The Energon Pub

theres something thats bugged me, or at least made me wonder. sometimes the japanese names of characters sound pretty cool, but in the need to be "western-ized" we tend to lose them.

the one that always bugged me was nemesis prime/scourge. because black convoy sounds cool! our cybertron sideways? NOISEMAZE. thats sounds awesome enough to be a metal band.

theres times where they actually have adopted the japanese name: galaxy force exillion, the red hotroddy repaint became excellion. which thank primus, cause its an awesome name that didnt get lost in translation for once.

what do you think? what are some of your favorites?

Gasket went to Ransack.I mean- a-doy. And why, oh, why is Convoy no more? Eedjits!

You should look into the various international translations of the English names. Italy has/had a particularly fun (?) way with those.

Va'al wrote:You should look into the various international translations of the English names. Italy has/had a particularly fun (?) way with those.

Didn't BW Inferno end up as 'Formicula' or something like that?

I have a DVD in which the American names are translated into Dutch for the subtitles. Double awesom is that they never bothered to learn the actual names of the characters. Powerglide ends up as 'Krachtzwever' and Mirage ends up as 'Morade'.

RhA wrote:

Va'al wrote:You should look into the various international translations of the English names. Italy has/had a particularly fun (?) way with those.

Didn't BW Inferno end up as 'Formicula' or something like that?

I have a DVD in which the American names are translated into Dutch for the subtitles. Double awesom is that they never bothered to learn the actual names of the characters. Powerglide ends up as 'Krachtzwever' and Mirage ends up as 'Morade'.

Indeedums. All thanks to the All-Powerful Uottefak.

RhA wrote:I have a DVD in which the American names are translated into Dutch for the subtitles. Double awesom is that they never bothered to learn the actual names of the characters. Powerglide ends up as 'Krachtzwever' and Mirage ends up as 'Morade'.

kratchzwever is awesome!

i might not be letting the convoys go, but... convoys a good name! what about lio convoy? its good on its own, leo prime always bugged me. big convoy is a bit of a stretch.... id have westernized him as glacious prime or something. glacious convoy would be good too, they dont always have to be a prime/primal.

Leo Prime sounds like a fat drunk sailor. I can't explain it, but that's where my brain goes with that name.

'Aw nuts, Leo fell of the damn boat again. Where's the bloody rope?'

One that I can never get my head around is dezarus/desarus / deathsarus. I can never imagine that anyone would choose that as there name

ZeroWolf wrote:One that I can never get my head around is dezarus/desarus / deathsarus. I can never imagine that anyone would choose that as there name

good call. deathsaurus is something my 2 year old niece could come up with. dezarus is neat though, especially if you think of the "zar" as "csar" giving him a regal quality.

maybe another reason i like these foreign names is just the fact that they are foreign. i mean, TF's are aliens after all.

ZeroWolf wrote:One that I can never get my head around is dezarus/desarus / deathsarus. I can never imagine that anyone would choose that as there name

Here's the thing: "Deszaras" isn't meant to be a real word, it's an actual Japanese nonsense word. You know, the kind you usually see in Gojira/Godzilla movies.

One could argue that the BW Neo Blentrons falls in the same category: Drancron, Elphaorpha and Rartorarta (not the Kamen Rider OOO combo, that's spelled a bit differently)

Then in that case why not just keep that word? Why bother with the clunky deathsarus

ZeroWolf wrote:Then in that case why not just keep that word? Why bother with the clunky deathsarus

A better question would be "Why do we have such a problem with nonsense words?"

Slag and Spastic were my faves. Thanks for ruining them, UK!

JelZe GoldRabbit wrote:

ZeroWolf wrote:Then in that case why not just keep that word? Why bother with the clunky deathsarus

A better question would be "Why do we have such a problem with nonsense words?"

That is a good question...Who was it that first used the name deathsarus?

Kibble wrote:Slag and Spastic were my faves. Thanks for ruining them, UK!

You know, I just used those guys as examples in a discussion about English norms.

shajaki wrote:
i might not be letting the convoys go, but... convoys a good name! what about lio convoy? its good on its own, leo prime always bugged me.

Lio Convoy makes little sense. The whole Convoy name is because of the short lived 70's trucker/cb radio fad (and in particular a novelty song based on the fad by CW McCall) that they apparently still had on their minds in Japan when making the Diaclone line. It's just weird to apply that sort of thing to a lion or really anything but a semi.

Optimum Supreme wrote:

shajaki wrote:
i might not be letting the convoys go, but... convoys a good name! what about lio convoy? its good on its own, leo prime always bugged me.

Lio Convoy makes little sense. The whole Convoy name is because of the short lived 70's trucker/cb radio fad (and in particular a novelty song based on the fad by CW McCall) that they apparently still had on their minds in Japan when making the Diaclone line. It's just weird to apply that sort of thing to a lion or really anything but a semi.

By the time though, the name has become iconic to the G1 character, so any "descendants" are fair game to be named after him, however weird it may seem

ZeroWolf wrote:

JelZe GoldRabbit wrote:

ZeroWolf wrote:Then in that case why not just keep that word? Why bother with the clunky deathsarus

A better question would be "Why do we have such a problem with nonsense words?"

That is a good question...Who was it that first used the name deathsarus?

It was the most commonly accepted translation of the name among the fandom, which was made canon with FunPub's BotCon 2005 Deathsaurus. That doesn't make it a correct translation though, something Hasbro tried to rectify with Robot Heroes "Dessaras".

I like the translated anime names in most cases. Translated names like Leo Prime created by Hasbro I find preferable to Lio Convoy

Kibble wrote:Slag and Spastic were my faves. Thanks for ruining them, UK!

The fact that Slag's name was a curse word in fiction and vulgar in real life fit the character so damn well.

Still makes me a little sad that it had to change.

I like how Armada Wheeljack's name was changed to make me think he was gonna be an Autobot again

I really wish they'd left Galaxy Force Chromia as Chromia in the adaptation into Cybertron, if only because Thunderblast is a dreadful name.

RID Megatron should have been called Gigatron like in Car Robots. Gigatron just sounds awesome, not to mention it differentiates him from G1 Megatron. Although chances are that America would have been a little iffy about his renaming as Devil Gigatron...Likewise, Speedbreaker is a much better name than Side Burn. I disagree with Black Convoy though- Nemesis Prime/Scourge are much cooler.

Armada Wheeljack should have kept his Micron Legend name, if only because said name was RAMPAGE, AKA the best name ever. Sinnertwin and Slayride can suck it!

Optimum Supreme wrote:

shajaki wrote:
i might not be letting the convoys go, but... convoys a good name! what about lio convoy? its good on its own, leo prime always bugged me.

Lio Convoy makes little sense. The whole Convoy name is because of the short lived 70's trucker/cb radio fad (and in particular a novelty song based on the fad by CW McCall) that they apparently still had on their minds in Japan when making the Diaclone line. It's just weird to apply that sort of thing to a lion or really anything but a semi.

Also Convoy suggests a group and not an individual. It never sounded much like a heroic name, never mind for the leader of the heroes. And yeah that song always comes into my head. I remember the first time I heard that the japanese Optimus Prime was called Convoy and I thought man, that's a stupid name...

Carnivius_Prime wrote:

Optimum Supreme wrote:

shajaki wrote:
i might not be letting the convoys go, but... convoys a good name! what about lio convoy? its good on its own, leo prime always bugged me.

Lio Convoy makes little sense. The whole Convoy name is because of the short lived 70's trucker/cb radio fad (and in particular a novelty song based on the fad by CW McCall) that they apparently still had on their minds in Japan when making the Diaclone line. It's just weird to apply that sort of thing to a lion or really anything but a semi.

Also Convoy suggests a group and not an individual. It never sounded much like a heroic name, never mind for the leader of the heroes. And yeah that song always comes into my head. I remember the first time I heard that the japanese Optimus Prime was called Convoy and I thought man, that's a stupid name...

In his defense, the Diaclone originals of Optimus Prime and Ultra Magnus were called Battle Convoy and Powered Convoy, and the latter has appeared in a commercial... as part of a convoy.