seems like the translators got lazy.
It's either that or they wanted to put in their own "take" on Squall's characterization, sort of like what the original MGS translator did with the original MGS that annoyed Kojima. Though to be fair Jeremy did a great job on the translation.
Written by the man who did it
www.polygon.com
I’ve tried to explain where my mind was when I started the project, my level of enthusiasm, my efforts, and, ultimately, the decisions that led to me pissing off Kojima and not translating another game in the series.
Here’s what happened, as best I can piece it together. The voice-over work was done in Los Angeles, and, as script writer, I sat next to the director and had one of the three microphones that let us speak to the actors. The director and the sound tech had the other two.
I went home when the recording was finished, and the audio went to Japan, where Kojima heard it. It was my understanding that he loved it. He enjoyed it so much that he decided he wanted to create a release called
Metal Gear Solid: Integral so players could play the Japanese audio with English subtitles, or vice versa.
I STAND BY WHAT I DID WITH THE GAME
That’s not a small job. Every single English line had to be “aligned” with the Japanese dialogue so everything flowed smoothly while it was being played. Whoever was assigned this job began to see the differences between the original Japanese writing and dialogue, and the work I had turned in.
I should mention how rare it is for the texts for two markets to ever be in the same game, especially at that time. Until then, North American releases were for North America, Japan’s voice acting and writing was for Japan, and so on. There was never a feeling that they needed to line up exactly, only that each had to offer a good experience for its particular market.
From what I heard at the time, Kojima began to hear that his work had been “tinkered” with. I’d argue there might have been a lack of appreciation for the needs of localization due to his not being bilingual, but he was not happy. As a result, all future Metal Gear games would be closely monitored for fidelity to the original Japanese script.
This approach resulted in lines like: “I won’t scatter your sorrow to the heartless sea. I will always be with you. Plant your roots in me. I won’t see you end as ashes. You’re all diamonds.”
Some players find this sort of dialogue endearing, but I’d argue that it could have been massaged a bit more for English-speaking players. That’s not up to me, although I’m very proud of the work I put into
Metal Gear Solid. The reviews were very positive at the time, and many mentioned the quality of the translation and voice-over work in the game.
Though the decisions I made cost me future work, I stand by my efforts and am glad that I followed what I thought to be, ultimately, the most sincere form of flattery and respect for the original — namely, to emulate the original feelings in reassembly rather than to leave them as broken bits, drained of the color that was so clear in the original Japanese writing.