La Esponja Grande -languages!-
We sure haven't seen it yet but...if we're going to use a name in Spanish, why pronounce it incorrectly?
It kept my attention as I heard it first. I'm pretty sure that all of you say "esponja" by giving to the letter "j" the same sound it gets in the word "banjo", for instance. But that's an error. "Esponja" in Spanish is pronunced by using the Spanish J, that sounds more or less like the "h" in the word "ham".
But it is ok as far as here in Spain "Guybrush" is pronunced -at least I do so- with the sound of the Spanish "U", the same used in English to say "two" in both letters "u" of the words, knowing that that's incorrect but it is the way I learned it as a kid by reading the word in the screen.
It kept my attention as I heard it first. I'm pretty sure that all of you say "esponja" by giving to the letter "j" the same sound it gets in the word "banjo", for instance. But that's an error. "Esponja" in Spanish is pronunced by using the Spanish J, that sounds more or less like the "h" in the word "ham".
But it is ok as far as here in Spain "Guybrush" is pronunced -at least I do so- with the sound of the Spanish "U", the same used in English to say "two" in both letters "u" of the words, knowing that that's incorrect but it is the way I learned it as a kid by reading the word in the screen.
Sign in to comment in this discussion.
Comments
It is an extra touch of realism.
You are not far from the true. In Puerto Rico where opur main language is spanish, when we go out to US we struggle with our accent to speak english wiht an english accent. So do mexicans trying to speak english with a english accent, but end up speaking with a spanish mexican accent. But when english speaking people come to spanish speaking land they dont even try to talk spanish with sounds so disrespectfull. And if u tell em "i dont speak english they get mad!"
For me its like unbelievable. I just want to get that off my chest, and i agree that guybrush speaks bad spanish and so is the voodoo lady.
On behalf on English speakers everywhere I apologise :P
The funny thing is we know we do it and we know it's bad but we don't stop.
(I am learning Spanish at the minute (only basics so far) and I do struggle with the different sounds.)
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=E28WrhpTzQA
Oh, and I think that "He dejado en libertad los prisioneros" should sound better adding an a between libertad and los prisioneros.
But it stills sounds awesome. Viva El Pollo Diablo!
Like a big pirate sponge really.
And that, my friends, is why I don't like the whole 'Guybrush doesn't exactly say what's written in the dialog options, but rather something in the same vein,' like Telltale is doing.
It could be to keep the WiiWare version capped to 40 megs they have to chop out (what they perceive as) unnecessary lines, but that brings us back to my opinion that they should have released it for XBLM instead and done a complete game on disc for Wii later (so it didn't drag other versions down, particularly the flagship one on the PC), but that's by the by.
¡El alquitrán y los empluma! hehe
But I'm sure the main reason (and it's a good one) is what alexonfyre pointed out:
If I didn't speak Spanish and the Voodoo Lady had thrown out a name like 'Esponha Grande' I would have totally missed the funny side of it to begin with. All I would've known is that it was a big- something.
I pretty much agree with everything you have said. This is the most accurate explanation to it.
I find it ironic because when I went to Spain (Im portuguese), I listened to spanish radio and spanish tv, and when something in English came up it was completely pronounce-butchered... Don't be so radical, it's a given fact that people with no education in other languages (like Guybrush and the Voodoo lady) tend to make mistakes. It's understandable.
Besides, maybe it's an half-spanish half-portuguese sponge, since "esponja" in portuguese is pronounced the way they do.
Interesting
EDIT: 100 posts! Woo! (god I'm sad)
Weren't a fair proportion of Pirates in the Caribbean Portuguese? I'm sure I've heard the term 'Portugee' in old Pirate movies - it's Dutch for Portuguese...Dutch East India Company...Portuguese spice trade routes...?
It could be 50% Spanish and 50% Portuguese. If it were 100% Portuguese, it would be "A Esponja Grande."
Oh, thankx.
And after all, how can we guess, what accents were used in carribean at that times ))
I have another thought - if they localize the game in Spain, how will they name the Artifact? They could have a revenge like English "Big Spoonge"
Nope.... It sounds like a "J" in English.
For what it's worth, some of the characters pronounce "de Singe" a bit weirdly, but for the most part they have a great accent.
And as how it should be pronounced... I speak Spanish with a Spain accent, where J certainly isn't pronounced H. It's a gutural sound that doesn't exist in English, close to the arabic "Kh" (kinda close to the French R but then again not really).
So even if they pronounced it with an H people could complain that it's innacurate, since at the time people who spoke Spanish came from Spain and would have a Spanish accent, not a South American one.
Sure its not the same exact sound as an "H" but its similar to that and much close than a "ge"
On this page http://www.uiowa.edu/~acadtech/phonetics/spanish/frameset.html click "modo" then "fricativas" then the big X (right under the small x)
They even give you examples (jota, gente, ajo, caja).
Granted, that doesn't sound like an English J at all, but even less like a H.
At any rate, my point is that a) we don't know for sure what language it is, for all we know it's a mix of some sort and b) it's not like the rest of the game makes perfect sense, is historically accurate, etc.
I think that if they are indeed mispronouncing it (It's possible that it's portuguese and they're saying "la" instead of "a" by mistake, too, for instance) it's in character, since it's not their first language.
BTW: there isn't such a word as "fettuccini" in Italian but i never thought of complaining about that with LucasArts
Actually, we (south american spanish speakers) really appreciate when a foreigner makes the effort to speak correctly in spanish, so even saying it like an H, while it's not perfect, would be enough. But I hate how it sounds with an english J, because they don't event try to do it right.
On the other side, I liked how the name "Marquis de Singe" was pronounced correctly by Marquis de Singe himself and incorrectly by Guybrush. I think they really did a great job with the Marquis de Singe French/English character mix (And say that after living in Paris for 2 years and playing ToMI with some French friends), another great example of the same is Manny Calavera from Grim Fandango, and I hope Coronado de Cava will be just as great.
Dutch for Portugese would be PortugeeS.
And for the record IT'S A GAME.... there are many things in forieign languages that are pronounced wrong in life, so why be so p.o-ed about a game.
look at New York for instance... 99% of the people that live there pronounce most streets the wrong way... you don't here the dutch complaining about that.
We can safely say that Guybrush does not speak French or Spanish.
That'll be Dominic's fault, then. That's the only flaw he puts on Guybrush, so I'm willing to forgive it.
That's not actually true. "Coronado" is not a Portuguese word, its equivalent is "Coroado" (meaning "Crowned", not king). In fact, what little instances of the word I can find are as a name with ostensibly Spanish origins.
Also, "de Cava" grammatical structure is not particularly solid (in Portuguese at least), and would translate roughly to "of digs". Coronado de Cava can work fairly well as a Spanish name, but not as a Portuguese one.
I know literally speaking it's "crowned of digs" but that doesn't sound quite right in English
You are right. I don´t think that "Coronado de Cava" could be translated to "King of Digging". In fact, I think that Coronado de Cava doesn´t mean anything in particular, it´s just a name.