Does gaming need to support more of a 'subtitle culture'?

johnny_ultimate

I'll get right to the point: I hate dubbing. Whether it's in film, animation, whatever, I just can't stand it. I tend to think it conflicts with the creator's original vision, and very often simply does not sit right with the images on screen. When I watch an anime in a distinctly Japanese setting, for example, it just seems extremely weird for the actors to be speaking English in American accents. Also: 90%+ of the time dubbing is absolutely appalling, which naturally doesn't help.

Luckily while dubbing of, say, foreign films isn't much of an issue these days, I still think many developers and publishers have an awful tendency to dub and 'localise' game releases. Two games I've started playing this week reminded me of this. The first is Contrast, which is set in this beautiful retro French city, full of French architecture, text and culture. The voice acting is all dull, half-assed English, and it pretty much shatters the illusion everytime someone says anything, which is pretty regularly. The developers are based in Montreal, so certainly I'd imagine they'd have been inclined to include a French soundtrack. Secondly is Bravely Default - a damn good JRPG based on first impressions, but by default hampered by rather appalling localised voice acting. Thankfully, there's an option to change it back to Japanese, albeit an option hidden in a menu within a menu within a menu (the settings section is hidden under a 'tactics' menu, bizarrely). The Last Story is another recent game which I felt was pretty much 'unlistenable' during its narrative sequences due to the dodgy voice work. That time, there was no choice.

I'm probably in a (massive?) minority when I say this, but if a game offers an original language option I will 100% of the time turn it on. Most of the time that's in niche Japanese releases. Now, the original voice acting may not be particularly world class either, but it always feels more natural. I have to commend companies like Nippon Ichi and (sometimes) Atlus who go out of their way to support these options alongside their dubs (and they're among the best localisation teams out there, their optional dubs typically superior to the mandatory ones from other companies): even having a dual language option indicates a lot of respect for the player. These days especially genres like JRPG are becoming increasingly niche, so I'd image a considerable percentage of fans of these releases would be more than happy without a dub.

There are some practical issues with gaming subtitles - they can be difficult to follow in some particularly intense gameplay circumstances - although that's never been a concern in any game I've played in another language - and there can be storage concerns. But the latter has never been less of an issue thanks to huge storage space - and if a 3DS game can store multiple language tracks, a BluRay can, despite what Hideo Kojima might say. And there's massive benefits too in terms of cost, as sticking with the original language can mean we get more niche titles, or genres such as visual novels. The later Yakuza games are a good example of how opting out of a dub can be beneficial, and I'm pretty sure no one is mourning the loss of the infamously dreadful English cast anyway :pac: And overall it's not like subtitles only negates strong writing for the localisation team - the Phoenix Wright team 'westernised' the (voiceless) releases in many respects, but tend to keep it smart and funny without betraying the tone of the original game.

Any thoughts, or anyone vehemently opposed to subtitles? I just feel far too many games ignore the artistic and practical benefits of using foreign languages and subbing, and really hope there's more cultural acceptance of that in the future.

Dont be at yourself

Can't disagree more, to be honest. For foreign movies or TV shows, I'll always watch in the original language, with subtitles.

Games though, are different, and localisation is a whole different ball game to dubbing or subtitling. Remember that for videogames, even the original version is dubbed. The problems that can appear, or are more noticeable, in localised versions aren't due to dubbing, they're due to poor dubbing. There's no reason, if the publisher commits sufficient budget, the dev team sufficient motivation and the loc team sufficient care, that a localised dub can't even exceed the 'original' dub.

The script can be translated polished by professional translators (sadly rare in film dubbing / subtitling!) who are deeply familiar with the game, the
lip-syncing, scene timing and entire animations can be re-worked by the dev team, and experienced and professional voice actors can be cast.

At its best, dubbing will offer a superior experience to playing a subtitled version. Games like Metal Gear Solid and Dragon Quest have nailed it.

Where dubbing falls down, and sadly I've seen this first-hand, is where corners are cut. Maybe the script has to be translated in a tight schedule, or the developer hasn't supplied any context to the translator. Maybe there's only budget for a handful of actors, so they each need to perform many roles. Maybe budget or schedule doesn't allow for a pick-up session to fix bugs. Maybe the audio team made a hames of the implementation. But in many of those cases, the same issues that will have affected the localised dub may also very well have affected the original dub.

Retr0gamer

Actually, Atlus aren't really that great when it comes to subtitled options. If it's something cheap they want to throw out there usually they do it but when it comes to their big games they always dub and don't have an option for subtitles. At least their localisations are usually very good.

I definitely would like to see more subtitled games, I however get the feeling that a lot of the games that do come out subtitled are only that way to reduce development costs. Localisation costs are very high and it's only niche developers that will bother to pay for the cost of localisation so thank god the ones that do are so good about it. Square Enix have said privately to some games journalists that they won't be bringing anymore niche games to the West because they don't want to spend money on localisation. They couldn't even be bothered to publish Bravely Default in the West or Dragon Quest VII (Bravely Default only came here once Nintendo stepped in and footed the publishing and localisation bill after much begging).

Japanese games seem to be in a good way regarding localisation but we are going to start to see a lot of indie games from other non-english speaking parts of the world so I'd like to see them stick to their own language with subtitles.

We already got Sine Mora which was in Hungarian. Thank god that wasn't localised with a dub, that final boss battle wouldn't have been so chilling if it wasn't for the excellent acting by the hungarian voice actress.

My god Yakuza was bad, why did you remind me. Japanese street thugs and Yakuza talking all 'gangsta'. Mother of god.

At least the days of absolute localisation travesties like Persona, FFVII, Legend of Dragoon and even quite recent releases such as ZoE2 and Ar Tonelico 1 and 2 are long gone. However I still kind of miss some of the hilariously bad PS1 era dubs

johnny_ultimate

Dont be at yourself wrote: »

Games though, are different, and localisation is a whole different ball game to dubbing or subtitling. Remember that for videogames, even the original version is dubbed. The problems that can appear, or are more noticeable, in localised versions aren't due to dubbing, they're due to poor dubbing. There's no reason, if the publisher commits sufficient budget, the dev team sufficient motivation and the loc team sufficient care, that a localised dub can't even exceed the 'original' dub.

The script can be translated polished by professional translators (sadly rare in film dubbing / subtitling!) who are deeply familiar with the game, the
lip-syncing, scene timing and entire animations can be re-worked by the dev team, and experienced and professional voice actors can be cast.

At its best, dubbing will offer a superior experience to playing a subtitled version. Games like Metal Gear Solid and Dragon Quest have nailed it.

The two examples you give here are actually quite interesting for different reasons

Metal Gear is something of an exceptional case, given that Kojima would be much more involved in the production of the English language version than most Japanese developers would be. I'd sort of equate it to the way Chris Marker himself made English and French versions of Sans Soleil: when the creator is that involved, then I'd happily go with the English version. Also, the characters are usually Western in the series, which again means that English is actually more coherent within the game world. That said, I don't think anything in the English dub matches the game over yell in the Japanese version

Dragon Quest VIII is an exemplary dub, a 1 in 10,000 example of an effort that has a unique character and energy about it, and fits in well with the tone of the game. But at the same time if I had the option for a Japanese one, I'd probably end up going with that because to me it's a Japanese game, from a Japanese creator and I want to play the closest thing I can to what the game was when it was signed off by Akihiro Hino. That's just me.

I suppose ultimately it boils down to choice. I'm certainly not going to begrudge someone for choosing the dubbed version: many people will always prefer it that way, and some people simply cannot keep up with subtitles for any number of very understandable reasons. This isn't necessarily a call for all English language dubbing to halt, although I would like to see that for subpar dubbing - which is very much still the norm, as I believe the ideal financial and creative circumstances you discuss above are extremely rare But to me I always, always want to play the original version while listening the original cast (I'd say the same about animation, incidentally, which I've often had similar discussions about).

If there is the rare circumstance when the dub is truly superior or English is a more natural fit to the game's style or setting, then it would be great that option is available if I so wish. All in all, though, there's never been fewer reasons to not include both, especially since the bulk of the subbing work will have been done during the localisation process anyway - some fine tuning aside

To offer a somewhat extreme hypothetical: imagine you didn't speak English and wanted to play The Last of Us. To me, it would be vital the 'performances' are kept intact as they're such a major part of what Naughty Dog intended. Obviously pretty much all other voice work isn't up to that standard, but I'd still consider the voice acting a significant part of any game's development.

Retr0gamer wrote: »

Japanese games seem to be in a good way regarding localisation but we are going to start to see a lot of indie games from other non-english speaking parts of the world so I'd like to see them stick to their own language with subtitles.

We already got Sine Mora which was in Hungarian. Thank god that wasn't localised with a dub, that final boss battle wouldn't have been so chilling if it wasn't for the excellent acting by the hungarian voice actress.

At least the days of absolute localisation travesties like Persona, FFVII, Legend of Dragoon and even quite recent releases such as ZoE2 and Ar Tonelico 1 and 2 are long gone. However I still kind of miss some of the hilariously bad PS1 era dubs

Yes, it will be great if more games from different countries ship with their original language intact. Development is ever more international, and it would be delightful to see a greater diversity of language carry over. As said above, it's a massive disappointment games like Contrast don't - or maybe even aren't able to - fully follow through on their setting through voicework.

You're correct that the days of truly appalling dubbing are effectively over. I do still feel an awful lot of efforts are deeply mediocre or below average. Funnily enough it's the smaller distributors and independent ones that seem to put the most TLC into localisation efforts. You'd hope the massive resources of major publishers would mean they'd be putting the requisite effort into their import releases, but it's very regularly the enthusiast companies and even sometimes the fans who do the most impressive work in this field. Oh, and I think Level 5 would probably have been a better example to give than Atlus, although I do suppose the Guild releases didn't feature dubs as a mere cost saving feature rather than any grander artistic reason!

SeantheMan

I agree.
With any foreign movie I will watch it in the original language with subs rather than dubbed.

In many games these days, English included, I even put subtitles on if there's an option. Played through the first 2 uncharted this month and on the 3rd now, all with subtitles on.
The same for Mass Effect and many other games, It's not that I'm hard of hearing...I just like them.

Retr0gamer

Level 5 still got Alexander O Smith in to localise Crimson shroud which couldn't have been cheap, he's by far the best localiser in the industry.

Did anyone else play Assassin's Creed in Italian with English subs? It makes for a much more immersive experience although you have to change back for the future sections.

returnNull

the only time dubbing ever worked was on eurotrash:p

Reekwind

Maybe it's a testimony to the Anglo-Saxon prominence in games but the lack of non-English voices has never really grated. One obvious exception (now thankfully fixed) is XCOM, where your team of international recruits spoke exclusively in US English

Subtitling wouldn't remove my biggest gripe with (acceptable quality) voice-acting: wandering into some medieval tavern or distant alien planet to be greeted with a cheesy American accent.

Maximus Alexander

Ever since JRPGs started to have voice in them rather than relying exclusively on text, I have endeavored to play them in the original Japanese with subtitles where possible. Sadly, this option is far too rare. English speakers with American accents in a JRPG just doesn't fit for me, and can grate, they're far too Japanese. It doesn't bother me in other genres though.

In the same way I normally watch Studio Ghibli films in Japanese, even though the English dub is usually of very high quality.

calex71

MSG: Ground Zeros Japanese version is confirmed to have an english language menu/subtitle option making it possible to play with Japanese audio.

While I agree with most of the above, I don't see the point in this at all. Would make more sense for Japanese players to play with english audio and japanese subs in this case wouldn't it?

Would be totally unnatural for western/american characters to be speaking Japanese to each other, Ok if say they meet a russian / insert nationality agent who doesn't speak english and have a conversation with that person in their native tongue with subs that would be ok and actually for me personally more imersive, assuming it's plausible for Big Boss to know japanese or russian etc.

krudler

Depends on the game TBH, Metal Gear is a good example of a dubbed version being so familiar where it's now almost impossible to see Snake and not hear David Hayter, seeing early footage of a new MGS game and hearing the as yet undubbed Japanese actor playing Snake just seems weird so in that sense a dubbed version works for a Western audience.
I would like to be able to play Persona 4 Golden in Japanese, it's odd playing a very Japan-centric game with all the characters talking in American accents. Or any bullet hell type game, I think it adds to the overall chaotic feel of something to have characters shouting in Japanese in those.

I agree about being able to overlook dubbing if the voice acting is good, take Skyrim, the voice acting is utterly appalling in most of it. All flat performances and the same tone of voice for nearly every character give or take a few like the dragons.

I never realised you could play Assassin's Creed II that way, that's interesting and would definitely add to the authenticity of it, isn't there talk of one of the future AC games being set in feudal Japan? That would definitely be worth keeping the original language option for.

johnny_ultimate

Maximus Alexander wrote: »

Ever since JRPGs started to have voice in them rather than relying exclusively on text, I have endeavored to play them in the original Japanese with subtitles where possible. Sadly, this option is far too rare. English speakers with American accents in a JRPG just doesn't fit for me, and can grate, they're far too Japanese. It doesn't bother me in other genres though.

In the same way I normally watch Studio Ghibli films in Japanese, even though the English dub is usually of very high quality.

I agree with this. When even the artstyle, setting or gameplay frequently betray the country of origin, I'm inclined to play it in its original form. That's why I hate it when JRPGs don't offer the option - the English voices just by their very nature just do not suit the game, unless the rare situation when it's a particularly well crafted dub.

calex71 wrote: »

MSG: Ground Zeros Japanese version is confirmed to have an english language menu/subtitle option making it possible to play with Japanese audio.

While I agree with most of the above, I don't see the point in this at all. Would make more sense for Japanese players to play with english audio and japanese subs in this case wouldn't it?

Would be totally unnatural for western/american characters to be speaking Japanese to each other, Ok if say they meet a russian / insert nationality agent who doesn't speak english and have a conversation with that person in their native tongue with subs that would be ok and actually for me personally more imersive, assuming it's plausible for Big Boss to know japanese or russian etc.

As discussed above, MGS is a notable exception, because of both the international characters and the hands-on nature of Kojima. That, and the English versions have clearly had much effort poured into them.

It's worth bearing in mind that the Japanese voices are sort of legendary among some fans, especially since a lot of people would have experienced it during something like the famed MGS2 demo disc. There was a minor controversy - 'controversy' in Internet terms - when it was announced MGS4 wouldn't contain an original voice option, with Kojima not entirely convincingly suggesting lack of space as a reason. To a certain degree, the demand for an English sub option is a result of people having been denied it for so long.

Just for the record, I was never a big fan of David Hayter's performances as Snake, iconic though they may be. They were too over-the-top, almost unnatural. Although I'd still hold some suspicion he'll be back in the next games, I am curious to see if Sutherland is an improvement.

Retr0gamer

calex71 wrote: »

Would be totally unnatural for western/american characters to be speaking Japanese to each other, Ok if say they meet a russian / insert nationality agent who doesn't speak english and have a conversation with that person in their native tongue with subs that would be ok and actually for me personally more imersive, assuming it's plausible for Big Boss to know japanese or russian etc.

A lot of japanese games are actually only released with English voice acting if they are set in America.

Dubbing done right (this unfortunately is not fake):

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BAtC1SzWSXg

Mickeroo

Outside of live action films dubbing doesn't bother me at all provided the voice acting is half decent.

johnny_ultimate

Mickeroo wrote: »

Outside of live action films dubbing doesn't bother me at all provided the voice acting is half decent.

Just going to leave this here

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

Sir Digby Chicken Caesar

johnny_ultimate wrote: »

Just going to leave this here

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

im going to go find and hug all my .srt files

o1s1n

It all comes down to the quality of the dub with me. Most dubs are crap, so I automatically turn to the subtitles. Particularly anything with cheesy American accents, really grinds my gears.

However, if I come across a good dub with a game/animation it doesn't bother me at all. In fact, in some cases I rather the dub (the Berserk anime would be one example, the dubbed voice actors are excellent)

As mentioned, games and animation are already dubbed over with voice actors, it's not like cinema where you're literally removing a real person's voice and substituting another. I find that naff beyond belief and just plain unwatcable.

Chris_Heilong

ahem...

I never like over american dubs, especially when it was motion captured with using Japanese people, their mannerisms and body language are completely different to westerners and always feels horribly wrong, especially female characters.

Some times English dubs have their charms and add to the cheesy feel of a game, like evil zone

Retr0gamer

Chris_Heilong wrote: »

ahem...

That's more an example of very good voice actors having to deal with a terrible script, there's only so much you can do to save it. Don't believe me? Check out the scene in Japanese. It's even worse.

Mickeroo

johnny_ultimate wrote: »

Just going to leave this here

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

1. I said nothing about singing.
2. That song is delightful :pac:

penev10

For games I almost always prefer the original soundtrack. Even though the dub for Persona 4 was very good it still killed me to hear the Japanese schoolchildren with American accents. On the inverse of that I couldn't play Dragon's Dogma with the Jap voices, didn't seem right in a swords and sorcery setting.

I'll put up with dubbed films for silly stuff like old Godzilla or kung fu movies but I'd still rather watch in the original language. Watched the Swedish version of The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo with an awful dub, the voice actors sounded like they were all sedated!, it was terrible.

I always watch anime with the original soundtrack and subs bar maybe some Miyazaki stuff which is actually ok.

Dont be at yourself

johnny_ultimate wrote: »

...

A few quick points spinning out of the above:

Metal Gear, Dragon Quest etc are not quite the fringe cases they may have once been. As the industry trends towards either small-budget indie or big-budget blockbusters, we're seeing less and less of the low-quality dubbing previously a staple of Japanese localisation (Jill sandwich, etc). Nowadays, if a game is localised, it's generally localised quite well, including the audio. Xenoblade, Ni No Kuni are a couple more examples of this.

I guess that could explain our different perceptions though: I'm not really too interested in the niche stuff coming out of Japan these days (Deadly Premonition a recent exception), so perhaps I'm just not as exposed to as much low-budget dubbing as yourself. I will say that for the larger titles, there's generally no quality deficit between Japanese and English audio tracks.

Another point raised by yourself and Retro is a good one: some games, due to their setting, are much better suited to being subtitled rather than dubbed. AC2 and the Yakuza series are great examples, and I'd add Fatal Frame/Project Zero to the list also.

The Last of Us is another interesting one, because the facial animations are so heavily based on performance capture (albeit with expert tweaking by Naughty Dog). Ditto with LA Noire, I can imagine how a localised audio track might replicate some of the weird performances of dubbing due to the dissonance with the on-screen acting vs that of the dubbing actor.

In general though, I wouldn't paint a Japanese dub as definitive or closer to the developer's vision than a localisied dub. In my experience, dev teams can invest quite a lot in making sure that a localised dub is right: from offering feedback on the script, having final approval on casting, actually being present during recordings, and flagging lines for re-recording.

Grumpypants

I generally have subtitles on even for English games I don't know why but I think I grew up reading text in games so it is something that stuck.

krudler

on a side note even though it's a Japanese game I couldn't imagine playing Dark Souls in Japanese, wonder what the Jap translation of jolly cooperation is :pac:

edit: according to google translate: Jorī kyōryoku

Duggy747

:pac:

What about sign language? The original Resident Evil had some awesome hand movements when the characters spoke . Especially Barry Burton

snausages

Retr0gamer wrote: »

Level 5 still got Alexander O Smith in to localise Crimson shroud which couldn't have been cheap, he's by far the best localiser in the industry.

Did anyone else play Assassin's Creed in Italian with English subs? It makes for a much more immersive experience although you have to change back for the future sections.

I did that, but as you say it's very annoying they didn't include an option to split between Desmond and Ezio. Massive oversight

krudler

Deleted User wrote: »

What about sign language? The original Resident Evil had some awesome hand movements when the characters spoke . Especially Barry Burton

His fingers were all stuck together, probably from all those Jill sandwiches.

Now there was an example of appalling voice acting, "No!..don't open...that door!" The cast must have graduated from the William Shatner school of line delivery. But it added to the overall B movie charm of the series.

krudler

krudler wrote: »

His fingers were all stuck together, probably from all those Jill sandwiches.

Now there was an example of appalling voice acting, "No!..don't open...that door!" The cast must have graduated from the William Shatner school of line delivery. But it added to the overall B movie charm of the series.

The Wesker scenes at the end were also hilarious. Hands all over the shop with some badly delivered lines.

snausages

Deleted User wrote: »

The Wesker scenes at the end were also hilarious. Hands all over the shop with some badly delivered lines.

I liked that one Chris said: "He's sleeping with the ultimate failure!", or words to that effect

ShadowHearth

More dubbing, the better. I am not an anime fanboy, but I do like to watch it now and then. Watching bleach dubbed now and it is perfect for me. Watched subtitled attack of the titan and it was annoying.
I am playing mng persona 4 and enjoying it, but if it would be pure Japanese I would go freaking mad.

Just to note, English is not my native language. So when I was a kid I hated watching dubbed movies from English in to my native language. So since I was a kid I watched stuff on original English voice with my language subtitles. Then when I already watched movie for 10th time I would watch it in English with English subtitles. Thats how I learned English ( games helped a lot too lol ).