Thursday, August 23, 2018

Title Fix: Taiko Time 8th Anniversary Version

Welcome back to Title Fix, where we admit we were wrong and fix them wrongly-romanized titles. And we are doing it in parts this time!

The Ones That We Already Proposed to Fix
 太鼓侍 Taiko Samurai → Taiko-zamurai
 和蘭撫子 Oranda Nadeshiko → Carnation

The One That We Really Got Wrong
美しく忙しきドナウ Utsukushiku Sewashiki Danube → Utsukushiku Isogashiki Danube
忙しき has two readings: いそがしき isogashiki and せわしき sewashiki, and we come to know from Japanese Donder communities that it should be the former one. Apparently there are subtler differences between the two according to native Japanese speakers in (reference 1, 2, 3), but we are not going to delve in too much here.

The Ones That Official English Version Convinced Us
天国と地獄 序曲 Heaven and Hell Overture →  Orpheus in the Underworld Overture
"Heaven and Hell" was the Japanese title back when the operetta first showed in Japan in 1914, and it somehow stuck in Japan's public psyche. Almost zero reputable sources call it that in English or the original French.

We are not putting "Overture from ~" exactly like the official English title though because (1) length (2) following our other "~ Overture" songs and (3) actual music terms dictates it should more formally be "overture to ~".
   
ハンロック Hanrock → Hung-rock
The song is a rock arrangement based of Hungarian Dance No. 6 (roku) by Johannes Brahms. Namco's official English title keeps all these references and so it feels better.

流浪の琥珀姫 Rurou no Kohakuhime → Rurou no Kohaku Hime
We take hints for this from the Chinese song title (流浪的琥珀公主), in which 姫 hime is not kept as the same kanji and instead put it as 公主 (princess). That tells us that 琥珀姫 is likely intended as just two common nouns (amber and princess) instead of a proper-noun name. So we finally decided to side with the official English title here.