Cyberpunk: Edgerunners’ Atrocious Subtitles Make It Almost Unwatchable
The genre and aesthetic of cyberpunk have been on the edges of the mainstream for decades thanks to stories like Neuromancer, Blade Runner, and Ghost in the Shell. It exploded in 2020, however, when CD Projekt Red’s Cyberpunk 2077 hit consoles. Whatever any of us might feel about that game, it was a huge deal. Recently, the promised Cyberpunk anime, Cyberpunk: Edgerunners, finally hit Netflix. It is, by any metric, an absolutely gorgeous show. It has a killer voice cast in both English and Japanese. And it’s almost unwatchable when you watch it with subtitles.
And no–this is not a subs-versus-dubs argument.
The world of Cyberpunk, created by Mike Pondsmith for the original tabletop role-playing game, is rich with detail, fleshed out with a brain-frying stream of slang that is just barely close enough to understand without keeping a dictionary handy. “You can’t trust a corpo to pay you the eddies you earned, choom. Don’t be a gonk. A real edgerunner doesn’t even trust their ripperdoc. Did you check that BD?”
Let’s not pretend that’s very good writing, on paper, but it gets the point across: this world is so packed with slang that it might as well be another language. If you make the mistake of watching the show with subtitles on, regardless of whether the voice track is in English or Japanese, you’ll leave confused unless you’re intimately familiar with the game world’s language because the sub track gets more of it wrong than right. When watching the English voice track on its own without subtitles, it’s easy to see what a great job the actors did of mastering all of those terms and making them feel natural.
But I habitually keep subtitles on when watching TV just to keep my overall TV volume down in my apartment. Every time I looked down at the bottom of my screen, I found myself gaping in awe of just how bad the subtitles are. Choom is spelled correctly in some places, and then spelled chume in others. The term IC, meant to refer to Intrusion Countermeasures (a.k.a. cybersecurity) is rendered as eyes. A character says Edgerunner–you know, the title of the show–and the subs read Headrunner. They confused “ripper” with “reaper” on more than one occasion–not not on every occasion.
And it’s hard to tell where it went wrong. Reading that “eyes” mistake, we could chalk it up to a translator whose first language is Japanese hearing a soundalike word and getting confused. But the more I watched the show, the less it seemed like a human translator had actually touched the subtitles. Sentences frequently make little sense; they read less like they were poorly translated and more like they were machine translated. Some of the sentences have all the hallmarks of ‘I was speaking a text message to my phone and it got half of the words wrong,’ with the examples of words being spelled multiple different ways really highlighting the possibility.
This affects not just the English subtitle track meant to play over the Japanese dialogue, but the English closed-captioning text meant for the heard-of-hearing as well. It’s not worthwhile to go into a line-by-line dissection of every mistake here. It’s hard to believe that a high-profile show like this, from a company so hot on anime, received such slapdash treatment like this. It’s pretty clear that whatever happened to make the subtitles end up like this, the show didn’t get any love from the Quality Assurance team before they put it online, or they simply ignored the notes from QA to get it out by a certain date.
Make no mistake: if you have any love for the video game, the tabletop RPG, or even the aesthetic, Cyberpunk: Edgerunners is rad as hell. It’s bright, loud, colorful, and lively. It has all the flash of the game coupled with an engaging story and some of Studio Trigger’s best work. Just watch it in English and turn off the subtitles. Or maybe wait and hope Netflix fixes it. And make sure to check out our review before you dive in–this is a special show.
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Bandai Namco Revives Popular Tamagotchi Connection Virtual Pets For 20th Anniversary
Though Bandai Namco releases new Tamagotchi devices fairly regularly these days, its next major release is a blast from the past. To celebrate the 20th anniversary of Tamagotchi Connection, a refreshed set of the multiplayer-focused virtual pets is set to release on July 9. Not only will you be able to raise you pixelated pet, but they will be able venture out into the world to mingle with other little aliens who also happen to be trapped inside keychain devices. Four different color variants are available to preorder now for $30 each. Alternatively, you can preorder a two-pack for $58 to ensure your little guy makes friends and maybe even finds love. Just please don’t forget to feed your digital pet this time.
Tamagotchi Connection – $30 each
While you might be familiar with the original Tamagotchi released in 1997 in the US, the Tamagotchi Connection was a serious upgrade in comparison to when they debuted in 2004. Along with brand-new designs for the digital critters, the big draw here was the infrared “connection” that could be used to link up with friends. Once a connection was established, you could play games, exchange gifts, and even breed your Tamagotchi after they became married to each other. What a wild time, the early 2000s were.
All of those original features have been retained for this new line of Tamagotchi Connection toys, and these eggs also allow you to meet more than 50 characters, play more games, and earn Gotchi Points to spend on food and other items, as part of the new extras being introduced here. You can even find passwords to unlock special items.
If that’s not enough Tamagotchi for you, then check out this new line of Hello Kitty Tamagotchis.
Available for $20 on July 9 in red and blue shell designs, these cute accessories come with a clasping carrying chain and batteries.
There are plenty of other themed Tamagotchis you can buy, and many of them are discounted at Amazon.
More Tamagotchi
Assassin’s Creed Shadows Is Ditching An Iconic Franchise Feature
In Assassin’s Creed Shadows, one of the franchise’s most iconic features–synchronization points–will work a little differently than before.
Following a cinematic reveal trailer, Ubisoft has revealed all kinds of details about the latest entry in the long-running series to IGN. The game will put players into the shoes of both a shinobi and a samurai in feudal Japan. While much of Assassin’s Creed Shadows will sound familiar to fans–parkour, a large open world to explore, stealth assassinations, melee combat–there are some notable changes, particularly when it comes to filling out the game’s map.
Now Playing: Assassin’s Creed Shadows – Who Are Naoe and Yasuke?
In the past, these have been done via synchronization points. These points are usually atop tall buildings or towers. Traditionally, synchronizing sees the camera slowly rotate in a panoramic view of the surrounding area, before marking all nearby points of interest on the in-game map.
That won’t be the case in Assassin’s Creed Shadows. There will be no spinning panoramic views in the upcoming title when synchronizing, nor will synchronizing automatically reveal nearby points of interest. Instead, players will need to survey the area and manually highlight areas of potential interest before investigating them further once back on the ground. Synchronization points will, however, still allow for players to fast travel between them.
It’s a small, but significant change, as synchronization points, including their stylish, slow camera pan of the surrounding area, have largely worked the same for much of the franchise’s long history. Other changes in Assassin’s Creed Shadows include the lack of a bird that can be used to mark enemies, though players will still have access to Eagle Vision to track nearby foes. Light sources, shadows, and the weather will also play an important role in gameplay. For the first time in the franchise’s history, Assassin’s Creed Shadows will star a real historical figure as one of its dual protagonists: the African samurai, Yasuke.
Assassin’s Creed Shadows will be similar in size to 2017’s Assassin’s Creed Origins, Ubisoft has said, which means there should be plenty of Japan to explore. It will feature a non-linear campaign story revolving around tracking down and eliminating specific targets, according to Ubisoft, and it’s one that will also see players building out a spy network to gather intel on targets in a system that sounds similar to one seen in Assassin’s Creed Brotherhood.
Assassin’s Creed Shadows will release on PC, PlayStation 5, and Xbox Series X|S on November 15. A collector’s edition exclusive to GameStop is available for preorder now.
