They had a person who spoke some English and she did her best with Final Fantasy II, which was her game. This was later confirmed by another translator: But there are also small chunks of text throughout the script that were clearly revised and edited to sound better. ItвЂ™s clear that the script was translated by a Japanese speaker who lacked the ability to write in fluent English.If you can think of any others, let me know!ДЄnyway, if the Japanese text doesnвЂ™t mention anything about spoony bards, why did the line get changed during the translation? IвЂ™ve been analyzing all the Final Fantasy IV scripts for years now, and I feel there were two main causes behind the line change: IвЂ™m sure IвЂ™m overlooking some other factors for the quoteвЂ™s longevity, like the advent of household Internet access. ItвЂ™s a completely made-up line that doesnвЂ™t exist in the original game.ДЄctually, if youвЂ™ve played Final Fantasy VI before, you know that scene where Gau jumps around and laughs at CyanвЂ™s use of вЂњthouвЂќ over and over? This вЂњspoony bardвЂќ thing is a lot like that вЂ“ most of Final Fantasy IVвЂ™s Super NES translation used a standard style of speech, so suddenly seeing this weird phrase made fans jump around and repeat вЂњspoony bardвЂќ over and over too. Other players probably thought it was a typo or a translation mistake.ДЇor these reasons, вЂќYou spoony bard!вЂќ is/was often considered a bad translation вЂ“ but itвЂ™s not a translation at all. So although it makes perfect sense to us and sounds normal after hearing it for so many years, back then the word вЂњspoonyвЂќ probably came across as meaning вЂњspoon-likeвЂќ for many players. But the biggest factor of all is that nobody uses вЂњ spoonyвЂќ in everyday English, and most of the target audience had probably never even heard of the word before at the time вЂ“ I know I hadnвЂ™t, at least.Similarly, this gameвЂ™s English translation had already established a certain level and style of writing by this scene, and this line suddenly goes in a different direction.Console gamers were accustomed to a certain type of writing in Japanese-to-English game translation at the time, and this suddenly veers from that.You could probably write an entire book on the phenomenon (I wonвЂ™t), but itвЂ™s a combination of a few things: So why is this quote such a big deal? I hear this a lot from Japanese gamers and occasionally from younger English-speaking gamers. Even the most well known fan translation left 'You spoony bard!' in even though the line never appears in the original Japanese script The Recipe for Fame

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