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In about an hour, as of this writing...

(http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v640/renz0/policenautsout.jpg)

... I've got my eye on the site and will be constantly refreshing till it pops up!

Actually, comes out at noon, EST, apparently.

And... it's finally out! Just scroll a bit down here...

http://forums.junkerhq.net/viewtopic.php?f=2&t=6&st=0&sk=t&sd=a&sid=5977b6ddc8367d8bbf74535903427cdd&start=3550

... Haven't had a chance to check it out yet, but hopefully soon! Though I'm mostly hoping that someone at Black Cats does all the work for me.

my copy of Policenauts is at my parents' house and, since i won't be there until Tuesday, it means i'm currently trying to find an ISO of this game.

there's something relatively weird about this.  i got this game roughly 10 years ago (xmas of '99 i think) and at times it's sort of scary to think about how quickly that time has passed.  i mean, really, this game has been sitting in my old room for a decade now.  maybe i'm talking like this because it's technically my birthday right now (AND KOJIMA SAN'S!!!!!), but it's still odd to think that i've "waited" 10 years to play this game.

anyway, for anyone curious about what kind of game this is, it's basically the spiritual sequel to Snatcher.  and if that doesn't clarify things, it's basically a point and click adventure style game mixed in with detective work and sometimes shooting-gallery style fight sequences.  also, lots of dialogue and whatnot. 

really, if you think about it, this genre fit in with Kojima's style a lot more than the action/war games he's made as of late.  these kinds of games are more laid back and require patience and reading, so listening to or reading the dialogue of characters is a bit more seamless.

more seamless, at least, then killing a boss in an action game and then hearing about her life story for 20 minutes.

Yeah, I can't wait for that much talked about 90 minute cut-scene in MGS4. Seriously!

isfet i'll PM you the link of the game patched

thanks man. before i dl it though, is disc 1 less than 700 mb?  the copy I got before won't burn since it can't fit on the disc

Well, I'm on a Mac, so patching ISOs is automatically tricky, so if anyone would mind hooking a brotha up, I'd be super appreciative.

looks about 750 by my count :(


also:kaki king, takashi miike, dave chappelle.

really! i looked it up!

Forget Shadow Complex, there's a new anti-gay game in town!

(http://pics.fort90.com/forum/pn-ugh.jpg)

Here's the original screen btw...

(http://pics.fort90.com/forum/pn-ugh2.jpg)

... Apparently the translation is pretty close to the original. Various folks at NeoGAF are having a hissy fit over this, but they get upset over everything.

yeesh. I mean, I dunno, maybe it really says that in Japanese, but I kind of doubt it. "I
look like a fag" just sounds really juvenile (particularly american juveniles).  I could
see it saying something like "this picture makes me look gay."

I hope the rest of the translation isn't like this.

"This is Ed SHOOP DA WOOP LOL"

How tacky. But considering how much work is involved, and as a result how much you have to actually care about a game to make an entire working translation patch for it, it probably is accurate. I just feel bad for the patchers getting flack for it when it's just omg edgy writing :(

Again, according to the translator on NeoGAF, that's just the way it is originally, who seems to have adopted a semi "don't shoot the messenger" stance, due to what ATOMU has just stated.

Eh, I'm guilty of sometimes saying "well, that's just gay" in response to something that I find peculiar or dumb. Hey, it's a stupid little thing, and I've certainly learned to stop after a fairly power PSA about it I caught while watching Degrassi.

BTW, I just started playing this, and it's actually fairly compelling! Though I'm stopping myself fairly early since I want to finish Kojima-san's other masterpiece, MGS4. Which as noted in another thread, I'm taking my time with since it's the only PS3 game I'll be owning for some time now, unless I'm super drunk and "accidentally" buy LittleBigPlanet off of Amazon.

Like I almost just did ten minutes ago.

i understand the amount of time they put in, but honestly, thus far I've found their translation suffers like an old school VHS fansub. inserting words like "fuck" when "damn" would probably be more appropriate, etc. so it wouldn't surprise me that "fag" is something they inserted because "cursing = more mature!!"

also, they could really use a proofreader.


but yea, as the above suggests, I've got this working on my PS1 now. I'm only on act 1 but it's enjoyable. I forgot how pervy the game is, too. i also find it realllly interesting how much Kojima recycles or includes ideas between games. Aside from Policenauts having Meryl in it, there's also stuff like "white blood" which appears in MGS4 as well.

Once again, I believe the word fag was used because that's the word, or it's equivalent, that was used in the original script.

I get what you're saying... and truly excellent translators are able to distill the original meaning of foreign text and make it more palatable to the native tongue, often by changing things considerably, but in an intelligent manner, and all that jazz. But that's a skillset that is sorely lacking with most fan-subbers, as you already know. So in that case, I'd much rather take a straightforward translation, regardless of how awkward it might be.

As you might be able to tell, I was not a fan of Working Designs, especially during the Sega CD era.

oh Jesus a character just said "quoted for truth." I dunno, I'm still convinced these guys couldn't help inserting stupid internet speak into their project. a long term effect if spending so much time on computers?

BUT

it's nice to be playing this in any form if English at all. truthfully, I'm playing it because it's available. these days, it's kind of easy to see why this genre has died out; the pacing is kind of boring at times unless you're super into reading a bunch of psuedo scientific bs. but it definitely explains why Metal Gear is the way it is.  

it's also worth noting that while time has helped explain to me why, when speaking to women in this game, i have the option to "smell" or "touch" (their breasts, usually), it has not made it less creepy.

i mean, i guess it's not much worse than walking in on a naked 14-year-old girl in the shower (like in Snatcher), but it's still worrisome to see how much pandering the game does to its audience.

there's creepy and bizarre sexism in the Metal Gear Solid series, but nothing quite of this magnitude.  i wonder if maybe he toned it down so it would have a better reception outside of Japan?

ok i gotta ask - what is the justification for groping within the game?

um, there is zero justification for it.  you can just do it.  generally, your partner will just say stuff like "Jonathan, don't do that at a time like this!" or "you haven't changed at all!"  the women appear to either get slightly annoyed or don't care at all.  but their irritation is in a weird, down-trodden Japanese woman kind of way.

ok actually, on the space plane flight there was a pseudo-justification.  Jonathan tells the stewardess he's never felt breasts in a zero g environment before and then goes in for the grope.  she makes a little moan and...doesn't really seem to mind?

yea.  creepy.

"no, really, though" people say to me. "there's a lot of good things about anime."

damn vic ireland's cursed bloodline

this fucking translation somehow manages to get even worse.  a character just said "and God said 'let there be win.'"

i mean, seriously?  are we fucking serious here?  that's how you translated a phrase?  do they actually think this is clever and witty dialogue?  to have space cops in the future who are investigating a dual-action narcotic scheme speak like shut ins on the internet??

i don't know if this is better or worse than Working Designs era BS, but i'm just waiting for some kind of Obama joke or something.

that's exactly how i'd imagine it but that's probably why i'm not a writer.

also i mean boob grabbing, really, what are you looking for here?

you raise a very valid point.

i mean, essentially, i guess to the person who idolizes this type of game, this sort of dialogue would be pretty gut-wrenchingly hilarious.


i guess, i'm not expecting amazing prose here; the original text in Japanese is probably barely tolerable as it is.  i just get annoyed when people insert really specific slang or references that 1) make no sense in the context of the story and 2) will make no sense in 5-10 years.  i feel like being a good translator is about finding smart ways to convey an idea while avoiding those kinds of pitfalls.

but you're right; i mean, you get what you pay for.  and this is free.

I'm in the process of giving this translator a bit of shit, or at least this person who claims to be associated with the translators, who claimed that everything was 100% based on the original script. I now have to wonder if that gay comment was actually there in the first place. Meanwhile, everyone on NeoGAF thinks its a masterpiece, which further confirms why I stopped going there regularly years ago, or at least post there anymore.

this is an absolutely reasonable stance to take. it just may not be realistic given the context.

The way I'd put it is "being a good translator is about finding smart ways to convey an idea while avoiding those kinds of pitfalls because maybe you spent years on this so you should try to take a fucking modicum of pride in what you're doing."

I haven't played Policenauts yet, but this is a really common problem with fan/amateur translations; it's kind of dumbfounding.  Why are they putting so much energy into learning the language if this is what they do?  Are they really that introverted and egotistical?  Maybe the project editors are to blame, and that this is how they make their mark on the finished product, or something.

funny i havent seen any complaints about the internet memes outside of here. then again ive only looked as far as a few threads on neogaf and SA, they seem to be fine with it/not mention it at all

it's "nanowrimo or whatever that retarded write a novel in thirty days thing is called" disease. if it's "creative" it certainly can't be a poor choice.

i feel for joe, though, since he bought this ten years ago and getting a boob-grabbing cavalcade of lolcat-level jokes is like getting kicked in the balls. something like fallout 3 but with no entertainment value. 

well, i just beat Policenauts.  all told, it took approximately 10 hours in total for me to finish, which isn't too bad and fits right into the "beatable games" category for me these days.


LONG ANSWER:


i have a lot to say.  so first i'll start with familiar territory:  the translation.  overall, playing the game in English was a real treat.  the oddest thing about this translation is how inconsistent it is, though.  it's almost like a few different people wrote it.  which i believe is the case?  if so, it really shows.  they do an impressive job conveying and explaining a lot of the fake Kojima science stuff that's in all his games, as well as some technical stuff that i imagine would have been pretty obscure.  but then you have things like the game using "win," "fail" and "QFT," which are just so out of place.  to top this off, aside from perhaps the instance of "fag" in the game (which everyone says is apparently accurate), the game tends to go for the juvenile a lot of the time.  any chance to throw in a curse word, the game goes for it.  here's an example from the last chapter:

"you're nothing more than one of his bitches!"  says Jonathan in the translation in regard to a guy he's facing off with.  now, the word he uses in Japanese is "inu" which means "dog," not quite "bitch."  i mean, they're the same animal, yes, but substituting bitch in place of dog (which honestly would still make sense and would probably make more sense simply as a phrase) is clearly meant to make it edgier or something.  there's a LOT of this in the game and it can be grating at times, especially if you are able to understand just a little bit of what the characters are actually saying.

but, all in all, it's not quite enough to ruin the experience.  85% of the translation is done well enough to draw you in.  it's just a shame that these little moments of stupidity exist at all to drag you out of things the other 25% of the time.

next, the game

if you liked Snatcher, you'll probably at least sort of like this.  if i had to recommend this game or Snatcher to someone (if, say, they were really dying to play a Kojima pre-MGS adventure game), i'd probably go with the latter as i think the characters, setting and story are probably more interesting.

the game starts off strong (for about 15-20 minutes) and then immediately slows down to a grinding halt for the next three or so hours.  after that, the story takes some pretty obvious turns and "twists," but i feel like the obviousness of the plot twists has to be an homage to the whole buddy-cop genre from which this game borrows so heavily.  at some point towards the end of disc 1 and into disc 2 we begin to read/hear some things which are actually kind of interesting looks into the future and we start to see what Kojima's M.O. for the game is.

see, that's the thing with every Kojima game:  he always needs to tackle some kind of political topic; generally something obscure that interests him or something that's fairly widespread at the time.  every single one of his games has a moment where one of the characters (bad or good) will go on for over 15 minutes straight about some obscure political or scientific topic which, hopefully, you find interesting enough to hear about.


and that's what it all comes down to; this game, like Metal Gear Solid, would have probably blown me away when i was 16 when i bought it.  it tackles a lot of stuff other games don't, but to anyone over the age of 20 who has some modicum of intelligence and who actually tries to keep up with current events to some degree, the plot of these games is really not enough.  Kojima is like the Tool (the band) of video games; his work is essentially a cursory glance at a range of topics that his target audience has probably never heard of before (in the case of Tool it's Crowley and in the case of Kojima it's Richard Dawkins).  this is good for that particular group, but kind of boring for those outside of it.  in fact, it becomes downright perplexing when this information is coupled with absurdity (take the boob grabbing in Policenauts, OR even better, take Mike's story about being confused why Otacon would bother explaining to Solid Snake, a chain-smoking hired killer, how anime inspired him to build giant robots).


SHORT ANSWER

if you enjoy Kojima's games, with their quirks, constant exposition and general strangeness, then you should probably give Policenauts a shot.  and hell, you may as well beat it.