Word has it that Nob Ogasawara, the man behind the translation of nearly all the Pokemon titles available, has been let go. Nintendo says they will be taking on the translation task internally from here on out. The following is a posting from Nob Ogasawara himself.:
So, after nearly a dozen years and nineteen Pokemon games later, I am out. I was told that my services were no longer needed because translation work will be handled internally hereafter. They assured me it’s not a quality issue, but because of some bureaucratic thing. OK, cool, whatever. As a career-long-and-not-about-to-change freelancer, I always expected this day to come, but not for this reason. But such is life.
I’ll always be grateful for the incredible opportunity the franchise gave me. I mean, sheesh, as the sole translator on those games, my words went out to tens of millions of people, perhaps even more, since all the Euro translations were based on the localized-by-me English text. Tens of millions? Maybe in the hundreds of millions? That’s mindboggling for an average shmoe of an immigrant kid who grew up in a Canadian suburb. It amazes me how many people its reached and how deep it has penetrated into the sociocultural fabric of… OK, enough of that grad paper horse****. Still, whenever I see some little kid playing a Pokemon… gently caress, yeah, I still get a surge of pride.
Continued Next Post
03/09/2008
Captain Rainbow
Don't Be Surprised If I Ain't Here Later