Etrian Odyssey localization lead on 'The Naming of Stuff'

Nich Maragos, localization product lead for Etrian Odyssey 2 (and Gaming Intelligence Agency alum), has taken us inside the English naming process for Etrian's characters and items in a new Production Diary post. Like classic RPGs, Etrian has an 8-character restriction on all monster, character, and item names. This isn't so much of a problem in Japanese, in which a single kanji can express a very complicated concept, but in our phonetic writing system, it's a bit more of a restriction.

This means that not only is Maragos and his team encouraged to be a bit creative with English names, they are required to be creative. They have to condense concepts like Fundo No Gankou-Nushi "Owner of the Malicious Glare" into something that can fit into eight characters: in this case, "Illgaze."

A lot of work goes into translating text-rich RPGs like this. Mythological references, in particular, are trouble, as some random Japanese word could actually be a transliterated Old Norse name.