Liar Game Chapter #113: Recapture
by Ryusui on May.18, 2010, under Scanlations
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The Harimoto Group takes the leader election, putting the Akiyama Group’s chairs in jeopardy. To combat this threat, Nao proposes a plan to shift the elections back in the Akiyama Group’s favor…but how long will this advantage last?
With this chapter, Liar Game is now scanlated in English all the way up to chapter #128. Enjoy!
66 Comments for this entry
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May 26th, 2010 on 5:10 PM
Oh, I don’t take offense. I’m just a little surprised and disappointed that no one seems to quite get what I mean here.
Let’s say TDX encountered a reference to 野球 and, having no familiarity with the game in question, decided to translate it as “Fieldball”. Technically, that’s exactly what “yakyuu” means, but there’s a problem: what the Japanese call “yakyuu”, we call “baseball”. So would he be justified in calling it Fieldball “since that’s what the Japanese call it”?
It’s translations like the ones TDX churns out that inspired me to sign up with d4s to do the English script for his Breath of Fire 2 retranslation project. You want literal translations, word-for-word from the Japanese? Apart from some minor, irrelevant bowdlerizations, Capcom’s original work on Breath of Fire 2 is about as close as you can get to the original Japanese script without actually speaking Japanese. After you’ve played that, I want you to try out my retranslation, and I want you to tell me which one you’d play again.
TDX can beat me in terms of translation speed, sure. But he can’t match my ability to turn out a moonspeak-free, quality product.
May 26th, 2010 on 6:44 PM
I see your point with the fieldball thing and it definitely makes a lot of sense. I agree with you on this, assuming that there is no fundamental difference between American musical chairs and its Japanese counterpart. However, if there are notable differences, such as the case is with shougi and chess, then I feel there would be some room for justification. Having never played musical chairs in Japan, I can’t rightly say which is the case.
I can’t say anything about Breath of Fire , as it isn’t a game that I have any particular interest in.
May 26th, 2010 on 7:16 PM
According to Wikipedia, the only thing different is the name:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Musical_chairs
http://ja.wikipedia.org/wiki/%E6%A4%85%E5%AD%90%E5%8F%96%E3%82%8A%E3%82%B2%E3%83%BC%E3%83%A0
But then, it should have been obvious from Alsab’s description of the game that the “Isutori Game” is what we’d call musical chairs. My issues with “Samue” and “Gaya” are just matters of stylistic disagreement, but “Steal-A-Chair Game” is unquestionably a mistake.
As for Westernizing other things, it’s on a case-by-case basis. For example, the prize amounts are always given in yen, but when Kurifuji explained the “Door-in-the-Face” technique, I converted the prices quoted into their rough dollar equivalents to make the example clearer (i.e. using $10,000 worth of gems to convince someone to buy a $20 bottle of vitamin supplements). If there were an actual shogi game depicted, I wouldn’t shy away from referring to it as such, but in a similar vein to Kurifuji’s psychology example, I changed Alsab’s shogi references into appropriate chess references.
May 28th, 2010 on 12:35 AM
I agree. Even if the japanese musical chairs game isn’t identical to the western game, there’s no real problem in using the term “musical chair” as long as the concept of “sit or out” is still there.
Moreover, the “gaya” thing is starting to get on my nerves (especially when he uses it as “an extra” AND “extras”).
I don’t agree so much on the yen->usd part though. It may help understanding the amount of money that is in-game but that’s just a tad too much westernization for me ^^(but it’s just my opinion).
But we shouldn’t be that killjoy, retranslation for perfectionist maniacs should be out of question :p
May 28th, 2010 on 8:24 AM
I only converted yen to USD for one little example in chapter 100 where Kurifuji is explaining how Nao and Akiyama got Butch and Slick to help them.
Kurifuji explains it as the “Door-in-the-Face” technique, where someone gets what they want out of someone else by playing off their guilt at an earlier refusal. The exact example she gives is a salesman who comes to your door selling $10,000 (1,000,000-yen) gemstones; obviously, you refuse, and then the salesman asks if you wouldn’t like a $20 (2,000-yen) bottle of vitamin supplements instead. If he plays it right, he’ll have successfully convinced you to “make up” for refusing his ridiculous offer by accepting his more reasonable one.
Every other time, it’s been yen with perhaps a helpful footnote.
May 28th, 2010 on 6:05 PM
Yeah, I’ll admit that he should have translated musical chairs. But wasn’t that his only mistake?
May 28th, 2010 on 6:06 PM
oh, and IMHO speed with readable and understandable translation trumps perfect translation but a lot slower. but again, that’s just my opinion.
May 31st, 2010 on 4:19 AM
For all gaya means to us, he could have called the extras trees and made as much sense. Yes, I love fast chapters, but only because the terms have already been translated correctly.
May 31st, 2010 on 2:12 PM
well the translator note did translate it for us, so whats the prob there?
May 31st, 2010 on 8:28 PM
I do share Ryusui’s philosophy about language localization, but this isn’t a professional work and we aren’t paying anything for it, so I am not expecting any translation to be that much polished. The quality/price ratio will be awesomely high anyway.
In my country the editorial company that holds the rights just released the first volume and then it dropped it all together. Right now scanlations are the only source I can access to and I can forgive some little stylistical preferences; also not being a native English speaker, I often don’t even notice some grammar mistakes.
If Ryusui sure brings up some more logical choices in translating terms, TDX balances it with faster releases. I’m grateful to both to the same extent.
May 31st, 2010 on 10:42 PM
I prefer better terminology over faster speed, in the end, terminology shows better. However, since speed usually results in more people reading (especially since some sites, such as onemanga, only put the first translated up), I am happy to hear that Ryusui will be working on something different, allowing more people to get the better translations.
June 3rd, 2010 on 5:35 AM
what will you be starting on?
will it be one outs? really disappointed that noones translation such a good manga
June 3rd, 2010 on 10:42 AM
Hello,
First, I’d like to say thanks for the chapters you have done up ’til now. It’s because I enjoy your releases so much (that sounds so dirty…) that I’ve gotta ask- are you planning to re-translate those chapters that TDX has already done? I hadn’t read more than the first few pages of chapter 114 before deciding to wait for you to do that chapter.
If you don’t plan to continue with Liar Game, could you let me know? I only deal with mediocre quality when there’s no alternative.
June 3rd, 2010 on 11:40 PM
TDX just released another chapter. Good to know that rather then sit down and whine about their competitors quality, they have decided to keep scanning more chapters.
June 5th, 2010 on 5:24 AM
@Nauf: Ryusui is currently planning something different. My guesses are towards Roots of A 2 or the character profiles.
June 5th, 2010 on 3:42 PM
We’re not planing on doing the chapters TDX did in the nearest future. Both of us are kind of busy with other things, but we will do Roots of A 2.