i'm playing ffvii in spanish

[Strangelove]

i just got to kalm and i think they just called jenova 'that headless secret agent' who lives in the Shinras' building?

Barret
"Recuerdo a Jenová.
Es esa agente secreta sin cabeza que
vive en edificio de los Shinra."

i played a bit of the ps1 version a few years back (so if this kind of thread seems familiar to older folks here it's because i already made one long ago) but this is the ps4 port, i thought they might have fixed some of the translation (i think at it said your 'fiesta' was waiting in the original when you get to the kalm inn and now it says 'grupo'?) but i'm not sure about that now.

i'm working with a spanish guy and my spanish sucks so i thought i would try to improve again. by playing a game that was notoriously badly translated on its initial release but hey. it's more than i was doing so far.

 

[The Twilight Mexican]

Aw, they fixed the "fiesta" thing? =(

 

[Strangelove]

is it weird that they call a village like nibelheim 'ciudad' or is this just me not knowing enough about spanish?

 

[trash panda]

Okay so based on what you've said so far, it seems like the story is possibly even better in Spanish?

 

[Strangelove]

that would require me to understand more than 30% of what i'm reading

 

[Rydeen]

My Spanish isn't great either, but I think ciudad sounds weird too. I would think pueblo makes more sense. The stress on the last a in Jenova kind of threw me off there too. But then I remembered Japanese doesn't have stresses like that and I guess it makes sense for them to stress it where they want. I guess I'm just too used to Jenóva.

 

[Strangelove]

i think it was jénova actually, at least it has been other times. i must have just mistyped when i was looking back and forth between the tv and my computer

 

[Shademp]

If I were making a Spanish version of FFVII, I would have Costa del Sol be called "Coast of the Sun" or "Sun's Coast". Because appropriate switch!

I expect that this is not the case in the official Spanish version(s).

 

[Alex Strife]

The fact nobody mentioned me on this thread amuses and saddens me just as much!

"Ciudad" would not be a bad way to put it in the sense that it's a very generic term. Yes, it's true that if we go by amount of people and size of the place, only Midgar might qualify as a "Ciudad", but... there's far worse things in the game.

The game's translation is a hot mess, really.

 

[The Twilight Mexican]

Oh, I thought of you @Alex Strife and hoped you would pop by. I think it was you who I first saw mention the "fiesta" thing?

 

[Ite]

What’s the fiesta thing? Is that the word they chose for Reunion?

 

[The Twilight Mexican]

No, if I recall correctly, when you arrive at Kalm and are told "Your party is waiting for you on the 2nd floor," the Spanish (mis)translation went with "fiesta" for "party."

 

[Strangelove]

i am away from home now so i can't keep playing it but if i still have the iso of the spanish ps1 version i kinda of want to go through and screencap stuff to see if there is much difference (except then i can't use the boosters the ps4 port has to speed through because i'm too dumb to figure out how to do that stuff on an emulator)

i think the original spanish version also used a word for 'party' that meant like a political party rather than just a group? i might be remembering wrong and i didn't want to bother alex with my thread of questions

i did a gcse and half an a level in spanish (they cancelled the second half of it because the only people who enrolled were me and this nice old lady)

why am i so bad at this (because you don't practice enough, you dingdong)

 

[Alex Strife]

Oh, I thought of you @Alex Strife and hoped you would pop by. I think it was you who I first saw mention the "fiesta" thing?

That's actually possible!!

As a side note, this mistranslation is a running gag among some motorsport journalists who are around my age and have geeky interests. Even those who haven't played the game find the mistranslation quite amusing. So we'll be roaming around some circuit and we have some event to attend which may be up the main building and one person will always go: "Your -party- (fiesta) is waiting upstairs".

i think the original spanish version also used a word for 'party' that meant like a political party rather than just a group? i might be remembering wrong and i didn't want to bother alex with my thread of questions

You're never a bother, hito!! And you're very right. At any point of the game when they ask you to form a party of three (menu, etc.) they would say "partido"... which can mean both "(political) party" or "sports match". Good times!

 

[Strangelove]

there’s a weird error in the ps4 port, not sure if it appears in other languages or on other consoles, but on the screen with the little corner path between wall market and the park next to the sector 7 gate (where you see tifa on a chocobo carriage), if you check the triangle menu for the location name (which i try to do at every chance to check names because i am here ? to ? learn ?) it just shows a seemingly meaningless string of letters and characters. is this a remnant of untranslated text converted into code? did a tired translator just mash the keyboard instead?

i have a screen cap of it but it’s at home where i am not so i can’t do much with that right now

 

[The Twilight Mexican]

@Strangelove
Hopefully @Shademp can tell us if that's an error across all versions or just something unique to one translator who fiesta'd too hard.

 

[Strangelove]

pls name this discovery after me, it’s the only thing i will be remembered for

 

[Erotic Materia]

Lo llamamos... The strangelove fiesta.

...it can be a little awkward for some.

 

[Shademp]

The only Spanish files I have for FFVII is the spanish flevel.lgp file (called "sflevel") for the PC2012 version. If anybody sends me the Spanish PS1 iso files then I'll gladly check the script over there.

The location name for mds6_3 reads "akao" (as in Minoru Akao, the sound programmer of many Final Fantasy games). I am familiar with this sort of example: When viewed in-game, this location name tends to become gibberish. The gibberish may change depending on if you are playing on console, emulation or modern ports. Sometimes the "akao" bit will be preserved, other times it won't.

 

[Strangelove]

i think it does start with 'akao', followed by more after that (maybe a $ after 'akao'?)

 

[Kionae]

No, if I recall correctly, when you arrive at Kalm and are told "Your party is waiting for you on the 2nd floor," the Spanish (mis)translation went with "fiesta" for "party."

I think I'd prefer a nice fiesta in the remake over the snorefest that is the Kalm flashback. There are good ways of doing exposition and backstory and there are bad ways.... that flashback is definitely the latter.

 

[The Twilight Mexican]

I think I'd prefer a nice fiesta in the remake over the snorefest that is the Kalm flashback. There are good ways of doing exposition and backstory and there are bad ways.... that flashback is definitely the latter.

¡¿Que?!

 

[Shademp]

OMG SHOTS FIRED DIS GUN BE GOOD

While I think that the Kalm flashback is slow on replays (same with any other extended series of cutscenes that you can't skip) I think it does an excellent job at the multiple things it wants to convey. It is also a stroke of genius to have you controlling the flashback and deciding on some details, which makes so much sense when you learn the truth about Cloud on disc 2.

Anyway, please proceed.

 

[Kionae]

¡¿Que?!

The information is important to the overall story. And the manner in which it's conveyed (the interactive flashback) isn't awful... it's the length that I have a problem with. I guess on the first playthrough, it's tolerable, if a little exhausting. But on subsequent plays, it just that it goes on... and on... and on... They needed to break it up a little.

 

[Erotic Materia]

I'm with Kionae on this. The story is great for fleshing out the backstory, but it really does drag out. Every playthrough, getting to Kalm is immediately followed by me thinking, "Ok, let's blow through this as fast as possible."