Thread: "Earthquake Spiral"?

You gotta consult someone who KNOWS JAPANESE AND LIVES IN JAPAN to translate the names of things *cough* not me but someone like me *cough* before the official English versions come out.

I saw "earthquake spiral" scrolling though Bulbapedia and thought: FAIL.

"Jishin" is "self belief" i.e. "ego" in Japanese (yes it also means earthquake with different Kanji).

The full phrase "jishinkajou" means: overconfidence

Does that make sense? As you defeat each opponent, you think you are stronger (and in fact are, for the length of the battle) and become overconfident.

"Earthquake spiral" makes no sense. Please fix it.

This section isn't about Bulbapedia, specificaly. Moving this.

Where did you see that? I don't see anything linking to it at the moment. That "translation" was from a long time ago (probably taken from Serebii).

Don't get mad....posting this here for relevance from one of my blogs.

Originally Posted by UltimateSephiroth

I don't really know Japanese either but...
じしんかじょう
In Japanese, spaces aren't necessary; I assume they are used mainly to make it easier to read kana-only text. So, we can take this ability in two ways. Either as "じしんかじょう" or as "じしん　かじょう". The first one means "overconfident", the other means "earthquake spiral". Or, that's what my Rikaichan Firefox add-on says, and I believe it is quite correct. The second one with the name split could have other translations too, the first part has eight meanings and the second part eight as well, but those ones wouldn't be so logical.

Of these two, Overconfident sounds more plausible, given the effect of that ability.

E: Here are the translations from that addon's dictionary.

自信過剰 じしんかじょう
(n,adj-na,adj-no) overconfident; presumptuous

----

侍臣 じしん
(n) courtier; attendant
慈心 じしん
(n) benevolence; mercy
磁心 じしん
(n) (magnetic) core
自信 じしん
(n,vs) self-confidence; (P)
自身 じしん
(n) by oneself; personally; (P)
地震 じしん
(n) earthquake; (P)
磁針 じしん
(n) magnetic needle
時針 じしん
(n) hour hand (watch, clock)

----

渦状 かじょう
(n,adj-no) spiral
下情 かじょう
(n) condition of the common people
佳醸 かじょう
(n) sweet sake; good wine
家常 かじょう
(n) family custom
架上 かじょう
(n) on the shelf
箇条 かじょう
(n) items; errors; articles
過剰 かじょう
(adj-na,n) excess; over-; (P)
個条 かじょう
(n) article; clause; item

I got into an argument with Shofu about this. He still believes it is Earthquake Spiral when that makes no sense. It is overconfidence. Plain and simple.

Since the Kanji is not given, it can be translated as either Earthquake Spiral or Overconfidence. I think they were aiming for Overconfidence, since other pokemon that aren't ground-types can have the ability.

Well, if it were intended to have a double meaning, hopefully it's better able to be translated than Curse was.

Are attack names written out in kanji when you set the game to kanji mode? Or are they still written out in hiragana/katakana?

They remain in hiragana/katakana, unfortunately. Kanji would have been helpful in numerous cases.

Written in kana with no way to see its kanji, stuff like this is pretty ambiguous.

のろい

Translating it as Earthquake Spiral makes absolutely no sense. Overconfidence is the obvious meaning.

Overconfidence is the translation.