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Was Resident Evil 4's terrible writing intentional?

Resident Evil 4 is my favorite game partly BECAUSE the dialogue and Leon's character. Even if it's goofier than a bond film at least he HAS some character. He's sarcastic while being bad-ass enough to back it up (knife-fighting-suplexing-laser-flipping-harpoonin-Kevin Costner bodyguard). He's incredibly likeable.

Then he goes back to being an angsty sissy in 6 or the movies.
 
Having taken a gander at the dates... I wonder if any of the localisers on RE4 did work on Phoenix Wright.

And I do say localisers, because that's arguably more the treatment that RE4 got than just a straight up translation. Original treated itself - at least in script - as a for serious horror and action story, where the localisation treated it more like it was the sequel to Army of Darkness.
 
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Yes, also, I love Capcom Typos.

RE4's writing is terribly good.

Top to bottom perfection!
 
Since some people seem convinced that the Japanese games are meant to be taken seriously, let's establish a scale here, because "serious" is not a binary condition

Your average RE game is about as serious as a cheesey action movie. Something like Predator or Die Hard. It's more or less straight faced, but not meant to be taken particularly seriously.

Resident Evil 4 steps further into the surreal and comedic direction than the rest. It's more like A Sam Raimi movie.

Then there's 7, which is about as serious as an actual horror movie (in the sense of early 80s bloody horror movies, and not these modern, bloodless dull, atmospheric, ghostly ones) . I.E. it's intense and serious and grim, but every now and then you'll catch the movie/game winking at you and going "Is this fun or what?"
 
I want to see the receipts on the English script being more out-there than the Japanese one, honestly. People throw that around a lot but I've never actually seen any proof.
 
I want to see the receipts on the English script being more out-there than the Japanese one, honestly. People throw that around a lot but I've never actually seen any proof.

Receipts?

There are corny lines that are one for one what they were in the Japanese script("Your right hand comes off?" In fact, I think anything involving Salazar is about the same in both scripts. He's obviously there for comedy.) but there are also quite a few quips that are added purely by localization ("Where's everybody going, Bingo?)
 
Having taken a gander at the dates... I wonder if any of the localisers on RE4 did work on Phoenix Wright.

And I do say localisers, because that's arguably more the treatment that RE4 got than just a straight up translation. Original treated itself - at least in script - as a for serious horror and action story, where the localisation treated it more like it was the sequel to Army of Darkness.

Assuming that you are talking about the first Phoenix Wright, that was not done in house by Capcom. Instead if was done by the great Alexander O. Smith (Vagrant Story, FF12) who did not work on RE4.

I believe the rest of the Phoenix Wright games were done in house by Capcom.
 
Assuming that you are talking about the first Phoenix Wright, that was not done in house by Capcom. Instead if was done by the great Alexander O. Smith (Vagrant Story, FF12) who did not work on RE4.

I believe the rest of the Phoenix Wright games were done in house by Capcom.

Thanks for clearing that up. So not quite aligned, which I guess mostly sinks my supposition that perhaps it was something of a 'thing' at Capcom during the timeframe.
 
RE4 is so fucking hilarious. The writing is amazingly cheesy. I would also like to add that RE5 is so fucking boring writing wise until they introduce Wesker. Then it just becomes so fucking jokes as well. I mean Redfield punches a motherfucking boulder, it just goes off the deep end and I love it.
 
I think the translators add some obvious intentional one liners and jokes, but it isn't like Leon is supposed to be some parody character. The game designers wanted you to think he's cool as shit. The core of every RE is weird awkward cheese and that's just the way I like it.
 
I'm pretty sure the ridiculous Salazar statue, for example, was always in the game and there is no possible serious way to construe it. Same with the shooting gallery. There's no deadly serious version of RE4.
 
I'm pretty sure the ridiculous Salazar statue, for example, was always in the game and there is no possible serious way to construe it. Same with the shooting gallery. There's no deadly serious version of RE4.

I would have said this before I played TEW, a game that is just as, if not even more so, ridiculous as RE4 is yet the game plays it almost entirely straight faced. The difference is that RE4 comes off as a a cheesy Rami film whereas TEW comes off as a bad anime.
 
All I know is that the credits are great. The music + showing drawings of the villagers before they were infected and Saddler showed up.
 
Well its news to me that Mikaki DIDN'T want it to be funny but that it was the translator who made it so... I mean some of the camp goes beyond the dialogue: the Spanish Napoleon dude, his giant robot, the laser dodging, the roundhouse kicks, the action figures... yeah no Mikami HAD to be intentional when writing this.

I love the writing though, RE4 is one of the funniest games I have ever played.
 
Kind of silly and naive to assume they didn't know what they were doing especially since it's blatantly obvious that the dialogue is so clearly self aware
 
I'm pretty sure the ridiculous Salazar statue, for example, was always in the game and there is no possible serious way to construe it. Same with the shooting gallery. There's no deadly serious version of RE4.

Right, I think any creative liberties the localizers took with RE4 was done fully to enhance the spirit of the game
 
"Meeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeester Kennedy"

(I'm not as mad on RE4 as a lot of people, but the way Salazar accents 'Mister' has always been a source of high entertainment)
 
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