Looking for PS3 Japanese item names

[MaxKnight]

Tried searching this forum and a broader internet search, and outside of of a small sampling of names from Hugues Johnson's Phantasy Star III page I came up empty. Even on that page, it's just a list without referencing what names correspond with what from the official translation.

Does anybody here have a comparative list of the weapons, armor, and items (with both Japanese and English names) from this game? I've always been curious what the original names were, but for some reason I can't seem to find such a list anywhere...

Thanks in advance!

[cala]

I initially couldn't find a list, so I began translating the names myself. Then towards the end, I stumbled across this list, which seems to be complete. Oops. Should have looked more carefully before beginning :'D The only translation here I'd take issue with is "Staff of Poems" for "Eiga no Tsue” (the "Eiga" is almost certainly 栄華, meaning "glory", and I'm not too sure where the translator got "poems" from). The rest is pretty much what I would have gone with. Hope this helps!

http://www.sceneryrecalled.com/trans/ps3item.txt

[MaxKnight]

Yes, this, thank you! I've been wondering about these for a long time, so this is perfect.

Interesting... Steel, Force, and Planar equipment in particular appear to have interesting names originally, and the Ceramic Shot finally makes sense, as it was originally a Shotgun.

This is so cool. Thank you again for finding this!

[cala]

Yes, this, thank you! I've been wondering about these for a long time, so this is perfect.

Interesting... Steel, Force, and Planar equipment in particular appear to have interesting names originally, and the Ceramic Shot finally makes sense, as it was originally a Shotgun.

This is so cool. Thank you again for finding this!

Not at all, I'm always interested in these kinds of things too, and I'm glad I could find something useful to you! Feel free to let me know if there are any other changes you're interested in. Even if there's no existing list like there was here, I can always Google a Japanese walkthrough and cross reference with an English one. :)

You might have noticed, but quite a few of the quirkier Japanese names seem to be drawn from what the weapons do when you use them in battle as items. "Knife of Pity / Mercy", for example, casts Forsa, which despite functioning like an instant death technique, is called "Unbalance" in Japanese, and says in its description that it "blows an enemy out of the way". I think basically the technique is supposed to summon up a big gust of wind that throws the enemy off balance and out of the battle, hence "pity" / "mercy" - you're not really killing the enemy when you cast it, and are actually allowing it to escape. "Dimension Sword" casts Rimit, which helps you escape from battle (perhaps opening a dimensional door to escape)? "Knife of Protection" casts a technique that raises defence. "Sword of Anger" and "Scorching Bow" both cast Foi when they're used. And "Bow of Order" and "Chaos Claw" cast techniques that are called "Law" and "Chaos" in Japanese respectively.

Those sorts of function-related names appear to have been abandoned in the English version, both for consistency across item types and due to character limits, leaving some of the item functionality of weapons as a bit of a mystery in English (why does a Steel Knife cast a defence-buffing technique, but a Steel Sword doesn't? :'D). Though to be fair, it's not completely consistent in Japanese either, and a few of the items you'd expect to have added functionality based on their names do nothing special.

[Zucca]

Code: Select all

Force Sword          Ikari no Tsurugi        Sword of Anger

I wonder if the "Sword Of Ang" in PSII is also "Ikari no Tsurugi" in Japanese version...

[cala]

Code: Select all

Force Sword          Ikari no Tsurugi        Sword of Anger

I wonder if the "Sword Of Ang" in PSII is also "Ikari no Tsurugi" in Japanese version...

It certainly is! I noticed that too.

[Zucca]

That single "non-magical" but unique sword in PSII has always intrigued my mind. Hidden in Red Dam. I remember it having quite good attack factor, but almost no defence bonus.
Apparently it isn't unique in PS universe, since iirc in PSIII one can buy those swords (Force ones) from store.

Also I find it strange that the translation team decided to rename so many of the items to Force <something>.

[cala]

That single "non-magical" but unique sword in PSII has always intrigued my mind. Hidden in Red Dam. I remember it having quite good attack factor, but almost no defence bonus.
Apparently it isn't unique in PS universe, since iirc in PSIII one can buy those swords (Force ones) from store.

Also I find it strange that the translation team decided to rename so many of the items to Force <something>.

Haha, I was the same! I remember always wondering growing up who this mysterious "Ang" was and what relevance he and his sword had to the Phantasy Star universe. And then I played it in Japanese, and was kind of disappointed to learn that it was just a contraction of "anger". :'D Reminds me of the whole mythos that built up around "Sheng Long" in Street Fighter 2 in English-speaking markets, when it was literally just the first two characters of the name of Ryu's dragon punch erroneously rendered with Chinese pronunciation.

Yeah, I think looking at it they were probably trying to standardise item names across different types as much as possible for simplicity, but it created certain problems given that functionally, some of the items were quite different. Like I said, it doesn't really make much sense for a "steel knife" to be able to cast a defence buff when no other "steel" weapon can.