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Super Robot Taisen W
Original game : Super Robot Taisen W
Platform : Nintendo DS
Language : English
Released by : Kingcom
Release date : 10 July 2022
Status : Fully Playable
Patch version : 1.1
Downloads : 18224
ROM Information
Database match: Super Robot Taisen W (Japan)Translation description
This is the complete translation of Super Robot Wars W.Screenshots
Contributions
| Contributor | Type of contribution | Description |
|---|---|---|
| Kingcom | Hacking | |
| Brunom1 | Translation | |
| Fei | Script Editing/Revision |
Reviews
| Really good patch, but uses the wrong translations in several places | Garauga | 2022-03-03 | Version 1.0 |
SRW W is one of the white whales of the franchise in how we never got it over here due to Bandai Giving up on imports of these crossover games due to the Harmony Gold-Robotech-Macross Licensing/Rights mess (see your local Macross fan for details on that). Almost every entry crossed over in W ends up amalgamated together works as a complete, cohesive story; and gives a shot to several properties that normally wouldn't be given the time of day. I mostly applaud the work done here to make it available, when Bandai was not able to back when it was a new game. Even better, every Series featured in this game WAS imported, making access to them together like this even better as it endears the game even more to their fans. I in particular am a huge Tekkaman Blade fan due to the anime's import as "Teknoman" in the late 90's, and always hated how I couldn't play the entries featuring him due to import limitations. Now I can! Sadly however, as of the initial release version, the Translation Team seemed to prefer mistranslations made popular by Fansubs for some of the series that were officially imported, which end up holding it back as the Imported series used different translations than the fan translations did, them correcting various errors the fansubs made; as the imported versions made use of Official materials that the fan translators did not have. In particular, episode transcripts by which to base the translation from, which fansubs for many of these series did not have accessible when they were originally made. The repetition here of these mistranslations shows a lack of due-diligence to confirming which version is the "Official" one. And while this IS also a fan translation, making use of the official versions of the terminology lends greater credence that their work can be relied upon to be a truthful depiction of the events and dialogue of the game, as opposed to one that could be heavily revisionist that individuals not familiar with the Japanese language or the process and guidelines of Translation would be unaware of. Recycling the known, acknowledged errors thus calls into question the validity of their choices in phasing, EVEN IF an overall honest effort was intended and made. That everything outside of fan mistranslations for some series in regards to terminology seems to be correct would lend them the benefit of the doubt, and there is hope such script errors could be corrected. But In particular, they repeat the recurring translation errors present in the fansubs of "King of Braves GaoGaiGar", which were amended and corrected in the Sunrise-Official translation released in the late 2000's by Media Blasters...which admittedly, does have some punctuation placement errors in the MB script, but nothing that disrupts from the validity of that translation. This specific series unfortunately also has the mistranslations for it used by the formally Translated SRW T and 30, where it's acknowledged by their translators that they were in error from basing their translation on erroneous fan works as they did not have the official material accessible (primarily due to the DVD's being long out-of-print), and it's noted that the SRW 30 TL team's translation of the GaoGaiGar Vs Betterman content is Frequently a Blind Idiot Translation so the terminology they used cannot be relied upon as a reference. If the TL team for this game based their work from the same erroneous fansubs...well it makes the errors made more explicable and understandable, but it is still something that should be addressed and corrected. The most egregious of these mistakes-to the point some dialogue alluding to which way to write his name were changed-being GaoGaiGar's protagonist, Gai Shishio, having his name mis-spelled as "Guy" to match his Superhero alias/Codenames of "Cyborg Guy" and "Evoluder Guy"; which the show's staff originally had as a Homonym, a type of word pun where someone's alternate identity has their given name be spelled differently despite the two words sounding the same as a means to distinguish them. Marvel superheroes make use of Homonyms quite often for their superhero identities, such as The Character "Mar-vell" being known as Captain Marvel; thus the concept is NOT unknown to most. Japan also LOVES the use of word puns like this with names, and due to the original Fansubs For GaoGaiGar being made at a time where the fan translators couldn't get transcripts, they were unaware back then that Gai's Name is spelled with a Kanji (凱) which is only Romanized as "Kai", "Gai" or "Kachidoki"(Victory Song) depending on contextual use. Whereas Transcripts of the series would tell you that "Cyborg Guy" and "Evoluder Guy" are exclusively written in Katakana *Every time* that alias is used, acknowledging those name are utilizing English loan words for SOLELY the spelling of them and not Gai's Given name. Foreign loan words are ALWAYS written in katakana, and these two names are first seen Romanized in English as a romanization guide For THEM, while Gai's GIVEN name is always written in Kanji. Even the katakana used for "Guy" NORMALLY Romanizes as "Gai", it's just when a loan word is involved you sometimes end up needing to change the Romanized characters for something to make sense. The Loan word spelling is the Exception in regards to Romanization, NOT the Rule. Yet when it comes to Gai's Name, the exception is erroneously the only one considered despite all evidence to the contrary. To Call out a Example for Romanization Flubs regarding Loan words and homonyms I hope is understandable, Funimation tripped over a similar homonym problem with Their translation of "SSSS Dynazenon". When the story talked about one character originating as a Mummy, Funimation mistranslated "Mummy" as "mirror". This happened because they confused the loan word for Mirror, "ミラー" (miraa) and Japan's Loan word for "Mummy", "ミイラ" (Miira), as they are pronounced the same. why this happens is The term for mummy was introduced to Japan via a Portugese Salesman, where the preservative "Myrrh" was confused as the word to be used for entirety of the Mummy, and such was never corrected until "Miira" became the common use term. Funimation was not initially aware of Japan's word for Mummy originating like this until it was called out, and they corrected it once it was. Likewise, to avoid problems like this WITH homonyms, When someone's name is written in kanji (even if the pronunciation for their name is at some point written in either kana as a guide for those who might struggle with kanji), the translated spelling should nonetheless match those used for the Kanji and not the spelling of an English loan word that could be an option made possible by alternate readings of Katakana. Further proof of this is shown simply by the character's titular Mecha's name, "GaoGaiGar", being a name made by combining the GAO machine support units, the Lion mech "Galeon" (which due to L/R romanization issues can also be written as "GAReon") and GAI Shishio Himself. If Gai's Given name was supposed to be "Guy", then resultantly the mech's name should instead be romanized as "GaoGuyGar", which it is not. By erroneously spelling the translation of the Kanji as that of a Loan word, it results in a rather egregious and cascading Translation error; one that fans and Bandai/Sunrise reps aware of it-including those who made the original erroneous fansubs-have been trying to correct for nearly 20 years. All the more egregious, as "Gai" is frequently used for the spelling of many characters who share the same used "凱" Kanji, of note being Getter Robo's Gai, where the Translations that mistranslate Gai Shishio's name as 'Guy' frequently mess up when jokes about their names being spelled the same that are made throughout the SRW games that mutually feature them. Others being Gai Yuki From the Sentai Series "Jetman", Gai Ogata from "Sword Gai" (which coincidentally, also has the show's title in Katakana and is invoking this exact same homonym as a pun), Gai Tendo from SNK, and-most relevantly to this game as their series are also featured in SRW W-Gai Daigoji from Martian Successor Nadesico and Gai Murakumo From Gundam Seed Astray. Even if one were to cite the Character "Guy" from Street Fighter as their source for how to Romanize it...well, Capcom has acknowledged that romanization to be a translation error they have only kept due to character brand recognition...but it's still acknowledged officially as one of Street Fighter's many import naming and Romanization errors in the same vein as Vega, M. Bison and Balrog having their names swapped around. I went as long on this error as I did in this review of the Translation as I hope why this specific one keeps happening can be amended so it no longer does, and the work here can be corrected so we can continue work on correcting the misconception overall, and I'd like to hope more SRW games in the backlog can get good work done to make them available. | |||