More “Silver Tempest” English Cards Revealed!

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A few more English cards have been revealed from Silver Tempest! The Zeraora V character rare is the oldest of the bunch — the card originally released in Japan’s VMAX Climax all the way back in December 2021.


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Silver Tempest releases in the...

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RIP, thought Alakazam's ability would translate to "Spoonful of Pain"
The original name of Radiant Alakazam's Ability is ペインスプーン. This is the English phrase "Pain Spoon" spelled out phonetically in katakana (paste the phrase into DeepL and/or Google Translate, and click the 'speech' button if you're not clear on what I mean). There's no 'translation' to be done here, ペインスプーン is Pain Spoon and anything other than Pain Spoon is incorrect. SWSH has been very hit-or-miss on respecting attacks that are already in English, but Silver Tempest so far(?) seems to be gunning for new levels of terrible on this front.
 
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The original name of Radiant Alakazam's Ability is ペインスプーン . This is the English phrase "Pain Spoon" spelled out phonetically in katakana (paste the phrase into DeepL and/or Google Translate, and click the 'speech' button if you're not clear on what I mean). There's no 'translation' to be done here, ペインスプーン is Pain Spoon and anything other than Pain Spoon is incorrect. SWSH has been very hit-or-miss on respecting attacks that are already in English, but Silver Tempest so far(?) seems to be gunning for new levels of terrible on this front.
If that's the case, then it's silly anyway; "pain spoon?" Lol, I get that the gimmick with the name might be cooler for a native Japanese speaker but for us English speakers it's just lame. I've been disappointed a lot recently with attack/ability names ("spit innocently," "flower selecting," "garbage attack")
 
If that's the case, then it's silly anyway; "pain spoon?" Lol, I get that the gimmick with the name might be cooler for a native Japanese speaker but for us English speakers it's just lame. I've been disappointed a lot recently with attack/ability names ("spit innocently," "flower selecting," "garbage attack")
It's not just a 'gimmick', it's (1) an opportunity for Japanese speakers to pick up English phrases and learn a second language, and (2) an opportunity to break the language barrier at high-level organized play [that mistranslations like this undermine].

On point (1), I'll note that despite hundreds – if not thousands – of attacks in the Japanese TCG being phonetic English, we haven't really seen the English language TCG attempt this at all? On the contrary, in fact – when Japan's Generation 6 cards had the gimmick of M Pokémon EX having the Japanese attack name complimented by the English spelling in the art of the card, the English edition undermined this by changing many of the attack names anyways. The JP cards act as sorts of "Rosetta stones" for learning some English phrases and even characters, the lack of consistency with how the EN TCG meant you're probably not learning anything.

For the Japanese, the Japanese video games improved their Japanese vocabulary, and the Japanese TCG went on to teach them some English here and there. For English speakers, the English video games did help improve many players' English vocabulary, but the EN TCG hasn't done anything to help anyone pick up many – any? – Japanese words.

(2) Imagine being a Japanese player at Worlds who happens to use a card like this Alakazam in a deck and is matched up against an English player, or are matched up against an English player using the card. Wouldn't it become noticeably bizarre that how you understand the attack to be named – in English, as "Pain Spoon" – is contrary to how the person you're playing against? "Painful Spoons"? Where is the "ful" coming from? Wait, ペインスプーン is plural? Did I misread one of the kana? Huh.

Is there any purpose to this kind of deliberate mistranslation?

Put another way: even Japanese players in the 10-and-under division all, by manner of how ubiquitous phonetic English is in the Japanese TCG, have picked up some baseline English vocabulary and pronunciation. On the other hand, there are probably many English players in the Masters division who can't speak any Japanese beyond the 'konnichiwa' and 'sayonara' they've picked up from outside of playing the Pokémon Trading Card Game, a fundamentally Japanese product.



Looking into the attacks you mentioned;
Spit Innocently is originally おとぼけスピット, but it's more pretending you're innocent/don't know what you're doing, than being innocent. Like "oh sorry I was spitting and didn't notice you there I didn't meant to hit you except yes I did haha". This wouldn't really be anything to get up in arms about as such, since it's not something you could readily translate into a snappy attack name for the English TCG.

Flower Selecting is originally はなえらび. This translation also seems fine.

Garbage Attack is the correct transliteration of ガベージアタック.
 
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It's not just a 'gimmick', it's (1) an opportunity for Japanese speakers to pick up English phrases and learn a second language, and (2) an opportunity to break the language barrier at high-level organized play [that mistranslations like this undermine].

On point (1), I'll note that despite hundreds – if not thousands – of attacks in the Japanese TCG being phonetic English, we haven't really seen the English language TCG attempt this at all? On the contrary, in fact – when Japan's Generation 6 cards had the gimmick of M Pokémon EX having the Japanese attack name complimented by the English spelling in the art of the card, the English edition undermined this by changing many of the attack names anyways. The JP cards act as sorts of "Rosetta stones" for learning some English phrases and even characters, the lack of consistency with how the EN TCG meant you're probably not learning anything.

For the Japanese, the Japanese video games improved their Japanese vocabulary, and the Japanese TCG went on to teach them some English here and there. For English speakers, the English video games did help improve many players' English vocabulary, but the EN TCG hasn't done anything to help anyone pick up many – any? – Japanese words.

(2) Imagine being a Japanese player at Worlds who happens to use a card like this Alakazam in a deck and is matched up against an English player, or are matched up against an English player using the card. Wouldn't it become noticeably bizarre that how you understand the attack to be named – in English, as "Pain Spoon" – is contrary to how the person you're playing against? "Painful Spoons"? Where is the "ful" coming from? Wait, ペインスプーン is plural? Did I misread one of the kana? Huh.

Is there any purpose to this kind of deliberate mistranslation?

Put another way: even Japanese players in the 10-and-under division all, by manner of how ubiquitous phonetic English is in the Japanese TCG, have picked up some baseline English vocabulary and pronunciation. On the other hand, there are probably many English players in the Masters division who can't speak any Japanese beyond the 'konnichiwa' and 'sayonara' they've picked up from outside of playing the Pokémon Trading Card Game, a fundamentally Japanese product.



Looking into the attacks you mentioned;
Spit Innocently is originally おとぼけスピット, but it's more pretending you're innocent/don't know what you're doing, than being innocent. Like "oh sorry I was spitting and didn't notice you there I didn't meant to hit you except yes I did haha". This wouldn't really be anything to get up in arms about as such, since it's not something you could readily translate into a snappy attack name for the English TCG.

Flower Selecting is originally はなえらび. This translation also seems fine.

Garbage Attack is the correct transliteration of ガベージアタック

That's all interesting, and confusing. With the phonetic Japanese phrases, I guess you don't have any wiggle-room when writing them in English, so my complaint then is that they chose ペインスプーン which is now a lame attack name in both languages. As for the non-phonetic phrases (I don't know which are and which aren't), you say "Flower Selecting" is a "fine" translation, but "flower selecting" sounds janky and awkward in English while "flower picking" is a common English phrase. "Garbage Attack" might be the "correct" translation, but the way English works makes it sound like you're calling the attack itself "garbage," slang for "bad." "Spit Innocently" just sounds rediculous in English; if it's not a phonetic phrasing thing, then I don't know why whoever decides the translation couldn't come up with another phrase. This is a Japanese game first, I get that; but I'm not sure I buy the idea that they don't/can't give any accomodation to the limits of other languages (English, or Chinese, or Spanish, or whatever). Didn't they choose to translate Shadow Rider VMax's ability as "Underworld Door" rather than "Hell's Gate" for cultural reasons? Language problems are outside my realm of experitse; I just know the game has felt really awkward recently.
 
"Flower Selecting" is a "fine" translation, but "flower selecting" sounds janky and awkward in English while "flower picking" is a common English phrase.
Flower Picking was already used for the name of a different Ability on Floette and Florges from Cosmic Eclipse. Since the effects are different, it's almost inherently necessary to ensure the translation is different.
 
Not all of the TG cards look great when just viewed online, some I came to love more when I saw the printed versions; this basically applies to all V/VMAX within the TG subset. The etched details really add to it and enhance it in some cases. But that Zeraora V already looks great, so this will be a nice card to encounter!
 
The original name of Radiant Alakazam's Ability is ペインスプーン. This is the English phrase "Pain Spoon" spelled out phonetically in katakana (paste the phrase into DeepL and/or Google Translate, and click the 'speech' button if you're not clear on what I mean). There's no 'translation' to be done here, ペインスプーン is Pain Spoon and anything other than Pain Spoon is incorrect. SWSH has been very hit-or-miss on respecting attacks that are already in English, but Silver Tempest so far(?) seems to be gunning for new levels of terrible on this front.
You've failed to consider that 'Spoonful of Pain' sounds more silly than 'Pain Spoon' and is therefore the better translation.
Though really, Pokemon is way less susceptible to Frog the Jam type translations so I think they should be allowed to mess with the move names a little if it allows for the maximization of funny
 
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