I really love this series!
I actually like Dragon Quarter best of all, and still think it's one of the most interesting, different and memorable RPGs I've ever played. But I can definitely appreciate how it could be a very divisive game for many fans of the series, and I think that looking back, it might have been better to have released it free of the Breath of Fire name (I get the impression that the English localisation staff probably thought so too, given that they chose to drop the number 5 from the title for its Western release...
). While I think it was a fascinating reimagining and deconstruction of the series, gambling the brand name on a game that was almost guaranteed to polarize opinion from the outset was probably not the best move for Capcom. :'D Dragon Quarter aside, I think for me it's probably IV > II > III > I in terms of preference. But I like all of them to varying degrees.
Also, really surprised at how harsh people are being on the English version of Breath of Fire IV in this thread. Putting aside a couple of issues (a handful of untranslated elements like the ending credits, opening movie and the Japanese title on the title screen) that were largely the result of the game being rushed to market for the holiday season, it's easily one of the PS1's more competent JRPG translations for me, with a mostly well written script that deftly deals with a number of relatively tricky pieces of made up terminology in Japanese (I
love "Endless" as a translation for "Utsurowazaru Mono"
), and also puts a good amount of thought into how to give the English script its own flavour and character with things like Fou-Lu's faux old English, and the adoption of Korean as the language of the Endless in the English version to give them an identity removed from either Japanese or English (nearly all of the names of the dragons / their elemental spells in the English one are actually Korean words - "Hwa" means "Fire", "Bing" is "Ice", "P'ung Ryong" is "Wind Dragon", the "Yorae" in "Yorae Dragon" is a Korean Buddhist term referring to transcendence beyond the human condition, etc...).
As for the censorship issue, I reaaaally don't think it's nearly as bad as is being made out. I played the game in both languages, and the only censorship change that I think is really significant is the one of a certain character's death, given that the scene transition in the English version does feel quite awkward once you know what was supposed to be there, and given that the scene did add something quite meaningful to the story. But even then, it's not something I even noticed in the English version until I played it in Japanese, so I don't think it's an enormous deal breaker. As for the rest... The three other scenes are fairly disposable sex jokes that don't serve to add much to the story, and which I actually think are a bit jarring in contrast to the game's general tone to begin with. The Scan ability wasn't one that was enormously useful in the Japanese version anyway, and they had a pretty good reason for cutting it (the text box simply isn't big enough to show all the elements in English, and would have required modification). And Scias's alcoholic slur becoming a stammer is a bit unnecessary, but really not that much worse than any number of JRPGs that have made similar changes to alcohol (heck games as prestigious as Final Fantasy VI and Chrono Trigger did it too, and arguably in far more goofy, less believable ways). Also a little surprised that it's IV's English localisation that is getting the most flak when Breath of Fire II, much as I love it, has a script that is easily one of the worst JRPG localisations in the history of gaming, and one that does pretty much everything that it's possible to do wrong in a translation. :'D Surely you can't give that a free pass if you're going to come down so hard on IV's comparatively minor issues?
Originally Posted by Elin
I really love this series!neither do the japanese tbh. If you had REALLY played the japanese versions then you would have been more off put than ANY of the "jaring moments" we have talked about. The series is full of smut jokes since BoF 1, they are funny...it was a part of them, taking them out completey jarred it FOR ME as ive seen those scenes, i watched my friends import and play them...not seeing them ruined the experience for me because as usual, it ment a bunch of middle aged house wives stormed in said "THIS IS WRONG AND EVIL AND WONT SOMEONE THINK OF THE CHILDREN!?!? (translation wont everyone PAY ATTENTION TO US!?!?!) But that doesn't matter right aslong as that 1% that DONT like the smut are satisfied? (sorry but ive about had enough of western censorship, it pisses me off).
its in its own isolated universe which means it has nothing to do with the BoF canon imo.
HAD you have actually have played the japanese version and understood it, you'd know theres alot of those jokes in it, specialy between Katt and Nina that were ALL cut out.
