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Nintendo censors "human rights" and "freedom" in Chinese localization of Paper Mario: The Origami King (UP: Game was not censored. See threadmarks)
- Thread starter Atheerios
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An explanation about the translation
Yes, I am a native speaker, though I emigrated from China as a teenager, so I am not up on contemporary slang. If you want a more natural sounding English translation, I would translate it as:
"Toads need to be clean!
Toads need peace and quiet!"
需要 does not mean anything substantially different from "need" in this context. Both imply that what is needed is a necessity, and both can be used in the context of a protest demand or in less urgent situations. Chinese people are substantially less likely to use 需要 when it is really something that they want, not need, but that does not make a difference here.
The main part that was lost in translation is the cultural context: We associate cleanliness with economic means, and we associate peace and quiet with good governance. The lack of economic means and good governance has been the cause of rebellion many times in China's past, with the rebels explicitly naming economic calamity and civil disturbance as signs that the current dynasty has lost its right to rule.
I do not consider the Chinese version a sterile demand for better personal grooming and less noise. I consider it a bitter complaint against tyranny and a prelude to rebellion. I expect the CCP to recognize this, if they ever played/watched this portion of the game, because the government officials certainly know more about history than I do.
I am completely confused since the text is in traditional Chinese meaning this version is not localized for the mainland Chinese market. What does Tencent have to do with this? Or are people assuming that the translators for the HK/Taiwan market thought mainland Chinese people would import the game and play it in traditional Chinese and be offended by a Toad's rights joke and thus it was purposefully changed?
That might be a possible use-case and a possible consideration for localization but I think it's mostly a racist assumption by people who don't know any better than Chinese = Tencent = CCP since that's common rhetoric on Era.
Thank you, this is exactly what I meant. People who have no cultural or linguistic context won't get this. I certainly didn't.
This should be threadmarked.
Also, I'm giving the side-eye to people who were a bit too quick to jump on the "Chinese censorship!!" bandwagon. Big time.
This ought to be threadmarked to counter any wild speculation on the part of non Chinese speakers
It's amazing that people are still realizing corporations don't give a shit about you, just your money.
Singling out Nintendo like they are the only and one company known for that, is a bit weird.
So it's more or less a localized version of what the original was, just using terminology that is distinctly Chinese?
The chinese government is currently sending muslims to labor camps and their children to indoctrination schools. I mean, why would you be surprised that they would censor something like this?
Thank you for this insightful post.
1.This should be a threadmark
2. Title needs to be changed.
Thank you for the translation with the cultural context. The OP Atheerios should probably threadmark this update.
Looks like it, yup. It's almost like people are spouting shitty kneejerk takes out of sinophobia and/or cultural and linguistic ignorance.
There's plenty of things to be legitimately critical of/revolted at when it comes to the Chinese government without the need for bad faith criticism.
Exactly. Bad call, Nintendo.
This is a black eye on your reputation. Shame.
You and other people should read the last few posts in this thread, especially Raftina's.
So uh... This thread is a nothingburger then?
The spanish version is actually more censored lol
It's painfully obvious who's posting now without having read the thread and who has. Not that I'm saying that post was the final word on the matter, but it provided a ton of context that so many people are going to miss just to post an "oof" or a "yikes" without even paying attention to what has been said.
It's especially frustrating when the OP and the twitter poster clearly did very little research into how localizations work for this series or for Nintendo games as a whole. This thread should really be closed IMO.
Chinese native speaker here, and I think the Chinese translation is very clever in the way that the wording can literally mean two very different things at the same time. 1. It's referring to the idea that toads should have have less crease, I haven't played the game but I assume this is fit given what the game is called.. 2. It can also mean toads society need better governance/management so that to keep every toad 'clean', i.e. less corruption, less abuse, etc..
I mean people are saying this because some people who speak Chinese have chimed in to say that this statement is in fact anti-government so it would be good to read the last few posts.
I've called out just about every company involved in this shit for the past 4 months and even copped a ban for it.
Nice try though.
Thank you for this. I definitely should've taken the insane localization intricacies into account before speaking. It's easy to forget that every dialect has their own analogues and symbols. This is a post that should be bookmarked if anyone could do so.
Not surprised to hear it was kneejerking without looking into it. I Was gonna note that typically, Chinese localizations are done by iQue or Nintendo HK... So anything of the sort that would be edited for the sake of avoiding mainland scrutiny, would be done for brief lines or in minor moments if done at all, instead of more major edits like whenever Tencent publishes a game and they actually edit a lot more things like assets or lengthier dialogue. (Not to mention mainland Nintendo fans have gotten pretty mad at Tencent for their slow release schedule along with the silly edits like the Pow Block in NSMBU being a thing they wasted time on to begin with.)
In fact people there are so sick of Tencent's slowass release schedule due to the approval process, that most hardcore fans down there just buy imported switches/games from the black market anyway and don't bother with the tencent switch. Lines like this just come off as a case of localization on a per territory basis rather than as an out of fear scenario. (though that doesn't mean it wouldn't be edited if Tencent wanted to bring it mainland... Which they haven't announced yet)
The fact people jumped the gun and didn't think it was a case of a line being translated differently in a bunch of different languages is telling.
It's pretty sad since there's a lot to rightfully criticize about the country and how absurd their government is, but the blatant stereotyping and sinophobia I've seen here towards developers/people living there over things like EGS and Pokemon Unite is just going too far and pretty sickening
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Would this be viewed as a double entendre, like if the English version referred to corrupt officials as being "crooked" (bent)?
It's unfortunate but there's a very clear division between Pro-China and Anti-China camps in HK.. and you'll be amazed to read how they can interpret the exactly same event in completely opposite ways.
It's also the fact that Chinese translation doesn't mention the word 'human rights', which looks exactly the same in Kanji and Traditional Chinese and makes the news even more eye-catching.
It's the second post on this page, the page you wrote your reply on.
There are 7 posts before yours (again, on the same page) quoting it and stating that it should be threadmarked.
There's a line between "reading the entire thread" and "doing the bare minimum before posting your hot take".
Looks like a tech blog. I don't know about the site but poorly researched clickbait happens here in the west too lol.
It is probably more due to your tone. But thank you, I appreciate your anger.
Anyway, regarding actual topic, see discussion above.
I don't get the complaints in the first page, not even the English translation contained those words.
The game in Spanish doesn't use those words either, they don't even mention rights, so this is a weird thread for me.
Good thing that people who speak Chinese came here to clarified the situation a bit.
The game in Spanish doesn't use those words either, they don't even mention rights, so this is a weird thread for me.
Good thing that people who speak Chinese came here to clarified the situation a bit.
You're right.
Also this is the global version of the game. The same version you buy in the US basically.
The game does not have an official release in Mainland China, it has not gone through the approval process there and no changes have been mandated by the Chinese government ore regulators. So I wouldn't read into this too much with the most generous interpretation being the one above and the least generous interpretation being that they could have changed it in advance of a Mainland China release.
But ultimately people are jumping to conclusions overall.
I know it's been said multiple times, but good localization is not transliteration. Paper Mario is known for its heavy use of puns. Puns in Chinese can be super clever because they often contain multiple meanings dependent upon literal vs. colloquial use and spoken vs. written form. It makes sense that the Chinese translation would employ that.
Thanks for the native speakers here for providing that context. The knee-jerk hot takes here were extremely disturbing.
Thanks for the native speakers here for providing that context. The knee-jerk hot takes here were extremely disturbing.
OP
OP
Doesn't surprise me. This sort of thing has been going on for a long time in business and probably won't be changing anytime soon.
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