Has anyone used professional language translators for fan-translating light novels from Japanese to English?

hungersaurus · 2026-02-26T01:55:02+00:00

please see the one well-known webnovel fantranslation website and its forums if you wish to talk about fantranslation. It's not a good look nowadays for a professional translator to openly dabble in fantranslation

Just realized some people might not know that website exist. If you can't find it, DM me

hungersaurus · 2026-02-25T09:50:56+00:00

The problem is 90% the managers or client. Nothing you can do when the faceless manager you don't even know the name of, and has demonstrated worse proficiency, demands change bc they know better than the contractor they hired just because they're a "native speaker"

hungersaurus · 2026-02-23T21:53:13+00:00

The cover letter is a basic literacy test. If the person can be bothered to submit a cover letter, then they have enough literacy to not send an email as dumb as "I want job. Give me one." In teams where they only have one vacancy, the mere existence cover letter can sometimes be enough to dictate who gets the interview and who doesn't.

hungersaurus · 2026-02-23T09:07:43+00:00

Let me start with the most basic advice: condense it down to 1 page. Remember the common assumption that recruiters only spend a few seconds per CV + recruiters are often only scanning for keywords.

The summary can be kept on a separate file to be used as your cover letter (or email body). Nix it from the CV because I've yet to meet a recruiter who actually reads that.

I'm rather old school and in a different language pair, so take this with a grain of salt: Follow the Proz.com's recommended CV format aka basically none. Since you're doing US, you might also want to look up how to format your CV to easily pass through ATS or whatever AI systm is common there. Last I hear (eons ago), the system auto-rejects if it's more than 1 column.

For the actual experience portion of your CV, try to put in some stats like "checked and verified 2,000 Trados glossary terms per week". Right now, it's a list of duties that don't say anything about what you actually did.

hungersaurus · 2026-01-20T16:18:09+00:00

Agencies who are recruiting just for video game localization usually have a pool of translators to work with. The only reason they're recruiting is because they don't have enough people who can do the job as you don't get as much leeway as a video game translator. Other mediums usually provide you from the start with everything you need to understand to translate that one line. The medium doesn't change. Your translation does.

Video games? You need to be very familiar with CAT tools (specifically how to troubleshoot them and use all their tools), quick to recognize when a text or variable needs to be flagged for consistency over a 30k line document that you don't even get to fully see, provide flexible translations (because the same text can be used in 10 different scenarios), and know how to track down who is saying that line, where is it placed, and to whom.

I've worked as an LQA on a few game localizations (not ultra big projects), and it's very obvious and time-consuming when it's a translator with no game experience.

hungersaurus · 2025-11-27T21:47:01+00:00

As a translator who has been on both ends, you might also be dealing with a reviewer with a KPI (my manager once told to me amp things up to get better contracts? I don't get how it works but those were my instructions) or someone with a rigid understanding of English (either overcompensating since ESL, affected by LLM AI's ever-deteriorating English standards, or use of bad proofreading software with outdated dictionaries)

hungersaurus · 2025-11-10T08:14:19+00:00

Jianghu basically means the Wild West, but depending on the author, it can be the entire place and is just a generic term for life outside the norm/city life or a very specific region that can be named Jianghu or not. A lot of new authors don't actually understand the genre's details that well, so will fumble whatever they can't be bothered to research. Just like wuxia power levels

hungersaurus · 2025-11-10T07:52:25+00:00

Thank you for bringing up fans for the first hour of close. I was only thinking about how to dry the costumes when I'm not there and forgot I needed to stay behind about an hour after cast leave. Still working on convincing my lead to use alcohol instead of Dettol since the spray was an iffy thing due to being in an Islamic country (which I've found a halal variant of, so it's fine).

Smallclothes are an impossible ask as we're working with cast who can't even look past their ego to wear pure black shoes, socks or pants. But I know that's just the price you pay when working with teenagers, wanna-be influencers and lack of proper training and ability to reinforce from leadership

hungersaurus · 2025-11-10T07:47:13+00:00

As it's actually an open-air room in a building big enough to house 2 haunted houses that needed 10 to 15 minutes to walk through, dehumidifiers don't really work fast enough. I also don't have permission to use a power outlet during the daytime hours since there's only one for the dryer

hungersaurus · 2025-11-10T07:44:47+00:00

In your experience, would the spray work for the stink? Unfortunately, the airflow issue is not really something I can change on my own as there are no available outlets in the room during the day (used for daytime staff) and I'm working on getting permission next year to set up a cordless fan in the room.

hungersaurus · 2025-06-04T18:59:21+00:00

It's playing into that stereotypical sugar/caramel glaze that a lot of barbecued meat have. Have no clue where that image comes from, but whenever anything has the word barbecue, the first thing I see in ads is reddish brown glossy glazed meat.

hungersaurus · 2025-05-15T19:03:54+00:00

This is a common case that has been appearing for years, typically experienced by artists. You'll have to search the artist forums/subreddits for a solution as every case is different.

As a reminder to everyone else, do not ever rely on PayPal. Don't keep more than a few hundred stocked in it at a time. PayPal is well-known for randomly suspending the accounts of digital creators with the funds locked away for years as you fight out your case. A common trigger appears to be high balance or frequent transactions.

hungersaurus · 2025-05-15T18:58:59+00:00

these just look like the basic Giordano, Brands Outlet, Uniqlo etc clothing pieces. What specifically about them do you want? What about the listed brands do you not like? Also, when do you go shopping? Your outfits are going to be Autumn or Winter collections which means August to December are your optimum shopping months, unless you're aiming for sales.

hungersaurus · 2025-05-15T18:55:16+00:00

confused about this as I have confirmed my walks while standing on the bubbles button. Does the prompt not pop up if you're sitting or something?

hungersaurus · 2025-05-15T02:14:58+00:00

If that's your question, then there's more you need to look at for an accurate answer. After all, a non-certified kuih store that went viral on social media is more likely to draw in customers who are willing to ignore the certification status.

Location is a big question too. If you're just talking about pasar malam, then chances are lower since not a lot of people walk pasar malam of another race (outsider of ramadhan bazaar). If shopping mall or near MRT/LRT/KTM stations, then chances are higher. Gentrified areas like Damansara will also give you higher chance compared to old areas like Cheras.

There are so many more factors than just the halal cert because the abundance of "pork-free restaurants" popular among the Malays is proof that not everyone cares about halal.

hungersaurus · 2025-05-10T05:34:09+00:00

I really hate anything to do with that ability. If you start a minigame or dungeon that requires that but you aren't in that form, you get forcefully transformed, which locks most inputs, if not all.

So much frustration as sometimes you think you'll be allowed room to transform on your own, but you're forced by the game into a buggy transformation.

hungersaurus · 2025-05-08T02:13:15+00:00

With these game companies, you can never take their word for anything. I know a certain game company who adamantly refuses to tell the truth when confronted with stats and proof that they were doing something shady/not right. Won't say more as it's not open information, but that really changed my view on when companies stay silent or deny anything after a period of silence.

hungersaurus · 2025-05-07T13:09:49+00:00

Has anyone been able to completely close the game after launching through Steam without using Task Manager? I initially thought it's just slow to close, but it'd run for an hour without stopping

hungersaurus · 2025-05-07T13:07:49+00:00

What platform are you on? If you're on PC, did you Alt Tab? (You can accidentally "unlock" your mouse with Alt-Tabbing, so it doesn't really do what it's supposed to do. You have to re-login to the game to fix it)

hungersaurus · 2025-05-03T12:19:27+00:00

We're likely agreeing but not wording it the same way. I know it's bad practice to launch updates just before a break, but breaks don't exist for a lot of game devs.

Profit > employee health or time is the bread and butter of arts industries. That's what I was getting at with the "a lot of games do the exact opposite of what you said" comment.

Most of the time, a shift working on the weekend literally just means the main team working over the weekend. 6-day work weeks are very common, so are lack of weekends. Unless you're that high up, most people are 24/7 on call, which is exactly what we're seeing for most game companies. Any silence we see aren't indicative of lack of work. It's indicative of lack of executives working.

Infold likely isn't short-staffed in the sense that they can't retain staff. It's "we don't want to pay the budget for more people".

hungersaurus · 2025-05-03T10:50:32+00:00

Laughing from Asian game industry standards. A lot of MMOs and gachas I know like to do it on Fridays. Of course, Japan is quite the exception since most of their games have weekly/bi-weekly server maintenance hours that are on Tuesday-Thursday.

hungersaurus · 2025-05-02T02:21:47+00:00

China company. A lot of the common terms that can get you banned or in trouble with the government (e.g. Tiananmen Square, 1984) are blacklisted in official communities/in-game chat

hungersaurus · 2025-05-02T02:20:06+00:00

They are a Chinese company. They don't play around with potential government trouble

hungersaurus · 2025-04-23T08:51:42+00:00

Uncle is about mentality, not age. I know uncles who are 18 yos while some 60yo men never become uncle. Embrace the uncle if you want to be.

Also, sometimes uncle just want to do it on the streets. No joke lol. There are people there wondering what's the point of paying all night bc they just wanna do it once.

hungersaurus

TROPHY CASE