The MC spent 500 chapters before imrpoving his cultivation rank .. Like how could there be something more anoying than that in a novel -hello ze tian ji)
(Please disregard this post if you're a fan of instant gratification) Well, that's one of the things that's admirable about Sorcerer's Journey IMO. It manages to give a story that's not all about massive power ups, but is action filled all the same. Keeping the MC at that level of power allowed the author to express more of the MCs character through various scenarios instead of just powering through it if he was OP. It was tastefully done too, not like some other novels where you want to tear your hair out at the MCs stupidity.
I usually don't like the MC not having progress in cultivation for a long time because it means the MC need to have some shonen-dbz-breakthrough or some plot armors which I find quite annoying and forced
I know right! Yeah, that's annoying. Anyway, SJ's is tastefully done, the breakthrough wasn't done in the middle of combat or anything where he suddenly becomes a hero. It's actually one of the most memorable and most human scene I've read in a web novel.
@absolutezerofricks @Qidian First of all, I'd like to put in my thanks for the improvements done to the translation of Sorcerer's Journey. There have been 3 chapters released since a response was made to this thread, and I'm happy to say that all 3 have shown a marked improvement over the earlier chapters. Even though I was being cautiously optimistic, I didn't really hold out that much hope that there would be changes. Thank you for proving me and the skeptics who have put in their 2 cents here wrong. Anyway, that aside, I'd like to ask if there's a plan to retroactively implement these improvements to the earlier chapters. There are no expectations of course that something like that could be done quickly, but at least knowing that there's some sort of plan in place and what kind of schedule the updated chapters would come in would be very reassuring.
Yeah it's because I kept hearing of so many novels translated in Qidian didn't have much quality check, whether it's story cut out or lines that feel like MTL. I tend to not read any novels on Qidian because of that but since there are changes when someone voice out, I guess it's good to know they do something about it. I'm pretty sure if you didn't say anything, it would've continued on. So kudos to you.
(I'm John Cui, translator of A Sorcerer's Journey) To be honest, the two missing chapters are not integrated into somewhere else. I just gave a short summary of the Test results in the following chapter. The reason I did this was that I was afraid that readers might be complaining about the slow-paced plot and got out of patience. It was my knowledge that too much fighting scenes would not keep readers engaged. I intentionally made things go quicker where I think they were unnecessary to be described in great details, to reveal more information in fewer chapters. That was my standpoint for doing this. And that must have created some inconsistencies in plot and a diluted description of plot, characters' personalities and so on. That must be the reason that the observing readers have resorted to the raw to make sure if the raw was not good enough or was because of the bad translation. For that, I' gonna say sorry. The point is Qidian and I have realized your appeals and we're willing to learn from the past. And since the accident broke out several days ago, I've been redoing the old chapters while ensuring getting new chapters done ( It's gonna take a while since I'm doing this part time). Again, I'm sorry to have robbed your readers of the rights to read a faithfully-translated version.
(I'm John Cui, translator of A Sorcerer's Journey) Thanks for your appreciation to the 3 new chapters. We do have a plan and here it is: I'll go through the Raw and compare it to its translated version starting from Chapter one. I'll then repair any parts that are not consistent with the Raw, then the translation will go to the editor for quality assurance. Afterwards, it will go to Qidian guys. They'll do the same job as me—to make sure the translation is in line with the Raw completely before the revised chapters are released on the website. It indeed gonna take a while since we also need to update new chapters. It's huge workload but this is a lesson for me and I'm more than willing to take the lesson and forge ahead.
(I'm John Cui, translator of A Sorcerer's Journey) I'm also grateful to Stark 3. He/she gave me a chance to find out that I need to do much more in my translation, and the bigger effect about this whole thing over this novel was that it has caused much attention to Qidian, which has clearly tightened their quality inspection. But I'm sure that there was quality assurance before, too. And the accusation that "Qidian knows that readers can't read Chinese, so they acquiesce their translators to translate their way or MTL or censore stuff" is clearly wrong and unfair. As a translator, I've been notified by people in charge in Qidian to "try your best to be loyal to the Raw" in the very beginning of my translation, because some of the readers are proficient in Chinese and some of them Google-translate the Raw to better appreciate the translation." I believe (personal opinion) that Qidian might have got clues that I've been rearranging while translating, but they were not ordering me to do what what (for that I'm grateful) to give me some discrepancy in dealing with the Raw. Qidian has spent big money on quality control, from which my English level improved. Both Qidian and I, as well as other translators, desire to present the best possible translation to readers. Going back to this novel's translation, the team (me, editor and Qidian staff) have been working on the old chapters, and I hope that you would be satisfied with the revised ones (Still, we need to keep on updating because some readers are still waiting).
(I'm John Cui, translator of A Sorcerer's Journey) As far as I know, Qidian doesn't censor stuff. And as some of the readers have accused me of, there are stuff missing from the Raw. The problems with the translation arouse because of me, for which I'd like to make an apology to this novel's readers. And we've been redoing the old chapters since we "heard your voice". Hope you'll stick with this novel.
((I'm John Cui, translator of A Sorcerer's Journey) We have been redoing the old chapters starting from Chapter 1, to make sure the Raw is faithfully translated, and we'll keep to this principle in the future.
While it is certainly possible to do it in some cases with little loss to the story, in this one it faces one major problem: To determine what is essential to the plot, and what not (and thus can be safely removed), you have to first read the whole story, from start to finish - or to be the author. Since the story is not complete, only Flying White Egrets knows what you can safely cut. Same thing is with other frivolities, like changing "Victor" to "HalfRobot". Are you sure his surname is not going to be, say, Frankenstein?
Thanks for your feedback. You made a very good point in saying "one has to be the author or have read the whole story to safely cut part of the plot". I share this point of yours. In your eyes, I must have been NOT professional in cutting stuff, causing some loss to the story. But it was my intention to have quickened the plot to glue readers. It's my knowledge that some of the well-known web novels (the Raws) have been redone (at least the first several dozens of chapters) because readers were complaining about the slowly-going plot. And the pace quickening thing also happened when the second season of a TV series learned the lesson from the first one, where viewers are not that satisfied with how its plot is paced. It's good but the crawling plot is killing you! I'd say that's a strategy. Still, my way of translation is not justified and I've learned my lesson from the fact that you found the translation was a far cry from the Raw. Clearly the rearranged version is not as good as I've expected, and I'd even admit that it's BAD. That said, I'd like to say something about the HalfRobot thing. It was not frivolously done. His name is Vitor yet he's nicknamed as 机械之心, which literally means Heart of Machine. 机械之心 is pretty a cool, understandable name in Chinese while, in my opinion, "heart of machine" is too abstract and thus doesn't make much sense in English. So I replaced Heart of Machine with HalfRobot since parts of his body are made of metals and parts are not. I thought that would make sense to readers.( something I'd say is localization) All in all, we've heard your voices and the team has been redoing the old chapters and the newly-released chapters have been translated rigorously faithful to the Raw. The translation of this novel is being watched by many now and Qidian is being ever more strict with its quality control. I do hope you guys give this novel a second chance. I made mistakes and I'm eager to make them right. (Still, redoing the old chapters is gonna take a while.)
Why not Metalheart? Heart of Machine sounds fine too but it is a bit wordy; it isn't abstract since the comparison between men and machine/ai have been a common theme in western literature/media. Halfrobot just loses the original charm. What if the author refers to his nickname in the narrative eventually relative to his action in the future? Halfrobot wouldn't make sense if the author brings up his machine heart nickname as a justification for his action via spectators/commenters. When I read Halfrobot, I imagine a cyborg and it stops there. When I read Metalheart or Heart of Machine, I wonder about his character, whether he will be cold and distant because he is a machine or whether he will be merciful and law-abiding due to the nature of robotic laws.
Not necessarily. Since you are doing the official translation, you might have consulted the author before making such extensive changes (but it still wouldn't make it the same story as the web novel - it would be an adaptation, akin to the difference between LN and Web novel version for the Japanese stories). Does FWE know English?
Props to @John Cui, it must have been tough jumping in to this thread with all the previous negative comments. Also, straight up owning to your mistakes is something I see so little on the Net, it almost always gets my respect when it does happen. Anyway, nice to have you on board. While we may not entirely agree with all of the reasoning behind the translation choices, it's good to have both sides represented at least. I understand that your policy has already shifted to having more transparency moving forward, but I hope you don't mind me still giving my 2 cents on the previous editing approach. Regarding speeding up the earlier plot. The funny thing is, I think that the author has already done something like this. Up till around ch130ish (when MC leaves the academy), the story was structured similar to a lot of other webnovels: quick and easy powerups, MC being able to immediately face off vs stronger more established opponents because of X reason, scenes that has little point except to show off MC's strength, etc. After that, the novel shows its more mature side : it takes things slower and focuses more on worldbuilding, exploration of the MCs thought processes / personality, and in general developing a richer story. Personally, I didn't appreciate this approach. It almost makes the mistake of turning away what I think is its target audience : mature readers looking for a story that's different from the generic hash that's out there. (Unless that was all unplanned and he just got a sudden epiphany after the first 100 or so chapters and changed to a more mature approach in which case I'm just grateful he did) Why do I bring that up? Well, the previous edits would have made that issue even worse, IMO. Toned down details, lack of foreshadowing (making events that will be good for the MC look like they just "coincidentally" happened) are bad flags which, added to what the author wrote at the beginning, would I think easily make people judge this novel as mediocre and make them walk away before they get to the good stuff. Another funny thing : the group of people that the edits would have catered to, the impatient crowd, would probably not appreciate the story once the author slows it down after the 1st hundred or so chapters (unless a LOT of other cuts happen), while those who would appreciate it might have been turned away by the edits.
About localization ... Now that raises a question : which particular locale would be the target of this localization? I hope that Qidian is aware that while the translation for this (and their other novels) is being made to English, the readers won't just be (or even primarily be) American but from nationalities that don't speak Chinese but are comfortable with English. Again, a more neutral approach would be better, IMO
I'have simply ruined it by sending the wrong intonation. I admit my mistake in this. But I believe that the bigger issue here is how to deal with nicknames in the future so as to avoid such occasions. Actually I don’t think AAA equals to Heart of Machine (its literally translated version) in meaning or Metalheart, because both of the versions carries the indication that he has a heart that's as ruthless and distant as a piece of metal, while AAA doesn't imply exactly this way. AAA, like many of other Chinese terms, is a cool name and it just invokes readers’ feelings and can produce the effect the author desires. And sometimes that's all that the author wants—the terms don’t have actual meanings. But such “meaningless names” make perfect sense to Chinese readers, and they abound in Chinese popular novels and classic books. We grew up with them! Then the problem arises—What do we do about such a nickname or any of such types of wugong (martial skills)? I want to share an example of such kind. For those of you who have read many Chinese Wuxia novels, you might have encountered sth like Sword of Sun and Moon, or Riyue Sword, and there might be a FOOTNOTES saying that this sword was struck under the heat of sun and then cooled by the moon, or simply have absorbed the essence of them, thus making it the sharpest of its kind. But if you believe that Sword of Sun and Moon always refers to something related to Sun and Moon, you might be misled, because it doesn't always has something to do with these things at all. It’s a cool name and it sounds mysterious, arcane in a good way. What have motivated me to go with HalfRobot was that I subconsciously concluded AAA didn’t carry real meanings, too. So I thought I’ll just make up a name according to what he looks like (a strategy used when faced with such a situation), which is a clear mistake because I failed to grasp that it indeed implies something. However, If AA is translated as Heart of Machine, or MetalHeart or mechanical heart, then one will be tempted to believe he’s really of the cold type, which may not be the truth. When typing this, I checked the raw again and visited some Chinese posts discussing about this novel, and it turns out that AAA is very gifted in dealing with metals (say, melting metals and merge the liquid metal into blood and flesh, to evolve). Here I repeat that AAA is an exception and it has actual meanings in this novel, and “metal” even represents a branch of sorcery, and that makes HalfRobot even a worse choice. And I think I'd go with Bao's suggestion of Metalheart, but only use its second layer of meaning—he is at the center/core of metals/machines. Here is my plan to improve my translation: I'll go through the Raw more thoroughly and discuss with Chinese fans of this novel about the points I can't fully understand and consult the author when necessary, rather than just "take liberty" in my future work. You’re welcome to drop your comments here and I’m looking forward to further discussions on this and more.
I have no idea whether FWE speaks English, and I haven't talked with FWE about this. Moving forwards, I will.