[Game] Umineko no Naku Koro ni - Translation Project

[k//eternal]

As far as I know, none of us at WH signed away our right to state our thoughts and opinions when we jumped on board. Whether or not you agree with Klash, it's kind of sad to deny his right to even say what he wants to say.

Some basic courtesy wouldn't hurt here, people.

[MeoTwister5]

Holy crap I didn't know the Ep6 patch was finished almost a week ago.

I guess it's time to get back into the groove. I've missed more than 6 months worth of theories and discussions so it's time to catch up.

[Klashikari]

Originally Posted by Sir Andy Richter

Every fanbase every translation group has idiot fans. Posting this publically doesn't seem very professional..

I'm perfectly aware there are idiots in the world, regardless what field we are on. I'm also perfectly aware that a portion of people act like bunch of trolls on purpose (hell, the whole "messaaaaaaage" stuff didn't bother me until someone brought it on this thread for no good reason).
Heck, some people actually showed me before the "meanwhile at witch hunt" stuff from 4chan, and it made me and chrono chuckle at times. Second degree and context aren't hard to read.

That said I'm talking about people -really- thinking this way. For the little trivia, I met some people at a french convention who told me we were slow, with a straight face, without even knowing what I was talking about when I was asking if it was a joke.
If it was a single occurence, that would only be an afterthought of few moments, however...
Over a full year, I've seen that kind of "serious" comment about our pace, 2-3 times IRL, majority of the time on various boards. Perhaps they were people who don't have much experience with VN translation release. Perhaps they were accustomed to our first full release (the gap between episode 1 and episode 2 was definitely short). I have no idea, and I would have preferred that kind of people would at least consider the source material in general, before complaining about something that we have dedicated 2 years on it.

As I said in my post, we aren't professional and I believe critics and feedback aren't exclusive to the readers, are they?

[Zero Sora]

I'm wondering if Umineko is the first VN that people here have started to read. A lot of you people may complain about how slow WH are, but have you people ever waited for a VN other then Umineko to be translated? Now other VN's can take up to anywhere between 6 months to a year to be translated. No joke. I for one, am actually very impressed with WH's speed and accuracy when translating Umineko. This wait is nothing compared to most fan translated VNs out there. So have a little patience people.

[moichispa]

Originally Posted by Klashikari

GIGA DR-... RANT BREAKER.

I think you can complain. I even wonder why did you didn't did it before .


As a not native speaker and a student of English and Japanese I'm used to grammar points and those stuff of student so I can say easily that both languages are very different between them. and that Japanese sometimes can very difficult to be translated.

I have to confess that until episode 6 I didn't realized to much about your work. It can't be helped if umineko was my 1st VN/SN and I rode it just 2 months before ep5 patch. But while I was reading ep6 I realized how good your work is.

People who complain just compare it with the time of another VN but if you simply measure time seeing the actual umineko you will understand that WH translations are very good and fast.

As you say people who complain can start learning Japanese but It is rather useful for them to complain for 6 moths that study Japanese for 4, 5 (or even more) years in order to be able to read then without relaying in yours translations.

It just a few words. As longer as us don't have enough Japanese level We need you so don't give up witch hunt.

Because you have end your work for a while forget all and feel free to go out. It is summer and the weather is so good for going outside. (being at home with hot chocolate for under equator people). So don't worry and thanks for all

[Katz]

Thanks so much to the Witch Hunt for everything. Without these translations I would never have been able to enjoy the Umineko games.

It really must be frustrating to have people complaining about the speed of the project. Honestly, whether it is slow or not, no one really has the right to complain since the Witch Hunt is doing us all a huge favor by translating it in the first place. Beyond that, it is such a good quality translation too.

[Digdri]

Quite understandable reaction and I guess sometimes the kettle has to explode so people see not everything works fine because nobody mentions anything.

At least for me all those infos about your works on the project and its complexity you put in this thread once in a while give me some nice statements to link to people who think Japanese to English translations for animes / games or whatever are just a god given normality instead of work someone has to do.
I would blame the huge floor of Fansub for almost anything visual from Japan and the whole competitiveness mindset of speed over quality many of those group seem to subscribe to for so many people actually ignoring how much time and effort has to be put into this. This obviously is debatable but IMO thats part of the reason why some of the more ignorant people have so little patience for the release.... been spoiled by all that the net has to offer instantly by now not realizing how game translation on this level are a totally different beast.
And then obviously their are people who are really that ignorant..... just seeing a "magical link out of nowhere" enabling them to play some game they never could have otherwise and after finishing they wonder "why not moar.... where is the next patch".... a bit of exaggeration but still not everybody knows their is a community around these games for sure.

But I guess what also contributes to this is just how much of a success this game series has become. I always was fascinated how broad and active the non-japanese community surrounding these game has become considering how this game obviously target a rather special interest market. Thats a really heterogeneous group of people I'm thinking about here.
So while most people regularly dealing with VN usually are interests in other Japanese games or Animes anyways and (I suspect) have at least a vague idea of the complexity of Japanese and how really fond Japan is of playing with all the resulting possibilities in language you cannot even take THAT for granted for fans.
So in conclusion this may be just be a big group of people not knowing what they are talking about at all.

And then their is your image... I don't know how this started but when Umineko became my hobby around EP4 patch came out and I guess WitchHunt already had become a name associated with quality and fast translations which stuck in the head for many. And just like sequels to blockbuster movies that usually get bashed by hardcore fans for not reaching the impossible hype that also just the expectation your have to dealing with for setting so high standard for yourself.
After all some Umineko fans may not have ever played any other VN/SN and don't even know what the average translation group accomplishes.
(Not that you cannot be proud of this image in the first place.)

But enough of Mr. Obvious talk and lets be a bit more constructive:

While the complexity of this project and the time needed cannot by chance I also noticed how often you commented on your progress and it seem to me that those "lacking" updates on the site were a little drama in itself at times. So I wondered if it wouldn't be wiser to do away with this or change the system for this.
Before every fan here starts bashing me: Don't get me wrong. I appreciate that feedback as much as everybody else but I read time and time again your comments how translation work just cannot realistically be measured in percentage digits and after all its just a service to the community which shouldn't be a obligation if the just have so little meaning.

I know this is a rather shaky comparison but I would like to point in to the commercial gaming industry. Taking Blizzard as a example. They obviously know what it means to sell their products and what PR is about but even those big fishes shy away from making announcements which are not 100% solid. Always quality first and feedback to community later... "Comes when done" even has become a catch phase. But thats not because the don't want to share plans but because the backlash through disappointed fans and the accusation of "broken promises" just weights much heavier for them then any positive PR though announcements could (as they stated themselves).

Obviously this idea loses some of its meaning realizing how companies have vastly different intentions and priorities then a fan project group but I think what someone more versed in consumer psychology may draw as a conclusion from this may even have relevance for you. ;P
Personally I only remember what I once learned about project management: Never force status feedback into a system where it doesn't fit in. Because if you demand any number from someone for feedback he also will give you ANY number.

Turning this around I guess those % infos just put a Windows progress bar into peoples minds and thats not really representing what this is about .... and yes, I realize the irony how this was the first example that came to my mind

Perhaps I'm just overthinking stuff but if people even make memes about this (even if that just meant to be funny) it still shows that people care about that. And you obviously do too mentioning it so often.

I think especially EP6 has shown how their is almost no meaning to this anymore.

[cmos]

I'm sorry, can you please clarify this sentence?
It's from ep4 tea party:

彼ら全員には致命傷となった銃創と思わしき傷痕があったぞ!
It was translated as:
All of them had wounds resembling gunshot wounds which became fatal!

Is this supposed to be "they had wounds (resembling gunshot wounds) which became fatal" or "they had wounds (resembling gunshot wounds which became fatal)"? Because some people seems to be confused about this line. Thanks.

[zorahk]

Originally Posted by cmos

I'm sorry, can you please clarify this sentence?
It's from ep4 tea party:

彼ら全員には致命傷となった銃創と思わしき傷痕があったぞ!
It was translated as:
All of them had wounds resembling gunshot wounds which became fatal!

Is this supposed to be "they had wounds (resembling gunshot wounds) which became fatal" or "they had wounds (resembling gunshot wounds which became fatal)"? Because some people seems to be confused about this line. Thanks.

The former is how i would read that

[KoolNickMan]

Originally Posted by KoolNickMan

I've been having some trouble with the patch. For some reason, the game crashes whenever I try to progress past this point:

Spoiler for Screen:

I made sure to see if this was a problem with the patch or the game itself, but if I run the non-patched version, I can easily progress past that point without any problems. I'm running on Vista, so I also made sure to run everything as admin, but it doesn't fix the problem.

Any ideas on what's going on?

So, does anyone know what's going on? Cause I kinda wanna play some episode 6.

[luckyssol]

Do you have all the BGM files? There should be three folders:
BGM -> 72 files, 363mb
BGM0 -> 23 files, 107mb
BGM2 -> 27 files, 130mb

[Reinako]

First off, I'd really like to thank Witch Hunt for the amazing translations that they've been doing. I'm really grateful that we have such a group that is passionate about translating the game, and it makes me feel really happy.

I wanted to ask about a problem, if that's alright with everyone (and I'm hoping I can post this here)...

Spoiler for Lengthish?:

Well, I originally downloaded Umineko and the patch onto my desktop and then everything was then extracted into C:\, where the "07th_Expansion" folder was along with the BGM and the English and everything. I then played until towards the end of EP1 and had a save file there.

However, after that, I decided to move everything into my external harddrive, so that I could play it from there instead. Therefore I moved all the files from my C:\ to F:\, and deleted all the files from C:\.

From there, I took the external harddrive and used it on my aunt's laptop, which worked perfectly fine with one exception. The save file was not there, and so I therefore decided to go through EP1 (at a faster speed) and made it to the beginning of EP2. Then I saved there and removed the external harddrive.

When I took it back home to my computer, the save file I had saved on the laptop was not there, but the one from the previous night that I had saved on my computer.

I am wondering if there could be any solution, or even an explanation to this, if possible. I'd be sincerely grateful. ^^; It just confused me greatly that even though I had the game sitting in my F:\, that it wouldn't have the same save file anymore.

[KoolNickMan]

Originally Posted by Ssol

Do you have all the BGM files? There should be three folders:
BGM -> 72 files, 363mb
BGM0 -> 23 files, 107mb
BGM2 -> 27 files, 130mb

Just double checked there, that matches up with what I've got.

[st_nick5]

Originally Posted by Reinako

First off, I'd really like to thank Witch Hunt for the amazing translations that they've been doing. I'm really grateful that we have such a group that is passionate about translating the game, and it makes me feel really happy.

I wanted to ask about a problem, if that's alright with everyone (and I'm hoping I can post this here)...

Spoiler for Lengthish?:

Well, I originally downloaded Umineko and the patch onto my desktop and then everything was then extracted into C:\, where the "07th_Expansion" folder was along with the BGM and the English and everything. I then played until towards the end of EP1 and had a save file there.

However, after that, I decided to move everything into my external harddrive, so that I could play it from there instead. Therefore I moved all the files from my C:\ to F:\, and deleted all the files from C:\.

From there, I took the external harddrive and used it on my aunt's laptop, which worked perfectly fine with one exception. The save file was not there, and so I therefore decided to go through EP1 (at a faster speed) and made it to the beginning of EP2. Then I saved there and removed the external harddrive.

When I took it back home to my computer, the save file I had saved on the laptop was not there, but the one from the previous night that I had saved on my computer.

I am wondering if there could be any solution, or even an explanation to this, if possible. I'd be sincerely grateful. ^^; It just confused me greatly that even though I had the game sitting in my F:\, that it wouldn't have the same save file anymore.

The save file is saved in C:\ProgramData\Umineko6

Well, I originally downloaded Umineko and the patch onto my desktop

I assume you mean installed Umineko from the disk and downloaded the patch?

[Disz]

They take long?...I haven't read any other VN so I wouldn't know.I always thought they were fast.We don't need them to go fast anyways.We want to solve it before the release of EP7,or it's no fun.

[Reinako]

Originally Posted by st_nick5

The save file is saved in C:\ProgramData\Umineko6


I assume you mean installed Umineko from the disk and downloaded the patch?

Thank you very much. And yes, my apologies, I worded that a bit weirdly, I agree. ()

[Thunder Book]

Originally Posted by Klashikari

I'm also perfectly aware that a portion of people act like bunch of trolls on purpose (hell, the whole "messaaaaaaage" stuff didn't bother me until someone brought it on this thread for no good reason).

I really hope this wasn't directed at me, because I was just asking a question about the translation I was legitimately wondering about.

[luckyssol]

Originally Posted by KoolNickMan

Just double checked there, that matches up with what I've got.

Are you loading an existing save state? Save states can become corrupt between different patch versions. Try starting a new game and hold down CTRL to super fast foward to the point the game crashes.

If that doesn't get you past it then go to:
Control Panel -> Regional and Language Options -> Administrative Tab
Set the system locale to Japanese and restart the computer.

If it still won't go past that point then uninstall the game and then reinstall it.

After that, I'm not sure what else to try. Maybe someone else here has more ideas. If it still doesn't work at least reply here with a screenshot of your Umineko folder.

[zorahk]

My god this is completely OT but ssol I just read your theory and my mind is now blown. You sir are winner

[Pika_power]

Originally Posted by Thunder Book

I really hope this wasn't directed at me, because I was just asking a question about the translation I was legitimately wondering about.

And I'm still curious about it. Along with some other points, such as the keyboard mashing after someone died. e.g.

Spoiler for EP2, EP4:

Batter's death in EP2 and Sakutaro's death in EP4.

Also, how do you decide how to translate some names? If I look back, prior to your translation, people called Kinzo Kinzou, Ange Anje/Anji, etc. I want to know why you did what you did.