Prerelease:Undertale/Early Localization Differences
This is a sub-page of Prerelease:Undertale.
Due to Undertale's immense popularity in Japan, a Japanese localization was put into work less than a year after the original game's release, along with a PS4 and Vita port for the huge Japanese console/handheld gaming market. However, being such a long and text-heavy game with a lot of English-specific jokes, it obviously took quite a while to perfect the localization.
Contents
Preparation & Spreadsheets
For starters, Toby sent text documents and emails to the localization team at 8-4, to inform them of how to preserve the tone, what statements should and shouldn't be kept, localization ideas, in-game details, and more.
This first screenshot is a text document consisting of Toby basically going over the absolute basics of the game. He notes that the MOTHER series is a good example of the tone Undertale and its text has, and that Brandish was an inspiration for the Ruins area and the game's lore, especially the wall plaques around Waterfall that tell the backstory of the Monsters. Toby then goes on to say that the team should probably try to mostly use hiragana and katakana with scant usages of kanji to retain the feel of those games. While those games used it as a necessity due to hardware restraints, thanks to the thousands of characters present in kanji, Undertale doesn't have these restrictions, being a modern game made with much more freedom. The translation team ended up abiding by Toby's suggestion in most situations, however.
Toby goes on to explain that the team should retain the realness the characters have in their dialogue, that being the casual, very organic exchanges in-between the very goofy, unrealistic things they also do throughout the game. Toby believes this is why people loved the game so much, so this was a major priority for him. He also says that if an English-specific joke wouldn't work in Japanese, that they should change it to a more region-appropriate joke, similar to the MOTHER series' localizations from Japanese to English. He then goes on to begin talking about character profiles, but the image cuts off there.
This screenshot delves deeper into specific characters, starting off with pronunciations for harder-to-discern names (i.e.: Alphys is pronounced "Alphys", Napstablook is pronounced "nap-sta-blue-k", etc.). He also notes Alphys could be changed to Alphy if the name was too much, which the localizers eventually did.
Toby then goes into specific random ideas for various characters. These include:
- Temmie's "You will regret this." line, with Toby stating it could be funny if they made a pun with the Japanese word てめぇ (temee, meaning a harsh form of the word "you", akin to calling someone a bastard) and the name Temmie
- Punny Monster names, mainly Tsunderplane (whose name, ironically, stayed the same in the final translation). He also states certain names like Ice Cap translate over in a very naturally punny way, stating that it could be translated as hyōbō, a contraction of "hyō" (ice) and "bō" (cap or boy), adding an extra layer of punnage to the name. This ended up being his name in the final version
- Aaron having to be kept the same, as it's the name of one of Toby's friends
- Ideas on how to keep Jerry's name suitably annoying
- Advice on how to translate Snowdrake's name, with him suggesting they make it a bird pun instead if it makes it easier. The localizers ended up doing that
- An idea on how to add a pun to Astigmatism's name
- A way to translate Lemon Bread's name to Japanese in a way that retains the Gunstar Heroes reference, which the localizers ended up doing (translating it as "LEMON PAN")
- Dog name ideas, specifically a way to keep one word used consistently between all of the dog monsters. Among the descriptions he provides, he notes that Greater Dog and Lesser Dog's names are references to the Greater Fire Elemental and Lesser Fire Elemental from Dungeons & Dragons
Physical notes by Toby regarding the Japanese localization, both coincidentally focusing on Sans.
The first pertains to the localization of Sans' 'dog gag, with Toby coming up with the very Japan-specific ットdog (tto-dog) idea, dropping the "ho" part and spelling "dog" out in English, however he never submitted this idea to the localizers, who instead ended up using a more general gag involving the English initials D.O.G..
The second image focuses on Sans' infamous "You'd be dead where you stand." dialogue, with Toby trying to come up with ideas on how to successfully retain the line's intensity that he felt was integral to the experience of the game as a whole. (The line would end up being translated as "You'd be long dead by now."/"You'd already be dead by now." in the final localization.) Also present are crossed-out notes on the mantacore [sic] in the MTT Resort using the personal pronoun boku (boy-ish pronoun) instead of watashi (gender neutral, female-leaning pronoun), and some ruminating on the HAPPY BREAKTIME message during the fight with Mettaton EX.
These spreadsheets are examples of the creative process of the translators. The first image showcases the first part, where Toby writes down notes for any areas which are either very specific, or could be problematic in the localizing process. This was used for the localization's first draft, made over the course of eight weeks starting from February 2016. In the selection shown, he takes note of the "Toby" name in Mt. Ebott, the consistency of the phrase "golden flowers", and Flowey's greeting, which is meant to both be friendly and inviting and the same as Asgore's.
The second image showcases the fine-tuning process, using this spreadsheet to have others look over it and make changes when necessary. This was constantly added to until the PlayStation version's release date of August 15, 2017.
The third image shows daily updates on the localization, specifically what has been added or changed to the Japanese script. Interestingly, one of the updates pertains to the script for room_gaster.
The last image showcases translation notes for drawn graphics, with more notes from Toby. He notes that the message "HAPPY BREAKTIME" is yet another Gunstar Heroes reference, and that Mettaton loves English. He goes into a lot of detail on the Monster Kidz Word Search, noting that it could be changed for the localization, but Ice-E needed to be included somewhere. (The word search was kept in the final localization.) He also goes into detail about Ice-E, stating "He's one of those insufferable knockoff mascots who inevitably has the most pedestrian grammatical error somewhere in there," before explaining the theming of each row of the word search (seasons, bosses, and the word search creator's chronic smoking habit).
Seen here is a debug menu made by 8-4, made purely to easily test out changes in the Japanese script. Of note are the areas using their internal names as reflected by their room asset names, the term "No Mercy" being used as the name of a submenu (presumably) about the most violent path, and Flowey's dialogue in the Echo Flower room being one of the numbered scenes.
Bugs
During development, text formatting bugs would occur due to Undertale's dialogue system not being programmed for Japanese. This screenshot showcases one such instance, where Sans' text goes outside the textbox due to incorrect formatting.
The Japanese text wasn't the only problem, as the process of porting the game to PlayStation's current consoles was also a hurdle the team at 8-4 had to jump through. This screenshot shows a grievous error with the English font size in the MTT Resort's shop, showing all of the text at completely wrong sizes (except for Burgerpants' dialogue, strangely enough).
Shown here is a PS4 screenshot of a crash report from an early build, seen in the settings menu. These crashes occurred often because porting games built in GameMaker (Undertale's engine) to PlayStation consoles is a very particular process, meaning things would have to be adjusted in order to have the game run correctly without crashing.
After the PlayStation 4 Pro dropped in late-2016, efforts had to be made to ensure the game ran correctly on the new revision of the console. This screenshot shows an amusing error introduced with the PS4 Pro, with the border shrunken into the top-left corner during gameplay.
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One particularly unique bug came in the form of Papyrus talking about what item you're wearing. Since his text is unique, scrolling vertically down and writing from right to left, the translators had to program a unique case for this dialogue (Dusty Tutu is the example shown here), so that it didn't break out of the text box.
Early Localization Differences
The Great Taterus
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Papyrus' dialogue, in this version of the game, is read top-to-bottom, right-to-left. Because of this, the localizers considered naming him "Taterus", a combination of the Japanese word tate (vertical) and Papyrus. This was kept in the game for a few weeks, before it was removed for being too forced and not very funny.
Toshonka Librarby
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To retain the "Librarby" misspelling, the localizers originally chose to change としょかん (toshokan, Japanese for library) into としよかん (toshiyokan, gibberish) to retain the error. However, the error was too subtle, so it was changed to the even more nonsensical としょんか (toshonka, even more gibberishy) to make the joke clearer.
Wrong Number Name
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During the initial stages of translation, the localizers assumed that the "G" in the Wrong Number Song person's text was referring to W.D. Gaster. (All Toby had to say was "Character's name beginning with 'G'... Actually, it might be suitably bizarre if you leave this line completely intact in English".) Because the language doesn't allow you to write out just a single letter of someone's name due to the linguistic differences between English and Japanese, they wrote the text out as the English sentence "Hello? May I speak to Ga-" spelled phonetically in Japanese, with が- (Ga-) being used for the partial name. However, upon seeing this, Toby firmly requested they keep this one line completely in its original English to retain the mystery of the name, which is how it ended up in the final version.
Monster Kid's Laughter
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In early versions of the localization, Monster Kid's laughter was represented by the English letter w, which is the Japanese equivalent of saying "LOL". This was changed to a regular laugh later in development, purely because it sounded more natural. (The laugh is at the end of both of these text boxes.)
Delteaida Rune
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The only note Toby originally provided regarding the Delta Rune was "Delta Rune = anagram for Undertale". Going by this very vague description, the localizers originally scrambled the katakana spelling of Undertale, アンダーテイル (andāteiru), into テアイダ • ルーン (teaida rūn, literally meaning "Teaida Rūne"). This worked to retain the anagram name, however "Teaida" doesn't mean anything in particular. However, Toby emphatically requested they change it back to the English DELTA RUNE, which the localizers agreed to, along with the phonetic spelling of the English pronunciation in parentheses for players unaccustomed with English.
It would later turn out that this was done for a very good reason: a year after the Japanese localization's release, Deltarune Chapter 1 would release simultaneously in both English and Japanese, retaining the title in both languages. If the change was made, Deltarune very well could've been referred to as "Teaidarune" in Japan.
Undyne's Fish Market
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Flavor text during the battle with Undyne will occasionally read "Smells like sushi.", a joke on what raw fish smell like. The translator for this scene originally chose to translate it as "Smells like a fish market.", explaining that Japanese players would associate the smell of sushi with vinegar-ed rice rather than raw fish, since not all sushi contains fish. However, Toby requested they change "fish market" back to "sushi", as he said the sushi line was a "fan-favorite quote".
Waterland
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Early drafts of the game's localization referred to Waterfall as "Waterland", purely as a placeholder for a more fitting name. The team later settled on the similar "Waterfell", which made it sound more like the name of a place. The placeholder name made it into the development stage, as the Riverperson's early dialogue refers to it as "Waterland".
Pop Goes The Sansel
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This screenshot from an early draft of the localization has Flowey refer to Sans as "Pop", his original localized name referring to the font he uses in the Japanese version (Sōikaku Pop-tai), during one of his Neutral ending monologues.
Pop'n Tater(us)
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Despite Papyrus' Taterus name going away much sooner than Sans' Pop name, there was a time when both were in the game - as seen by this early version of the True Pacifist credits, showing Taterus and Pop in place of Papyrus and Sans.
