In an effort to translate Pokémon games into traditional and simplified Chinese, Nintendo has essentially renamed Pokémon characters, including Pikachu.
The Pokémon Company recently announced Pokémon Sun and Moon for Nintendo 3DS. These are first Pokémon games to be translated into Mandarin, but in doing so, the efforts overlook Hong Kong's primary language, Cantonese.
According to QZ.com, in Greater China Pokémon will be officially called 精靈寶可夢 -- or "Jingling Baokemeng" in Mandarin (Jingling means “spirit” or “elf,” and Baokemeng is a transliteration of Pokémon).
In Hong Kong, however, it was 寵物小精靈, which translate intos Pet Little Elves (or Spirits), and Pikachu was originally translated as 比卡超 (Bei-kaa-chyu).
Now, however, it's 皮卡丘 (Pikaqiu). While that might look similar to the Western name, in Cantonese it actually reads as Pei-kaa-jau.
In protest at the changes - which also represents a broader fear that the Cantonese language is too often overlooked - a handful of committed fans took to the streets, marching to the Japanese Consulate singing the Cantonese Pokémon theme.
Over 6000 people have signed an online petition protesting the changes, offering to boycott Nintendo entirely if the company does not agree to their requests.
Pokémon Sun and Pokémon Moon will be released on Nintendo 3DS on November 18 in North America and Japan, and on November 23 in Europe.
Vikki Blake is a very jumpy survival horror survivalist. You can find her twittering over at @_vixx and twitching at twitch.tv/vixxiie.
Aucun commentaire:
Enregistrer un commentaire