Dark Horse Releases

BayJumper said:

Do any of you watch movies in widescreen? If so, then y'all know, that in order to create such a "rectangular screen" effect, studios crop away approximately 10% of the image. From the bottom of the screen and from the top and add in those bars. Now, with that, are you missing out on anything when you watch the film on a widescreen? Of course not.

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Your analogy is flawed (besides being _completely_ wrong) in that people prefer the widescreen editions (statistically). I know I do. Perhaps a better analogy would be this would be the equivalent of being forced to hear the audio track for the blind instead of the regular track.

BayJumper said:

A similar logic can be applied to Berserk having its SFX translated. After reading my copy of DH release of vol 12, I could see that almost all the SFX are placed on the panels in an un-obtrusive manner. In other words, they're on the "neutral" areas of the artwork, where there's nothing happening. So you're not missing out on anything.

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So now we're judging which part of the panels are important and which aren't? If a sky or tree may be beautifully rendered but not deemed necessary to the narrative it can be covered?
Perhaps you'd prefer just having the story read to you?

BayJumper said:

Now tell me, throughout all those years of reading Berserk, have you ever (at least once) got confused from reading the Japanese SFX, and just wanted to know what it means but couldn't, 'cause you don't know Japanese? It happened to me, and I'm sure to at least some of you.

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No. Like I said earlier, this has never been a problem for me. I'm curious about what part of the book you were so confused about that you couldn't go on until you had heard the literal translation of the sfx. Thats another thing. Is the inclusion of a box saying, "hyuuuu" all that informative? An appendix giving the translation of the sfx and how its being used would solve any confusion you might have.

BayJumper said:

Now just for a second, ignore this "SFX captions covering up the art" crap and only concentrate on the fact that FINALLY the SFX is being translated, so you can enjoy Berserk in its full aspect.

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I love how you said "covering up the art" and "enjoy Berserk in its full aspect" in the same sentence. I think it sums up your post very well.
To sum up the rest about what you said about "progress", I don't know how you can argue full disclosure being preferable while advocating covering up parts you/DH deem unimportant. I don't think you can say this is a step in the right direction when the general consensus is that the fans either dislike it or don't mind it. Thats either a step backwards or a lateral movement.

Cummon DH. Put in an appendix! I don't think it'll cost... I mean, "break the reading experience" too much.

Interestingly enough, they don't crop anything when a movie is presented in wide-screen. It's when it's in full-screen that the edges are cropped off to format it to a square TV, versus a rectangular theater screen. And CnC is right, most people prefer the wide-screen because, in the instance of Star Wars Episode 4, you can see the god-damn sand person that Luke is talking about (hopefully people will know which part I mean...). Anyway, sorry for the off-topic.

BayJumper said:

Do any of you watch movies in widescreen? If so, then y'all know, that in order to create such a "rectangular screen" effect, studios crop away approximately 10% of the image. From the bottom of the screen and from the top and add in those bars. Now, with that, are you missing out on anything when you watch the film on a widescreen? Of course not.

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Yeah, seriously, this is ass-backwards. Where do you get your information?

Interestingly, your bad analogy contradicts your support of the caption boxes in the panels.
The reason I, personally, hate the "full-screen" versions of films, and even moreso those notorious "Pan & Scans", is that there is someone besides the artist determining what portions of the screen are not important and cutting those off, thus losing information, valuable or not.

Scorpio said:

I went ahead and emailed Chris Warner about my concerns on the topic of the translations.

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What an awesome first post! Welcome to SK.net Scorpio! As already said, your email to Chris Warner was very well written and well thought out,
although his reply was not exactly what I wanted to hear.
I look forward to your future communications with Chris Warner and you never know what may happen. If you keep your emails as well written as they are now maybe you'll be the person to sway his opinion on the SFX. And if you do that I guarantee that you'll have every future volume at your doorstep!

CnC said:

"Wait! Did batman just punch that guy with a 'POW' or a 'SOK'!? This changes everything!"

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Hehe, can I nominate CnC and Scorpio to be on the "change Dark Horse's mind" committee? I have never been blessed with the power of persuasion (at least not persuading men ) and I have a hard time expressing my thoughts in a professional manner. I really believe that others with a good writing ability can persuade Chris to get the SFX thing if they are persistant and professional.
Or maybe I'm daydreaming, I'll shut up now.

One thing Chris Warner said that a lot of you seem to be ignoring is the fact that adding an appendix adds pages and therefore adds to the cost of production.

I don't really have an answer for that point other than I think they'll be losing more revenue in the fans' backlash from messing up the art than they will be from adding one page to each volume.

smoke said:

One thing Chris Warner said that a lot of you seem to be ignoring is the fact that adding an appendix adds pages and therefore adds to the cost of production.

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I kinda joked about it on my last post, so I don't think we're ignoring it per se. In fact, I think cost of publication takes more precedence than any interruption of the "reading experience" to an editor.
But thats just my opinion. And I agree with the rest of your statement, or at least hope its true.

BayJumper said:

I could see that almost all the SFX are placed on the panels in an un-obtrusive manner. In other words, they're on the "neutral" areas of the artwork, where there's nothing happening. So you're not missing out on anything.

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Well fortunately they're not on the most important parts of the artwork, otherwise nobody would buy the books... "No way, the captions aren't on the characters' faces?! Phew, that was a big apprehension I had!" But seriously, like I said earlier it's really just a matter of personal taste here. It's fine if you don't mind it, but don't imagine that it's the same for everybody else since as you can see by the replies in this thread it isn't the case. Also, because it works with this volume doesn't mean it'll always do. There's bound to be a moment where it'll be messy given the number of volumes to cover, and when that happens it'll be too late to complain. I think my point here is that you should be more careful with your statements in regard to other people.

Translating Japanese sound effects directly while carrying their specific meaning in English isn't an easy task by the way, so in my opinion this system is bound to experience problems. Time will tell.

BayJumper said:

you can enjoy Berserk in its full aspect.

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Sorry, but the only way to enjoy Berserk in its "full aspect" is to read Japanese fluently. Being familiar with Japanese culture is also a plus. Something will always be lost otherwise.

smoke said:

One thing Chris Warner said that a lot of you seem to be ignoring is the fact that adding an appendix adds pages and therefore adds to the cost of production.

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Oh, I'm sure adding two pages to a 240 pages book is going to cost a lot to this company that has at least dozens of series printed every month, amounting to tens (hundreds?) of thousands of printed volumes in the end. In no way do they have contracts and agreements with printing companies, and I'm certain these same companies are going to very much mind that extra page as everybody knows that the exact number of pages to print is the most important and costly factor for industrial printing, as opposed to say, calibrating the printers. And that's why volume 01 is sold $13.95 retail when it's 232 pages, the same price than the other volumes which are 240 pages. Makes sense now that I think of it.

It's an argument people not working at DH can't really counter because of the evident lack of precise information, but then again doing an appendix is a gain of time as opposed to editing the panels like I said earlier in the thread. That's less work for an editor (look up panels on every page, find the most discreet yet still comprehensible place to put the textbox on, type the SFX, verify the final aspect, repeat), so in theory they'd gain money on that side of things.

Would anyone like the SFX translations better if they removed the white box around it? It might be harder to read depending on the background, but less of the art would be obstructed. I also think it would be less visually distracting to eliminate the negative space.

I'm not trying to be an optimistic ray of sunshine here, but I do appreciate the effort that Dark Horse is going through to make Berserk as accurate and professional as possible. Each printing and each volume seems to be better than the last. It's always preferrable to get it right the first time, of course, but it does show that they actually care. We know Chris Warner checks this board (And possibly others), so I'm sure they're listening and will try to reach some compromise that pleases most people.

I'm with Aaz about the extra page, though, that cost shouldn't be a big deal for them. Besides what he mentioned, Berserk seems to sell pretty well for them, though it could just be relative to the market. I don't completely buy it, but I'm not going to argue in favor of the appendix. I think eliminating the caption box would be enough for me.

Well, after reading what Walter wrote several days back...

Walter said:

You won't be helping Berserk by black listing the series because of this supeficial change, you know.

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...I decided to change my mind and pick up Vol. 12 of the DH releases today at the Uwajimaya in Seattle (which is conveniently located 2 blocks north of where I work). I've read through it and am pleasantly surprised by the fact that they have started using the correct term "causality" instead of the iffy "fate" they had used back in Vol. 3. On another note, not all of the SFX translations are the literal Japanese, many have the American version of the SFX (like "klata klata" instead of "gara gara" for a wagon being pulled by horses, for example). Also, many of the SFX translations are in the gutters when they have enough room. While reading through it I wasn't really distracted all that much by them, as I can read the Japanese SFX just fine (the one useful thing that came out of taking a year of Japanese in college ). All in all, while it's certainly nowhere near perfect, it's still Berserk and I'll be damned if I'm not gonna support it (especially with not owning most of the earlier Japanese volumes). So yeah, there ya have it.

Does anyone remember the comically bizarre sound effects that Dark Horse used when they were publishing Akira? I wonder if we should consider ourselves lucky that they've reigned themselves in? Some classics included "Grrrooo" (manhole being pushed), "Skling" (window being broken), "Flosh" (tank falling into river), and "Kropf" (tank driving through house). Great stuff

OK, I got my copy today and I absolutely hated the translated sound effects. I thought they were disruptive and annoying; only a few things could be worse than a white box with the text *FX: (insert sound here), regardless of where it appears on the page. I'm a bit worried that the manga is becoming a bit too americanized; when Dark Horse announced that they would be releasing berserk in the states, I thought two strong promises they made were that it would remain in the Japanese right to left format, and that the sound effects would remain untranslated. I don't think the newly translated sound effects are enough to make me stop buying the English releases, but I would really prefer that they stop doing it.

SMZKAH said:

I'm a bit worried that the manga is becoming a bit too americanized; when Dark Horse announced that they would be releasing berserk in the states, I thought two strong promises they made were that it would remain in the Japanese right to left format, and that the sound effects would remain untranslated.

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I remember the promise of untranslated sound effects as well. Another reason why it seems so odd that they were added this late into the series, even if they received some requests for it.

I'd be OK with them outside of panels....but inside?
Ugh...
Sfx are subconscious in comics, having them posted like road signs is just defeating the purpose.

TheSkyTraveller said:

I remember the promise of untranslated sound effects as well. Another reason why it seems so odd that they were added this late into the series, even if they received some requests for it.

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Allright, by seeing how a this SFX translations issue is generating so much heat, it's about time I'd chime in my two cents and try and cover the WHOLE picture on DH Manga (at long freaking last) translating the SFX in their English version of Berserk manga.

You see, since early 2000's, DH had partnered up with Digital Manga Publishing and started to license and release more rescent manga, such as Trigun, Trigun Maximum, Hellsing, Berserk an so on. Unlike the manga series that the DH published while being partnenred up with Studio Proteus, such as Akira, Ghost in the Shell, Lone Wolf and Cub, and etc., the manga releases from this recent collaboration came unflipped. But unfortunately, with the good came bad. None of the Japanese sound effects that were in those manga series were translated into English.
Ever since I picked up my copy of Trigun in 2002, those untranslated Japanese SFX plagued me as hell. Even going to a dentist to get my root canal done was more entertaining to me than reading a English translated.... no scratch that, English semi-translated manga, which does not have its sound effects translated. As you guys might have noticed from my previous posts in this thread, I'm no fan of untranslated SFX. I personally believe that when a manga is being translated into English language, those sound effects must be translated as well. And that's whether it is via English captions, or glossary appendixes. As long as they're translated, I've got no problems.
As of 2003, I've been writing numerous letters and e-mails to DH about those untranslated SFX. And this did not just concern Berserk anymore. As King of Wolves (another manga which Kentarou Miura had co-authored), Trigun Maximum, Hellsing, and others followed, this whole "rule" of not to translate the SFX had started to become more and more frighteningly normal. Several comic book and manga reviewing sites even expressed their displeasure and distaste with that, and as well as other fans on various anime and manga message boards. I sure as hell knew, that I wasn't the only one complaining to DH about this whole SFX issue. Then in March of this year, it started to seem like all of mine and numerous other fans' (who wanted translated SFX) efforts to get their Japanese SFX translated into English, paying off. It was all in the form of extra-large vol 1 of English version of a seinen manga classic (and one of my favorites), Crying Freeman, that the DH had put out. And in that book, there were those un-obstrusive English captions, which were there to translate the all Japanese SFX that were in the release. And now, seeing how vol 12 of Berserk finally receiving its SFX translations as well, I'm at long last happy that I can finally read the comic without having to try and guess the meanings of the katakana SFX. And to me, as long as the English SFX are NOT in those goddamned overly-stylized letterings, be it glossary appendixes or English captions, as long as they're TRANSLATED, that's fine by me.
So you see guys, getting those Japanese SFX translated for manga titles that I like, and which never had their sound effects translated before, is a major victory for me. And with that, I hope that all the future volume releases of Berserk, and as well as all the re-prints of the first 11 volumes, will receive their SFX translations as well. Whew!! (Damn, that was long!)
Peace out.

Disclaimer: all the opinions that you've just read above, are solely mine, and I don't expect any of you to agree with me, or anything that I've said.

BayJumper said:

As of 2003, I've been writing numerous letters and e-mails to DH about those untranslated SFX.

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Well, thanks a shit-ton, jack.

BayJumper said:

FX: HONK HONK

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What an engrossing tale, it's a lucky thing they saw the error of their ways before you had to commit suicide. Anyway, save the rest for your book, man. Nobody here wants to know your life story about SFX bubbles.

Unless it contains a hot quid pro quo "sfx for sex" scene with Chris Warner.

I've actually been writing to various manga publishing companies for a long time as well. I find it fundamentally disturbing that while a character's facial expression might hint at what hes thinking and feeling, the fact of the matter is I just don't know! Is that expression one of smug satisfaction or was he concocting some sort of devious plan? I could read ahead, often to just the next panel, to see if he was pleased with himself or if he set off some sort of trap, but that would disrupt the flow of my manga reading experiance. Instead, I've proposed to these companies to have a little box that has [internal monologue: HAHA! Little do these fools know that in the next panel I will spring a trap involving a spiked pit! And that they will rue the day they were born!] or something similar sprawled into the corrosponding panel. This may detract from the art, but hell, who needs the actual facial expression when such helpful information is provided? When they finally heed my calls, I can rest easy knowing that I leave no nuance to chance. Then maybe I can actually sleep at night instead of taking all those pills. It's ruining my life I tell you!

I support BayJumper 110%!

BayJumper said:

Allright, by seeing how a this SFX translations issue is generating so much heat, it's about time I'd chime in my two cents

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Hahaha, excuse me but I think you're the one that's been chiming in his 2 cents the most since this whole issue started. There hasn't been one page on which you didn't reiterate your opinion even though everybody knew it already. So yeah, it'd be nice if you could please refrain on posting huge chunks of nothing about it, I think the whole world's got your point now. No offense intended, it's just that it's getting redundant. I know it may be frustrating that a lot of people disagree with you, but insisting about it again and again won't change that.

Scorpio said:

I've actually been writing to various manga publishing companies for a long time as well. I find it fundamentally disturbing that while a character's facial expression might hint at what hes thinking and feeling, the fact of the matter is I just don't know! Is that expression one of smug satisfaction or was he concocting some sort of devious plan? I could read ahead, often to just the next panel, to see if he was pleased with himself or if he set off some sort of trap, but that would disrupt the flow of my manga reading experiance. Instead, I've proposed to these companies to have a little box that has [internal monologue: HAHA! Little do these fools know that in the next panel I will spring a trap involving a spiked pit! And that they will rue the day they were born!] or something similar sprawled into the corrosponding panel. This may detract from the art, but hell, who needs the actual facial expression when such helpful information is provided? When they finally heed my calls, I can rest easy knowing that I leave no nuance to chance. Then maybe I can actually sleep at night instead of taking all those pills. It's ruining my life I tell you!

I support BayJumper 110%!

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you ARE being sarcastic, right?
right?
please?

CnC said:

you ARE being sarcastic, right?

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Yes, I think he obviously is.

To Bayjumper..

Hey great, I've never been opposed to the idea of translated Sfx myself. In the end I prefer it.

BUT BY JESUS CHRIST there's such a thing as abuse...

Viz Media for instance makes notoriusly LARGE sfx, that can ruin a panels visual balance....
But the sign post sfx?
Much worse. Because they're completely inorganic to the comic page/panels. Any basic class in sequential art would tell you they're bad.

Its a nice gesture from DH, but its still a mistake...
And I really doubt that translated sfx had any real sway on sales or not. Adult titles don't need to worry about impressionable kids...

Aazealh said:

Yes, I think he obviously is.

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...phew

I just think its pretty awesome a lot of us have changed our avatars in protest.

these forums rule...
...that is all

CnC said:

...phew

I just think its pretty awesome a lot of us have changed our avatars in protest.

these forums rule...
...that is all

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Just FYI, I did not change my goddamn avatar. Someone from SK added [FX: Jumps] near my login name. Fuck.

BayJumper [FX: JUMPS] said:

Just FYI, I did not change my goddamn avatar. Someone from SK added [FX: Jumps] near my login name. Fuck.

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FYI, nobody changed your avatar. I and I like the addition to your login name. Its PROGRESS!

CnC said:

I just think its pretty awesome a lot of us have changed our avatars in protest.

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It's a signature that started it all though. Often copied, never equalled.

BayJumper [FX: JUMPS] said:

Just FYI, I did not change my goddamn avatar.

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Geez man, who cares about goddamn you? Everybody can see your avatar is unchanged, so what? Other members changed theirs, CnC commented about it. You don't have an obligation to reply to everything as if it was personally addressed to you... And you can change your username yourself in your profile, learn to use the board and please stop being so uptight. Relax, it's all in good humor.

EDIT: Ok, I took care of your avatar since you were so unhappy you had to post about it. Hope you like it!