#;noxiatalks2ya

[noxiatoxia]

What’s the worst cause of a bad translation in danganronpa? I just saw your posts about it and was wondering how it it was

I didn't answer this right away because I spent some time thinking on it.

If you want my honest opinion, I don't think there's necessarily one "worst" translation. To me, it's more of a series of small translation errors / willfully removing character quirks that add up overtime to the bigger picture.

However, there are some specific egregious examples. I highly suggest this article on DR1's translation, as it paints a clear picture for the rest of the series (which abide by similar translation errors/choices).

In said article, however, I think is the worst translation I can think of in Danganronpa off the top of my head.

This is pretty bad for several reasons. Firstly, the official TL completely flipped the meaning of Naegi's sentence. I've seen bad translations in Danganronpa, but to completely 180 the meaning of a sentence is pretty bad. Furthermore, I think a joke was lost here. Naegi claims he is not a "Stand User", which is a JoJo reference. This being changed to a generic "I'm not psychic" I think ruins the joke that Naegi, who claims to have no hobbies, is making a reference to a manga - something many consider reading to be a hobby.

Plus, considering this is your first introduction to the character, and this is your foundation for understanding them...yeah. Not good.

SDR2 has a similarly bad introduction for Hinata, though not quite as egregious.

Left is the official translation, right is my fan translation patch.

This is pretty bad considering this is the crux of Hinata's motivations as a character. He does not think the people who attend Hope's Peak are marvelous. He thinks Hope's Peak itself is amazing. That's the whole point of his story, after all. He idolizes Hope's Peak. Never in the game do we see him idolize the students themselves beyond a simple "Wow, you sure are skilled, I can see why you got in". In fact, he routinely is pretty judgemental of them.

There's other things here and there. Komaeda's love confession in his final free time event was botched, as well as Saionji and Koizumi's love confessions in Island Mode.

Mioda's talent was messed up, too. She is not the Ultimate Musician. She is the Ultimate K-On Club Member. This is a pretty Japanese thing, hence the change, but if it were me, I would have gone with "Ultimate Pop Rock Musician" because that's what K-On music basically is, in terms of English genres. This is why the screamo music joke falls flat in my opinion. Of course she likes/plays metal, she's the Ultimate Musician. Except it was supposed to be more shocking since you're told she makes upbeat pop rock music.

Danganronpa also has just...a lot of clunky-sounding dialogue. Maizono's freetime event about the crane is very painful to read, as it is littered with references to Japanese folk lore which is not handled well in English, making it sound very unnatural.

Plus, this line:

was changed. Usually, when given your multiple choice in freetime events, you're supposed to guess what the other character is referring to. Notably, that isn't the case here. You're simply supposed to guess which of these birds are the biggest.

In the Japanese version, Maizono says, "It appears often in Japanese folklore. You know, that bird lives for a thousand years, a tortoise ten thousand years..."

To which Naegi thinks, "She must be talking about..."

Maizono is using a Japanese proverb (a crane lives for a thousand years, a tortoise ten thousand years), which strangely even the wiki seems to miss and mistakenly attributes it to her referencing Urashima Tarō. It's basically her saying "fill in the blanks, you know how this saying goes"...but since that saying is not known among English players, this part is poorly reworked.

Similarly, Twogami's final freetime event was written oddly.

I get what's trying to be achieved here, but it still sounds...not great. The point of the scene is that Togami from DR1 uses "omae" when referring to people, which is a very masculine/rude way to say "you". Twogami drops the act in this sentence and uses "kimi", which is a much softer ways to say "you". Hinata acknowledges this, but since there's only one "you" in English, they tried to word it as best as they could. Personally, I would have just reworded the scene entirely to make Twogami's sentence much softer in general, and then have Hinata comment, "It's weird hearing you speak so politely. The Togami I know is constantly looking down on others."

So, when it comes to the official Danganronpa translation, you're basically contending with 1) a lot of mistranslations, 2) removal of nuances in speech and 3) a lot of clunky, poorly naturalized dialogue. As the article I linked pointed out, even in Japanese, Danganronpa isn't some masterpiece of writing, but undoubtedly a lot is lost from these decisions.

Keep in mind these are just the ones off the top of my head I found worth pointing out in this post. There's probably way worse ones I didn't even think of, since I don't have either the English or Japanese text line for line memorized.

IMO, the best Danganronpa game in terms of text is Another Episode, 100% only because nearly every line in that game is read aloud. I find that trials in Danganronpa typically have marginally less clunky-sounding dialogue in English, and that I believe is entirely due to the fact they have people actually reading this stuff out loud. They can catch if it sounds weird out loud and then change it. So Another Episode, which is basically entirely voice acted, has the most natural-sounding dialogue in the whole series.

V3 I know very little about as I am not a fan of that game...but from what I've seen/heard, it's not much better despite coming out quite some time after SDR2. Gokuhara's speech patterns were entirely rewritten in English to sound like Tarzan...I guess to match his design? If I had to make him speak like any of the existing characters, I'd say he's more in line with Sonia's English translation. Just strange all around.

[noxiatoxia]

hihi hihi sooo looks around... ur translation posts have made me wonder more about certain scenes across the game - specifically the ones featuring nagito. i seen the post where it's said that the translators just happened to throw in the word hope for no apparent reason and that really made meeeee curious........ so i was wondering, is this another example of a scene like that? it kinda felt clunky to read whenever i saw it but thought it was just a wording issue but now im wondering if this is a translator just pulling shit out their ass ^_^;;

Hi! So, let me write out my own TL and give some notes.

Komaeda: it's also just a very miserable display. It doesn't promote hope at all. It only serves to piss me off.

Calling it a "hopeless object" is a very direct translation. In theory, at least. The word 絶望的 (zetsubou teki) - which literally translates as "despairful" - is defined as meaning "hopeless" in most English dictionaries.

This is kind of why I advise NOT to use Japanese to English dictionaries if you can help it. They're fine if you want a basic translation, and are helpful springboards to get an idea of what a word means esp if you're a beginner in the language, but the fact is, giving one or two English words for a Japanese word rarely encompasses the meaning of said word.

So while Komaeda technically uses hopeless/despairful in his first sentence, the way "zetsubou teki" is used here means something along the lines of "miserable" or just devoid of positivity. It's a "win" point for the Japanese team because it happens to include the word "zetsubou" (despair) in it, and the word despair in Japanese is a lot more flexible than it is in English imo. But keeping it as "despair" or "hopeless" in English just to keep the brownie points of mentioning le funny despair/hope I think is a sort of inaccurate translation, even if it's "literal". I hope that makes sense.

As for "object", he literally DOES say "オブジェ" or "obujee" which of course is a shortened way to say "object". However again this sounds unnatural in English. Komaeda is simply saying "that thing over there sucks". "obujee" also carries the nuance of art pieces (google オブジェ and look at images) so I think changing it to "display" makes more sense than keeping it as "object" to keep the artsy nuance. Commonly English words are borrowed and used in Japanese, but they get transformed to have their own meaning over time and you can't reasonably rely on being like "oh, it's borrowing the word "object" so it must mean the same as the English word object."

Oh, and the reason I had him say "also" is because he's clearly responding to Tanaka in this scene, who says "This is yet an evil attempt to besmirch Koizumi even after death! We will be dragged under with her if we look it dead on!" <- translation from the Japanese text (I don't know what the official English makes him say...)

I don't know why the team didn't catch that Komaeda was adding on with "also". If it's a situation where translators were given specific characters to translate text from and didn't swap notes, I can see how the また would be interpreted as him emphasizing instead of saying "also".

Okay! On to the second bit!

"It doesn't belong in a hopeful place like this at all" this is pretty literal, but not wholly inaccurate. I don't know why but something in my brain is telling me the wording is off. Maybe it's him calling this a "hopeful place". 希望益れる場 means something like "a place that is of use to hope" so it's less that this "place" is hopeful itself but more so that it can be useful to hope...I don't know if that nuance means much to anyone, but I think it matters. Komaeda does talk about how hope is on this "very island" but never once says the island itself is hopeful.

The second part is a mistranslation of sorts. I think the translators mixed up 忌々しい with 忌まわしい because they're pretty similar (and because a lot of English dictionaries/online translation softwares will tell you they are the same). But 忌まわしい is the one that means malice, abhorrent, morally bad etc. 忌々しい (what Komaeda uses) is more subjective and is more akin to "annoying" or "irritating". It's basically going "this personally pisses me off".

Yeah, that's basically it. All in all this is basically the same quality as most of the official translations (sighs), no egregious outright mistranslations mostly but just a lot of fumbles on nuance and wording. Thank you for the ask!

[noxiatoxia]

What do you think about kokichis hat / whole design controversy ? You seem like a dangan expert so i want to know your 2 cents

So, this is going to be a bit of a history lesson.

Kokichi is very obviously supposed to be a Nazi reference. That's pretty undeniable. From the SS Officer Visor to the Grape Fanta parody (Fanta having been created by Nazi Germany) it is very much an intentional reference.

This is where culture shock comes into play.

Please note as you read I am not attempting to make a statement on if this is "okay" or "bad" - I am simply presenting the facts of the matter.

As you can imagine, WWII is taught differently depending on where you're from. America, Germany, Italy, Japan, etc. A country will typically focus on its own perspective of events. This not only influences the narrative, but what parts of history are most focused on. For example, in Germany, it is often cited that they focus very heavily on Nazism and Hitler, and reinforce the tragedies they were responsible for. American schools will focus on a more general overview, with a lesson maybe on the atomic bombings they committed (and condemning their actions).

So for Japan, it's obviously different, too.

You can read some personal accounts on threads like this one and this one. But it mostly boils down to this: because a country will mostly focus on their own personal experience when teaching about a historical event, in this case, Nazism is not covered nearly as much in a Japanese curriculum as it would be in an American or German one.

This article from 2015, titled "What is the Nazi Chic Fashion and why is it spreading in Asia?" has a good excerpt, which I'll translate (the article is in Japanese):

しかし、Kidd氏が、欧米のマーケットよりも遥かにナチ・シックが急速に広がっている、と話すアジアのファッション・マーケットでは、ナチのシンボルが繰り返し使われている背景にあるものは異なる。ヒトラーと結び付いた文化的ハードルは低く、かぎ十字を身につけてもショックは本質的に大きくない。

However, according to Kidd, "Nazi Chic" is spreading much, much more rapidly in the Asian fashion market compared to the Western fashion market. However, the context behind the repeated usage of Nazi symbols is different to that of the Western market. The cultural hurdles of wearing something associated with Hitler are much lower, and not intrinsically all that shocking.

This is evident in many pieces of media meant for children or teens. Please think to yourself if you've encountered a piece of Western media made for children or young teens that depicts Nazism or Hitler in a comedic or stylish fashion. Personally, I cannot think of any.

But that is not the same in Japan. For example, the 1995 movie Dragon Ball Z: Fusion Reborn has a scene where the characters Goten and Trunks fight a caricature of Hitler.

Or Ouran High School Host Club, a 2002-2010 manga and 2006 anime, had not just a gag in the anime depicting an all-girl school as Nazis, but a piece of art drawn by the Mangaka herself of the main characters wearing Nazi Chic fashion.

Of course, this is not to say Japan is a-okay with Nazi imagery as a whole. Like any country, citizens have their own views and opinions. There are plenty of Japanese citizens who do not think this type of fashion style is okay. Much like how in America, there are people who think humorous depictions of Hitler are fine. I am just bringing these up to say, from a cultural standpoint, this subject is handled slightly differently.

That takes us back to Kokichi. Kokichi is definitely supposed to be reference to Nazi Germany. But I think it's much clearer now that it's not intended to be malicious. Making jokes or fashion statements out of this is more socially acceptable relative to the west. You still have the right to find it uncomfortable or not okay if it personally bothers you, but I am just explaining why this came to be, why it is not intended to be malicious, and why it was allowed.

I hope you find it informative. :]

[noxiatoxia]

you should draw hikakyo ooooh you want to so bad (subliminal psychic messaging)

idk why i drew it in animation cell style

anyways idk the concept of hikaru down bad for kyoya but trying to play it off is very funny to me. number 1 tsundere type bullshit like "i made you this shirt by hand NOT BECAUSE I LIKE YOU i hate you. it was kaoru's idea. take it before i change my mind." and kyoya knowingly is just like "ok ." and says nothing else and it drives hikaru insane. can anybody else see this vision please.

[noxiatoxia]

While we're talking about the official translation vs orenronen's, can I ask about a Tanaka line about Komaeda in chapter 3, just as he's being hospitalised?

Official:

Orenronen:

I originally thought these clashed but the latter's second half can read as him being okay with Komaeda dying anyway. Is this another case of one translation being more literal and another going more for vibes? It wouldn't be out of character for Tanaka to expect to cross paths with people after death lol.

No rush to answer this, of course.

Thanks for the inquiry! So, this line as it is read in Japanese is as follows:

狛枝だけならば、リタイヤしたも構わんのだがな...

Literal: If it were just Komaeda retiring, I would not care. However...

Tanaka literally says "retire" in English. This is a common loan word used in Japanese and means much of the same. It's unclear if he means it "permanently" or not. Given the context, I'm going to say no, he does not mean it that way, which leads into my analysis:

Orenronen's translation is much closer with some added flair...because it's Tanaka. The NISA translation is a bit off the mark and I think I see what tripped them up.

At the end, Tanaka says だがな. I think the official translation misinterpreted this as だ + がな, when it's supposed to be だが + な. Basically, だ、が and な are all particles, but when combined, they have different meanings.

If you read it as だ (it is) + がな (a sentence ender to mean emphasis or expressing a wish/desire) - I can see how it would now suddenly seem like he's saying "I want Komaeda and ONLY Komaeda to 'retire" - which then makes it sounds like he DOES want him to die.

However, it's meant to be read だが (but/however) + な (emphasis particle, also sometimes filler). This makes it what it's supposed to be: him emphasizing that he's not worried about Komaeda's condition, but is worried about Owari and Mioda.

In the surrounding context of the scene, death is never mentioned. It's far more likely Tanaka means he does not care that Komaeda is now "out of commission", but he doesn't like that it's also happening to Mioda and Owari. Making him say he wouldn't mind if Komaeda died forever and ever, while not something necessarily out of character per se, is simply not what he's saying here.

[noxiatoxia]

HEY so I know its been a minute since I've sent an ask, but I saw some of your posts about danganronpa, specifically regarding another episode, udg, and I was agasp because I was literally in the middle of playing it for the first time lmao. So after finishing the game last night I really wanted to ask, if you want to ofc, your in depth thoughts on the game and why you like it so much, or even thoughts on the gameplay and mechanics since its so different than the danganronpa staple. I quite liked it personally because of Komaru and Toko's relationship, them becoming two of my fav characters in the franchise so far, and because I became very endeared to the kids by the end of the story. I have some qualms with how Kotoko was handled in chapter 3 at... that part... but she's also my favorite of the kids at the same time lol.

Anyways yeah no pressure at all, I just was really curious because I liked the game a lot and found it so funny that you posted stuff about it as I was playing it. Also because I really enjoy your ouran opinions. But again I get if not, the game has some senstive subjects for sure. Thanks!

THIS IS LIKE THE BEST ASK EVER FOR ME TO RECEIVE. I AM SO PASSIONATE ABOUT THIS GAME AND HAVE BEEN FOR NEARLY A DECADE AT THIS POINT.

Okay....where to even START....

(I will be referring to UDG as DR:AE or just AE in this. SPOILERS FOR ALL OF DR:AE.)

Firstly, the environment. Unlike the main series, DR:AE does not take place in a secluded area away from the real world. It does the opposite; you are in such a vast area, you are not caged, yet you are still trapped. Even if Komaru didn't have that wristband on her, where would she go? The game is great at highlighting what the world outside of what we are told in the mainline games is actually like, how caged things are even outside, all while expanding upon existing characters' backgrounds by introducing family members, or little pieces of dialogue that serve to flesh out the world.

The gameplay itself, personally, I find VERY fun. I'm not a shooter game person, but DR:AE was a game I could play many times over. I love the different types of ammo, the puzzles, the possibilities with how to destroy the monokumas. Just a fun game all around. It's by far the most replayable Danganronpa game, as the main series games are all about the story. Once you know the story, there's really no reason to replay them. In fact, they are quite slow and boring without the intrigue of the mystery.

But the highlight, obviously, is the characters. As is Danganronpa's specialty.

While I still maintain Hajime is the most interesting protagonist of the series, Komaru serves as a great subversion of the expectations set up by Makoto's actions in the first game. Makoto is someone who preserved no matter what, changed those around him with his hope. He was your quintessential paragon protagonist. While Komaru displays this a little in some scenes (namely rallying the adults under Haiji's protection) this is only the result of speaking from her own wants and experiences. That is to say, unlike Makoto who always tried to help others even if it cost his own life, Komaru is much more realistic. She cares, first and foremost, about her safety. Her helping others to stand up for themselves comes from her own desire to keep fighting so she can live, and so she imparts that onto the people around her. Fight so you can live. She says it herself: she is not like Makoto. She is selfish, she is not endlessly optimistic. She's more like Hajime in this way, but unlike Hajime who find his own brand of philosophy, Komaru really doesn't. Rather, while Hajime's character serves to show you don't have to choose a predetermined path (hope or despair) and rather your path can simply be believing in yourself, Komaru's character shows that sometimes, and maybe even most of the time, believing in yourself or a specific ideal is not feasible. Komaru believes in the people around her - namely Toko. She believes in her friend, and believes with her friend that things can keep going. This in my opinion is an excellent twist on Makoto, who was, by all means, that friend that people believed in, not the one doing the believing.

And, as an aside, Toko and Komaru have the best development of any pair of characters in the series. Yes, even moreso than Hajime and Komaeda (who I maintain never really had "development" between each other than just a very, very good dynamic from the get-go that was influenced at points by outside plot forces on Komaeda's end. Think Light and L from Death Note in this manner).

Now, let me talk about the real meat of the game, and my favorite characters to date in the whole series: The Warriors of Hope.

I won't lie that I'm biased. I'm very biased for these guys. But I think a lot of people don't give these guys the credit they deserve considering this is a Japanese game. In Japan, child abuse is a bit of a taboo topic (that thankfully has been resolving over time). Due to the nature of Japan's politeness system and "family above all else" attitude, many child abuse cases not only go unreported, but are flat out ignored. The epidemic of babies dying in coin-operated lockers being an especially egregious example of rampant child abuse that occurred. Despite being prevalent since 1971, it took till 1993 to be socially addressed.

This is just one example, but I think it serves my point: child abuse is/was an issue in Japan when it comes to socially speaking of it. ( In fact, in the game itself, Nagisa and Kotoko both directly say they tried to reach out and get help, but were ignored by adults). This is why art regarding child abuse is so important. And that's why a huge series like Danganronpa centering a game about child abuse is such a huge deal. It sparks discussion and promotes visibility of the topic. Not to say media before hadn't talked about it - in fact, there is a lot of Japanese media about child abuse for this very reason - but that does not undermine the importance of Danganronpa deciding to portray it so openly. It is even more important, to me, that they do not stop at physical or sexual abuse. Rather, abuse focused on verbal harm and emotional neglect are portrayed as being just as damaging, which is one of the most overlooked and underplayed forms of abuse in general.

Their portray of abuse also is rather accurate. I will make a confession: I was definitely a bit too young to play danganronpa when I did. Definitely not 18 yet. But I was a teen, and very aware of different types of abuse, sexual abuse included. But despite all the PSAs, books I had read on my own or even ones assigned to me for classes, I had never seen a sexual assault victim be portrayed as hypersexual before. In fact, I didn't even know such a thing was possible. Yes, it is very, very likely I just got Komaeda levels of unlucky to not encounter that in any of my reading or research material at the time, but I think it's common, nonetheless, that people to this day still have the misconception that sexual abuse victims are all afraid of sex or anything sexual. While that is true for some, many people are now becoming more aware that sexual abuse survivors can often display hypersexual tendencies. In this way, I DID learn a lot about the effects of sexual abuse based on how Kotoko acted, and was able to do my own research from there to learn more. Furthermore, the game is good at portraying things like specific triggers in the form of words, smells, items, or specific phrases. Again, I feel it's mostly stereotyped that most triggers are objects that "make sense" like cigarettes or alcohol (much like with what Masaru was afflicted with). But the game made sure to include ones that were "non conventional" like specific words ("gentle" in Kotoko's case) and portrayed both triggers, no matter how common or uncommon, as equally severe. The game also shows negative effects child abuse can have on those around the children. After all, the WoH would not be doing the things they were doing if it weren't for how they were treated in the first place.

(Aside: This is particularly WHY I get so mad when people hate on DR:AE for being "icky". If you are personally uncomfortable with topics of child abuse, that is wholly reasonable and you do not have to play or even like a game that centers on that. You are in your full right and perfectly valid to say "I think this is gross and uncomfortable, therefore I do not like it" or "I don't like this game because I felt personally overlooked/triggered by it" or "I don't like this game because I felt it was not fun or well written". But to say it is objectively "problematic" or "disgusting" to have a game like this exist? That is just spitting in the face of people trying to advocate for visibility of child abuse. You are doing nothing but making people like myself who felt vindicated, seen, or educated by this game like bad guys. Sincerely, please do not call a game that does not shy away from the uncomfortable realities of child abuse "problematic" based on that alone.)

(Aside aside: there are "problematic" elements in the game and things to criticize as is true of all media. The Kotoko minigame I would say is the biggest "why is this in here" moment and is definitely just a fan service scene. I don't like it either. This does not mean the game itself and as a whole is valueless or bad.)

That leads into my next point: I love how morally gray the "good" and "bad" guys are. The WoH aren't doing what they're doing (save Monaca) because they want to hurt people for the lolz (though they have fun with it, as kids would). They think what they're doing is genuinely good. It's a good way to rival Junko, who knew she was evil and batshit crazy, but didn't care. These kids think they are helping children and keeping them safe. And they're kids - young kids can't really think in very complex manners. If you were treated horribly by most adults in your life, and your peers were as well and shared the same sentiments as you, you would be 100% convinced your convictions were righteous then. Hell, I've met adults that think this way (pretty much all extremists who think anyone part of x group, race, gender, religion, etc is evil). A kid thinking this way is very realistic. They are also all different levels of "morally gray". Nagisa, for example, ends up helping Komaru because he feels that a paradise for children is more important than the sole idea of killing all adults. Meanwhile, Monaca, perhaps because of the abuse she suffered all her life, has become a person that we can assume will just enact similar abusive tactics on everyone around her till the day she dies. While it's a misconception that people who suffer abuse often turn into abusers themselves (they simply just have a higher chance to commit crimes, anything from petty crimes to violent ones) there are undoubtedly cases where this does happen. A real life example is Douglas Spinx (HUGE TW; CSA & BESTIALITY). My point is: the portrayal of abuse victims in many different lights from people who can inflict harm unintentionally but with help and intervention can make recoveries to those who, in the rarest and saddest of cases, will turn to a full life of inflicting harm on others intentionally, is important - for someone like me, at least. Without the proper care or attention, horrible things like these can happen. I find this a very important thing to be open about.

Then we have Haiji. Haiji is supposed to be a "good guy". He's cowardly, yes, but he does fight to help the adults being killed. He attempts to bolster moral. But...despite having good intentions and even doing some good things, he's kind of horrible. After all, he's the one who contributed to Monaca's abuse and made her the way she is now. He's just like the kids except reversed; he thinks all children are evil because they're the ones killing everyone. And in his position, I do think most people would feel that way. I mean, if literally every kid in your area was wearing a helmet that turned them fuckin murderous and were killing all your friends and family would you, after enduring months of this, still bother to be like "not all kids though!". Likely not. Even though it is wrong, it is still a realistic way these things would pan out, much like how it did for the WoH. I mean, for a real life example, one need not look further than one of those extremist radical feminist blogs here on Tumblr that believes every single person born male is a brute. Most of those people believe that way because they have personally been hurt by one or several males in their lives, and y'know, fear and pain leads to hate and all of that.

Speaking of, I like the brainwashing in this game far more than in DR3 the anime (spoilers for that later on but tbqh DR3 is not worth anyone's time). I never liked brainwashing as a trope - I feel it is lazy. However, in DR:AE and DR1 they're utilized pretty well. In DR1 it's literally glossed over as "does it really matter? The outcome is more important than the means" which considering DR1, moreso than any other game in the series, is a satire and is supposed to focus on absurdity, I think having the brainwashing LITERALLY be hand-waved as "eh, it just happened" makes a lot of sense thematically with the goofy writing. But as you know, as DR went on, it became more and more serious with itself (for...better and worse...) in DR:AE, I like how the brainwashing affects only the nameless children. DR3's anime was lazy by having all the main characters get brainwashed by a funny little video, both in future&despair arc. In AE, it's a helmet. I think this makes much more sense as theoretically the helmet could be attached to the actual brains of these people. Plus, as said in the game, they blow up when the controller is destroyed, giving credence to that theory. The brainwashing in AE is not a vehicle to explain why main characters act the way they do. Rather, it's just a device used to create background conflict/build up the main villains, leaving the main characters to be affected by persuasion and manipulation (the objectively better version of "brainwashing").

Circling back to the WoH, outside of their thorough portrayals of abuse and standings as "villains who think they are doing the right thing", they're just fun. Like, legit, I just think they're fun. Outside of their trauma, they aren't very complex, but that's the point. The game is a commentary about abuse and how it affects you, the people around you, and the world. The WoH are not the characters meant to be developed and complex entities who undergo deep changes - that is left to our protagonists. As most series with static characters do, they assign each member a core personality. Every Warrior of Hope has a number of traits influenced by this personality (the "sporty" one, the "smart" one, etc) that make them vastly different from each other, making them not only distinct but just fun to watch their personalities clash. After all, if they were not bonded by their trauma, they probably wouldn't be friends at all. it's honestly like a Teen Titans situation in that way, and I've always loved stuff like that. Of course, their personalities are also heavily influenced by their trauma, again a realistic depiction of how trauma can and will change who you are as a person and present itself in many facets of your actions.

I THINK that's all my MAIN points. Suffice to say, DR:AE is my favorite game in the series. I think it's the most fun, has the best character developments and dynamics, I think its story is the most emotional and deep-cutting, and it really spoke to me during a time that I needed something like this to reach me. I won't say it's the best DR game in terms of overall narrative (that honor goes to SDR2) but it comes close. And I know not everyone will feel the same way about this game that I do. Thanks for this ask; yet another reminder I need to do my bi-yearly replay of this game.

(Footnote so I don't get "so you hate waffles"'d: my bringing real-life examples into this is not to say those instances are exactly like what happens in the video game nor to say they are on the same level of importance. Obviously real life is far more important and complex than anything that could happen in a game. I only bring them up to support my points about certain aspects being realistic by using, well, real life examples.)

[noxiatoxia]

I find I'm either 0% or 110% with basically any interest. Pokemon was my longest one and I've had a lot of fun messing around with RNG abuse on older games to do all-shiny runs and set up gen 4 games to use the cute charm glitch and so on. I have yet to try arbitrary code execution on pokemon games but I really want to do that too; on ruby/sapphire/emerald you can generate a specific glitch pokemon and use it to execute code based on what you've named your PC boxes.

Oh!! I LOVE glitches in games and especially Pokemon! A big part of my childhood was glitching the shit out of my Pokemon Yellow copy. Every glitch you can think of I preformed in that game. My favorite glitch is the Q pokemon in Yellow, since it lets you literally fuse pokemon together. I created a real "Pikablu" that way haha.

If you do try ACE please update me on how it goes!! I've never quite done it myself before, but I've watched a lot of videos on it for gen 1.

[noxiatoxia]

Can you give komahina (toxic yaoi?) headcanons

lemme see here. this is hard bc i dont necessairly have ~komahina~ headcanons i just have headcanons for komaeda and hajime it really has nothing to do with them as a ship;. but uh

ok so here's one. long winded. but i think from what we can gather about hajime he was a bit of a loner child. his parents didnt seem to gaf abt him. so i think he does get attached to people easy. tbh sdr2 was like a miracle scenario in some ways bc there's this guy who has little to no friends (be he never goes out of his way to make them) and then hes stuck with 15 other people his age and he's like i guess i'll talk to them what else can i do....and turns out everyone desires him carnally. tbf he's able to match ppl's freak and he's just good at listening (or pretending to listen) so this makes him popular. so its like ohhh ok we're friends now. hajime is that kind of guy who if he talks to someone once he calls them his friend. but like everyone IS actually his friend. anyways i think if hajime goes a long time without talking to someone he knows he starts to get a little nervous like if its been 1 whole week and he has not even exchanged small talk with like idk mahiru he's like "something is Critically Wrong" so then he'll go find her and be like "hi hows it going". its like disrupting his routine or whatever. i think the time periods for "how long hajime can go without talking to this person" varies depending on the person obviously. like with hiyoko it's like. they don't interact much so if it's been a week and a half he'll be like ohhh ok...maybe i should say something to her....but someone like kazuichi it's like. 3 days hasn't spoken to him once he's like Where Is That Mother Fucker.

this is all to say when it comes to komaeda in a komahina scenario it's devastating bc if he does not see komaeda in a while he gets fucked up abt it in like his anxiety/ptsd spiral his first thought it KOMAEDA IS DEAD. HIS LUCK GOT HIM KILLED. HE KILLED HIMSELF. and then hes like banging on komaeda's cabin door and shit like KOMAEDA. PLEASE.PLEASE. and komaeda is like um hi. flip side: komaeda is also very much like this but with people he's close-close with bc if he does not see hajime in like three days he's like HAJIME IS DEAD. MY LUCK GOT HIM KILLED. HE KILLED HIMSELF. and then he also goes crazy so they have to at least be makin small talk every day to ward off the demons....

as for like. TOXIC YAOI headcanons idk........anything in the chapter 4 area would be bad. i think. i have read so many hate fucking doujins in the chapter 4 time period. while dat all doesnt seem very canon to me (i just dont think hajime be doin all that. nor komaeda really) i see the vision. kamukoma was probably unhealthy on both sides if we want to go there. but like komahina. idk . 1) my brain is fogged up rn so it's hard to think you can ask again later if you desire but 2) really they aren't all that toxic like outside of a killing game environment. komaeda tends to keep to himself and hajime tries to understand people. so like. hajime is very much a "if it sucks hit da bricks" kind of philosopher so if komaeda was being a detriment to his health and he DID have a way out then it's not like he'd stay. hajime does put his foot down when things get too much. (if komaeda was a woman tho she could abuse hajime and he wouldnt gaf #mikanislandmodeending #hiyokoislandmodeending ) but see again komaeda wouldnt be doin all that. i cant see him intentionally hurt hajime post sdr2 canon, at most unintentionally toxic/unhealthy but again i thinnk hajime would in that case try to help him out like couples therapy style or something. WHERE AM I GOING WITH THIS. im bad with headcanons it seems.

[noxiatoxia]

hi!! i hope you don't mind the ask ^^ i was wondering about how you got started with sprite ripping, specifically through tinke, because im trying to learn myself so i can rip as much as i can from the d.gray-man ds game and well..... it's definitely quite the process and im really unfamiliar with these things ;;^_^ i actually found your blog while searching for information which is why i thought to send an ask :0

Hey! I'm pretty flattered you thought to ask me!

So, I'm gonna go through several games, because it highly depends on the game and what you see. That way you have a lot of examples to work with.

Let's start with Death Note: Successor to L as that is the game I'm most know for ripping the sprites from. It is also a bit unstraight forward, which helps some things in explaining.

Upon opening the .nds file in Tinke, this is what we see.

Locate the "data" folder, click the +.

See this data.bin? Despite its icon, we do not want to unpack it.

Instead, we want to Open as > compress

You'll get a popup window called "Select Offset". Don't do anything; just click "Accept".

After a second of waiting, suddenly we have this huge list of new .bins! So where do we find the images?

Scroll until you find the LAST [IPAL] .bin. Everything under it will be the game's sprites.

So, everything under "data_15108.bin [IPAL]" in this case. So...where are the images?

Under it is data_15109.bin. And under that, data_15110.bin. Open as > compress them both.

Based on icon, we can see we have a palette file and a tile file. First, we have to open the palette file as a palette.

Now, let's see what happens if we open the tile file now... (as a tile, of course)

Well...that doesn't look right. For reference, this is the sprite in question:

So, why does it look like that?

What if we manually adjusted the width? You can hold down the up or down arrow to see it change in real time.

But setting it to 128.... (half)

Looks about the right size, just...cut off. We'd have to adjust the height, too.

Or, we can try opening it as a map instead and see if that helps. So let's try opening this file as map instead.

Ah! Did all the work for us! But...where's the other half of the sprite? And why are the colors weird?

Let's Open as > compress the .bin below...

...Well, there's the other half. So, you'll have to stitch them together. Ok, what about the colors?

This is where the palette comes in. Tinke will use the colors of the last palette you viewed. Thankfully, we know this is Light's palette since the palette file precedes all his sprites. But why is it showing up wonky?

See these bold colors up top? This is our issue. We need only one of these bold colors that is clearly not supposed to be a color in Light's sprite. Why? Because that will be the color of the sprite's background (which we can edit out later.)

See this start byte button? Keep clicking up, you will see the squares slowly move backwards (idk how to describe it, just hold down the up button and see for yourself). Do it until only the last bold color remains. Cyan, here.

Now, let's go reopen the image as map.

Perfect! You can even click that "Transparency" button to turn the bold color transparent.

Now, all you have to do is click "Export"

Here's the output:

Of course, the same will have to be done with the sprite below it, and then you'll have to stitch them together in any editing software or art software (MS paint, firealpaca are both free) and there you go! the sprite :)

Now, not all games are like this. So let's look at another.

Let's do Pokemon Black 2 (this is the JP version but as far as I know, both games have the same file paths)

Already, this looks WAY different. No Data folder. Just an "a" folder, with a million sub folders. How are we ever gonna find what we want?

Well, there's 2 answers. One is Google. I googled "Pokemon Black 2 sprite files locations" and got this answer:

So a > 0 > 0 > 4...

But what if Google doesn't have an answer?

Well...Sorry to say, at that point, it's a game of trial and error. You're going to have check everything yourself (that's what I had to do with the Death Note game).

But back to Pokemon. So, I open as > compress....

A little different here, too. But If I had to guess, 4_19.RLCN is our palette, and 4_20.bin (after we open as compress) will be our image.

Right I am. But opening the image as map, it still looks weird. I'll mess with the width - that usually works.

Just a few clicks of the down arrow and we got Bulbasaur.

However, this palette doesn't look like Bulbasaur at all. There's no green or anything...maybe the actual palette it at the bottom there?

So it is! You can tell just by looking at the colors that this is meant to be for Bulbasaur. The greens, blues, and reds for the mouth. Now, the question is how to get the right palette on it...

Unlike Light's palette from earlier, this one is much smaller, so we can tell the palette size is actually 16/16, not 256/1

Just switch it over.

I did 40 for the offset again, as this seems to be a regular number used for palette offsets.

And wouldn't you know it!!

Okay, I've hit image limit so i'll stop here. But I hope this helps. Some games are encrypted or use file types not recognized by Tinke, so if you're having additional troubles you can message me again :) otherwise I hope this helps. When in doubt just try opening everything and anything lol.

[noxiatoxia]

emergency noxie. do you have that fucking traditional drawing of edd eddsworl in a diaper that says some esoteric shit like "all things that grow return from whence they came" or something. Thank you

HELP? IVE NEVER EVEN HEARD OF THIS IMAGE BEFORE...NOW I WANT TO SEE IT TOO

[noxiatoxia]

hi! im so sorry for the random message out of nowhere, but i saw you're responsible for a lot of sprite uploads on spriters resource for the death note L game - thank you so much for them!! <3 i know that was a few years ago now, but i was wondering if you have or know how to get some of the other sprites from the spiraling trap game, namely the ones where L is eating random snacks. i can't seem to find clean rips of those anywhere so i was hoping you had a clue for me :') no worries if not though! thank you so much for your time regardless, i really appreciate it. hope you have a nice day!!

Hi!! Firstly, thank you for the kind words :D

Secondly, back when I did rip the second DN game's sprites, I did try to also rip L the Spiraling Trap, however I was unsuccessful.

The reason for which is because, unlike Death Note: Successor to L, L - the ProLogue to Death Note: Spiraling Trap is encrypted :<

I use Tinke to view DS game files, and the second DN game's file was unencrypted. All I had to do was open the image files as tile in Tinke, mess with the offset and width settings, and then import the correct color palette from the palette files. Tinke can automatically detect which files are images, palettes, text, etc.

The problem with L's game - and a number of other DS games - is that all of these files are encrypted as .bin files, which are generic container files. They're not unique to the DS in any way. Because they are generic container files, figuring out how to open a specific game's .bin files is a biiiig game of trial and error. I'm sure if you knew hexcoding you may have a leg up on me (as I do not know hexcoding, just enough to glitch out Pokemon Yellow and use a gameshark). But as it stands, I have no clue how to break into those .bin files... I have to assume this is why nobody has been able to rip the sprites.

Now, there ARE other ways to do this. If you download a rom to the L game and play it in DeSmuMe, you can rip the sprites by playing the game and following this tutorial here! I haven't done this yet because 1) it has it's own tricks to it and is still a bit of a trial and error situation (read the whole page), and 2) it requires you to actually play the game so the sprites actually appear on the screen. You need to get the sprite you want to show up before you can actually rip it. This means that sprites that, say, only appear during a final scene or something requires you to play the whole game. And I simply do not have the time for that. Maybe one day.

I hope this is at least of some help. If you have further questions or need help just send another ask or DM me, I'm always open for stuff like this!

[noxiatoxia]

as a funamusea fan who sees genshin impact stuff everywhere, i would genuinely be interested in elaboration on the "genshin impact character designs are funamusea if they sucked" post

OK SO that post was 99% a joke but the reason I made it is because while genshin impact does have flashy cool clothing designs, the actual character designs just feel...same-y. I compared it to Funamusea because she also makes a shit ton of character designs that are very eccentric but I feel while you could critique some of her stuff looking same-y there's a lot more variation and creativity. like

i googled genshin and this is one of the first images i find and like idk compared to these

i feel funamusea just does it better. granted the creative process of her stuff is different than a game like genshin, but all her characters match a theme for what the game/comic is about. like i chose these 3 specifically because they are all from the same game. you can clearly tell the different personality/vibes they give based off their posing and design alone but you can also gather from the elements of their designs that the thing they all have in common is being related to the ocean/water somehow (which makes sense. the game takes place in an underwater kingdom.)

she also is more varied with what exactly she makes characters out of and how to make them look.

like idk does this Make Sense.

[noxiatoxia]

am thirsty for kaohika headcanons

hikaru is a sigma male gamer incel (the i in incel stands for .) EVIDENCE: anytime we see the twins near video games it is HIKARU playing them (both a present and flashback shot in ep 9, and in ep 20 it is hikaru who suggests they play video games and he COMPLAINS THAT EVERYONE ELSE IS TOO EASY TO BEAT!!! CAN YOU SAY PRO GAMER !??!) now while we don't see the opposite i doubt kaoru is bad or anything. im sure he can hold his own against his brother. but i feel hikaru always manages to outclass him just a little in every game. i think because hikaru has that gamer rage flowing thru his veins he is more competitive and DEDICATED to his craft. kaoru doesnt care all that much.....he just plays cuz its whats hikaru is doing......if kaoru chose his own game to play it would probably be animal crossing. and no i am not "" female - brain """ coding kaoru ...i just think he Tires of fast-paced games. hikaru loooves those damn beat 'em ups and FPS but kaoru wants to create a dystopian hell society and trap all his villagers in holes. he also loved mystery games. ace attorney and danganronpa. the joke here is greg ayres voices monokuma.

okok anyways tying it back to incest: IMAGINE. hikaru going thru his manly gaming sesh of Chibi-Robo Zip Lash for the Nintendo 3DS. "Hikaru im bored" Kaoru says but Hikaru is like "give me a moment" and like 5 minutes turns to 10 turns to 20 and he's still on that damn Chibi-Robo Zip Lash. So kaoru is like "you're gamer? you want a gaming challenge?" and before hikaru can ask him where the article went in his first sentence Kaoru is SLONKING HIS SHIT!!!!( SILLY SADASS STYLE !!!?!)its like those "THIS GAME WILL MAKE YOU CUM IN 5 SECONDS" but instead the objective is to NOT cum and finish Chibi-Robo Zip Lash (for the Nintendo 3DS). WHO WILL WIN !?!? it is a fierce battle indeed... (kaoru wins obviously)

[noxiatoxia]

shut the freak off bruh some ordinary g****ers reacted to duh the carriage everything is hopeful and bright. when did this happen

7 months ago SOB. you can see the full vid here

[noxiatoxia]

I saw your post about Americans constantly justifying what america did to japan courtesy of Hiroshima and Nagasaki and the camps and how its not genocide. like im pretty sure Dresden and Hiroshima and Nagasaki counts as genocide because America knowingly dropped the bombs on innocent civilians o purpose. im glad Germany and Japan lost the war given what they did but the.bombings were one of America's most evil actions and civilians aren't numbers, they were fucking people

It's sadly something we see commonly in History, and I don't know why. Maybe it's easier to live with yourself and your cause if you convince yourself that ALL people of a certain nationality are evil...?

We see it time and time again. It's okay to kill Russians, they're just as bad as their government, look what they're doing to Ukraine! It's okay to kill Israelis, they're just as bad as their government, look what they're doing to Palestine!

So on and so forth.

I never understood it, ever. The blatant lack of logic in such hatred I guess is hard to understand. People cannot separate civilians from their wicked governments. People are just needlessly violent.

The world is a complicated place so there really is no clear cut right and wrong to, say, a group of people standing up to their oppressors. Does being oppressed legally give someone the right to take the life of another? Does "one side" suffering loss at the hand of the "other side" justify them doing the exact same thing? Is substituting civilians in your violent protest because you cannot reach their government the right thing to do, when the other option is doing nothing at all, and abandoning your own life?

Humanity, war, life, and death are complicated both logically and morally. It's why I hate the people who like to pretend there's a clear cut "good guy" and "bad guy" to any given geopolitical affair. Because there isn't.

In any case, I speak on the topic of those same people with these black-and-white ideals then turning around and, shocker shocker (to nobody) having a very black and white outlook on the people involved. (i.e., "Japan did horrible things, so it's civilians deserved to be bombed.")

[noxiatoxia]

you weren't kidding about the article, that translation sure can bad

learning japanese just to play DR in it rapidly becoming less of a joke

IT'S BAD BAD...the idea of learning Japanese just to play DR is super funny, but also pretty admirable. Knowing another language is just a useful skill in general (I really hope to learn more! Chinese and Arabic are on the list).

I have a little pipe dream of re-translating all of SDR2...which will likely always be a pipe dream given retranslating ALLL the text in the game is a monumental task for one person. Besides, on a wide scale, I can't imagine there's much demand for it. If I ever buy SDR2 on Steam though, maybe I'll look into patches and at least re-translate the prologue for shits and giggles. (I also worry about accuracy. I am just one dude so I am bound to make a mistake with no one to check me on it...still a fun thought though.)

Getting off track. Sadly, I wish there was a better way to play these games :( I know SDR2 and DR1 both have unofficial Eng patches for the PSP that were made before the game was officially translated, but I have no clue how good they are. I may have to play one sometime just to see.

RELATEDLY! I have errands to run, but in like, 4 hours or so someone remind me to look into something. I was thinking about the transgender hajime hinata headcanon (as one does) and recalled the line people like to point out in chapter 1 where he says: "I've never been comfortable showering" ...somehow never clicked on the shower in my copy so when I get back I need to boot up the PSP and check if it's the same in Japanese.