
I could go on for days just explaining some of the more odd pokemon and how they actually have rather obscure origins heralding to Japanese culture. Like, say, Meowth, his original sprite pose and the coin on his head and its signature move of Pay Day is a reference to the Maneki Neko, the lucky beckoning cat that many Japanese people put in shops to welcome in fortune and money. Or how Dunsparce is based on the Tsuchinoko, a cryptid that is basically Japan's equivalent of the Chupacabra. Froslass is based on the Yuki-onna, a snow demon from Japanese mythology. Mawile, Electabuzz, Shiftry, Lombre and many more are all based on yokai from Japanese culture. I could go on and on about pokemon that make sense only if you understand some Japanese or Chinese culture, but I'm not going to. I'm going to talk a bit about the things that are lost in translation.
See, when they translate pokemon from Japanese to English, everything gets translated. The names of towns, the names of pokemon, the names of attacks, all those dialogue... a shit ton of things get translated and sometimes oversight during translation makes some things kind of wonky in English.

This is not going to be an exhaustive list of every single thing that is lost in translation from Japanese to English, nor is it a critique on poor translation because god knows there's a shit-ton of dialogue in a game.

But that's just a couple of examples of dialogues being changed into a different joke, and the essence of the puns aren't necessary for anyone experiencing the game. There are several translations such as pokemon names that kind of make people go 'whoops' when future games add on that pokemon and they realize they made a goof while translating names. For example, Togetic was Togechikku in the original Japanese. And while Togetic was a valid translation and romanization for Togechikku, a more appropriate one would be Togechick, which admittedly does sound stupid... but that kind of makes Togetic's sudden transformation from the weird pixie-thing into a bird-plane odd if you didn't realize Togetic is supposed to be a slightly-grown chick.

Also, ever wonder why Mr. Mime... isn't an entirely-male species? There are female Mr. Mimes out there. It's a bit of a bad translation, since back in Generation I pokemon genders wasn't a thing in the games other than the Nidorans, so the English translators just picked the name 'Mr. Mime' and popped it onto this pokemon... whose Japanese name was the perfectly gender-neutral Bariado, a bastardization of the English word Barrier. So when Generation II introduced gender, whoops, it seems that Mrs. Mimes do exist, and Nintendo really doesn't want to change anything they've already established unless they absolutely have to.
A good portion of the bad translations come from the original Generation I games, where thanks to them just, y'know, starting out, they don't have as large a budget as they do have. And there are things to take into consideration such as the letter limitations that the Game Boy has. For example, people cried foul when the classic Generation I item 'Itemfinder' suddenly changed names abruptly in Generation IV into the 'Dowsing Machine'... when, in reality, it has been constantly named Dowsing Machine (Daujingu Mashin) in the original Japanese versions ever since day one. The games themselves never put letters on the Poke Balls other than the Master Ball, but some manga and TCG cards put the letters S and H on Great Balls and Ultra Balls, referencing their original Japanese names: Supa Ball (Super Ball) and Haipa Ball (Hyper Ball) respectively.


A well-known oddity in Generation I is during an in-game trade where you can trade a Raichu for an Electrode, upon which the NPC trainer will claim that the Raichu has evolved, causing so many people to think that there's a hidden or canceled Raichu evolution somewhere. And while Nintendo isn't afraid of building up on things introduced way back from Generation I (the Generation V pokemon Munna has been referenced all the way back from Generation I), this is just a translation error where, in the Japanese version of Pokemon Blue, the in-game trade was for the player to give him a Kadabra, which would evolve by trade. The localization team used the alternate trade from the Green version of the games, which changed the trade, but used the dialogue from Red/Blue.

A bit of an obscure one, this time. Back in Generation I, practically the only pokemon that could learn 'Double Kick' was the Nidoran families, plus Hitmonlee (who can learn every single 'kick' move) and Jolteon. Why the Nidoran family? They were these weird poison rabbit-porcupine-rhinoceros hybrids, you wouldn't think that they would rely much on kicking. Well, it turns out, the Japanese words for Double Kick is 'Nidogeri' and it's just a pun because it sounds a lot like the Nidoran families' name.

Haze and Mist are another pair of attacks whose relationships are gone thanks to translation. Haze and Mist always has similar animation, and that's because Haze is Kuroi Kiri, meaning Black Mist, in Japan, wheras Mist is Shiroi Kiri, White Mist. Though unlike most other examples, the relationship between Haze and Mist isn't particularly evident since Haze eliminates stat changes whereas Mist protects the team from status moves.
A well-known example would be the move Splash, which can only be learnt by Magikarp in Generation I, and is famous for... doing absolutely nothing. Now translating it as 'Splash' for a fish's move sounds like an improvement and probably would work well... except that come future generations and other non-fish pokemon like Hoppip and Spoink can learn Splash, and it becomes confusing until you realize that Splash's original Japanese name was Haneru, which more accurately translates to Hop or Jump.
Aerial Ace, introduced in Generation III, is odd because a lot of random non-Flying-types can learn it, but the original name for Aerial Ace is Tsubame Gaeshi, roughly translating into 'Swallow Return Strike', which is a swordfighting technique. The Flying-type is only added into it as an additional pun. Acid Armor is another one that Generation I got wrong. Again, it's a seldom-seen move, only learnable by Vaporeon and the Grimer line, and the Generation I animation didn't really made it clear what's happening... but if you watch the anime or read the manga, or looked at the prettier animations of future games, Acid Armor's animation has the user literally transform into water. That doesn't sound very armor-y, or acid-y. That's because Acid Armor's original Japanese name, Tokeru, meant Liquefy.
Ever wonder why the Generation VI ability Mega Launcher affects pulse moves (Water Pulse, Heal Pulse, Dragon Pulse, Dark Pulse).... and Aura Sphere, randomly? Because in Japan, Mega Launcher affects all moves with the word 'hado', and that could be translated as 'pulse' or 'aura'. And indeed Aura Sphere's Japanese name is Hadodan, which makes the Hadoken reference even more evident. But since the placement of Hado isn't as evident as the others (Water Pulse is Mizu no Hado, Dark Pulse is Akuma no Hado, etc) it just got lost in translation, since it's a combination of multiple moves that have been introduced differently over multiple games with no indication that some random ability is going to treat them as a set.

Ever wonder why Spore and Stun Spore has such similar names, but has such different effects? Spore is a sure-hit attack that puts the enemy to sleep, whereas Stun Spore is basically identical to Poison Powder and Sleep Powder, except with paralysis? Well that's because Spore's Japanese name is Kinoko no Hoshi, meaning Mushroom Spores, which also explains throughout Pokemon's history why only pokemon with mushrooms can learn it. Stun Spore is Shibire Gona, meaning Numbing Powder, to go with the same naming themes of Doku no Kona (Poison Powder) and Nemuri Gona (Sleep Powder)... but I bet Paralyze Powder doesn't fit in the Game Boy's attack slots, nor does it sound particularly catchy in English. And the alternative would be PARLYZ Powder which is equally stupid. But it did make me kind of confuse Stun Spore and Spore for years, so...
Why does Double Slap hit you two to five times? Don't they realize that 'double' means twice? Well that's because Double Slap isn't even named Double Slap in the original Japanese. It's called Ofuku Binta, which apparently translates more closely to Round Trip Slap or more accurately translated to Series of Slaps.

Anyway, Comet Punch seems like an awesome translation of "Renzoku Panchi" that still keeps the essence of the attack... until Generation III rolls along and introduces a move that is literally Kometto Panchi in Japan. Welp. This Kometto Panchi eventually got translated into what we know as Meteor Mash instead of renaming the original Comet Punch, but it's certainly a rather interesting event where the translation they chose ended up being used for another attack's name.
I could go on and on and I'm sure there's loads more things that are lost in translation, but I guess this will do for now. It's been fun, and I haven't done these non-review articles for a while. It's interesting to see that despite Nintendo's relatively high quality of translations from Japanese to English, lots of things lose their contextual meaning when future games bring up the puns and original cultural references from the original Japanese names.
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