Cal C

it's a radically different approach to a game I've known front-to-back for almost three decades, and though I don't have the juice to consistently pull off frame-perfect inputs at 60 fps, a lot of these skips are surprisingly approachable, flashy, and fun.

or this so-called Scrolly-Scroll glitch where the left side of the screen shoves you through the last 20% of Jungle Jinx at ludicrous speed, as long as you're facing right, necessitating perfectly timed about-faces and stalls for tire bounces

or this death-defying balloon-eschewing Rambi charge across the lava expanse in Red-Hot Ride, which involves a wonky unintended double jump to reach that final Zinger (hold B during airborne charge, press left, press right)

started tackling dkc2 speedrunning (102%- full clear) on a whim and have been learning some of the wild techs/skips/glitches

like an invisible barrel spawning the goalpost in the middle of the level (in Castle Crush)

yup, that's the crux of it.

stay silent now in order keep supporting the good stuff -> bad stuff takes over

make the sacrifice now and withdraw support -> we stand a chance of fending off the clankers

again, I have a strong feeling that internal people aren't happy about this, and are just waiting for backlash ample enough to report back.
"the western readership hates this shit in a loud and substantive way, and we're losing money over it" is the verdict we have to force them to tell Shogakukan.

> last reposts

with that comicsbeat article drawing more attention to the issue, now is the time to keep up the pressure.
complain, cancel your sub(s), tell them why, tell them you might be won back if they reverse course.
I even saw one comic shop say they won't stock the pub's books anymore!

This article is right on the money by saying that the simple "Translation and lettering provided by Shogakukan" credit is cowardly.

Maybe Shogakukan required that wording. Maybe they didn't.

Either way, it is deceptive to not label this localization as what it is: slop.
Because they know it is.

Dear manga publishers, we don’t want your AI translations VIZ Media quietly added an AI-translated manga to their app and hoped no one would notice. We did and want none of it.

VIZ Media quietly added an AI-translated manga to their app and hoped no one would notice. We did.

Manga deserves better than cheap, soulless automation. This is a betrayal of translators, fans, and the art form.

We don't want your AI translations!

also very likely:
-tech idiot glasses that record everything you see/hear and let you win arguments like an asshole (also surveillance state)

less likely:
-the borg as a video game
-lady jumps between parallel realities to be correct all the time
-Jon Hamm goes to mind prison for a million years

a skeet from Jim Acosta: "At 4p ET/1p PT, I’ll have a one of a kind interview with Joaquin Oliver. He died in the Parkland school shooting. But his parents have created an AI version of their son for a powerful message on gun violence. Plus TX Rep. @jamestalarico.bsky.social - see you soon on Substack and later on YouTube." the image shows this ghoulish reporter "speaking" to a "dead child" (unthinking chatbot framed as a miraculous product of necromancy)

from Black Mirror, we've now had
-UK PM does stuff with a pig
-weaponized robot dogs
-apps for rating people
-the dead brought back as chatbots

Coming up is probably:
-app runs dating sims using chatbots modeled on users
-incels imprison chatbots made from real people in roleplay campaigns forever

Nintendo released a survey asking for feedback on physical and digital games.

This is definitely the chance to make your voice heard about Switch 2 Game Key Cards.

Source: theWellRedMage

Survey: nintendoofamerica.co1.qualtrics.com/jfe/form/SV_...

one appeal of manga TL is def the ever-present constraint of having to do so much with so little. it's a puzzle, to use the speech bubble real estate just right, without the luxury of cramming in rambling explanatory glosses.

I *wish* I could go ham sometimes, but would my work be better for it? 🤔

anyway I like how the dialogue made it possible to provide genuine characterization for four characters in ~15 words, carefully selected so as to suggest distinct voices.
authors don't always do the utmost to distinguish their characters, but when they do, the translation had better reflect that.

title page showing the chapter title: Good Job Cooking with Those Claws

title page with chapter title: At Last, the Beast is Slain

Ruri and mom, playing NSMB Wii co-op. Mom declares, "At last, the beast is slain!!" Ruri says, "Phew."

title page with chapter title: Nothing Wrong with Some Venom

also fond of how the author fakes you out with misleading "b/c...dragon?" chapter titles, which I've leaned in to

claws -> the sister's long, done-up nails (thank you handy English slang)
slain -> re: Bowser in NSMB Wii
venom -> commonplace human spite/malice

I'd like to think that the switch to every-other-week (with frequent longer breaks on top of that!) makes these ^ sorts of details possible, versus the bonkers weekly schedule that leaves most WSJ authors with zero-to-negative 余裕 at best, hospitalized at worst

a panel of a living/dining room showing no characters, but rather some houseplants, including a monstera

two more (hanging) houseplants

kitchen scene, showing a bunch of see-through containers and glass jars, placed aesthetically on shelves

alternate view of the houseplants from the other image, and a girl wielding the Nintendo Ring peripheral (and leg strap with Switch Joycon) for playing Ring Fit

in a world of sterile cookie-cutter home interiors in mass market JPN media, I appreciate the author using BG visuals almost as flavor text

showing not telling us that this family:
-are plant people
-uses millennial-ass glass jars for one-off kitchen items/ingredients
-plays Ring Fit

caught me off-guard too!
I saw ブラつけんの and was like surely this is some annoying compound verb I don't know buuut nope

chapter's title page, with a pair of girls holding up fingers in "V" shape under their mouths. One has her pierced tongue sticking out

reply meme of a concerned guy about to say something, but deciding not to

four girls, in bed, at a slumber party: girl1: So, wearing a bra to bed—yay or nay? girl2: Omigosh, shut up. girl3: Ha ha. That's TMI! girl4: ...

closeup of the phones near the pillows

fun Ruri panel, translation-wise

(-"yay or nay" communicates "this is an opinion poll," versus, "are you, right now?"
-"omigosh" to indicate exasperation beyond just "be quiet."
-"TMI" for キモ; would be too literal as "gross.")

also love the charging phones next to pillows. just like me frfr

next tattoo about to be

alt+0151

from my cold dead hands

I've been em-dashing professionally since 2013, and if I'm ever hooked up to a captcha polygraph—because surely that's coming down the road—I've got MS Word docs dating back that far as proof

the theoretically informed libs denying there's anything rotten about this (for fear of looking hysterical?) are part of why we find ourselves sleepwalking into ethnofacism.
"corporations using masterrace dogwhistles? nawww, surely not in this country, at this moment" 🙄

Three copies of Adabana volume 1. A girl standing in snow stares up at a blood-red sky.

The back cover of the book

A mostly black page, crediting me as the translator and Brendon Hull as the letterer

on a less doomer note,
I got my comps for Adabana v1- my first title with Dark Horse, out in September

can't show interiors yet, but I do appreciate the slick credits page at the front of the book, and the classic parental advisory stickers (only on the plastic wrapper- not the book itself)

*squints*

these are just Harlequin Romance titles, a bunch of which got manga adaptations, which I then translated back into English at trash-tier rates from DMP

I was extremely disappointed to see that Dealing With Mikadono Sister Is a Breeze was added to your Viz app as-is from the Emaqi service, which is built on shoddy, Al driven work. It's insulting to be charged for something so low effort, so I have sadly cancelled my subscription that I happily maintained from the beginning of the service. I have also canceled Shonen Jump, which I have supported continuously since 2015. I like Viz manga for the skilled thought and craftsmanship that strives to make English versions match the beauty of Japanese originals, which are the products of monumental time and effort on the part of creators. Without that expertise, what value does your service have that a free machine translation can't provide? Please be a service that respects your creators and readers with the same translation & lettering skills you have cultivated and improved. I want to be a happy subscriber again!

I’m not one to have confidence in expressing myself, but this is what I came up with for my message to Viz.

this is fantastic. exactly the kind of thing they need to hear, internally.
thank you on behalf of those of us whose livelihood depends on not capitulating to these monstrous forces.

yup, that's smart.
...and obviously that's why the corpos don't want your name in the credits or mine on the cover :)

yeahhh so being fed rallying propaganda about the faceless external enemy and regurgitating it sono mama
(actual bullshit, when same-day simuls are an established and doable model. I've been part of teams that can turn around raw assets in ~48 hours, with time to spare before JPN release)

loc quality as a concept is so ignored/undervalued that the self-defeating temptation is to assume, retrospectively, "[hit series] would've sold just as much even with a shitty translation."
ergo the skilled translator isn't owed anything, is perfectly replaceable, etc.
ergo, a race to the bottom!