Dark Horse Releases

Walter

Administrator
Staff member
DH should actually get "caught up" to the japanese releases by 2010 at the rate of 1 volume every 2 months. Berserk is currently about 5 episodes shy of its 34th volume.
 
I just finished DH volume 26, and had a translation question. As Grunbeld is stomping on Guts on page 177, he refers to him as "Archenemy." In the translation archive on this site, you guys went with "Old Enemy." I'm a fool for asking y'all to second guess yourselves, but which is more correct? I ask because earlier I had been reading "why Griffith doesn't kill guts" thread, and the answer that kept coming up was, "Guts doesn't matter to Griffith." If Guts really doesn't matter, why would Grunbeld hear of him as an archenemy?
 

Aazealh

Administrator
Staff member
Bacongod said:
I just finished DH volume 26, and had a translation question. As Grunbeld is stomping on Guts on page 177, he refers to him as "Archenemy." In the translation archive on this site, you guys went with "Old Enemy." I'm a fool for asking y'all to second guess yourselves, but which is more correct? I ask because earlier I had been reading "why Griffith doesn't kill guts" thread, and the answer that kept coming up was, "Guts doesn't matter to Griffith." If Guts really doesn't matter, why would Grunbeld hear of him as an archenemy?

The word in question is "宿敵". The standard dictionary definition: "an old enemy[foe]; a mortal enemy; a rival of long standing". The word doesn't necessarily convey an indication of time. With that in mind, "archenemy" seems an acceptable translation to me.

As for your question, keep in mind that Grunbeld was talking on behalf of the apostles. And I refer you to Femto's comment about Guts killing apostles on page 77 of volume 3.
 

Walter

Administrator
Staff member
Well, I just finished reading DH's 26, and I have to say, they made some weird/embarrassing translation choices in key parts. It's like they try to inject personality at the worst possible times. The worst, for me, is when Zodd sees Guts wearing the Berserker Armor. He turns to Skull Knight and says: "Ah, the memories," instead of just "It brings back good memories." Or ANYTHING less casual sounding.  Or when Apostles are trying to get past Skull Knight to Flora and end up getting sliced,  instead of him saying: "It will not happen" or even "None shall pass." It's "No, you don't" (as in, "Ah, Ah, Ah! I don't THINK so!"  :badbone:) Ugh.

Another thing is the way they've inconsistently transliterated the sound effects. Sometimes they'll do a romanization of the effect, and other times they attempt to actually interpret its meaning for us, which I don't appreciate, especially when they fuck it up. For instance, In the second ep of 26, when Slan begins to rise from the waters of the Qliphoth, Guts' brand starts to bleed severely, but the actual sound effect is: "DO-KU" as in, a heart beat. It makes sense. But DH translates this as "*FX: Bleed." As if that wasn't already readily apparent when paired with the visuals, they felt they had to railroad over the actual meaning of the SFX to get that bleeding across.  :schierke:

I bought a few more DH volumes along with 26 with my eyes wide open to the possibility they were doing things right. I really wanted to enjoy this volume... but man they sure are making it hard for me.

Some more big ones I remembered after another glance through:
- When Skull Knight calls upon Guts to use the Dragon Slayer against Slan, "With that sword of yours, Knight, it can be done...!" (Guts is normally referred to as 'swordsman,' since he was never a noble, or knighted. With all the knowledge SK possesses, I thought for sure he'd know this...?  :SK:)
- They fucked up Causality again. They refer to it as Karma (despite them previously translating Inga as Causality in vol 12, during Void's speech in multiple segments). The worst is their use of it here though: SK: "IT IS KARMIC." and ... Flora: "...But Karma is by no means a circle."  :mozgus:
 
Y'know... errm. Well, I'm a college student, with a bit of cash from work, but this is making it rather difficult to be able to justify buying this edition. Some of what's being reported here is just incomprehensible.

Going by some of these... translation decisions, is it a possibility that DH could be using Berserk to train new staff? People who aren't used to translating, who don't know or care about the Berserk world. If it's just 'here, practice on this, we'll publish whatever you come up with', then it would start to make sense.

Me, I'm more and more wanting to just go ahead and buy the Japanese versions. There's far, far better translations here, and I won't have to suffer though a the weird slang and... as Walter posted, such ridiculous things as '*FX: Bleed.'. :schierke: (most useful emoticon ever, btw)

*edit* oh wow, sorry, spelling and such. never post /while/ drinking moring coffee, jeeze. */edit*
 

Aazealh

Administrator
Staff member

Reading this thread is depressing. :sad:

Bekul said:
Me, I'm more and more wanting to just go ahead and buy the Japanese versions.

You mean you haven't got them all already?! Do it. DO IT NOW!! :mozgus:
 

Walter

Administrator
Staff member
Continuing the tradition, I thought I'd add this, from the back cover:

[quote author=This fucking guy at Dark Horse who hates us all]"Created by Kentarou Miura, Berserk is the hammer of the manga forge, a white-hot amalgam of bruising action, breathless horror, and brimstone humor (UGH) that separates men from boys, wheat from chaff, and heads from shoulders. Do you want to live forever?"
[/quote]
gutsbarf.gif
 
Aazealh said:
You mean you haven't got them all already?! Do it. DO IT NOW!! :mozgus:

Well, I've got #'s 2,4,7, and 15. My precious'ess!

Walter said:
Continuing the tradition, I thought I'd add this, from the back cover:

"Created by Kentarou Miura, Berserk is the hammer of the manga forge, a (could not miss the point any harder) that separates men from boys, wheat from chaff..."

Coming soon...

BERSERK: The BREADMAKER
BERSERK: The BREADENING
BERSERK: Cooking with Slan! :slan:
BERSERK: Farmer Guts Roasts a Troll. :schnoz:
BERSERK: Old McGriffith Had a Farm... :griff:
BERSERK: Puberty! Separating Men :guts: from Boys :sad:
 

Walter

Administrator
Staff member
That's going too far. The vast majority of the volumes are great. I'm glad to have the series in English. I just wish they wouldn't mess up these important scenes, and would look more carefully at their word choices.
 

Th3Branded0ne

I'll be back.
I guess I did go in Berserk mode there too. I do wonder how much proof reading is done in a graphic novel, or they trust the guys who are doing it and go with what they have done.
 
X

Xem

Guest
I finally got my hands on the latest volume as well, but I didn't notice the mistranslations like Walter did. My biggest concern now is shelf space. I've got this perfect little nook where all my Berserk stuff fits perfectly but with the addition of volume 28 in March I'm going to have to change something. =P

I'm still really enjoying being able to read these in volume format without looking up translations.... I might see a thread revival in the volume analysis thread sometime soon. =) Why'd we stop that anyway?
 

Scorpio

Courtesy of Grail's doodling.
Walter said:
Continuing the tradition, I thought I'd add this, from the back cover:
"Created by Kentarou Miura, Berserk is the hammer of the manga forge, a white-hot amalgam of bruising action, breathless horror, and brimstone humor (UGH) that separates men from boys, wheat from chaff, and heads from shoulders. Do you want to live forever?"
gutsbarf.gif

This is poetry considering some of their earlier ones.
 

Griffith

With the streak of a tear, Like morning dew
Walter said:
Well, I just finished reading DH's 26, and I have to say, they made some weird/embarrassing translation choices in key parts. It's like they try to inject personality at the worst possible times. The worst, for me, is when Zodd sees Guts wearing the Berserker Armor. He turns to Skull Knight and says: "Ah, the memories," instead of just "It brings back good memories." Or ANYTHING less casual sounding. Or when Apostles are trying to get past Skull Knight to Flora and up getting sliced, instead of him saying: "It will not happen" or even "None shall pass." It's "No, you don't" (as in, "Ah, Ah, Ah! I don't THINK so!" :badbone:) Ugh.

I don't know, all that seems like small potatoes compared to the awkwardly garbled translation of Slan and Skully's conversation, at least to me. By no means is the DH translation "appropriate" on a whole anyway, so these being the translations we have (hello, Knight of Skeleton), all I care about is the bare bones message more-or-less accurately getting across, even if their style choices are irksome. I'll even go so far as to say some of it might be on our end, for example, in my edition, Skully simply says, "No, you won't." Perfectly boringly appropriate (I wish more of it were that way), so either we've discovered a variation, or after 26 volumes of this Dark Horse has conditioned you to see bad in their work even when it's not there. =)
 

Walter

Administrator
Staff member
Griffith said:
I don't know, all that seems like small potatoes compared to the awkwardly garbled translation of Slan and Skully's conversation, at least to me. By no means is the DH translation "appropriate" on a whole anyway, so these being the translations we have (hello, Knight of Skeleton), all I care about is the message effectively getting across, even if their style choices are irksome.
Karma does not equal Causality. That's got nothing to do with irksome style changes. They just fucked that one up.

I'll even go so far as to say some of it might be on your end, for example, in my edition, Skully simply says, "No, you won't." Perfectly boringly fine, so either we've discovered an edition difference, or after 26 volumes of this Dark Horse has conditioned you to see bad in their work even when it's not there. =)
That's what I meant to type: "No, you won't." I just mistyped it ... It's still retarded. I think I made my case clear in my post. There were other ways they could have delivered that line that would have been ... more Skull Knight-y. :SK:
 

Griffith

With the streak of a tear, Like morning dew
Walter said:
Karma does not equal Causality. That's got nothing to do with irksome style changes. They just fucked that one up.

I'll admit I'm pretty bummed that my standards have lowered to the point where it's good enough for me just if I can understand it after basically studying Berserk for a decade. To me, it's like a good companion if you're already an "expert", so you can translate their translation back into what it's supposed to mean. =)

Otherwise, without other sources of reference, it can be just as misleading as helpful.

Walter said:
That's what I meant to type: "No, you won't." I just mistyped it ... It's still retarded. I think I made my case clear in my post. There were other ways they could have delivered that line that would have been ... more Skull Knight-y. :SK:

There's probably a thousand examples of things like that though, it's the equivalent of citing them for jaywalking (when they're covered in blood =). Like I said, it's invaluable to an English-speaker's knowledge of the series, it's just by no means definitive.
 
One thing I didn't quite understand from reading the last volume, if the armor is supporting his broken bones how did they remove the armor, once removed how was he able to walk or do the elves also repair bone thanks.
 

Aazealh

Administrator
Staff member
Struggler said:
One thing I didn't quite understand from reading the last volume, if the armor is supporting his broken bones how did they remove the armor, once removed how was he able to walk or do the elves also repair bone thanks.

I think it's all covered in episode 236:

Schierke: I still think you should take that armour off and rest for at least 4 or 5 more days

Guts: The charm that your mentor put in this armour, and Casca's necklace aren't things that will last forever. I've been down/sleeping for close to a month now, we can't waste anymore time.

Guts: It's true the pain won't go away as much compared to when I'm fighting but because of this, there won't be any problems with our journey.
Guts: And thanks to your medicine and those little guys, I'm becoming quite a bit better.

Schierke: But, it's still over doing it. It was truly terrible after that battle. He kept bleeding for days because the armour stuck onto him.
Schierke: And once we finally took it off, he lost consciousness and awakened from the pain over and over. And everytime, his wounds would open again.

Basically, they waited some days but eventually had to forcibly remove the armor because the bleeding didn't stop (and by that time we can assume that the bone reparative process had already started), and then Schierke and the elves did their thing for almost a month before Guts started walking again (while wearing the armor so that he didn't feel the pain as sharply).
 

Solarmaker

I am completly ready for a Zombie attack!
I know how you guys feel about the horrid translations. It's hard to be watching an anime and spot problems with the subtitles. Makes you want to throw carrots at something. I really wonder who DOES the translation for Berserk?

But also you have to consider that sometimes when they make a change from the translation it could be that maybe there isn't enough space in the speech bubble or some other pathetic excuse like that.

But i hate it as well when they translate the sound effects. I mean how angry would you be if you were reading an american comic that had been translated and instead of putting "Kaboom" or something like that they put "loud noise". LAME.

It's probably harder for you guys who can read the original Japanese since you see how badly it's done, but from the spectrum of the readers who only read the english version, it's ok and at least it makes sense. I mean they may not translate properly and directly from but how much more of a tragedy would it be if it just didn't make sense? also, at least DH is doing a good job of bringing Berserk to the people even if it does have a few translation errors.
 

Oburi

All praise Grail
I wish they handled the series differently from the start. A manga like berserk should get, at the very least, the same treatment as a series like Eden, for example. The overall quality of the book is very nice for that series. Everything from the quality of the cover to the paper they use for the actual pages. And that series isn't even as popular.
 
i've had volumes 1-7 of the dark horse releases.. ended up selling them.. i bought them again, this time volumes 1-16.. ended up selling them.. i recently bought volumes 1-27 in a lot on eBay for a great price. my point is, i have OCD, and i blame it on the slow releases!! :schnoz:
 

Oburi

All praise Grail
VICTORIOUS march said:
i've had volumes 1-7 of the dark horse releases.. ended up selling them.. i bought them again, this time volumes 1-16.. ended up selling them.. i recently bought volumes 1-27 in a lot on eBay for a great price. my point is, i have OCD, and i blame it on the slow releases!! :schnoz:

? lol. I can't believe you bought them and sold them twice. And I think you may have beaten me on that 1-27 lot on e-bay. It's probably the same one I was trying to get because you almost never find the whole set like that so I was bidding on that one. You bastard!!! :azan:
 

Rhombaad

Video Game Time Traveler
VICTORIOUS march said:
my point is, i have OCD, and i blame it on the slow releases!! :schnoz:

The releases are actually quite fast. You'd probably lose your mind if you only followed the Japanese releases, since they come out only once or twice a year, instead of the two month wait you're faced with here.
 

Solarmaker

I am completly ready for a Zombie attack!
seriously, i mean miura has been writing berserk for 18 years. let me say that again, 18 years. why the hell does he only release chapters practically only when the planets are aligned? i mean i waited almost a whole year to read the latest 6 chapters and then at the end of those it said "miura-san will be taking a break."

and its not like hes been working on anything else right? if he was I'd understand but why does he string us all out like this? ohh...it's probably for the money huh?
 

Th3Branded0ne

I'll be back.
Solarmaker said:
seriously, i mean miura has been writing berserk for 18 years. let me say that again, 18 years. why the hell does he only release chapters practically only when the planets are aligned? i mean i waited almost a whole year to read the latest 6 chapters and then at the end of those it said "miura-san will be taking a break."

and its not like hes been working on anything else right? if he was I'd understand but why does he string us all out like this? ohh...it's probably for the money huh?

There are more factors to take place. He writes and draws the manga. He has a life besides berserk. Storyboard to see how the final product will look like, storywise and visually. He might have other jobs he might be doing for an ad or anything else we might not care about. I don't think it's much for the money, I think he is dedicated to Berserk as you might be to your job, career or family.
 
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