Fansub Review: [Commie] Sasami-san@Ganbaranai (Episode 01)

June 7, 2015January 12, 2013 by Dark_Sage

This post was written by Dark_Sage. He is Dark_Sage.

Sorry, FFF. I was doing your review but then I saw some screens of Commie’s release on subcompare, couldn’t stop laughing, and decided I had to review theirs first.

Release Information

Visual Quality

Script Quality

Results

Release Information

Episode details.

Release format: MKV (443 MB, 10-bit)

Japanesiness: No honorifics.

English style: American English.

Encoding details: http://pastebin.com/xaMvsTfe

Speed: Quick (<48 hours)

Note: The “ribbit” and “barf” typesets look like shit on some media player set-ups and fine on others. I dunno exactly why, but I heard something about lav filters. YMMV on what you get on your system (it was fucked up for me and I’m using the latest CCCP).

External links.

Group website: http://commiesubs.com/

IRC channel: #[email protected]

SubCompare screenshot comparisons: http://www.subcompare.com/sasami-san@Ganbaranai/

Visual Review

Karaoke.

Opening. Thanks, Commie. My eyes were a bit dry before but now that they’re fucking bleeding that’s no longer an issue.

Rating: Bad.

Sorta-insert, sorta-ED. Anyway, no group subbed this because it was pretty hard to hear and the main focus was on the dialogue.

Typesetting.

This got tl;dr fast. I didn’t expect Commie to typeset nearly everything. So here, have the signs that I didn’t comment on in this spoiler.

Spoiler for

It would have been nice to know what the item was before she opened the box.

Nothing wrong with a swastika.

In the gg review, koku pointed out that this is likely supposed to read “dead end” to reflect her “dead-end life”. I’m inclined to agree.

This is all so fucking weird. “Sasami’s Stumble Anniversary”? Really?

First off, shit looks like “Luwy Duwy”. Secondly, it’s “lovey-dovey”. Thirdly next off, it’s not clear enough that “Dynamite Anniversary” is a separate thought from “I Luvvy Duvvy My Brother”.

When read with the previous lines in the release in mind, it comes across as “Sasami’s ‘I luvvy duvvy my brother dynamite’ anniversary”. Either use quotes to close off the sections from each other or use an em-/en-dash to do it.

These are the errors I was talking about earlier. I don’t know if you can see the issue with my shitty jpeg screenshots, but click on the image for a bigger size and I think you’ll see what’s wrong.

>TLing eroge as “porn games”

Commie, you’re truly the best. (Hint: the preferred localization is “adult games” because it doesn’t sound so fucking out of place.)

Same issue as before. I do like how the “Ribbit”s shake around the screen, though.

*Blu-ray

^_^

(As an FYI, a lot of these things that don’t seem like huge issues are either only contributing very little to what comes up in the final grade or not at all.)

Since I already uploaded it, I should mention that this should be “Action-packed”. gg had that mistake too but I didn’t really figure it was important enough to dedicate a full screenshot to.

Y-You mean “blue”?

Other.

lol.

Top-tier styling, herkz.

Script Review

Karaoke.

Thank you, Commie. Fuck, I thought this song was just stupid shit that couldn’t be TL’d, but no, it was just FFF and gg that couldn’t handle translating it.

God’s hand paints the seasons
that pass my sight
Farther than the starry sky my wishes go
while I rock in my sleep
When I cup my ears and walk through the crowds
my sense of self disappears
I’m not yet old enough to accept that sometimes
your heart desires discord
I saw a scared, gentle flower in the wilderness
When I touched it, the diorama turned into reality
The whims of God draw the map that depicts my future
Countless sounds echo from it
and I chase them
whatever it may bring
The bonds that let us sit together under a starry sky
show me human warmth
The bonds we forge as we hurt others
are the bonds I want to protect

Main Script.

“Stupid box!” is a more likely exclamation of frustration than just plain “Stupid!”

Source: I’m a native hater of boxes.

“huge” by itself carries the connotation of “too”. So either go with “It’s huge!” or “Too big!” (I prefer the former.)

Both gg and FFF went with “Brush my teeth.” here for a reason.

You know there’s a word for “not asleep”, right?

“You’re still awake, Sasami?”

I’m not counting this as an issue, but it seems pretty silly to call it a “late-night anime” when we already know it’s late at night.

Just because you hear a name doesn’t mean you have to sub it in. Here, it stands out… and not in a good way.

“Are these for me?!”

I get that this dude’s straight baka, but there are limits. A box of chocolates, while being both a box and a possible lunch, is not a “lunch box”.

“Kill them!” is a better option here. “Murder” has negative connotations built in. It indicates she knows it’s “wrong” but is fine with it anyway. But that’s not really it cuz this chick doesn’t know much about anything, let alone the connotations behind “murder”.

Yes, it’s a stronger term and I’m sure you intended to use that for a greater effect for the line. But it doesn’t fit with her character.

more -> another

Yes, he can purchase more than just one, but since he intended it to be his lunch by itself, that doesn’t make much sense.

particularly -> really

That ain’t how you use “particularly”.

Not loving it, but this was definitely better than gg’s and FFF’s translations (“prepubescent hag” and “loli-hag” respectively).

Why would you capitalize “nightmare”? Would you do the same for “easy”?

“Nightmare Mode” or “nightmare mode” seem like better options.

Oh you guyz. <3

Results

Watchability: Watchable.

Visual grade: B+ (I want to give you guys a higher score, but that hideous karaoke and styling? That’s not A-tier.)

Script grade: B-

Overall grade: B

A lot of the English mistakes I pointed out may seem like nitpicks at first blush, but all run together it turns into something that I don’t feel I touch on explicitly enough — the overall feel of a release. And Commie’s was pretty bumpy.

But to throw a wrench in that argument, Commie also had a number of lines that I felt were much better than I was expecting to see. I wouldn’t be surprised to see them end up the favorite in the TL Party. (I might do a TL Comparison post for 01 because there’s still a lot I want to talk about when it comes to group differences.)

tl;dr so far:

Typesetting: Commie > gg

Styling: gg > Commie

Karaoke: Indeterminate. (Commie’s was the only understandable version for the karaoke, but the visuals were shit.)

Script: Commie > gg

Speed: gg > Commie

I’d say Commie is a better option than gg. Up next is FFF’s.
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49 thoughts on “Fansub Review: [Commie] Sasami-san@Ganbaranai (Episode 01)”

herkz

January 12, 2013 at 12:12 am

>Note: The “ribbit” and “barf” typesets look like shit on some media player set-ups and fine on others. I dunno exactly why, but I heard something about lav filters. YMMV on what you get on your system (it was fucked up for me and I’m using the latest CCCP).

>[20:19:29] herkz: Lord (one of the CCCP maintainers) is getting correct results for that sign with the latest CCCP release

so yeah, i have no idea

it doesn’t look right for me either in mpc
Reply
- Xythar
  
  January 12, 2013 at 12:24 am
  
  It also looks okay on my setup.
  Reply
- herkz
  
  January 12, 2013 at 12:29 am
  
  you’d have to ask airco. i don’t know if it’s supposed to be a “pun” like that and he’s actually read some of the novels
  Reply
- Verix
  
  January 12, 2013 at 3:12 am
  
  With the latest CCCP, it’s still possible to load up MPC’s own subtitle filtering which should be OFF to load up xy-vsfilter. Maybe that’s what went wrong?
  Reply
- nINJAkECIL
  
  January 12, 2013 at 3:58 am
  
  You should cover the entire screen instead of just put a mask around it.
  Reply
  - herkz
    
    January 12, 2013 at 4:04 am
    
    i am far too lazy for that
    Reply
herkz

January 12, 2013 at 12:13 am

>herkz in charge of escaping less than symbols

but yeah, we talked about it on IRC for like an hour and apparently it should display correctly with default CCCP
Reply
- njd09
  
  January 12, 2013 at 12:18 am
  
  But that’s a greater-than symbol.
  Reply
  - herkz
    
    January 12, 2013 at 12:24 am
    
    i mean if you leave them in whilst quoting from IRC, wordpress will break them and end up with what i have above (instead of showing that Plorkyeran said the line)
    Reply
- Dark_Sage
  
  January 12, 2013 at 12:25 am
  
  I thought I had CCCP default. All right, I’ll reinstall it and let ya know if that makes it better on my end.
  Reply
  - herkz
    
    January 12, 2013 at 12:26 am
    
    it didn’t for me… so i really have no clue
    Reply
    - Dark_Sage
      
      January 12, 2013 at 12:27 am
      
      Yeah, didn’t work for me either.
      Reply
      - Xythar
        
        January 12, 2013 at 12:31 am
        
        Could be something else on your system conflicting with it, maybe? My media PC (which doubles as my testing platform) just has CCCP and nothing else, and when I watched the episode on there those typesets looked okay.
        
        Weird.
        Reply
        
        Dark_Sage
        
        January 12, 2013 at 12:32 am
        
        That’s probably it. I don’t have a clean testing environment. Not sure what exactly is affecting it though.
        Reply
littlejinx

January 12, 2013 at 12:25 am

thanks! i trust you on this!
Reply
Akatsukin

January 12, 2013 at 12:31 am

You know, I meant to bring this up before, but about the ケロケロ　(kero kero) sound effect: I understand that it could mean “ribbit”, and with Tama being a frog and all it distracted you, but isn’t FFF’s rendition of it being “bleurgh” (i.e. the sound of vomiting) more accurate? It fits with what’s going on, and I’m surprised it wasn’t the first thing to come to mind for both gg and commie’s TL/TLCs.
Reply
P32L

January 12, 2013 at 12:37 am

Also, lovey-dovey is an adjective. I mean, that’s about three layers of fail right there.
Reply
tormaid

January 12, 2013 at 12:43 am

Why would you cover the Japanese lines on the “ribbit” and “barf” screens when there is a textured background? Even if your setup matches the colors perfectly, there will still be an ugly box around the text.
Reply
- herkz
  
  January 12, 2013 at 12:44 am
  
  there isn’t. it’s solid
  Reply
  - herkz
    
    January 12, 2013 at 12:44 am
    
    also i wanted to have multiple ribbits and yeah it would look weird on top or the side or whatever
    Reply
  - tormaid
    
    January 12, 2013 at 12:46 am
    
    Huh, must just be the compression on these screens :\
    Reply
    - herkz
      
      January 12, 2013 at 1:15 am
      
      well, there is a very subtle texture, but yeah, the jpeg compression doesn’t help
      Reply
kokujin-kun

January 12, 2013 at 12:57 am

You’re right, that really should be retching sounds instead of “ribbit”. Viewing that line without any background in moon, that just doesn’t make any sense. Who’d associate “ribbit” with vomiting? If you can’t come up with some other retching sound that sounds like a frog, then whatever joke or pun that was lost in translation can be explained in some blog post.
Reply
- Dark_Sage
  
  January 12, 2013 at 1:46 am
  
  FFF had it as “bleurgh” so at least one group went with it.
  Reply
- FalseDawn
  
  January 12, 2013 at 9:00 am
  
  Croak? To rhyme with choke? Okay, it’s tenuous…
  Reply
Alice

January 12, 2013 at 1:05 am

http://i3.minus.com/ibtsoOrWOKpdKJ.png

This was my result with the ribbit and barf typesetting. The first time around there was nothing, but it was fine the second time around.
Reply
lygerzero0zero

January 12, 2013 at 2:24 am

“Sasami@Ganbaranai”?

Why would you leave the title in Japanese but cut out the honorific? You’re basically abridging the title.
Reply
- Xythar
  
  January 12, 2013 at 2:39 am
  
  I don’t know. I’ve told them it’s stupid.
  
  It was even sillier for Tonari no Kaibutsu-kun.
  Reply
  - Kenshin_sama
    
    January 12, 2013 at 3:21 am
    
    I don’t like it either. Even if you don’t want to use honorifics in your subs, it would still be in bad tastes to remove it from the title.
    Reply
  - 2ColouredEyes
    
    January 14, 2013 at 11:45 am
    
    No, Xythar. I know you could do something about it but you stayed silent.
    Reply
    - Xythar
      
      January 14, 2013 at 6:45 pm
      
      Yeah, I’m sure you know more about what goes on inside the group than someone who’s actually, you know, inside the group. Truth be told, I actually make all decisions at Commie, even regarding shows I’m not around for, and even if the leader of the group explicity says to do things one way, I can just tell people to do otherwise. Your keen insights have shone a light on the truth behind this matter.
      Reply
      - FalseDawn
        
        January 14, 2013 at 7:06 pm
        
        Xythar is the puppetmaster, fo’ sho’.
        Reply
      - VividFear
        
        January 14, 2013 at 9:49 pm
        
        You make all the decisions at Commie? Oh, well, then, I have complied a list of fucks to be given for you.
        
        1. Who gives a fuck.
        2. Who gives a fuck.
        3. Who gives a fuck.
        
        I hope you take my sentimental list and continue to govern Commie on a glorious path.
        Reply
        
        Dark_Sage
        
        January 14, 2013 at 9:56 pm
        
        I think you’re just jealous.
        Reply
        
        VividFear
        
        January 14, 2013 at 9:58 pm
        
        I made a Gravatar just to post that comment. It was an enlightening post.
        Reply
    - rarely_upset
      
      January 14, 2013 at 9:23 pm
      
      It’s worse than you think. Xythar is in charge of everything – the entire world of fansubbing is completely directed by him. Daiz’s codecs, Hadena’s mistakes, Doki’s karaoke styling…
      All of it Xythar.
      Reply
      - Justinnnnnn
        
        January 14, 2013 at 9:31 pm
        
        Hadena’s mistakes you say??
        
        …That means you’ve been responsible for some quality laughs I had with Hadena’s releases then, Xythar. Thank you!
        Reply
- herkz
  
  January 12, 2013 at 4:04 am
  
  ask rhe. he’s the one that started this shit
  Reply
Beelzebub

January 12, 2013 at 10:44 am

“Are these for me?!”

But doesn’t she say it’s lunch (obento)?
Like… explicitly?
Or maybe he just sees the box…
Either way, shouldn’t it be: “Is this (really) for me?!”?

A box of chocolates, while being both a box and a possible lunch, is not a “lunch box”.

But she never mentions that there’s chocolate in it, but does say it’s an obento and if you really INSIST on localizing it, “lunch box” would be the most commonly used coice.

No offense, I’d just like to know if I understood these scenes properly or not.
Reply
- PT
  
  January 13, 2013 at 3:39 am
  
  Yeah, I’d second that opinion.
  
  Sasami did say it’s “obento” for her brother. And the said brother, being a straight baka as noted, took it at face value.
  
  Well, he even later said that he hadn’t received any chocolate that day. This pretty much indicates that he really regarded the present as a regular lunch box all along, no?
  Reply
- Dark_Sage
  
  January 13, 2013 at 3:49 am
  
  Well the issue is that this is what I think of when I hear “lunch box”: http://i.imgur.com/jeK8f.jpg.
  
  The joke works better for an English-speaking audience if you just shorten it to “lunch”. Or something less specific like you suggested.
  Reply
  - Xythar
    
    January 13, 2013 at 3:51 am
    
    I found the whole scene too disturbing to focus on terminology because the idea of eating chocolate and only chocolate for lunch is absolutely disgusting :(
    Reply
Justinnnnnn

January 12, 2013 at 10:51 pm

People, I’ll throw an off-topic comment here, do ignore or D_S-delete if you want:

Eureka Seven (‘s first episodes). Which is the best fansub to go with?
Reply
- Xythar
  
  January 13, 2013 at 12:33 am
  
  Funimation, probably
  Reply
- Solaristics
  
  January 13, 2013 at 12:40 am
  
  Eureka Seven AO – GG
  Eureka Seven – I watched it in Dub, as I didn’t like its sub, go with FUNimation with subs.
  Reply
  - Justinnnnnn
    
    January 13, 2013 at 2:47 am
    
    Yeah, just E7, not AO. Someone told me to go with Coalgirls, it’s fun~
    Reply
- Nevreen
  
  January 13, 2013 at 1:11 pm
  
  Funimation, definitely. A handful of derps in the subs pretty much every episode, but they far outclass any fansub group that was around at the time.
  
  The dub is really good for E7, too.
  Reply
Anonymous

January 17, 2013 at 9:50 pm

“Y-You mean “blue”?”

If by “water colored” they are directly translating mizuiro (Not sure, can’t read enough kanji), the “Aqua” would probably be better than blue.
Reply
natsukashii-ne

February 12, 2013 at 9:23 pm

Nobody mentioned this as far as I saw, but Commie also has better timing in a number of noticable instances. As you did say, Commie’s script flows better and the puns actually work.

Credit where it’s deserved: Commie did the best job on this show.
Reply

Fansub Review: [Commie] Sasami-san@Ganbaranai (Episode 01)

Table of Contents

Release Information

Episode details.

External links.

Visual Review

Karaoke.

Typesetting.

Other.

Script Review

Karaoke.

Main Script.

Results

49 thoughts on “Fansub Review: [Commie] Sasami-san@Ganbaranai (Episode 01)”

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