce various names.
- 00:51:50 – Poe demonstrates how to make the Stalchilds (Stalchildren?) to leave you alone at night.
- 01:05:46 – We meet Princess Zelda and her face experiences scary emulation errors.
- 01:17:59 – Poe shows off an old trick on how to get the heart piece from the guy on the roof of Kakariko Village early.
- 01:39:57 – The chat chimes in with their favorite OoT memories.
- 02:47:48 – We meet the first Great Fairy and everyone is horrified.
- 04:13:08 – The big ol’ scene where Zelda escapes the castle.
- 04:18:16 – We talk to the “dying” man in the back alley.
- 04:26:15 – Let’s travel through time!
- 04:36:05 – We meet the poe trader.
- 05:22:05 – Poe accidentally runs over a chicken with a horse and fails to jump over a fence multiple times. The chat shares how they like to escape the ranch.
- 05:59:50 – English screenshot GET!
- 06:10:16 – King Zora uses an unusual pronoun in Japanese.
- 06:15:15 – Japanese screenshot GET!
Other Discussion
- 01:59:08 – We talk about our Nintendo Power and Fun Club subscriptions. Also the rare Zelda GameCube disc with 4 games on it.
- 04:06:40 – A quick lesson on the difference between “weary” and “wary”. The chat shares their own grammar peeves and words they personally struggle with.
- 05:19:10 – We discuss our desire to license, localize, and release Bandai’s old Zelda board game that never left Japan.
- 05:32:50 – The chat gives suggestions for spooky games to use for articles in October.
- 05:57:54 – Mato discusses his very unorthodox valedictorian speech.
Join In
If you’d like to catch future Legends of Localization streams, follow on Twitch here. Hope to see you there!
For the Kansai King question, Golden Sun has a vaguely similar character where a lord has a very base speaking style in Japanese (Lord McCoy). The translation (which is actually really spotty and is entirely responsible for the game’s reputation as excessively wordy.) went with Scottish. It doesn’t quite work, not least of all because one of the party members has the exact same speaking style in Japanese and they sound nothing alike.
““Coup de grace” is a weird phrase for a Zelda game.”
Why? It’s a perfectly normal English phrase.
While perfectly fine and normal, I must admit that I didn’t expect to see “…administer the coup de grace…” when I first played it, but I’m not a native speaker so I don’t know how usual the term is. Personally, something like “…deliver the final blow…” would have felt more natural but I guess it gives the official English script some flavor. It reminds me of Ganon’s “En Garde!” in Zelda III, also by Dan Owsen.
The term used in the Japanese script is トドメ (finishing blow).
Funny thing about Cojiro; since I had no experience with Japanese, but extensive knowledge of Spanish, I always took it as a Spanish name. I did think it was hilarious that suddenly the’re a blue Spanish chicken completely out of nowhere. 🙂