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When Metal Gear Solid released in 1998 it was met with universal acclaim all around
the world and swiftly made its way to be widely regarding as one of the most popular video
games of all time, a honour that the title still holds now, over twenty years later.
One aspect of the game that critics have especially praised is the title’s gripping story, characters
and overall world that the game takes place in.
But, did you know that, behind the scenes, MGS1’s English translation has actually
been a pretty controversial topic and even led to the game being completely retranslated
for the Nintendo GameCube Twin Snakes remake?
The game’s localizer has spoke in-depth about this subject last month, in a self-written
article published on the website Polygon.
Jeremy Blaustein is the localizer responsible for many popular games released in the 90s
and early 2000s, including Castlevania: Symphony of the Night and Silent Hill 2 - 4.
Before being hired for Metal Gear, Blaustein already had a history of working for series
creator Hideo Kojima, with him helping as the localization supervisor on Snatcher.
In the article, Blaustein recalls the great difficulties he experienced translating the
game for Western audiences.
The scope of the game was massive and he also explains how the state of video game localization
back then was barely in its infancy.
There were hardly any frames of reference in other works for him to use to help him
and there was, of course, no Wikipeadia, Reddit or YouTube.
He recalls how he worked from home in a tiny office for 8 months, whilst his kids played
and cried 3 feet away, and this was under a contract that wouldn’t see him paid until
the job was fully complete – meaning money was a huge issue.
The stress had him on diazepam, which is also ironically the same drug that Snake can take
during the game to help stop his hands from shaking whilst aiming.
However, despite these conditions, Blaustein felt great inspiration in that he was working
on something special and was determined to see the job through and make it perfect.
Localization is by no means an easy task though.
Kojima is a celebrated writer but his works are by no means simple – often combining
complex subjects such as social issues, politics, psychology, philosophy, science and pretty
much any other subject you can think of thrown into the mix.
The Japanese language is inherently vastly different to English.
For instance, the sentence structure in Japanese is the complete opposite of English and then
you combine this with the cinematic nature of the game and the dramatic cut-scenes that
have to synch up perfectly with what is being spoken.
Alongside these issues, Blaustein felt, as he still feels, that localization should be
more than just translation.
He wanted to try and capture the same meaning and feeling that he believed Kojima was aiming
for, but to do that for Western audiences, he felt some tweaks were necessary.
This led to some changes to terms and dialogue, under the impression that this would help
it all sound more natural and how actual soldiers would sound.
For example, in the Japanese version, there is no “codec”, which is now a term that
is synonymous with the series and its wireless method of communication used between Snake
and his allies.
Instead, the Japanese version simply called this “musenki” (無線機).
This would translate into English to the much less imaginative “wireless transceiver”.
But, Blaustein had come across the term “codec” and thought it would fit the tone of the game
well and so put it in.
This is also the case for the term OSP, or on-site procurement, where weapons and items
must be acquired from within the enemy base due to not wanting to leave any trace.
This isn’t real military jargon but Blaustein felt is sounded official.
The Japanese version however simply calls this “genchi chōtatsu” (現地調達)
, which could be translated into “acquiring locally”.
Not wanting things to feel too stiff for US audiences, Blaustein also added or tweaked
little bits of dialogue here and there too.
In the original, Campbell only says to Snake “I’m not a colonel anymore”, whilst
in Blaustein’s English translation, he says “I’m not a colonel anymore, just a retired
old warhorse.”
When the job was complete though, Blaustein expresses that he really felt that he did
a good job on it and tried his best to stay in the mind of Kojima as much as possible.
Then, this sentiment was reiterated back by the team at Konami and even Kojima himself
when it was all shipped back to Japan.
In fact, Kojima liked it so much that when it came time for a special Japanese-only re-release
version of the game, dubbed Metal Gear Solid: Integral, he wanted to include the English
voice track in it.
This version of the game adds various updates and bonuses and only contains the English
voices with Japanese text.
This is a very unusual situation for a game’s English translation to be later put in and
it was with this where all of the problems appeared.
You see, when Kojima and his team started to go through the game line by line and matching
the Japanese text with the voices, the differences started to become made apparent.
Kojima, who is widely regarded as being a video game auteur, wasn’t happy that his
work had been changed around and it was here where it was clear that he wanted a very direct
literal translation.
So, Kojima was then put in a position where he had to retranslate Blaustein’s dialogue
back into Japanese for the Integral version.
Kojima then severed all ties with Blaustein and all future games in the series would be
translated much more word for word to the Japanese original.
Also, like mentioned earlier, for the GameCube Twin Snakes remake, the English translation,
including the voice acting, was redone to make it more faithful.
In the remake Snake says “I’m just a guy who can only find meaning on the battlefield”,
in Blaustein’s version though, this was a tweaked with him instead saying “I’m
just a man who’s good at what he does.
Killing.”
Whilst normally the meaning would largely stay intact, sometimes there would be more
subtle meaning in Kojima’s original words that could be lost.
Another example from the remake is during Psycho Mantis death scene, where his last
words in the Japanese version and the more faithful remake are: “This is the first
time … I’ve ever used my power to help someone.
It’s strange … such a … nostalgic feeling.”
Blaustein felt that “nostalgic” was a bit of an odd term for English players and
so his version changed this to “it feels … kind of … nice.”
However, Kojima intended on using the term “nostalgic” specifically, due to it being
a reference to Mantis’ mother, who died whilst giving birth to him, and this meaning
wasn’t conveyed in the English version.
The article ends with Blaustein saying: “Looking back on the whole thing, yes, there
were mistakes, and bad choices as well as successful ones.
But that’s art.
Translation isn’t science, and after 20 years of Metal Gear Solid’s success, I think
I must have done a pretty good job.”
But what do you think about the original Metal Gear Solid’s translation and the points
discussed in today’s video?
As always, please let us know you thoughts in the comments below and a big thanks to
NordVPN again for sponsoring today’s video.
There will be a link in the description if you want to go check their big discount out
and, until next time, thank you for watching.