Fansub Review: [rori] Kokoro Connect (Part A Pre-air)

This post was written by Dark_Sage. He is Dark_Sage.

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Summer 2012 is here with this fucking fantastic show. This is a pre-air, so it doesn’t “count”, but have a review anyway.

Table of Contents

Release Information

Visual Quality

Script Quality

Results

Release Information

Episode details.

Release format: MKV (58 MB, 8-bit)

Japanesiness: Honorifics. “Onii-chan”, “Onee” used.

English style: American English.

Encoding details: http://pastebin.com/MSqERLZu

Speed: Speedsub (<24 hour release).

 

External links.

Group website: http://rorisubs.com/

IRC channel: #[email protected]

8thsin’s translation critique: N/A

Ji-hi’s screenshot comparisons: N/A

 

 

Visual Quality

Karaoke.

N/A. This is a pre-air.

 

Typesetting.

Why the fuck am I reviewing a pre-air? This is stupid. I should stop (but I won’t).

Putting effort into a pre-air. Interesting decision, but I like it.

 

Other.

Nice sub placement. Since the pink thing is stuck throughout the episode, this is a recurring issue. Oh well, you get used to it.

I don’t care if it’s a pre-air; they should have redrawn all the frames by themselves. And what’s with that black bar? You’re slipping, rori.

Nice try, ghosting, but I still fapped to this scene.

 

Script Quality

Karaoke.

N/A. This is a pre-air.

 

Main Script.

What a fucking terrible line.

“But so long as there are rules, there will be those who break them.”

Way too many fucking commas. Replace the commas on the second screen with em-dashes. They will serve the same purpose, but your viewers will be less likely to think of this shit as a run-on sentence.

This is not acceptable. One sentence over four screens? Fuck you.

Group the first two lines into one sentence and the second two into another sentence. And for Jenova’s sake, don’t fucking end a full sentence on the same line where you begin another.

Mm, I want to make this “Anyway, you’re prettier than I am. You’d be a better fit.” but I get the feeling I’d be overediting the line and making Inaban too self-conscious when she’s totally aware what a sexpot she is.

How about this instead?

“Anyway, you’re more photogenic. You’d be a better fit for the article.”

I like this better because she refers to both the photos and the article instead of being unclear. Some people like translations where everything is implied, but I certainly don’t. And when Inaban has just been referred to as “blunt”, it makes sense to have her speak her thoughts clearly and succinctly.

Italicize “did” here because in regular speech it would be accented.

You use “and” five times over six screens. No. This is bad fucking writing. Stop doing that. Vary your fucking word use.

The “and” overuse and comma abuse really hurts the quality of this release’s script. Rein it in.

The first screen and the top line of the second screen are linked together. In the second screen, the two lines should switch placement so it’s easier to keep track of who’s saying what.

The top line is also a big issue here; just look at that abortion of a sentence. It’s just a bundle of non-specific words attached by a flimsy grammatical structure. Ugh.

Go with something like “I’d never date a creeper like you!” if you want her to be more direct (she calls him a pervert in the next line) or something like “I don’t want to date anyone who talks like that!”

Results.

Watchability: N/A

Visual grade: N/A

Script grade: N/A

Overall grade: N/A

I hope you enjoyed your free QC, rori.

0 thoughts on “Fansub Review: [rori] Kokoro Connect (Part A Pre-air)”

  1. > It’s almost October, but it’s still so hot.
    > This comma is about as needed as circumcision is.

    Actually, proper grammar calls for a comma before a conjunction joining two independent clauses. The comma is correct.

    Reply
    • This isn’t really about grammar—the grammar of the sentence is fine—but simply a matter of your preferred punctuation style. The rule you cite exists in many style guides (and I am about to follow it here), but most authorities admit that the comma may be omitted when the two independent clauses are sufficiently brief or evenly-balanced. (It is also somewhat more frequently omitted in British prose.) In this case, “it’s almost October” and “but it’s still so hot” are both brief enough that I see no problem with either style of comma usage.

      Reply
  2. This sort of show is terrible to sub in 400p. The font isn’t scaled from 720p, so there is a lot less room per screen for lines.

    Those introductions were a battle to remove several three liners per sentence. It’s just a talky show.

    “Group the first two lines into one sentence and the second two into another sentence. And for Jenova’s sake, don’t fucking end a full sentence on the same line where you begin another.”

    The lines are already broken as it is. I actually split that last line into two sentences to save the reader another comma. The way the Japanese was structured just didn’t leave me any room to split up lines without having about six to seven lines (which would have been too short timing-wise to actually read) per sentence.

    I’ll fix it when it airs, but most of the time spent QCing was me trying to make those introduction lines as readable as possible within the small screen real estate I had.

    “Mm, I want to make this “Anyway, you’re prettier than I am. You’d be a better fit.” but I get the feeling I’d be overediting the line and making Inaban too self-conscious when she’s totally aware what a sexpot she is.

    How about this instead?

    “Anyway, you’re more photogenic. You’d be a better fit for the article.””

    The lines goes “you’re the pretty type” -> “no, I’m the ‘idol’ type”.

    It’s either keep it that way or go completely liberal.

    I hope you enjoyed your free review of your QC, bro. Anything I haven’t brought up I probably agreed with.

    Reply
    • No, he didn’t.

      >Or, for example, Nagase Iori, who thought that, with so many clubs at her fingertips, choosing one would be a hassle and that maybe leaving the selection to the breeze would allow her to experience fresh and exciting things.

      That’s all one sentence.

      Reply
      • “Nagase Iori felt spoilt for choice and decided to add a little spice to her life by leaving the decision to the whims of her teacher.”

        Holy compression of text wall, Batman!

        Reply
          • In the next, not quoted, sentence.
            It’s likely to have turned into a timing issue, though. Text length of the original was apparently fine (or at least D_S didn’t criticize it), so Xythar’s version should be way too short.

            Reply
            • The third line in the original is like 80 characters in 3 seconds, so it’s a bit on the long side. I don’t really mind it if the text is a little bit shorter than the audio as long as it’s not an extreme example (for instance if a long sentence is spoken but only one or two words are onscreen) but if you want you can pad it out a bit more, e.g.

              Dialogue: 10,0:03:21.25,0:03:22.58,Default,,0000,0000,0000,,Or, for example,
              Dialogue: 10,0:03:23.18,0:03:28.98,Default,,0000,0000,0000,,Nagase Iori, who felt spoilt for choice at the wide selection of clubs available,
              Dialogue: 10,0:03:28.98,0:03:36.88,Default,,0000,0000,0000,,and decided to add a little spice to her life by leaving it up to the whims of her teacher.

              It’s still one sentence over 3 lines, but the word count is significantly lowered and the whole thing feels cleaner (and less run-on) as a result.

              Reply
      • It’s supposed to be “Rein it in”, referring to “reins” for horses. I had “Reign it in”, referring to “ruling over lowborn scum”.

        The argument could be made that “reign it in” works, simply because it’s so commonly used despite being incorrect, but I’d only ever purposefully use that phrase to make a pun.

        Reply
          • *shrug* There are far worse common atrocities to get upset about. People still can’t differentiate there/their/they’re and than/then; you can do a lot worse than confusing reign and rein.

            Reply

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