Why Guile's Theme Goes With Everything: Part 3

Welcome back for another installment of The SFII Interview.  While this may be steering away from my real interests, I made the decision to finish translating the interview - nobody likes to see a job half done.

I'm rather pleased I chose to try and complete the whole thing.  It was an eyeopener for me, and I definitely something about game music production.  It sounds like Abe had a pretty tough time due to the limitations of what he had to work with, but it certainly didn't prevent him and his partner creating some brilliant and memorable music.

From a couple of other interviews I've read, it seems like the tribulations Abe and Tanaka had to face were happening across the industry due to the lack of support for MIDI production.  For another view on game music production for old Nintendo systems, have a look at this interview with Keiji Yamagishi.

Why Guile's Theme Goes With Everything: Part 2

So I realised that the first part of the interview translation is not directly related to Guile.  Neither is this part.  Apologies for the misleading title but I like a nice SF meme.  This second part goes into detail about the name changes that occurred with (three of) the final four bosses, and is what I referenced way back in this post.  As far as I'm concerned, this is the interesting stuff!  There is also some background on Abe as he gives us a few tidbits on his formative years at Capcom, and Takano shows just how much of an SF nerd he really is.

Why Guile's Theme Goes With Everything: Part 1

Back in my second post, I mentioned that I'd consider translating that old interview with some of the Capcom staff.  Well, I decided to get stuck in and at least give it a go, and I now have a new found respect for translators and localisation staff everywhere!

As this is the very first attempt at translation for me, I don't think this is a perfect piece of work.  There were several sections, particularly in the second part (coming soon), that proved troublesome for various reasons.  For one thing, I think the text I translated is a word for word, largely unedited, transcript of the original interview and as such, even in Japanese, it doesn't flow particularly well.

How to avoid a lawsuit

Somewhat fittingly, I decided to make my first real post about a rather well-known localization change in one of the most popular games of its era.  The only way you won’t have played this game (in at least one of its many forms) is because you’re some kind of limbless invertebrate, or a piece of Dairylea, or five years old, or made entirely of up quarks.  I’m going to tell you in a minute what this game is, but first, let me tell you a story; the story of when I first found this big little variation. 

Jurassic Park was in the cinemas; the Chicago Bulls were all over that shit; and Nirvana were in the hit parade.  There I am flicking through a copy of my older brother’s SuperPlay magazine round Dad’s shop.  Me and my little bro weren’t allowed to play on the SNES unless our older brother, whose console it was anyway, was there to make sure we didn’t start stabbing each other in the eyes with RCA cables.  We had to make do with the mag.  (He actually caught us having a cheeky covert go on UN Squadron once, but it was only that one time, honest!)

Turning each page listlessly, longing glare in my tear-heavy, sapphire eyes, I wait intently until my brother comes back and I can start pestering him.  I flip the page to the pro tips segment.  “Oooh!” I think, “My brother’s got this game.”  Scanning over the words, but taking particular interest in the pictures, I notice what I can only assume to be a typo.  But that can’t be a typo because I’m sure I’m looking at a screenshot, and that’s not his name on the version our brother has!  Utterly confused by this I probably went off and start playing Batman on the Gameboy.   This is the extent to which I can remember that moment in my life.  That memory occupies the part of my brain where “remember to flush” is supposed be.