Amy (![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png)
brightknightie) wrote2025-04-01 07:45 am
brightknightie) wrote2025-04-01 07:45 am
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I recommend Zeldatuber QuestWithAaron
I'd like to recommend another Zeldatuber: ![[youtube.com profile]](https://youtube.com/favicon.ico)
questwithaaron (https://www.youtube.com/@QuestWithAaron).
QuestWithAaron explores where the original Japanese and the localized English differ, and the consequent implications for the lore. Usually, his videos refuse to take sides; they don't pronounce right and wrong, but academically compare and contrast, fully accepting canonical AUs. Yet, every now and again, the localization does something egregious, like saying the literal opposite of the original; the videos don't flinch from those points.
For example, his most recent video, "Zelda Begged Link Not to Die... But We Never Heard it," discusses Zelda's very different dialogue in BOTW after she manifests the sacred power, when Link is on the verge of death in her arms. And of course QuestWithAaron's first three videos were about what is Link's own first-person diary in Japanese and is just an anonymous reference tool in English.
For me, my favorites of QuestWithAaron's videos that I've watched so far tend to inform and educate me about the changes to the religions of Hyrule and the faiths of the individual characters, which the US localization has (understandably) purged and downplayed ever since the very first game. Surely this is largely to avoid upsetting US audiences -- the parents who freaked out about D&D in the '80s would not have bought word-for-word TLOZ for their kids! also, the US is much less secular than Japan and so takes these things differently -- but it's also because it's admittedly far too hard (and probably dull) to "Philosophy & Theology 101" all the Shinto and Buddhist (and Christian and...) concepts in use within the available dialogue text boxes (not many characters would stop their plot advancement to lecture on culture). A few of these videos include "What is Link? The Legend of Zelda's Eternal Hero" and "How Demise's Secret Origin Connects Skyward Sword & Breath of the Wild." (I think many of you know that character-appropriate-faith is one of my story sweet spots. This is another of the elements that has made TLOZ a story I enjoy snuggling down in.)
QuestWithAaron explores where the original Japanese and the localized English differ, and the consequent implications for the lore. Usually, his videos refuse to take sides; they don't pronounce right and wrong, but academically compare and contrast, fully accepting canonical AUs. Yet, every now and again, the localization does something egregious, like saying the literal opposite of the original; the videos don't flinch from those points.
For example, his most recent video, "Zelda Begged Link Not to Die... But We Never Heard it," discusses Zelda's very different dialogue in BOTW after she manifests the sacred power, when Link is on the verge of death in her arms. And of course QuestWithAaron's first three videos were about what is Link's own first-person diary in Japanese and is just an anonymous reference tool in English.
For me, my favorites of QuestWithAaron's videos that I've watched so far tend to inform and educate me about the changes to the religions of Hyrule and the faiths of the individual characters, which the US localization has (understandably) purged and downplayed ever since the very first game. Surely this is largely to avoid upsetting US audiences -- the parents who freaked out about D&D in the '80s would not have bought word-for-word TLOZ for their kids! also, the US is much less secular than Japan and so takes these things differently -- but it's also because it's admittedly far too hard (and probably dull) to "Philosophy & Theology 101" all the Shinto and Buddhist (and Christian and...) concepts in use within the available dialogue text boxes (not many characters would stop their plot advancement to lecture on culture). A few of these videos include "What is Link? The Legend of Zelda's Eternal Hero" and "How Demise's Secret Origin Connects Skyward Sword & Breath of the Wild." (I think many of you know that character-appropriate-faith is one of my story sweet spots. This is another of the elements that has made TLOZ a story I enjoy snuggling down in.)