Poll of the Day > Anime, Manga, VN, JRPG, Related Things Discussion Topic XCIX

(+) Yeah! (+)

Bought 13 Sentinels: Aegis Rim today since I read some of the people here claim it as their goty. wanna see if it lives up to the hype.

Also sorta related I also bought Valkyrie Chronicles 1 and 4, and AI: Somnium Files a while ago.

These should keep me busy (along with replaying Xenoblade 1 and 2) until all of the DLC for Xenoblade 3 is out, since I told myself I won't get it until it's a complete package.

T0ffee posted...

Bought 13 Sentinels: Aegis Rim today since I read some of the people here claim it as their goty. wanna see if it lives up to the hype.

i havent played it but i'm pretty sure it is the best switch-available game i've yet to play. like holy shit the hype from unexpected angles for this game when it was PS4 exclusive was IMMENSE. pls keep us updated on if you like it

T0ffee posted...

until all of the DLC for Xenoblade 3 is out

It won't be "finished" until12/31/2023 so you might wanna load up on some more games. Although I guess the actual game finishes 4/30/2023 with the final DLC being like tourna golden country or future connected where it's a standalone prequel/sequel.

YoukaiSlayer posted...

It won't be "finished" until12/31/2023 so you might wanna load up on some more games

Probably will have to do that. Good thing the Persona games are also coming to Switch, which means I'll finally be able to play 4, 5 and Strikers. And while I'm at it, I still haven't gotten to SMT V.

Also this looks like everything I wanted from Rune Factory

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5Yd3tzhN99E

Pretty hyped for this one which is rare for me. If it'll have romance and marriage mechanics it'll probably be better than RF5 overall.

I keep forgetting what I have pre-ordered, and the Game Stop app does not say anything about pre-orders. Need to check to see if Trails From Zero is in there. I know Xenoblade Chronicles 3 is. (... I am still missing the second game and Torna.)

T0ffee posted...

Pretty hyped for this one which is rare for me. If it'll have romance and marriage mechanics it'll probably be better than RF5 overall.

Damn, that game looks pretty sick. It's also coming out this year. Gotta be one of the best gaming years for me in quite a while.

T0ffee posted...

Probably will have to do that. Good thing the Persona games are also coming to Switch, which means I'll finally be able to play 4, 5 and Strikers. And while I'm at it, I still haven't gotten to SMT V.

Also this looks like everything I wanted from Rune Factory

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5Yd3tzhN99E

Pretty hyped for this one which is rare for me. If it'll have romance and marriage mechanics it'll probably be better than RF5 overall.

Eh I don't expect Square Enix to make a game like that good.

Revelation34 posted...

Eh I don't expect Square Enix to make a game like that good.

Square should have different teams working on different series, so I think this one might still have a chance. Could be from the same team that made Bravely Default for example.

In other news, started on 13 Sentinels recently.

Went into this game completely blind. Had no idea it was gonna be a visual novel/real-time strategy combat mix game.

Apparently I just got past the prologue? After 3 hours? And that was mostly reading since the actual combat gameplay only lasted like 8 minutes per fight. That's a long-ass time for a setup.

Although considering that there's all sorts of crazy timeline shenanigans, and multiple perspectives from multiple protagonists, I guess it needed to ease the player into it.

I just got past the prologue and I'm already feeling overwhelmed. Doesn't help that the only way the game keeps track of all the events is just a list. I'd need one of those crazy string conspiracy spiderweb things in order to keep track.

(if anyone has a spare DnF Duel preorder code for loot in Dungeon Fighter Online and wants to give it away, I'll gladly take one >_>)

I watched Summer Wars after seeing Belle a few weeks ago.

It was actually a fun movie!

Although that was the second movie in a row I've seen where millions/billions of people put all their credentials and government level powers in a single piece of software.

Man this game is just hitting ALL of the anime tropes. Like literally all of them.

MechaKirby posted...

Although that was the second movie in a row I've seen where millions/billions of people put all their credentials and government level powers in a single piece of software.

unfortunately relevant to today, with how we're all forced to interact with Experian and the other credit companies that keep giving up our personal information

Better Call Saul and Love Live!: Superstar!!! S2 air in the same time slot.

Watching Danmachi. Rewatching Noucome. I looked up the LN for that and discovered that it is complete (at 13 volumes), but no official translation exists, and the fan translation ends after Volume 3 (like the anime). Shame, as the anime is very funny.

I just heard the author of My Hero Academia is ending the story this year.

I originally expected the series to be kind of like Harry Potter and have the students go through many school years with lots of character growth in between, but he's just ending it before then.

Probably gonna have a fairly abrupt ending then; it's still fairly early in the climax now.

I'm gonna be working another convention this weekend; currently deciding what I want to get autographed by the guests. We've got four different characters from FMA Brotherhood (Hohenheim, Homunculus, Envy, and Yoki).

It kind of sucks this time around, because they require you to work a minimum of 20 hours. In most of my previous gigs the minimum was only 12-16. I do often find myself with a lot of free time when I go as a regular attendee, but this is gonna eat up too much of my time.

Dammit I watched this video about the history of the Xeno series, and it made me so hyped up for Xenoblade 3 that I might just go ahead and get it despite my initial plan of waiting.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_89jXwmbCXY

I'm playing xenoblade 3 and it's pretty good once you get the full cast. I do feel the beginning tutorial type stuff takes WAY too long but at least the story is interesting at that point to absorb a little bit of that tedium. Also, hard is fuckin hard. I've only managed to beat 2 UMs out of the like 10 I've come across that were near my level and I'm swapping characters mid battle to micro aggro and healing. I also lost on the first real story boss twice before I basically lucked out and had break land every time I used the one break move I had. Was still a narrow victory and I felt like I was a level or 2 above what would be expected. Enjoying it.

I just started on Xenoblade 2, since I finished my first playthrough of Fire Emblem. Xeno 2 definitely seems to have more personality than the first. Fire Emblem was good, but I didn't feel like doing a second play of it back to back, especially since it was just under 75 hours for my first time through. I'm glad there's a ng+, but it's a bit disappointing imo.

I stayed out too late at karaoke. I signed up right at 11 when it started, but when it was 1:30 and my name still hadn't come up I had to call it. I still have to work tomorrow as well.

Most annoying part is that some people actually sang more than once in that time.

Well, I can scratch "stand next to a trap at a urinal" off my checklist.

I'm actually surprised it hasn't happened sooner.

Would that be a bronze, silver, or gold trophy?

Bronze. Gonna take more than that for silver or gold.

Dammit; after we finished helping the sword vendor tear down, I found out that basically everyone but me got a free sword. Nice ones too. And the guy's already gone..

What a bummer, hope you had fun at least though.

keyblader1985 posted...

Bronze. Gonna take more than that for silver or gold.

Dammit; after we finished helping the sword vendor tear down, I found out that basically everyone but me got a free sword. Nice ones too. And the guy's already gone..

Real swords?

Also I rewatched The Girl who leapt through time again. Still holds up. I think it's a pretty good movie

Yeah, the sharp, "take it straight to your car when you buy it" kind.

I should watch that movie again, it was really good.

watching black summoner ep4 and I feel like as a fan of both the LN and manga, the anime's pacing feels like it's gonna suck until what was the end of LN volume 3 where Kelvin ascends to S rank and embraces being a battle junkie, and we're still in volume 1... I REALLY hope season 1 doesn't end right when it starts getting really good

Anybody got a Twitter account? I need to tag someone for a game giveaway contest.

I'm pretty sure lycoris won't go beyond yuribait, but it's got some solid bait in there. Good show overall too even though I've grown tired of pacifist protagonists.

While I am enjoying my time with Xeno 2, I do have a few gripes. Number one, I feel like the "x" button and "+" button's functions should've been the other way around. For the second one, I'm scratching my head as to why they changed some of the names. I downloaded the Japanese audio pack and now I'm stuck hearing Homura/Hana, but reading Pyra/Poppi. I've got no idea why they do this and it's always annoying. Lastly, the battles seem to take a bit too long tbh. Maybe I'll get stronger/better as the game goes on, but I'm not going to hold my breath.

dragon504 posted...

I'm scratching my head as to why they changed some of the names.

My actual #1 gripe with the game. Why the actual hell did they change Shin to Jin??? Both are Japanese!!! Y'all just changed it to change it!!!

It felt like they just wanted to de-japaneseify the game at the expense of good names. Patroka and Ahkos (which I found out after beating the game are references to Patroclus and Achilles) are literally nothing names for the average English speaker, but every Japanese player is gonna recognize Benkei and Yoshitsune (their names in JP are literally just mythic heroes). Changing for the sake of change to something that somehow manages to be less familiar for your target audience isn't good localization. It just feels arbitrary.

Edit: oh yeah, Byakko to Dromarch. What the fuck is Dromarch supposed to invoke in me??? I know what Byakko is!!!

dragon504 posted...

Lastly, the battles seem to take a bit too long tbh. Maybe I'll get stronger/better as the game goes on, but I'm not going to hold my breath.

Rando battle length does usually feel a bit too long for most of the game, but bosses become way easier to burst down in chapter 3. The battle system feels nuanced in pointless ways until then, but then everything clicks when elemental orbs get added in.

dragon504 posted...

Homura/Hana, but reading Pyra/Poppi

These actually kinda make sense, because japan is fine using words for names and the west isn't. Their translated names would be Flame/Flower which would be pretty lame names, so instead they went for something flame themed and something flower themed that could work as names. Meanwhile, if they just left it as Homura and Hana, most western players would have lost the name theming entirely unless they know some japanese.

I also kinda think the blades are better with unique themed names instead of just directly copying mythical hero names, but thats just my opinion.

YoukaiSlayer posted...

Their translated names would be Flame/Flower which would be pretty lame names,

we live in a time when the rpg ogs have names like cloud, or squall, or lightning, or whatever and everyone was fine with it

so someone being named flower or flame seems fairly normal

Lightning was memed on a fair bit and it's a pretty weak name. Squall is a weird name but it's also not a common word. I wouldn't be surprised if most english speakers that played that game couldn't define squall. Cloud is the odd one out where it's pretty well accepted. I didn't play FF7 or talk to anyone about games when it came out so I can't say if anyone thought it was a weird name at the time. Now that we know him as cloud, anything else would sound wrong, but if he initially had a name that was different we might think that was better than cloud. I also remember dart from legend of dragoon which worked ok but was kinda dumb and edge maverick which was dumb enough to be hilarious at least.

Then we have an example like Sora from kingdom hearts which means sky but they just left it as sora. It lost it's thematic context for english speakers but since most people didn't know, they didn't care. It'd be like the same way with pyra/poppi if they just stayed homura/hana.

It's just a tricky spot all around for translators because no matter what they do, it's impossible to convey the original meaning and context with the name. Something is lost in translation no matter which option they go with. This is just for those two. They could have maintained most of the original context with Achilles and Patrocles, I just don't mind the change cause I think it was a weird choice originally to use benkei and yoshitsune instead of unique names. I'm not sure they really had any good option for byakku. Dromarch is a welsh white mythological beast/dog so it's really not a horrible choice.

The other thing to consider is naming convention all around. Byakku sounds out of place compared to the general japanese take on western fantasy names like nia, pyra, mythra, logos and rex. Dromarch sounds right at home amongst those names that are basically a mix of latin and early european.

YoukaiSlayer posted...

Dromarch is a welsh white mythological beast/dog so it's really not a horrible choice.

how many people have enough knowledge of welsh mythology to even know that though

you're gonna have to google dive to find out what either Dromarch or Byakko mean, and you're gonna have to google extra hard for Dromarch because most of the results are of the Xenoblade character (78k results for "dromarch", 6k results for "dromarch -xenoblade"). meanwhile "Byakko" is sitting at 2.8 million results and immediately gives you context in the first result

I really think WAY more westerners would recognize Byakko than Dromarch. did you really know what Dromarch was without googling it the first time?

im just pointing out that when people play a jrpg, they tend to accept that names are going to be weird because...they usually always are

agesboy posted...

I really think WAY more westerners would recognize Byakko than Dromarch. did you really know what Dromarch was without googling it the first time?

I don't know either one and a google search gave me the answer for dromarch on the very first for dromarch meaning. That's why for that name I mentioned the naming conventions and how byakko sounds comparitively out of place in what is mostly a european/latin fantasy sounding game.

YoukaiSlayer posted...

I don't know either one and a google search gave me the answer for dromarch on the very first for dromarch meaning.

the first result for "dromarch meaning" is people asking what dromarch means in xenoblade specifically, because noone knew what the fuck it meant. dromarch is barely ever used outside of the context of xenoblade and history books, whereas byakko is in Final Fantasy, SMT/Persona, Yu Yu Hakusho, Bleach, etc. the chances of your average xenoblade fan also being a fan one of one those is a lot higher than them being welsh mythology majors in college

YoukaiSlayer posted...

how byakko sounds comparitively out of place in what is mostly a european/latin fantasy sounding game.

because they translated all the japanese names to a bunch of separate mythologies and cultures. I'm not saying only leave Byakko alone, I'm saying leave all the names alone barring a specific reason to change them. like also, Meleph isn't even a japanese name, it's an entirely fictional one- why change it to Morag? why does Mor Ardain NEED to be celtic at the expense of renaming things that weren't even originally japanese but instead made up fictional names?

"Dromarch: Named after Dormarch (or Dormarth). He's a Welsh mythological dog with fish tails that lives "on the clouds" and guards the way to heaven."

Thats the very first thing that pops up when I google it. It is from a topic about xenoblade, but before people had answered that question, it most likely just went to wikipedia or something. It's really beside the point though.

agesboy posted...

whereas byakko

I've heard the name before but I still don't know what it is and I've played like 10 of the final fantasy games, some SMT, persona 5, watched yu yu hakusho (ages ago) and bleach.

agesboy posted...

Meleph isn't even a japanese name

Not sure why they changed this one but why does it bother you. Same with mor ardain. Unless you specifically choose to play once in english and once in japanese, you'd never even know they are different and being a unique name, it's not like any context or meaning is being lost.

agesboy posted...

I'm not saying only leave Byakko alone, I'm saying leave all the names alone barring a specific reason to change them.

Then you lose context the original had, like homura being a name meaning flame and hana being named flower.

The only name change in the series that bothers me is dolls to skells, since dolls are already an english word that presumably most japanese people know and skells isn't a word at all. Doll actually has some symbolism with the main cast being mimeosomes and that layer is just lost on the translation when it didn't need to be.

YoukaiSlayer posted...

It's really beside the point though.

It isn't, though. If you're gonna have to google it either way to get the reference, leave it as it, because changing it isn't helping. There needs to be a reason for localization changes, not "everything should be changed by default", which is apparently their stance for every name in the game except for Rex, Nia (which surprises me, since that's a Japanese name), and Vandham (who is a XCX reference).

(edit: oh yeah, they didn't translate a single common blade name either, but i'm chalking that one up to laziness)

YoukaiSlayer posted...

Not sure why they changed this one but why does it bother you. Same with mor ardain. Unless you specifically choose to play once in english and once in japanese, you'd never even know they are different and being a unique name, it's not like any context or meaning is being lost.

subtitle dissonance with the audio, which was the original topic being discussed here in post #233. I guess if you're not on that wavelength then everything here is pointless, but that's why we feel these random ass name changes are obnoxious

YoukaiSlayer posted...

Then you lose context the original had, like homura being a name meaning flame and hana being named flower.

if the names sounded like actual names and not random gibberish versions of existing words it's probably annoy me less, but hana and homura are actual names that people have. i didn't even know that poppi was referencing poppy until after i beat the game, because she's not wearing a poppy to begin with. she's wearing a lily. why the hell didn't they call her lily, that works as an english name way better than poppi

agesboy posted...

It isn't, though.

It is though because my point on dromarch wasn't that people will get dromarch as a reference but won't get byakko, it's that they kept the idea of mythological beast and found a name that fit the rest of the names they chose. Dromarch does not sound out of place next to rex and pyra and nia and zeke. Byakko does.

agesboy posted...

Nia (which surprises me, since that's a Japanese name)

Nia also fits the theme of rpg western fantasy. It's also just straight up a popular western name (supposedly top 10 in the last decade). Pretty much anything that ends in ia is going to fit a typical fantasy naming scheme.

agesboy posted...

subtitle dissonance with the audio,

I'm fine with that being the sacrifice for a better sounding naming scheme. Localizers shouldn't be worried about people that play with japanese audio, and use english subs, and know enough japanese to know when the subs don't match. It's already throwing those people a bone to include dual audio.

or localizers did their job and localized the game.

you're expecting the average person to think way more in depth on these names other than just "he has a cool name"

YoukaiSlayer posted...

It is though because my point on dromarch wasn't that people will get dromarch as a reference but won't get byakko, it's that they kept the idea of mythological beast and found a name that fit the rest of the names they chose.

big spoilers for xc2: they're actively subverting their own plot by doing this though. all of the blades' names are in Japanese for a reason- to hint early and heavily on one of the biggest plot twists/points of the game; that titans are blades' final forms. two of the four heavenly beasts are titans and two are main characters' blades and you're supposed to realize there's a connection there, but that link is weakened if not completely severed by naming them disconnected mythological names. that's also an early indicator that Jin/Shin, Metsu/Malos, and the rest of Torna is ALL blades. and it even ties back into Nia!

i seriously feel like this detracts from the game more than westernizing the name palette

Kaiju #8 anime is happening

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-MaTda-Ws3Y

had read a bit of the manga, it's good

Vtubers are a topic here sometimes yes? Marine's new song and MV is good.

FellWolf posted...

Vtubers are a topic here sometimes yes? Marine's new song and MV is good.

I don't know why you can't talk about them. I don't like Hololive, but I listen to a lot of smaller JP Vtubers and I think a few other users watch Hololive content.

hera posted...

or localizers did their job and localized the game.

More like they way overstepped what was necessary to just change whatever as whatever they wanted it to be. Sometimes localizing names can be nice, but in a lot of cases, there's no reason for the changes. How on earth is changing Acadia to Indol somehow a good change? They localized the game too much and it's really detracting from my enjoyment. A lot of the name changes really are baffling.

YoukaiSlayer posted...

I'm fine with that being the sacrifice for a better sounding naming scheme. Localizers shouldn't be worried about people that play with japanese audio, and use english subs, and know enough japanese to know when the subs don't match. It's already throwing those people a bone to include dual audio.

The names are so much worse and there's no theme. Pyra is an already dumb replacement for Homura and Mythra is completely awful as a replacement for Hikari. At least Pyra invokes the fire theme, whilst Mythra isn't going to make people think of light. The localization in this game feels nearly as bad as calling a rice ball a donut.

This is probably the best season for romcoms that we'll get for a while (probably until next year when we get the Bokuyaba anime adaptation). KNKR + Shogi-senpai + Cuckoos + Step Mom's Daughter is My Ex is just a freaking powerhouse of a season. I don't know which one I like the most and can't declare an anime of the season at this time.