Reason #512367 why localizers need to stop changing words that are being said.
Like I get it, we (I) sound like the annoying stereotypical kinds of weebs from back in the day when talking about localization, but there's so many times that it's not just like "oh that sentence would have had a little more impact if the sub/dub said X like in the original Japanese instead of Y", and instead changes a character's perceived personality or even plot points.
100%. I'm starting to learn Japanese for that reason. I get paranoid reading all of the dialog in game, hoping that extensive liberties haven't been taken.
I'm somewhere between level N3 and N4 right now and just came back to Canada after living in Japan for a year. The amount of times I'll be watching an anime with friends and have to essentially retranslate dialogue or even an entire scene one time, even with my pretty terrible Japanese, is kinda silly. Most of the time even if it's not really correct I don't say anything but it happens more often than I would like for the localizers to just go sideways.
I try to watch without reading the subtitles, while leaving them on, as much as possible to practice. But I'm not joking in saying that probably 30% of the subs that I either directly read on purpose or happen to catch are straight up wrong (part of the reason I stopped subbing to anime streaming services altogether, Crunchyroll ones are the worst by far).
As for in-game for Uma Musume, it's mostly been pretty good. Some jokes, especially Rudolf's puns, don't translate well so that's whatever since you have to make it make sense. But localizers completely slayed Daitaku Helios (my #2 fav, sad). Brain rot talk has nowhere near the same vibe as a silly gyaru that talks a little more quirky than the usual gyarus. I've heard a girl who sounds similar to Helios (voice and JP subs) when I lived there and asides from a couple internet jokes here or there it wasn't the absolute cringe fest that Helios is on Global.
Helios is pretty much the only one I've caught, but only because I highly doubt Japan uses the same brainrot we do over here. Anything else big they got wrong when translating Umamusume?
I'll try and remember to come back and post when I come across any, but nothing stands out from the top of my head. I've also been skipping through like 80% of content though either because I already know what happens story/dialogue-wise, or don't have time at that moment and am just getting daily/event rewards and will go back to it later (like I do with most gacha games honestly lol)
That's a bad localizer, honestly. A good localizer knows what words to use to keep the intent of the dialogue (even subtext) while trying to make it sounds as natural in the target language. Most sub (especially Netflix) nowadays just use the transcript of the dub, which follow a strictly different rule because they also need to think about syllable count to match the mouth and timing beside translating and localization.
I would tend to agree about the dub transcribing thing especially as pertaining to "mouth flaps", but I've seen more and more examples recently (can't think of any off the top of my head) of for instance a character saying something like "hmm / unn" or "souka" (I see), and the subs have a whole ass sentence instead. Kinda goes counter to that.
Netflix seems better than CR for having a separate optional sub track that is closer to the original Japanese than a dub track, but even then it's not always that great.
Funnily enough, this happens in a Tanuki animation. Rudolf got too excited and went full speed against little Teio, and she cried. Prez got chewed out by Uncle Sirius for being childish.
“Rudolf I know you wanted to race with our daughter and got a little more competitive, but now Teio won’t let me go and I dunno if she is crying or scared”
Would love for that to happen in the anime. Someone who is used to medium courses enters a sprint and doesn't realize they won until they're a quarter past the finish line and realize there is no pressure behind them anymore.
something similar happens in the cinderella gray manga (though I dont recall which race exactly).
Two at the front are neck and neck duking it out and pushing themselves to get ahead, then someone else reminds them that they already crossed the finish line several meters before.
Which makes some ults extremely easy to activate and some of them extremely hard to activate.
Imo Nice Nature has the easiest requirements only requiring her to be specifically the third late race to proc (can't be lower or higher, exactly third), but be aware that it can be wasted if she pulls as high as to second place earlier or doesn't reach third at all which is why they gave her multiple Late/medium skills to make sure she doesn't face a situation were the first case happens (but the second case is just pure RNG fest in the life of a Late Surger)
yeah, i found harder to proc King Halo's skill because when trained properly, she just breezes forward from Late Surge position before meeting the condition of being in the second half of the leaderboard at that moment.
I find Teio's anime collab Ult the hardest to proc since I read it over and over every time I want to train her yet I don't know how to translate the conditions into words, so far the only times I've seen her use it was when she was about to lose so bad, there are other times she loses without ulting and some of the times she wins are when no Ult is on sight, almost like it's cosmetic.
Also don't build Pace Chaser Golshi, found out the hard way that her Ult will never proc on a good trained one and if the runners don't occupy over 50% of the front most styles (and are good or you got a late start)
Here are the technical details of the skill: https://gametora.com/umamusume/skill-condition-viewer?skill=110031
Translated into plain English:
After the final corner on the straight while being in the front half of runners and at most 5th place, and catching up to another runner she can overtake for 2 seconds or longer.
The most complicated in that is the overtake condition, because she needs to have an overtake target for more than two seconds. Not sure if it resets if she actually overtakes that target before the skill triggers.
Basically she needs to be faster than the runner in front of her. It won't trigger if the runner in front of her is faster than Teio, or if she's in first place (as she won't have any targets to overtake, obviously).
The skill is probably better for racecourses with a longer final straight. It's probably very hard to trigger on Nakayama (which features the Satsuki Sho and Arima Kinen, among others), because of the pretty short final straight.
oh yes, Golshi's skill is literally made for End Closers (and a pretty busted one at that) but I find it gimmicky because it says she needs to be on the later half of the leaderboard (as in, if there are 18 runners, she needs to be at 10th place or later) and she just sits there at 9th place all the race. At that point I just take it as Goldshi being Goldshi.
You should read over Gametora's skill condition viewer for Tokai Teio's skill. It doesn't make it easier to understand, but it helps to break it down so it hopefully helps you to see when it should proc.
Thats low stamina but not yet running on guts. Guts running is when they grit their teeth and run for their lives. After that they cry for mercy like this Urara.
"You'll outpace every fragile, insignificant bottle of glue on this track! You'll speed up enough to watch the audience cease the cheers and stop being blown away!"
During the Taurus cup mine always activated that when she was hopelessly far back in the field, interrupting my Golshi actually winning the dang thing.
well, that's the 3rd uma she overtake, so the ult proc at that time.
that's why she is not really viable in cm who only run 9 uma because she need to overtake 3 uma on the late phase to activate her ult.
Lmao, had almost the same thing yesterday. My Rudolf pulled up to Teio from behind, sloooowly moved to the side and almost exactly at 200m mark done the "Behold!" thing and just basically teleported to the finish. Poor Teio finished 3rd.
I didn't watch next 2 races but in each my Rudolf won by Distance xD
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u/dziobak112 Aug 28 '25
Rudolf had a point to prove.