About Canonicity

[Sniper670]

I should've asked this before making the crt, but better late than never. Heh.. Here's what happened

A game releases, with Japanese as the native language. Then the Company comes and says "We checked all the material in the English version to make sure it fits within and is canon to the setting the world takes place in".

NB: The Company made sure everything included in the English version fit within the world itself, and is not seeking validation from the Japanese version.

During a throwaway dialog(no relevance to the plot) , the English version decided to add an additional dialog that doesn't exist in the Japanese version. Does that make the dialog non-canon?

 

[James_Plays_4_Games]

All translated material is supposed to be accurate to the original material. The original material takes priority, because it is the most authentic in relation to the original intention of a story.

If the translation is deemed as accurate to the original story despite there being a difference, that only implies that "accurate" is too broad of a word to use to compare the two. A translation of a story that is accurate to an original canon can just mean that the story is comprehensible while faithfully using the original premise as a base. That can mean that the translation has plenty of changes, but successfully implements at least some of the original plot points like the original, despite very clearly not being meticulous with random dialogue. To many standards, if the game is like that, it isn't accurate to the original.

The bottom line is that there are multiple ways someone can interpret a phrase like "this translation is accurate to the original", even if the claim comes from the people who created the original. Exceptions are possible, so it's still important to judge this on a case-by-case basis, even though exceptions are rare.