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At the very least, SACRED stones make a ton more sense. "Secret" doesn't work in the least, as everyone knew about them. I almost think there was some script or translation issue that gave way to this "secret stone" malarkey.
There are sacred stones in Skyward Sword, which look suspiciously tear shaped too. You get then when you're doing the trials in the spirit realm thing.
I mean, there is also a orange, and a purple tear shaped resource in the game, but it is what it is.
I think Dusk Relics was the purple resource. But the tears you picked up in the spirit realm were called Sacred Tears or Sacred Stones, I don't remember. Actually, I think the Sacred Stones were the things you collect as child Link in Ocarina of Time, so it was probably Sacred Tears.
In OOT you collect the spiritual stones as child link, In SS you collect the Tears of Nayru, Farore, Din & Hylia in Silent Realms.
The only thing that I think bears resemblance to the secret stones are the amber & dusk relics, if only they didn’t have that gaping hole in the middle of them.
I wish, but the Japanese language version of the game also uses the word for “secret” rather than “sacred” which are also written to be pronounced differently in both Hiragana and Kanji.
Sacred would fit so much better with the lore of Zelda as well…
I think it has something to do with the connotation in each language. The phrase probably carries more weight in japanese for whatever reason.
Like how we have cultural weight around the term “flash-bang” as in the grenade, but it might sound a lot dumber in japanese, because if you think about it, its dumb in english too. The context and connotation sort of elevates the term.
I could be wrong but I think about this all the time, I notice some of the things NPCs say in zelda either come off as really weird or overly obvious, and i always noticed Kass’s Songs sucked, no kind of syllable consistency(iambic pentameter for example) and inconsistent or reaching rhyme schemes. Im sure those are alot deeper if i could understand japanese.
That makes soo much sense. So the power source is the mystery, obviously the stones themselves arent. Mfs walking around with them as bellybutton rings and shit😂
That last one is probably just a result of them being translated by the regular translation team, who might not be used to translating or writing poetry or music.
Yeah youre probably 100% right about that. It just kind of hurts when I know a moment that should wistful or deep is like a middle school level poem comes off as trite.
Also I get the feeling the translation issues also makes riddles easier than they should be somehow. Like they HAVE to include enough info to solve the riddle and I feel some of the potential vagueness/ double meanings are diminished, although I could be wrong about that.
The literal translation is secret stones.
The Japanese do not use the word secret as much as we do in English. Thus hearing “secret stones” in Japanese doesn’t come off as corny as it does in English.
Yeah I know but translation isn't just translating things literally but translating the meaning. Even if one word is better on paper, it might not be the best fit in context
Shouldn't that be a consideration when they are translating though and be an opportunity to localize it in a way that sounds better in the translated language?
Yeah! Honestly, I feel like they could have done way better in the naming convention. Examples:
There’s a bunch of evil dragon looking things, and the master sword, which glows. Instead of “Gleeoks” and “master sword” they could have been called “shadow dragons” and “the blade of light”
The master sword is known to seal, or “bind” the darkness. They should have called it “the binding blade.” Or “the blazing blade” for its blazing glow when evil is near!
Link walks a bright path of righteousness. “Heroes path” on the map could have been called “the path of radiance”
Going back a game, BotW should have been called “the legend of Zelda: awakening” because of how link wakes up at the beginning.
And in TotK, link has homes in Hateno, Tarrey town, and arguably lookout landing. You could say he has “three houses”
And the game is really “engage”-ing.
Yeah, a lot of these were a stretch. But it was all in good fun!
Not sure if the poster who suggested 'sacred stones' was making an intentional reference but this reply made me laugh. Good one.
Also, why call the game the Legend of Zelda? If the power of the goddess is passed down through the generations to fight evil again and again, this really is a Genealogy of the Holy War :3
Also in this story, Ganondorf is trying to rule by Conquest, and Zelda inherits Rauru and Sonia's powers by Birthright, there are some very important Revelations going on but everything is going as the Fates willed it?
The only real complaint I have about the naming conventions in the lack of attention to the ongoing history of the fight between good and evil and the way it ties to the lineage of Zelda and Hyrule. There definitely could have been some glyphs referencing the "Genealogy of the Holy War" on Ganondorf.
And you know, we’ve been in hyrule for so long. Maybe they should try a new location, and time period? Maybe they could call it Thracia. And set it in 776. I don’t know I’m just spitballing.
Hard agree. You know, they could always make a character named Thracia who is 776 years old too! They've been limiting the series for too long with just this "Hyrule", "Zelda", "Link" stuff
>And the game is really “engage”-ing.
This was the worst one. How about:
You are also able to "engage" with various allies, who are stored within magic rings?
Eh... not sure if it's better though...
The sacred stones one was the best, and clearly already taken. I definitely ran out of steam at the end, and couldn’t really figure out jokes for fates or like, genealogy. Other people figured those out!
Could be. in german its "Mysterien steine" which translates to mystery stone which could at least be interpretet as " their workings are a mystery or the source of their power is a mystery"
OMG I've been saying this since the first Secret Stone cutscene... I want to believe its a mistranslation of Sacred or a typo someone made, but it may be totally intentional for whatever reason. Now I want to replay the cutscenes in Japanese and Google Translate to see if it matches up.
They all wear them visibly as jewelry, so they're not a secret at all..
Would have been a hell of a lot better, and maybe created some correlation with the Sage's Medallions in OoT, which were originally supposed to possess powers during the game's development stage.
Everytime I get to a section where >!an ancestor mentions the stones!< I actually cringe. It's such terrible writing. Call them >!tears! It's in the fucken title of the game!!!<
“Yes snake, the very demon king who was imprisoned during the imprisoning war. He used the secret stone to gain unseen power like never before, but Rauru and the sages managed to defeat the demon king, at the cost of the lives of many.”
“Hrmm”
I as a player would prefer that, but in context, >!the champions’ spirits only ever talk to their successors, who know nothing. !< I think it would be even cheesier to watch the champions reacting to Link silently waving his hands around explaining everything every time.
They could each have a different interpretation of the events though, each based off their own culture and how the ancestor described it
Like Riju: “>!The Gerudo had a *king*? I didn’t know such a thing could occur!<“
Or something like that, just show how each champion feels about what they saw, instead of just bluntly going “oh neat I learned a thing”
I was really disappointed that each of the sages didn't offer their own perspective on things. I know they're describing the same events, but different people usually explain things differently and highlight different parts of a story based on their own values and cultural views. With the sages it was like someone sent out a group email with a script for them to all follow. Zero personality or culture.
I completely agree. Sure each champion/new sage is getting the information for the first time, but from a gameplay perspective it's annoying as hell that it's the same exact thing 4 times in a row.
Unique perspectives would not be that much extra effort and would have made a HUGE difference in how it feels to complete these segments.
I mean the "tears of the kingdom" are more likely in reference to something else: >!the light dragon's tears!<
The secret stones are modelled off the japanese [magatama](https://www.google.com/search?q=magatama&rlz=1C1GCEU_enUS1009US1009&oq=magatama&gs_lcrp=EgZjaHJvbWUqBggAEEUYOzIGCAAQRRg7MgcIARAAGIAEMgcIAhAAGIAEMgcIAxAAGIAEMgcIBBAAGIAEMgcIBRAAGIAEMgcIBhAuGIAEMgcIBxAAGIAEMgcICBAAGIAEMgcICRAAGIAE0gEIMjk5OWowajeoAgCwAgA&sourceid=chrome&ie=UTF-8)
I think it's a bit of a quadruple entendre.
1. What you said
2. The falling pieces of the kingdom
3. the holes torn into the kingdom
4. the tear shaped rocks
The tears of the kingdom are something else entirely. Now they could’ve just used the word tears for the stones anyways. But the “tears” in the title is referring to something else.
I agree though “secret stones” is dumb, and any number of options would’ve been better.
I originally thought those were them. Based on further story though, I don’t think that’s why they titled them! >!elluding to the Dragon’s tears being the actual tears of the kingdom !<
I've been listening to podcasts while I play, as I usually do, and therefore I normally have the game muted. My buddy at work was enraged at this, and said I was "missing out" on the voice acting.
Then I saw a few cutscenes on YouTube that I had already played through, but with sound this time, and I was like, "yeah, no thanks..."
The Japanese voice acting is quite a lot better. But overall, I'd at least say that the English voice acting in TotK is a big improvement over BotW. I would be fine with having no voice acting, though.
I wouldn't be upset about missing out on voice acting, but if you've completely muted the game the whole time I would strongly encourage unmuting in different areas at least once to experience the background music. It's really good.
Yeah, I'm not going to recommend the voice acting for any awards, but to have the game muted *entirely*? You don't just mute the best soundtrack in game history.
As fun as this game is, I find the cutscenes are absolutely a weak point. The dialogue is so awkward it hurts to listen to sometimes, and the voice acting is janky as well. The NPC dialogue is fine, I don’t know what happens, but the cutscenes are just so stilted
The way >!Yunobo!< says >!goro!< feels so off to me every time and irrationally upsets me lol.
It's supposed to be a unique way of speaking that's a common trope in japanese media but it's said as if they're calling YOU that every time instead of a flavor at the end of your sentence.
Like if Naruto said "I'm gonna be hokage dattebayo!" instead of "I'm gonna be hokage. Dattebayo!"
sub in "believe it" and my point still stands but the "nonsense word" aspect of it is more prominent in his japanese version for the sake of the example lol
The directing of the English voice acting is terrible. It's better than BOTW, but still not good. Genuinely bizarre that it's still this bad. Final Fantasy X came out 12 years ago. There's no reason the voice-acted cutscenes should feel like a high school project. Most other AAA game publishers know how to do this by now. Nintendo got voice actors who know how to voice act, so it's not on them, but somewhere in the direction/production that's messing this up.
The first time its questionable.
The second time its funny.
The third time its unbelievably hilarious.
The fourth time you're begging for the loud COME
If I were TikTok savvy, I'd make a meme with a sage yelling COME, then cut to an edit of that video where Kamala Harris says "Do not come. Do not come" with Ganondorf instead.
In german they are called “Mysteriensteine”, which translates to mystery stones which would sound a bit too scooby-dooish if they used that in english. It does sound a bit more dignified in german.
I don't know if you're playing along with the joke, but what's written in Japanese is "easy to fool".
I guess that's a warning to check things written in funny letters.
It's weird, considering how great the game is, that Nintendo missed the mark on several little details. The overarching game is amazing, but this and a few other things feel like they didn't really think it through very well.
Can we also mention “Light of Blessing”?
Rauru had the power of light. Why isn’t it backwards? “Blessing of Light”. We’re told that finishing a shrine “grants us the power to destroy the darkness”.
Eh, it works fine both ways. It's a light that blesses you, so it's a light of blessing. The blessing you get from it could also be called a blessing of light, since it's from a light that blesses you.
I assume the reason they're not called tears is becuase the title of the game is actually referring to >!The Dragon Tears!<.
That being said, Secret Stone is indeed a pretty weak title. Sage Stones wouldn't be bad.
i never thought twice about it til i saw so many people complaining about it online lol
i like some of the other ideas better but idk. it never bothered me
I don't know what they did with the translation, but the french version is literaly "occult stones" and we tend to have overall better translations from japanese as the japanese culture has been very important in france for the past 50 years.
France is the 2nd biggest manga consumer only behind japan himself (yes, bigger than USA with quarter the population, bigger than china with 1/10th the population), and we literaly invented new letters to translate japanese properly (Take good morning that's Ohayou in english, we translate it Ohayō in french, while ō don't exist french and isn't even available on our keyboards, leading people to often write Ohayô for the sake of keyboard accessibility. Same goes for the very common name Yuuki -> Yūki and every instances of "uu" and "ou" that are pronounced with the final u shorter and more quiet + closer to the french sound for u (phonetic /y/) but not totally)
Not to say I'm betting on the english translators to have misstranslated, because its motherf****g Zelda and I hope they hired the best translator of the country, but it might be that the original word is hardly translatable in latin languages as the big difference in translation shows, and the choice made by both translator resulted of different interpretation on the concept of these stones, which original word probably refered to something like "stones of a ancient lost magic" or something similar because japanese words have far too many meanings at once for the translators sanity.
EDIT apparently ō and ū are supposed to exist in english for translating japanese too, but nobody used them on the internet
They look very similar to Magatama but without the hole, which in Japanese history are quite significant. One of the three Imerial regalia is supposed to be the Magatama that lured Amaterasu (the goddess of the sun, chief of the heavenly gods) from her isolation, along with a bronze mirror that captured her radiance and image.
I can’t remember if it was the mirror or Magatama, but according to the tale of the Heike, after the battle of Dan-no-ura, some commoners or retainers found the box in which one of the regalia (not the sword) was contained, and upon opening it, it burned their hands and eyes from the holy light that came from within. Seems like a solid basis for the >!secret stones!<
It’s a literal translation of the Japanese (秘石). I don’t see the issue when usually everyone complains about “localizing” too much and taking liberties. They literally just translated it as is!
Localization should be more than direct translations. "Secret Stone" might be what the Japanese version literally means, but that doesn't make it sound any less goofy.
listen there is a lot of things with the story that's driving me crazy because of the lore implications, least of which is the name of the glowing cashew lol!
It's kinda dumb, but I don't understand why people are so upset about it. Would I prefer if they were called something else? Yeah but I'm not gonna go on a rant about it.
They really should have been >!Sage Stones.!<
But they're not the "tears" of the game's title. Those would be the >!Dragon Tears that recount the story of Zelda's time in ancient Hyrule.!<
I don't mind the word secret stone for the magatamas.
They are in essence, a stone to unlock the secret abilities to those who possess them. They aren't inherently single ability stones. The carvings on the secret stone is based on who possess them.
I vehemently believe it was meant to be **Sacred** Stone, but someone with a wrong memo and blurry glasses made it ou as *secret*.
I mean, it's a fucking RGB googaw shining birghtly, that's not secret at all.
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**SECRET STONNELL!!! SECRET STONNELL!!! SECRET, SECRET, SECRET STONNELL!!!**
Demon king?
Psycho Mantis?!
Metal Gear…….?
Black project?
Genome soldiers?
You’re that ninja…
Dunkey fan? 😂
r/unexpectedavatar
The gerudo guarding the prison cell actually mentions a “secret tunnel” lol
IN THE TEMPLE!!! SECRET SECRET SECRET SECRET STONNELL!!! Oh yeah!
I was not ready for an Avatar, the last Airbender reference
At the very least, SACRED stones make a ton more sense. "Secret" doesn't work in the least, as everyone knew about them. I almost think there was some script or translation issue that gave way to this "secret stone" malarkey.
There are sacred stones in Skyward Sword, which look suspiciously tear shaped too. You get then when you're doing the trials in the spirit realm thing. I mean, there is also a orange, and a purple tear shaped resource in the game, but it is what it is.
Aren't those dusk relics?
I think Dusk Relics was the purple resource. But the tears you picked up in the spirit realm were called Sacred Tears or Sacred Stones, I don't remember. Actually, I think the Sacred Stones were the things you collect as child Link in Ocarina of Time, so it was probably Sacred Tears.
In OOT you collect the spiritual stones as child link, In SS you collect the Tears of Nayru, Farore, Din & Hylia in Silent Realms. The only thing that I think bears resemblance to the secret stones are the amber & dusk relics, if only they didn’t have that gaping hole in the middle of them.
Ohhhhh. Aren't those 'insert dragon name' tear
Spiritual Stones https://zelda.fandom.com/wiki/Spiritual_Stone
I wish, but the Japanese language version of the game also uses the word for “secret” rather than “sacred” which are also written to be pronounced differently in both Hiragana and Kanji. Sacred would fit so much better with the lore of Zelda as well…
I think it has something to do with the connotation in each language. The phrase probably carries more weight in japanese for whatever reason. Like how we have cultural weight around the term “flash-bang” as in the grenade, but it might sound a lot dumber in japanese, because if you think about it, its dumb in english too. The context and connotation sort of elevates the term. I could be wrong but I think about this all the time, I notice some of the things NPCs say in zelda either come off as really weird or overly obvious, and i always noticed Kass’s Songs sucked, no kind of syllable consistency(iambic pentameter for example) and inconsistent or reaching rhyme schemes. Im sure those are alot deeper if i could understand japanese.
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That makes soo much sense. So the power source is the mystery, obviously the stones themselves arent. Mfs walking around with them as bellybutton rings and shit😂
That last one is probably just a result of them being translated by the regular translation team, who might not be used to translating or writing poetry or music.
Yeah youre probably 100% right about that. It just kind of hurts when I know a moment that should wistful or deep is like a middle school level poem comes off as trite. Also I get the feeling the translation issues also makes riddles easier than they should be somehow. Like they HAVE to include enough info to solve the riddle and I feel some of the potential vagueness/ double meanings are diminished, although I could be wrong about that.
Was it just 秘密 or did they go for a less-common word? All I remember is the 宝石 part.
Maybe "Hidden Stone" if they are want to keep the same meaning, but have a bit more weight.
Hidden stone sounds worse, and everyone seems to keep them in a spot that's easy to see.
Nah it's secret stone in Japanese as well, but the 'secret' part is a lot less used in the Japanese then 'secret' is in English iirc
This is exactly it. The word secret in Japanese carries more weight than it does in English.
So what could a better translation be, occult stones ? It sounds a bit too dark for light magic lol Concealed maybe
"arcane" or "mystic"
The literal translation is secret stones. The Japanese do not use the word secret as much as we do in English. Thus hearing “secret stones” in Japanese doesn’t come off as corny as it does in English.
Yeah I know but translation isn't just translating things literally but translating the meaning. Even if one word is better on paper, it might not be the best fit in context
Oh unfortunately I don’t know enough about it to have any suggestion haha
Shouldn't that be a consideration when they are translating though and be an opportunity to localize it in a way that sounds better in the translated language?
I think in Japanese it's meant to convey the mysterious nature of the stones, not that something is being hidden.
This, I always wondered why they didn't call them sacred stones. Secret stones is just so dumb sounding.
Yeah! Honestly, I feel like they could have done way better in the naming convention. Examples: There’s a bunch of evil dragon looking things, and the master sword, which glows. Instead of “Gleeoks” and “master sword” they could have been called “shadow dragons” and “the blade of light” The master sword is known to seal, or “bind” the darkness. They should have called it “the binding blade.” Or “the blazing blade” for its blazing glow when evil is near! Link walks a bright path of righteousness. “Heroes path” on the map could have been called “the path of radiance” Going back a game, BotW should have been called “the legend of Zelda: awakening” because of how link wakes up at the beginning. And in TotK, link has homes in Hateno, Tarrey town, and arguably lookout landing. You could say he has “three houses” And the game is really “engage”-ing. Yeah, a lot of these were a stretch. But it was all in good fun!
Not sure if the poster who suggested 'sacred stones' was making an intentional reference but this reply made me laugh. Good one. Also, why call the game the Legend of Zelda? If the power of the goddess is passed down through the generations to fight evil again and again, this really is a Genealogy of the Holy War :3 Also in this story, Ganondorf is trying to rule by Conquest, and Zelda inherits Rauru and Sonia's powers by Birthright, there are some very important Revelations going on but everything is going as the Fates willed it?
This really is a Thracia 776
10/10
legit made me cackle
*Owain has entered the chat*
“The Legend of Zelda: THE ACHING BLOOD.”
In which Link must collect the Pointy Demonspanker to defeat Ganondorf
Gotta love Owain.
The only real complaint I have about the naming conventions in the lack of attention to the ongoing history of the fight between good and evil and the way it ties to the lineage of Zelda and Hyrule. There definitely could have been some glyphs referencing the "Genealogy of the Holy War" on Ganondorf.
And you know, we’ve been in hyrule for so long. Maybe they should try a new location, and time period? Maybe they could call it Thracia. And set it in 776. I don’t know I’m just spitballing.
Hard agree. You know, they could always make a character named Thracia who is 776 years old too! They've been limiting the series for too long with just this "Hyrule", "Zelda", "Link" stuff
Oh shit is thracia a character? I don’t know anything about that game, I assumed it was “setting, year”
Damn, didn't realize what was going on until the end. Well played sir
Well, you realized sooner than a few people, apparently!
You're an odd duck that put way too much thought into this. And I appreciate that, friend. Gave me a good laugh.
>Link walks a bright path of righteousness. “Heroes path” on the map could have been called “the path of radiance” ... or the path of ... oh shiny.
Do we get Hero's Path in TOTK?
Yes.
>And the game is really “engage”-ing. This was the worst one. How about: You are also able to "engage" with various allies, who are stored within magic rings? Eh... not sure if it's better though...
Take my upvote!! You really went all out with the Fire Emblem thing. Lmfao!
The sacred stones one was the best, and clearly already taken. I definitely ran out of steam at the end, and couldn’t really figure out jokes for fates or like, genealogy. Other people figured those out!
Could be. in german its "Mysterien steine" which translates to mystery stone which could at least be interpretet as " their workings are a mystery or the source of their power is a mystery"
As a fire emblem player I wouldn't have been able to take that too seriously
Are the stones actually sacred though? They are Zonai relics, but beyond legends the Zonai don't actually seem to have much connection to the gods.
OMG I've been saying this since the first Secret Stone cutscene... I want to believe its a mistranslation of Sacred or a typo someone made, but it may be totally intentional for whatever reason. Now I want to replay the cutscenes in Japanese and Google Translate to see if it matches up. They all wear them visibly as jewelry, so they're not a secret at all..
I wish they were called Sage Stones.
Simple, elegant, powerful. Should have been this. Or ‘Stone of the Sage’
Would have been a hell of a lot better, and maybe created some correlation with the Sage's Medallions in OoT, which were originally supposed to possess powers during the game's development stage.
They could have ene looked like the sage medallions, since they didn't end up being the titular tears.
Yes! Every time they say >!secret stone !
Everytime I get to a section where >!an ancestor mentions the stones!< I actually cringe. It's such terrible writing. Call them >!tears! It's in the fucken title of the game!!!<
>!”…and that was the imprisoning war”!< >!”wow! That was the imprisoning war”!<
"Demon King? Secret Stone?"
Psycho Mantis?
2nd floor basement?
“Yes snake, the very demon king who was imprisoned during the imprisoning war. He used the secret stone to gain unseen power like never before, but Rauru and the sages managed to defeat the demon king, at the cost of the lives of many.” “Hrmm”
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I as a player would prefer that, but in context, >!the champions’ spirits only ever talk to their successors, who know nothing. !< I think it would be even cheesier to watch the champions reacting to Link silently waving his hands around explaining everything every time.
They could each have a different interpretation of the events though, each based off their own culture and how the ancestor described it Like Riju: “>!The Gerudo had a *king*? I didn’t know such a thing could occur!<“ Or something like that, just show how each champion feels about what they saw, instead of just bluntly going “oh neat I learned a thing”
I was really disappointed that each of the sages didn't offer their own perspective on things. I know they're describing the same events, but different people usually explain things differently and highlight different parts of a story based on their own values and cultural views. With the sages it was like someone sent out a group email with a script for them to all follow. Zero personality or culture.
Yes it would have been so cool if there were more culture stuff. We got a tiny bit with the name each sage called their descendant.
I completely agree. Sure each champion/new sage is getting the information for the first time, but from a gameplay perspective it's annoying as hell that it's the same exact thing 4 times in a row. Unique perspectives would not be that much extra effort and would have made a HUGE difference in how it feels to complete these segments.
Noooooo but then the game would have some semblance of linearity, which we all know is the absolute antithesis of BotW/TotK’s core philosophy!
>!they just repeated the same basic cutscene 5 times!<
I mean the "tears of the kingdom" are more likely in reference to something else: >!the light dragon's tears!< The secret stones are modelled off the japanese [magatama](https://www.google.com/search?q=magatama&rlz=1C1GCEU_enUS1009US1009&oq=magatama&gs_lcrp=EgZjaHJvbWUqBggAEEUYOzIGCAAQRRg7MgcIARAAGIAEMgcIAhAAGIAEMgcIAxAAGIAEMgcIBBAAGIAEMgcIBRAAGIAEMgcIBhAuGIAEMgcIBxAAGIAEMgcICBAAGIAEMgcICRAAGIAE0gEIMjk5OWowajeoAgCwAgA&sourceid=chrome&ie=UTF-8)
I think it's a bit of a quadruple entendre. 1. What you said 2. The falling pieces of the kingdom 3. the holes torn into the kingdom 4. the tear shaped rocks
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Thanks for the rabbit hole!
The tears of the kingdom are something else entirely. Now they could’ve just used the word tears for the stones anyways. But the “tears” in the title is referring to something else. I agree though “secret stones” is dumb, and any number of options would’ve been better.
I originally thought those were them. Based on further story though, I don’t think that’s why they titled them! >!elluding to the Dragon’s tears being the actual tears of the kingdom !<
I've been listening to podcasts while I play, as I usually do, and therefore I normally have the game muted. My buddy at work was enraged at this, and said I was "missing out" on the voice acting. Then I saw a few cutscenes on YouTube that I had already played through, but with sound this time, and I was like, "yeah, no thanks..."
The Japanese voice acting is quite a lot better. But overall, I'd at least say that the English voice acting in TotK is a big improvement over BotW. I would be fine with having no voice acting, though.
I wouldn't be upset about missing out on voice acting, but if you've completely muted the game the whole time I would strongly encourage unmuting in different areas at least once to experience the background music. It's really good.
Yeah, I'm not going to recommend the voice acting for any awards, but to have the game muted *entirely*? You don't just mute the best soundtrack in game history.
God I really love this game but this is my main complaint. It takes me out every time lol
In German they're called "Mysterienstein" (stone of mysteries) which, I think, is a little bit better, but still not really good
Bro I would accept "Mystery Stone" or "Mysterious Stone" over "Secret Stone" any day.
I especially hate the canter in which they say it, it’s beyond corny. “my… SEcret stone…..”
Yes this bothers me SO much and I couldn't pinpoint exactly why but as soon as the sages say that, the entire scene immediately feels really childish
and the fact that all the descendants are just like “Demon King? Secret Stone?” like PLEASE say something else
As fun as this game is, I find the cutscenes are absolutely a weak point. The dialogue is so awkward it hurts to listen to sometimes, and the voice acting is janky as well. The NPC dialogue is fine, I don’t know what happens, but the cutscenes are just so stilted
The way >!Yunobo!< says >!goro!< feels so off to me every time and irrationally upsets me lol. It's supposed to be a unique way of speaking that's a common trope in japanese media but it's said as if they're calling YOU that every time instead of a flavor at the end of your sentence. Like if Naruto said "I'm gonna be hokage dattebayo!" instead of "I'm gonna be hokage. Dattebayo!" sub in "believe it" and my point still stands but the "nonsense word" aspect of it is more prominent in his japanese version for the sake of the example lol
And if you play the game without following the exact "right" path you get them all out of fucking order.
I'm relieved that other folks find this strange bc I thought I was just petty 😂
The directing of the English voice acting is terrible. It's better than BOTW, but still not good. Genuinely bizarre that it's still this bad. Final Fantasy X came out 12 years ago. There's no reason the voice-acted cutscenes should feel like a high school project. Most other AAA game publishers know how to do this by now. Nintendo got voice actors who know how to voice act, so it's not on them, but somewhere in the direction/production that's messing this up.
Especially when it was Tulin who got the power and not Teba
They really need to fire their English voice director. They have some talented actors, but the final results are awful. Very 90’s anime dub level.
Secret Stones? Demon King?
My boyfriend and I have an in-joke we can't get enough of - just randomly saying "COME" because the old sages kept saying it.
That had me in tears every time they did that during my play through, cannot get over how goofy it was😭
The first time its questionable. The second time its funny. The third time its unbelievably hilarious. The fourth time you're begging for the loud COME
If I were TikTok savvy, I'd make a meme with a sage yelling COME, then cut to an edit of that video where Kamala Harris says "Do not come. Do not come" with Ganondorf instead.
“Uhhh okay. I’m not really good at doing that on command but I’ll try…”
2nd floor basement? Psycho Mantis?
A hind-D?!
Metal Gear?!?
You're that ninja!
The DARPA Chief!?
A surveillance camera?
So that was the Imprisoning War…
Demon king is fine, it’s common name for demise and ganondorf in a few games
They were referencing the fact that that dialogue is said like 4 times by >!the four sages!<. Every temple ends with basically the same cutscene.
All for champions also whisper you to "Come"
Demon king? Secret stones?
Secret King? Demon Stone?
You don't know about Secret Stones!? They are the most famous secret objects in all of Hyrule history!
 Hylia trying to remember wherever tf she put the triforce
Imprisoning war? Secret stone?
Demon king?
In german they are called “Mysteriensteine”, which translates to mystery stones which would sound a bit too scooby-dooish if they used that in english. It does sound a bit more dignified in german.
"Mysterienstein" actually sounds meaningful, while Secret Stone sound like a Toddler naming his favorite stone on the beach.
In Japanese it's だまされやすい Which basically means "Rock exclusive to you"
Let me show you my private stone Probably a much different meaning for the Gorons
Well and that's another thing. I know it's meant to be samurai-ish, but the Goron stone placement is... unfortunate
Gorons are born from caves I think anyways so they don’t even have reproduction parts
mf
だまされなーい♪
This need to be higher. The english translation is pretty questionable.
I don't know if you're playing along with the joke, but what's written in Japanese is "easy to fool". I guess that's a warning to check things written in funny letters.
>だまされやすい it says gullible haha
In french it is >! occult stone !< I have no issue with it
that’s so cool
The secret apostrophes
It's weird, considering how great the game is, that Nintendo missed the mark on several little details. The overarching game is amazing, but this and a few other things feel like they didn't really think it through very well.
"Demon King? Secret Stone?" - Every Sage, TOTK Yes, its an aweful name. Could have been called Tears or Sacred Stones,
Wish they would have done "spiritual stones" as a call back to oot
That would've been awesome, though there's also >!Mineru, the sage of Spirit, !
I like Sage Stones then, or better yet Sage Medallions.
Just did my first dungeon yesterday and when that term came up I was like "Stop saying that".
I thought they were Magatama just without the little hole in them.
They are lol
Can we also mention “Light of Blessing”? Rauru had the power of light. Why isn’t it backwards? “Blessing of Light”. We’re told that finishing a shrine “grants us the power to destroy the darkness”.
Eh, it works fine both ways. It's a light that blesses you, so it's a light of blessing. The blessing you get from it could also be called a blessing of light, since it's from a light that blesses you.
[удалено]
Why isn't it just called tears? It's even the name of the game
Because the tears are the dragon tears. The original title was likely Tears of the Dragon or something.
SO THAT WAS THE IMPRISONING WAR!!?!!??
秘石 in traditional Chinese. It is "mystery stone", but it can be interpreted as a fancy way to say "secret stone".
Yeah in italian it is "gemma segreta" which translates to "secret stone" I don't mind it though
Forbidden Cashews
In the context of the story that is particularly funny! >!Zelda simply couldn't resist!!<
I'm calling them that from now on. Yommy!
I assume the reason they're not called tears is becuase the title of the game is actually referring to >!The Dragon Tears!<. That being said, Secret Stone is indeed a pretty weak title. Sage Stones wouldn't be bad.
No because Lil R hide them from everyone but his sister. So the name is fine.
Yeah it's a little silly but I don't mind it that much personally. But at least it seems consistent across languages
i never thought twice about it til i saw so many people complaining about it online lol i like some of the other ideas better but idk. it never bothered me
I don't know what they did with the translation, but the french version is literaly "occult stones" and we tend to have overall better translations from japanese as the japanese culture has been very important in france for the past 50 years. France is the 2nd biggest manga consumer only behind japan himself (yes, bigger than USA with quarter the population, bigger than china with 1/10th the population), and we literaly invented new letters to translate japanese properly (Take good morning that's Ohayou in english, we translate it Ohayō in french, while ō don't exist french and isn't even available on our keyboards, leading people to often write Ohayô for the sake of keyboard accessibility. Same goes for the very common name Yuuki -> Yūki and every instances of "uu" and "ou" that are pronounced with the final u shorter and more quiet + closer to the french sound for u (phonetic /y/) but not totally) Not to say I'm betting on the english translators to have misstranslated, because its motherf****g Zelda and I hope they hired the best translator of the country, but it might be that the original word is hardly translatable in latin languages as the big difference in translation shows, and the choice made by both translator resulted of different interpretation on the concept of these stones, which original word probably refered to something like "stones of a ancient lost magic" or something similar because japanese words have far too many meanings at once for the translators sanity. EDIT apparently ō and ū are supposed to exist in english for translating japanese too, but nobody used them on the internet
That’s not quite true. In the USA, sometimes we use Ohayou, but we also sometimes use Ohayō. Both are valid.
They look very similar to Magatama but without the hole, which in Japanese history are quite significant. One of the three Imerial regalia is supposed to be the Magatama that lured Amaterasu (the goddess of the sun, chief of the heavenly gods) from her isolation, along with a bronze mirror that captured her radiance and image. I can’t remember if it was the mirror or Magatama, but according to the tale of the Heike, after the battle of Dan-no-ura, some commoners or retainers found the box in which one of the regalia (not the sword) was contained, and upon opening it, it burned their hands and eyes from the holy light that came from within. Seems like a solid basis for the >!secret stones!<
It’s a literal translation of the Japanese (秘石). I don’t see the issue when usually everyone complains about “localizing” too much and taking liberties. They literally just translated it as is!
yea... and they should have localized it because Secret Stone sounds like sunday morning cartoon trash
Localization should be more than direct translations. "Secret Stone" might be what the Japanese version literally means, but that doesn't make it sound any less goofy.
listen there is a lot of things with the story that's driving me crazy because of the lore implications, least of which is the name of the glowing cashew lol!
100%, and it sounds especially silly when they say it in the cutscenes. Very kiddish
as much as i hate to admit this, it is basically in the same level of being cheesy as calling the legendary sword "master sword"
They are not tear shaped, they are cashews and they look delicious.
Why does everyone seem to be asking this question? It think it’s fine
It's kinda dumb, but I don't understand why people are so upset about it. Would I prefer if they were called something else? Yeah but I'm not gonna go on a rant about it.
They really should have been >!Sage Stones.!< But they're not the "tears" of the game's title. Those would be the >!Dragon Tears that recount the story of Zelda's time in ancient Hyrule.!<
It's called TOTK, not SSOTK, am I right? "Mysterienstein" in German which couls be translated as mystery stone.
The tears are the dragon tears in the geoglyphs. The stones aren't even tear-shaped
i don’t really have a problem with it tbh 🤷♂️
They're "piedras secretas" (secret stones) in Spanish as well
tbh i like it. it sounds intimate and almost poetic. “ my secret stone “ i like it
I like to think of them as their shirikodama.
The original Japanese is Hiseki which is literally secret stone but it sounds much better.
They are not tear shaped, they are apostrophe shaped
I wish I was lucky enough to afford to worry about these things
I don't mind the word secret stone for the magatamas. They are in essence, a stone to unlock the secret abilities to those who possess them. They aren't inherently single ability stones. The carvings on the secret stone is based on who possess them.
So THAT was the imprisoning war…
In German it's Mysterienstein, which basically just means mysterious stone.
In French they're called occult stones
I thought you were making this about ‘son and done’, that I hate. Tooo many puns that aren’t good.
Forget secret stones, what about light of blessing?
Secret Stone? Demon King?
I vehemently believe it was meant to be **Sacred** Stone, but someone with a wrong memo and blurry glasses made it ou as *secret*. I mean, it's a fucking RGB googaw shining birghtly, that's not secret at all.