Translation review: [Aidoru] Shinsekai Yori 01

I wouldn’t have noticed this release if someone hadn’t pointed it out in a comment. Aidoru is a new group and this is their first release. Let’s see how they did.

Faker-cat sounds a bit weird at first, but it’s a good translation. The dialog in general flows well too, though there was a positioning problem that broke it.

I can kinda understand why you wouldn’t want the priest to call his temple ravaged, but he does say that.

I can’t see why that note is necessary. It’s not necessary and the role of the Ropes isn’t made clear until later. However, I really like the Ropes translation.

Again, that note is completely unnecessary. If it was explaining the characters used to write Wakien, I’d understand, but this way it’s close to being a spoiler. (By the way, the encoding quality isn’t that great at all. On the contrary.)

You know I actually considered Force as a translation for 呪力. It’s pretty much identical to the thing in Star Wars (and has a similar dark side as well).

No. They’re returning that power to the gods (I don’t think it should be capitalized, since this isn’t related to the Christian concept of God at all, not to mention it’s in plural).

That’s spelled “effigy”. However, I like this translation for 人形 the best. It’s obscure enough to make it sound cool, and it does mean the right thing too.

I really like this sentence.

Murmurs ignored.

This isn’t incorrect (I like the phrasing too), but it’s a very liberal line compared to the rest of the script.

The point is that she took long, not that she’s relaxed about it.

Don’t blame them for ignoring this. Even Commie’s native translator couldn’t figure it out.

That’s valid too.

Demon is a meh translation, but deed-devil is awesome.

This long sentence was split up and reordered to sound natural in English.

Another great phrase translation.

Plural. Not I, we. This goes for a line a few scenes later too.

The ending translation is very literal. The lines aren’t split by how they’re connected but by the breaks in the singing, and they’re literally translated that way. Because of that, the song as a whole doesn’t really make any sense. One line the Japanese is mistyped, saying 行ってく where it should be 生きてく. But it’s the Japanese only, the romaji and the translation isn’t wrong.

Conclusion: Great

This is a tough one. There are only a few mistakes (though still more than I’d expect from a slower sub), but the script as a whole is quite inconsistent. At points it’s literal to the point where I could almost hear the cogs of the English language squeal painfully, while at other points it’s quite liberally rephrased. I don’t mind if a translation is literal, nor if it’s liberal, but it should be either. Not that the viewers who don’t know Japanese would notice… Translation-wise it’s probably just as good as Commie, and with a bit more attention even better. Nice for a first release.

This entry was posted by Vale.

3 thoughts on “Translation review: [Aidoru] Shinsekai Yori 01

  1. Thanks for the pointers, Vale. We’ll take them on board for future releases.

    And here I was thinking we’d be laughed out of the community for using “The Force” as a translation for 呪力.

    • It’s always nice to see how people tackle the problems differently and uniquely. (I believe all the subs differ in how to translate 呪力). I love the idea of using “Force,” not just for the reference to the Star Wars’.similar power, but it being a word, rather than two. (I put it as Cursed Power). The word will be repeatedly used throughout the series, so having it as concise as “Force” is a really nice choice. Good work as a whole too (・ω・)d

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