Xanadu II Translation Development Blog

[esteban]

FINAL DECISION:

The Winds of Xanadu

AKA:
Xanadu, the Windy City

[Black Tiger]

"The Last of Dragon Slayer" (ie "The Final Dragon Slayer") is a great subtitle and it would be a crime if it for some reason edged out (in that scene) for wind-whatever.

It feels right, signifying that this is the last game in a long, winding legacy of games called "Dragon Slayer", building off of one another with experimentation and permutation. Even if the first Xanadu game was technically the "last" Dragon Slayer, it has an impact that tugs at the heartstrings of people who have played through other games under the "Dragon Slayer" banner, and serves to perhaps entice new people to Falcom's other early and seminal titles.

I feel like it's a good idea to have the games' titles consistent as "The Legend of Xanadu" because well, that's what they are called. If it's not outside the realm of impossibility, I like the use of LoX for the title screens and then using the Xanadu: Legend of the Wind in their appropriate cutscenes to give players a better sense of what the adventure is going to be all about. It might be a good workaround to the games' multiple-title-syndromes.

SPOILER ALERT






Dragon Slayer is the legendary weapon used by the hero who chucks it into the ocean at the end of the game, so that it is never used again.

So this isn't one last dragon slayer, it is the last of Dragon Slayer.

[elmer]

Dragon Slayer is the legendary weapon used by the hero who chucks it into the ocean at the end of the game, so that it is never used again.

So this isn't one last dragon slayer, it is the last of Dragon Slayer.

Hahaha ... brilliant! More fuel to the fire! 

I thought that I'd asked about that connection many pages back in the thread.

So ... this really is one of those cases where Falcom's English is correct, and it's not just another one of their dubious translations like "The Story is Begining".

I can have it say "THE LAST DRAGON SLAYER", I can have it say "THE FINAL DRAGON SLAYER", I can have it say "THE LAST OF DRAGON SLAYER", and I can even have it say "DON'T BE A COLLECTARD".

I actually like "THE LAST OF DRAGON SLAYER" being a reference to the sword better than it being a reference to the series, because the latter breaks the 4th wall.

[SamIAm]

I've taught English in Japan for 10 years, and all of my instinct tells me that that "of" is a mistake.

We talked about this a bit before. I still stand by this notion I posted:

If the meaning is more along the lines of "the sword's last outing" than "the final game in the series", then there is certainly no problem story-wise. However...and I'm open to discussion on this...I think you would need to say "The Last of the Dragon Slayer". If you leave out "the", then Dragon Slayer becomes a more directly addressed entity like Peter or Mark, and I have to leave out "the" everywhere just as I would never say "The Peter" or "The Mark".

"Hand over Dragon Slayer!"

"We better find Dragon Slayer."

"Only Dragon Slayer can defeat him."

It kind of reminds me of the way Tolkien had weapons with real names in The Lord of the Rings, like Glamdring, and treated them almost like living beings. Here, though, I have to say that I still prefer the sound of the Dragon Slayer. Like I said, I'm open to discussion on this.

Is it referred to as the Dragon Slayer in other games in the series that have already been translated?

[elmer]

If the meaning is more along the lines of "the sword's last outing" than "the final game in the series", then there is certainly no problem story-wise. However...and I'm open to discussion on this...I think you would need to say "The Last of the Dragon Slayer". If you leave out "the", then Dragon Slayer becomes a more directly addressed entity like Peter or Mark, and I have to leave out "the" everywhere just as I would never say "The Peter" or "The Mark".

Yep, you're definitely right there. 

But, I have no problem with Aineas's legendary sword "Dragon Slayer" being a "named" item.

Perhaps I've been playing for too many hours in a row, or perhaps it's just that that's how I already think of it, but I could swear that you've already been translating it in that way in the last couple of chapters of the game that I've been going through. 

Now ... I could be wrong there, especially after dismissing that "You've played for an hour, now take a break." message too many times in a row because I'm really enjoying the game ... but I definitely do like "The sword Dragon Slayer" much more than "The sword is the Dragon Slayer".  The second usage really shouldn't have capital letters in my understanding of English.

Good point about the other games, though. I guess that my personal preferences don't trump Falcom's actual history of usage if there's a conflict.

[SamIAm]

Perhaps I've been playing for too many hours in a row, or perhaps it's just that that's how I already think of it, but I could swear that you've already been translating it in that way in the last couple of chapters of the game that I've been going through. 

Elmer, my friend, I think you need a break. 

Run a text search for "Dragon Slayer" in the script set. I cannot find a single instance of it not having "the" when it's in a sentence (you know, and not in the item lists).

I think I leaned toward using "the" initially because "Slayer" sounds like a descriptor as much as a name. We could still go without it, but there would be that initial shock until the player realizes that it's a name only.

Tell you what - when you finish Xanadu 1, run that text search and imagine each sentence without "the", and let me know what you think. 

[SamIAm]

Very few games in the Dragon Slayer series were officially localized, so there isn't a lot of precedent. Not to mention, the decision of whether to use "the" may have been made solely by some random white guy in some random office rather than by Falcom themselves.

Articles, aka "a" and "the", don't exist in Japanese, and their proper usage is one of the most difficult subtleties to grasp for language learners here. I doubt that anyone on the original Falcom staff would have been able to quickly understand the difference between "Where is Dragon Slayer?" and "Where is the Dragon Slayer?"

Anyway, I'm at work right now and can't watch youtube to confirm, but based on what FAQs say, it looks like it's "the Dragon Slayer" in Faxanadu and Legacy of the Wizard.

EDIT: According to the manual for Legacy of the Wizard, it's "DragonSlayer" with no space. 
See for yourself. It's in the story paragraphs at the beginning. "Father said 'Don't worry, there is a DragonSlayer.'"

Meanwhile, in the Faxanadu manual, it has the space, but it's never in a sentence, so it doesn't tell us much. Link.

[elmer]

Elmer, my friend, I think you need a break. 

But I've just got to the door to the Boss in Ch.7 ... I can't take a break now!!! 

Maybe soon.   

Articles, aka "a" and "the", don't exist in Japanese, and their proper usage is one of the most difficult subtleties to grasp for language learners here. I doubt that anyone on the original Falcom staff would have been able to quickly understand the difference between "Where is Dragon Slayer?" and "Where is the Dragon Slayer?"

Anyway, I'm at work right now and can't watch youtube to confirm, but based on what FAQs say, it looks like it's "the Dragon Slayer" in Faxanadu and Legacy of the Wizard.

"Faxanadu"? That was done by some no-name losers called Hudsun (or something like that), who cares what they think!   

...

...


OK ... you got me. But I still prefer "Dragon Slayer" to "the Dragon Slayer".

Perhaps I just read too much Tolkien as a kid. 

[SamIAm]

But I've just got to the door to the Boss in Ch.7 ... I can't take a break now!!! 

Maybe soon.   

Congratulations! The next two chapters will be a breeze.

-----------------------------

You should take a gander at the edit I made after you posted your last message. It's very  .

Anyway, if Excalibur had been called King Maker, I think people would have either referred to it as the King Maker, or they would have renamed it to Kingmaker. In that regard, I see where they were going with DragonSlayer.

But basically, you should finish the game, and then we can have a nice long nerdy chat about all of this. 

EDIT: It is "the Dragon Slayer" in Faxandu.

[SamIAm]

Wait a cotton-picking minute...

Does the Dragon Slayer sword exist in either of the Dragon Slayer - Legend of Heroes games on the PCE-CD? I don't see it in any of the item lists that I can find in either English or Japanese. Is the main character the Dragon Slayer? Or is the sword too special to be listed with the items at all?

In the Super Famicom versions, it exists as an item in the first game, but not in the second.

I've also been investigating the Lord Monarch strategy games, which were only released in Japan and are another Dragon Slayer series offshoot. I can't seem to find the sword there, either.

If the sword itself isn't even in every game, if only in the story, then it makes all the less sense for THE LAST OF DRAGON SLAYER to be talking about the sword over the series.

TBH, I think it's talking about the series anyway. The sword's role in Xanadu 2's story is quite minor, and it would be strange for them to be celebrating it so much in the opening. Falcom may have intended a kind of double-meaning, but FWIW my gut tells me that if they were told that it's got to be either/or, they would put the series over the sword.

----------------------------

EDIT: If you're curious, the word Dragon Slayer appears 79 times in Xanadu 1 and 20 times in Xanadu 2, cutscenes included and item lists discluded. While I'm at it, the word Wind appears 126 times in Xanadu 1 (though about 10% are redundant) and only 10 times in Xanadu 2.

EDIT2: I checked the scans I made of Xanadu 2 from PC Engine Fan magazine (I have everything that magazine published for the game), and otherwise searched around the internet. While I didn't find anything totally conclusive, I did see two interesting things:

- The most common advertisement calls Xanadu 2 "one last trial." To me, this sounds more like one last game for the player than one last outing for the sword. I have yet to encounter mention of the sword.

- The Japanese wikipedia article on the series says that Xanadu 2 "was sold as the final installment of the series." That's the wording they used （シリーズ最終作として発売された）. It was not "the last game in the series to be put on sale."

EDIT3: Xanadu 1 took two years to make. During the first year, its working title was ザ・レジェンド・オブ・ザナドゥ～風の物語. This is something like "The Legend of Xanadu - A tale of the wind". Yes, that's Kaze no Monogatari instead of Kaze no Densetsu, and yes, they did write "The Legend of Xanadu" in katakana in front of it.

Take that for what you will, I guess. I better reiterate that from the second year forward, it was only ever mentioned as Kaze no Densetsu Xanadu in all Japanese print (that I can find). Anyway, on one hand, this legitimizes "The Legend of Xanadu" as being a bit more than decorative; on the other, it shows that "wind" has always been a key word.

I would love to see some magazine scans from 1992 when Falcom must have been giving interviews about their concept for this game.

[elmer]

Wow, that's a lot of good research. 

I don't really know where it leaves us, but it's all very good stuff to know.

- The most common advertisement calls Xanadu 2 "one last trial." To me, this sounds more like one last game for the player than one last outing for the sword. I have yet to encounter mention of the sword.

- The Japanese wikipedia article on the series says that Xanadu 2 "was sold as the final installment of the series." That's the wording they used （シリーズ最終作として発売された）. It was not "the last game in the series to be put on sale."

This seems to push us more firmly towards using "THE FINAL DRAGON SLAYER" as the subtitle in the Xanadu 2 cutscene.

I guess that since the game is set 1000 years after the original series, it can be seen as the final time that you visit the world in terms of the game-world's chronology, even if it's not the last game that they ever released that was set in that world.

So, are we happy with "THE FINAL DRAGON SLAYER", or is this still under discussion?

EDIT3: Xanadu 1 took two years to make. During the first year, its working title was ザ・レジェンド・オブ・ザナドゥ～風の物語. This is something like "The Legend of Xanadu - A tale of the wind". Yes, that's Kaze no Monogatari instead of Kaze no Densetsu, and yes, they did write "The Legend of Xanadu" in katakana in front of it.

Take that for what you will, I guess. I better reiterate that from the second year forward, it was only ever mentioned as Kaze no Densetsu Xanadu in all Japanese print (that I can find). Anyway, on one hand, this legitimizes "The Legend of Xanadu" as being a bit more than decorative; on the other, it shows that "wind" has always been a key word.

It's good to know that "The Legend of Xanadu" really does have more legitimacy, but we're still left with the question of what logo to use, and where.

Here is where all this information leads me ... (currently, and not neccessarily finally) ...

I think that we should be using "The Legend of Xanadu II" (possibly without the II) on the Xanadu 2 Main Menu.

It's really what all English speakers are going to expect when they first boot up the game, and anything else will be confusing.

I think that we should use the "II", because it's the 2nd game in the series, it's going to be confusing to people without it, and it just darned looks better to me with the "II".

I think that we should use "Xanadu : Legend of the Wind" and "Xanadu : Legend of the Wind II" in the cutscenes because it makes the most sense to the story, and to the second game being a continuation of the lives of the characters, even if the "Legend of the Wind" itself was pretty much fullfilled in the 1st game (I assume ... not got there, yet).

The whole "Wind" theme seems to be such an important part of the story that it would feel a bit wierd to ignore it altogether, and it would be strange to put it in the 1st game, but never mention it in the 2nd game.

But I'm not going to be in a rush to change the cutscenes just yet, in case the decision goes the other way.

[esteban]

I think that we should be using "The Legend of Xanadu II" (possibly without the II) on the Xanadu 2 Main Menu.

It's really what all English speakers are going to expect when they first boot up the game, and anything else will be confusing.

I think that we should use the "II", because it's the 2nd game in the series, it's going to be confusing to people without it, and it just darned looks better to me with the "II".

I think that we should use "Xanadu : Legend of the Wind" and "Xanadu : Legend of the Wind II" in the cutscenes because it makes the most sense to the story, and to the second game being a continuation of the lives of the characters, even if the "Legend of the Wind" itself was pretty much fullfilled in the 1st game (I assume ... not got there, yet).

The whole "Wind" theme seems to be such an important part of the story that it would feel a bit wierd to ignore it altogether, and it would be strange to put it in the 1st game, but never mention it in the 2nd game.

Yes.

All of this.

[joobloo]

How about:

Xanadu: Legend of the Wind
Xanadu II: The Last Dragon Slayer

Each game would then have a unique title.  I dunno, haven't played through either game, but just an idea from reading through this thread.

[Black Tiger]

Games that might feature the sword Dragon Slayer, which have been localized in the past, likely didn't receive extremely faithful translations, as that was rare back then. Maybe it appeared in and was called by name in the Japanese versions of games within the overall series.

The Dragon Slayer in The Legend of Xanadu II is the same one from the Dragon Slayer logo that has existed since the first Dragon Slayer game. TLoXII is tying everything together and that sword didn't have to be in every game which either had it in the title/subtite or was an official member of the overall series.

With TLoXII, they made a point of not only having Arios chuck it at the end and make a big show of it, the final screen of the game, done the same way as the final screens of the PCE Ys games, showcases Dragon Slayer residing at the bottom of the ocean, instead of a girly pic. The last of Dragon Slayer is obviously important to the creative members of the dev team. Many films, books, etc include a title or subtitle that only makes its full or true meaning clear as the story unfolds.

As people unfamiliar with the game have shown with various comments, adding a "THE" to LAST OF DRAGONSLAYER" will only make everyone all the more think that it's refering to someone who slays dragons, instead of what it is actually refering to. The game goes out of its way to not feature any dragon slaying. Even when one boss rides a dragon while attacking you, the heroes make a point of freeing the dragon instead of slaying it, become buddies and go for a ride on it. So if it's not going to reference DRAGONSLAYER itself, then a more appropriate title would be "SOME DRAGONFRIENDERS".

[joobloo]

Ah, so something like:

Xanadu II: End of Dragonslayer

would be more faithful/make more sense.  "Last of..." just sounds kinda weird to me.  But obviously I don't know much about the history of these games, so...yeah.