aiamg ep1 translation notes

hello! i’m the translator, aster! find me on twitter @iamyourmagician. asleep in a miniature garden is my first time translating a game from japanese to english. it’s been a pleasure working together with the dev, nobiti!  this is a devlog chock-full of spoilers for episode 1 of AIAMG, so please be mindful! ;w;)/

here’s some rules i’d like you to uphold:

• do not upload the soundtrack onto youtube or upload the images from the game files anywhere. 
  • screenshots and the title screen are okay, but do not extract files from the game and upload them anywhere. 
  • this is also in the readme, but i understand that japanese fandom culture and english fandom culture are different, so please respect nobiti-san’s rules.
• when uploading fanart onto twitter, please uphold japanese fandom rules:
  • no AUs, non-canon designs, or ships in the official #箱庭の眠り twitter tag.
  • to my understanding, putting the characters in different outfits is okay, though.
• if you’d like to share your art that features AUs, non-canon designs, or ships on twitter, please use the english tag, #AsleepInAMiniatureGarden !! 
• if you see anyone breaking the rules, i would personally appreciate it if you could let them know gently~! it’s possible they don’t know the rules even exist, so let’s be kind <3

now, onto translation notes!

there are two ways i generally translate things: if i want it to appear very obviously “japanese,” then i will keep titles like “san”, “chan”, “kun”, etc and translate clearly japanese things without localizing them. this is more of the mindset of a localization, however, so here’s basically how i translated everything:

• “kun” became “little,” for example “little castor”
• pollux is often called “poru-chan” in japanese (her full japanese name is porukusu), i changed this to “polly”
• “san” became “mr” (“mister” if castor was saying it) or “miss”
• “onii-san” became “big bro” (or “brother” in belle’s case)
• “onee-san” became “big sis”

the title was actually something i had to think about a bit. the original title of the game is 箱庭の眠り (hakoniwa no nemuri), literally translating to “slumber in a box garden”. box gardens seem to be rather well-known in asian cultures, but it was a concept i was actually unfamiliar with while i was playing the game for the first time. i asked nobiti-san about why she chose the title, and she said it was because it was supposed to represent how castor has been ‘sleeping in his little garden’ all this time: the garden being the mansion, and the sleep meant to represent his distance from the outside world. so i took an alternate translation of hakoniwa, that being “miniature garden,” and decided that “asleep” would be the best translation of nemuri. so here’s our title!

(part of the reason i was debating so heavily over the title was because a lot of my friends who i consulted seemed rather attached to the word box, and one of them even drew castor in a box lmao. the box still lives on in our hearts)

in real life, castor is the second-biggest star in the constellation gemini, pollux is the biggest. the stars are also very close to each other! 

castor’s dialogue is something i’m being very careful with. considering this is an episodic, four-part series, and he’s the protagonist, his dialogue and its progression is something i have to be rather mindful of.

but honestly, in regards to his dialogue, that’s rather easy: the hard part is maintaining both his cute image and his sarcasm! i really adore how castor is very kind and gentle, and then louis exists and he’s like “i want to sneak up behind him and snipe him” (direct translation from the japanese, i ended up translating this as “i want to shoot him” bc i love the bluntness of it lmao). castor has a lot of cute vocal tics that are very particular to japanese, for example he refers to the cotton balls as “pon-pon balls”, and when he dabs louis’s wound he says he’s “pon-pon”ing the wound which is so cute…! i tried my best to let his cute side shine through in the english version, but also balance it out with his strong emotions.

aside from louis, pollux, and one future character, castor refers to everyone as “~onii-san” (big brother…) or “~onee-san” (big sister…) this is a way that little kids will refer to strangers who are older than them. in most translations, i translate this as “mister” or “miss”. however, i was really enamored with the ring of “big sis spica”, and decided that this translation would be an exception. i debated “big sister spica”, but i think the shorter version makes his cuteness shine through more anyway!

one more thing: when i asked all of my college-age friends what a derringer was, not a single one of them knew. a derringer is a type of gun, it’s the gun that castor uses. one of them suggested i translate it as pistol or revolver, but i looked up “derringer” and it said it was neither a pistol or a revolver. however it’s classified as a type of handgun, so i ended up just translating it as handgun, so it would be easier to understand.

louis’s dialogue is so much fun, bless. i don’t get to translate sarcasm all that much, but it’s so perfect for him, and i love it!

people often say that people who swear a lot are stupid, because they don’t know what else to say. and honestly, that’s something i struggled a lot with in translating his dialogue — the thing about louis is that he Is rather smart. but often-times, his dialogue, when translated literally, didn’t flow at all. so instead of a literal translation, i would make him say something blunt and funny, often with a swear in it.

i asked all of my testers if he swore too much. two of them said i struck a perfect balance. another said that he sometimes seemed like a stupid delinquent, in the flashbacks specifically. 

i was overjoyed when i heard that, because that was intentional! in the japanese version, there is no difference between the way louis speaks in the flashbacks and when he’s a demon. however, i limited myself in regards to his dialogue: i didn’t let him use expressions like “oh my god,” “jesus christ!” stuff like that. considering he’s in contact with star gods, living in astra; i think it’s not appropriate for him to use terms like that since, in my knowledge, both of them are references to christianity. however, as a human, he had no idea about star gods, and i’ve heard atheists around me use “oh my god” etc, so i decided it was appropriate for human louis to use it. therefore there is a difference between his dialogue as a demon and as a human. i thought that would be a cool nuance to include in the english version, to show his changed self.

also: when does he start wearing the headband?👀

in real life, hamal is the brightest star in aries!

hamal’s dialogue was a bit of a challenge. his cuteness was conveyed in a different way from castor — it’s mostly conveyed in just making him sound extremely childish, whereas castor expresses that he’s not actually a child, even if he talks cute. so i tried making hamal sound like a child unfamiliar with the world — “what does groveling mean?” “i don’t get it!” and of course, i copied the music notes exactly from the japanese version. 

castor does initially refer to hamal as “hamal-san”, so i translated that as “mister hamal”. after a bit, he switches to “hamal-onii-san,” so i translated that as “big bro hamal.” that was intentional!

hamal’s dialogue includes a pun on the word “butler” (shitsuji) being only “sheep” (hitsuji), and i could not for the life of me think of how to translate that. thank you to dorkizoid for coming up with the “baa-tler” pun <3

tom’s dialogue was something i actually had a hard time with as well!

while i was playing through AIAMG for the first time in japanese, i was already thinking i wanted to translate it, and how i would go about doing so. everyone’s vocal tics and habits floated into my mind very naturally.

…except for tom’s.

japanese has multiple first-person pronouns. in other words, the word “i” and “me” can be translated in many different ways depending on who’s speaking. 

• the gender neutral and formal “watashi” (used by spica and belle), 
• the shy, cute boy “boku” (used by castor and hamal), 
• the crass delinquent “ore” (used by louis), 

and so on. 

in japanese, tom refers to himself with the first-person pronoun “oira,” which is a very uncommon way to refer to oneself. it’s often associated with country bumpkins and is very strange, but kind of cute in a way. but he doesn’t really have any other strange speaking patterns, they’re all just rather cute. i didn’t know what to make of this, so i started translating his dialogue with a couple of country accents “that singing’s darn beautiful!” etc, before i asked nobiti-san what her intention behind his dialogue was. she said that she wrote his dialogue to appear cute, but that she also wanted it to seem like he was hiding something. his usage of “oira” was just to further enhance that persona.

so i threw the country accents out the window, and tried writing his dialogue to make it seem like he was just a cute and trustworthy friend, who was maybe hiding a couple of things, instead. i didn’t put too much effort into making him seem like he was hiding something though, because i felt as though what he says itself is enough to do that.

while playing through the game for the first time, i actually didn’t suspect tom at all? but one of my play testers mentioned they thought tom was suspicious, so i’m happy all my intentions shone through!

i’m being very careful to ensure that every character in the english translation is faithful to the original japanese text and characterization. all in a good translation! <3 but if you see anything that you think should be changed, please let me know by contacting me through twitter @iamyourmagician, such as typos, or otherwise things you think i should change.

and lastly, shoutout to nobiti-san for being an incredible dev to work with! she expressed to me that she isn't good at english at all, and has been very open-minded and kind. i’ve never used wolf editor before, and i was very nervous about changing the programming of her game and making something not work, so she very kindly offered to edit all of the images so long as i provided the translation for each. she also redrew the title screen to have the title in english, which is something i’ve never seen a game dev do before! she was extremely kind to me throughout the process of the translation, allowing me to take my time and not force me with any deadlines. i’m honored to have been able to work with her on this project!

thank you, nobiti-san!! and thank you, everyone, for playing!!! please continue to support “asleep in a miniature garden”. i’m looking forward to seeing you again in episode 2!