Sorry, for the delay. Enjoy this poorly written review. More reviews to come out as soon as I break my Operation Darkness disc in half. (Yes, I’ve spent my reviewing time playing a game with a metascore of 44. I’m so sorry.)

Table of Contents

Release Information

Visual Quality

Script Quality

Results

Release Information

Episode details.

Release format: MKV (474 MB, 10-bit), MKV (, 8-bit)

Japanesiness: Honorifics used. Onii-chan used.

English style: American English.

Encoding details: http://pastebin.com/0hGyhKEZ

Speed: Slow (>48 hours)

Note: The karaoke is hardsubbed.

Note 2: Had to skip reviewing 04, which was an absolute shit release. It’s unfortunate cuz I was halfway done with it too. :(

<+HeavenlyArmed> Thumper edits that show, i think
<&Naruto-kun1984> ah yes, he did ep 4
<&Naruto-kun1984> only one ep
<&Naruto-kun1984> cause the editor on that show was busy

If you do decide to get all-Hatsuyuki releases after this, skip episode 4. The editor clearly didn’t understand English, or any other language really.

 

External links.

Group website: http://hatsuyuki-fansubs.com/

IRC channel: #[email protected]

SubCompare screenshot comparisons: http://www.subcompare.com/code_breaker/

Commie’s fansub reviews: http://notredrevie.ws/autumn-2012-reviews/#breaker

 

Visual Review

Karaoke.

Opening. Cool flamey stuff. ^_^ (Yes, it’s hardsubbed but I’m not one to care about that.)

Oh, and I had someone argue that kara lines which obscure the credits shouldn’t count against a group’s visual score if it was impossible to read. That actually makes a lot of sense, so starting from this review I’ll only count that against groups if it’s obvious it could have been avoided.

Rating: Good.

Ending. It didn’t do the shift thing that sage-koi’s did, but I liked the KFX quite a bit. Yeah I tend to like Hatsuyuki’s kara; it unleashes my inner fangirl.

Rating: Good.

 

 

Typesetting.

 

Other.

I dunno, this encode looks off to me. I’ll just chalk it up to a shitty source though as sage-koi’s was similar.

 

Script Review

Karaoke.

What the fuck am I even reading? Some of this is just pure gibberish.

 

I went over this on sage-koi’s. I assume Hatsuyuki’s excuses will be the same — “our translation is better than what the Japanese intended it to be!” — but I don’t particularly care.

Coruscant village? Really? I could see some argument to be made if you had “coruscant city” (since coruscant means glittering/flashing, and that could refer to the lights), but a village? Maybe, and I mean maybe, if you were talking about candlelight this could work. But that would be a shitty TL for that scenario.

Avoid the color reference, it’s fucking stupid.

“A wish of pure white” -> “A pure wish”

 

Main Script.

The idiom is “fruit of your labor”, not that you fruits would know that.

An accurate prediction.

“The issues start from here.”

This does not fit at all. Read the comparison section if you want more context.

“Taking that into consideration…”

If you’re going to use “Even though”, you need a fucking follow-up. Since you don’t have one, go with

“And I even turned it to stone for you!”

“You say that you’re evil, but…”

I am evil.

More like “Mr. Secretary”, the editor.

 

 

Hatsuyuki vs. sage-koi

I watched sage-koi’s 05 after Hatsuyuki’s 05 because I knew there’d be some bitching if I didn’t have a direct comparison somewhere here after declaring Hatsu’s subs to be the best.

Muscle bros: Children with weak special abilities are useless and unnecessary.
Muscle bros: Just look at it that way.
Muscle bros: At the very least, we should use their organs for “the greater good.”
Sakura: What the hell?!
Sakura: There’s no way that’s the right thing to do! {i think this is her catchprase or something}
Muscle bros: My, what a lively girl.
Muscle bros: Gosh, should we cut her up?
Ogata: What you say is true.
Ogata: If one is useless, then he’s unnecessary.

 

Muscle bros: There’s no need for useless kids with weak special powers.
Muscle bros: If so, then…
Muscle bros: If we could at least put their organs to good use, it’d be best for everyone.
Sakura: Screw you!
Sakura: There’s no way anyone would agree to that!
Muscle bros: My, what a lively child.
Muscle bros: Shall we take her apart?
Ogami: As you say,
Ogami: if you’re useless, then there’s no need for you.

 

I think this gives a good high-level view of some of the differences between the releases. sage-koi does have a number of points you could give them over Hatsuyuki. For example, their word choice and sentence structure is better. Comparing “At the very least, we should use their organs for ‘the greater good.'” to “If we could at least put their organs to good use, it’d be best for everyone.”, you get more out of sage-koi’s line.

But where Hatsuyuki destroys sage-koi’s release is in the phrasing department. sage-koi comes across as a kid trying to imitate their favorite wrestler and ending up with a broken back as a result.

 

“There’s no way that’s the right thing to do!” vs. “There’s no way anyone would agree to that!”

While Hatsuyuki’s line isn’t praiseworthy (or even noteworthy), sage-koi attempts to infuse their line with personality by using… italics. Mm.

The italics unintentionally make the line more awkward because there’s no reason to put emphasis on those two words. I don’t really see how this could be greenlit unless the writer ignored how italics work in subs.

 

“Gosh, should we cut her up?” vs. “Shall we take her apart?”

Yes, the guy saying this is effeminate, so the idea behind sage-koi’s line is fine, it just fails in execution… again.

“Gosh” is just haphazardly shoved in here, like they think it will work just because it came from a dictionary of words that gay people might use when they’re trying so hard to be recognized as gay. But you can’t just fucking throw random shit around, because you’ll end up getting some all over yourself too.

“Shall we cut this little harlot up?” for example, would work. You get the gay stereotype in there without sacrificing the English portion of English.

 

“If one is useless, then he’s unnecessary.” vs. “if you’re useless, then there’s no need for you.”

What the fuck, sage-koi? It makes sense, but only after a double-take or two. Awkward fucking phrasing.

 

In case you don’t understand what I’m saying here, this is pretty much all Hatsuyuki had to do to be considered the best group for this shitty show:

 

I could do this kind of comparison for the entire script and the vast majority of lines would show Hatsuyuki’s lines being just plain better. I know sage-koi has excuses for their poor performance here — “lack of motivation” “joint difficulties” “we’re a speedsub so we gotta go faster, faster, faster, faster (Sonic X)” — but excuses are just that. Hatsuyuki’s release is the best for this show. Deal with it.

 

Results

Watchability: Watchable.

Visual grade: B+

Script grade: B-

Overall grade: B

Hatsuyuki’s script isn’t great, but it does at least have flavor. Compared to sage-koi’s bland script, I think you’d be better off with Hatsuyuki’s release if you feel like waiting for it.