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A few years ago I documented the Japanese and English versions of The Legend of Zelda: A Link Between Worlds in great detail. I’ve been meaning to write about some of my findings, so let’s consider this the first in a small series of ALBW articles.

This time, we’ll look at how references to fat and beauty were changed for the North American localization.

Scene 1: Meeting the Zora Queen

Link visits a waterfall where the Zora queen and her underlings live. The queen suddenly grows fat after a thief steals her magical stone. Her underlings explain the situation to Link, but one in particular underwent some localization changes:

Japanese Version (basic translation) English Version Zora Underling 1: This is terrible, zora…… Zora Underling 1: It’s getting worse by the second! Zora Underling 1: The secret of the queen’s beauty, the Smooth-Smooth Stone, has been stolen, zora… Zora Underling 1: I can’t believe that guy came in and stole the smooth gem right out from under our gills! Zora Underling 2: As long as the Smooth-Smooth Stone is gone from the fountain, there’s no telling what’ll happen… Zora Underling 2: That finless jerk probably thought it was just some sparkly thing! But the queen needs it to contain her power!

In the Japanese version, we see that the stone is the source of the queen’s beauty, and she turned fat when she lost it. In the English version, the references to beauty and fat were dropped, and the stone was given an all-new explanation involving the queen’s power.

If you talk to Zora Underling 1 immediately after this, he has another line of interest:

Japanese Version (basic translation) English Version But I actually kinda like her even looking like that, zora… We’ve got to get it back in her pool before all is lost!

The Japanese line implies that she’s probably not what most Zoras would consider beautiful. The English version removes this concept entirely and replaces it with a line about the urgency of the situation.

Scene 2: Saving the Zora Queen

Link retrieves the magical stone and tosses it into the Zora queen’s fountain. She turns skinny and thanks Link for his help.

The Zora underlings have new lines of dialogue, two of which have changes similar to the ones above.

Japanese Version (basic translation) English Version The queen has regained her beauty, zora… The queen’s bloating stopped. …But I actually kind of liked the way she was before, zora… I wish the queen would do away with the pool and that magical gem.

A third underling has a line that changed too:

Japanese Version (basic translation) English Version What a relief, zora… What a relief! The queen has regained her beauty, zora…

As before, we see that the references to the queen’s beauty were removed. In the first instance, a beauty reference was replaced with completely new text. In the second instance, the reference to beauty was dropped without any replacement at all.

Scene 3: At the House of Gales

After Link completes the House of Gales dungeon, a Zora appears outside the entrance. He talks about the Zora queen and how she’s a fast swimmer:

Japanese Version (basic translation) English Version Nice weather today, isn’t it, zora? I just went swimming with the queen, zora. Nice weather today, so I swam here with the queen. …Now that she’s slim, she swims so fast. Before I knew it, I got left behind. But she swims so fast…and I got left behind.

In the Japanese line, the Zora directly references the fact that the queen wasn’t skinny before, but now she is. The implication is that slimming down has improved her. The skinny reference and implication aren’t present in the English version.

The Zora goes on to talk about his feelings:

Japanese Version (basic translation) English Version Talking about it like this, it actually sounds kind of sad, zora. I’m hurt, to be honest. The queen left me behind… …I guess she really did leave me behind. I feel abandoned. …The realization that I got left behind has really hit me, zora. Oh, my queen… Oh, my slim queen… My queen… My queen…

Once again, a skinny reference in the Japanese script doesn’t exist in the English script.

Potential Reasons for the Changes

Without asking the localization team directly, we can only make guesses at why – and at what stage in the localization process – these changes were made. Two possibilities come to mind, although there are surely more.

Possible Reason #1: Internal Policies

For decades, Nintendo of America has had internal rules and guidelines to ensure its games are wholesome, family-friendly, and inoffensive. So, given Nintendo’s history of content changes, these changes don’t really come as a surprise. As I recall, Nintendo faced heavy criticism for its handling of same-sex marriage in Tomodachi Life around the same time that A Link Between Worlds was released. I also recall that there’d been several fat-related controversies years before. For example, the PSN game Fat Princess received a lot of criticism when it was released, and there was some mild criticism involving Nintendo’s Wii Fit and the way it called players fat. There’s also the concern that impressionable kids might get the wrong idea and grow so obsessed with being skinny that they resort to anorexia or bulimia. This has been an issue for localizers for decades. For example, in one episode of Sailor Moon , the main character discovers she’s gained half a pound in weight. She considers herself ugly now, so she spends most of the episode skipping meals and exercising like crazy. To counter this, the localizers added a message at the end about consulting a doctor and that real beauty comes from the inside. With all of these concerns in mind, it makes sense that Nintendo would want to avoid offending players with the idea that only skinny is beautiful. Or, from a different perspective, perhaps the changes were made to fit the idea that big is beautiful.

I seem to recall there were other similar controversies around A Link Between Worlds’s release. If you can think of any from before 2014, let me know!

Possible Reason #2: Transcreation

When a Japanese game is released in English, we tend to assume that the game was written in Japanese, released in Japan, and then translated into English. This is the case most of the time. But a newer thing these days is something called “transcreation”, in which localizers work side-by-side with creators during the development process and help shape the final product. I believe Nintendo has commented on this approach before (probably by a different name), so it’s entirely possible that these dialogue changes weren’t technically translation changes but a result of transcreation.

Personally, I feel Reason #1 is far more likely, but I’m still curious if this game got the transcreation treatment or not. Of course, it could be a combination of both things, or maybe even some other reason that I haven’t considered.

Sources

I’ve uploaded all 8000+ of my A Link Between Worlds screenshots and videos as part of my Game Translation Catalog Project here. If you’re interested in seeing more from these scenes, they’re listed under “Hyrule Exploration 1” and “House of Gales”.

While these text changes in A Link Between Worlds don’t affect the game much, I feel they’re a good example of how game translations can have quiet changes that go unnoticed for years. At the same time, they offer insight into some of the deeper issues that localizers have to consider. It also makes me wonder how other companies might’ve handled these same scenes.

In any case, I’m curious to see how these lines were translated in other languages, so if you’ve played the game in a different language, let me know in the comments or on Twitter. And was Nintendo of Europe’s English translation different from the American one? If so, I’d love to take a look at it too someday!