Final Fantasy VI: Woolsey's dancing mad.
Exploring difficulties behind translations.
If you never played the SNES version of Final Fantasy VI, do it. Then come back to read this text.
In general Ted Woolsey (the translator who adapted FF6 into English) did an amazing job. Characters are distinct from each other, they act differently, they think differently, and this is conveyed not just through what they say, but also how they say it:
Terra: “Funny, isn't it… I was used by the Empire… even had my thoughts ripped from me… but here I am cooperating with the ‘enemy’…” [Heavy usage of ellipses - Terra is unsure and doubtful.]
Leo: “You also have a family there, right? Suppose you were to fall in battle. What would I tell them?” [Short, to-the-point sentences. “Actions speak louder than useless babble” mindset.]
Locke: “I PREFER the term ‘treasure hunter’!”; “Now, if you'll excuse me, I have an appointment with Kefka!” [playful usage of language, alongside a few euphemisms and coarse speech. Suitable for a street th… treasure hunter.]
Kefka Palazzo, the villain, is not an exception. On the contrary, it’s where Woolsey’s work shines the most; since the early game there’s something off on how Kefka speaks, as if he might not be the sanest person ever. Well, go figure - Woolsey was able to capture and transmit the insanity of the character to the audience.
But there’s one detail over Kefka that not even this wonder translator managed to convey: bokuchin/ぼくちん, the pronoun that Kefka uses to refer to himself in the original.
What’s so special about bokuchin? It’s a rather paradoxal pronoun coupling the “boku” that you’d expect from a young boy (not from a court mage), plus a “chin” that is rather close to a royal we (not from a court mage either). That pronoun alone shows that Kefka is childish and power-hungry, and sees no issue being self-contradictory.
And more than that, the pronoun is a big, big spoiler. Guess who kills the emperor and seizes the power? The one using “chin”. I bet that, for plenty people playing the game in Japanese, that would be a “gotcha!” moment.
And yet for the ones playing the English version, that moment was completely lost in translation. Buried like Figaro into the sand, only to resurface later on, as the internet connects players from different linguistic communities. Like the son of a submariner.