Georg Prime

[eldrasidar]

could be, but the other problem is that despite both black moon warrior and ebony moon knight seem similar in english, they are quite different in japanese, particularly when written. For example, Knight(kishi) and warrior(bushi) are completely different words with very different context. particularly when you see royal knight afterwards, and we know that translation to be right, it would be highly unlikely for it to be mistranslated. the translated phrasing is also following a fairly standard formula. x was in group a, x was in group b, x was in group c. that's a normal way to phrase something in pretty much every language as it is aesthetically pleasing. and keeps everything orderly and in theme. while certainly there could be translation issues here, there isn't any evidence that there is, and any translation error is more than likely either a matter of wrong synonym(like true holy rune versus godspeed rune) or syntax, not phrasing.

also consider that although Georg is a prodigious individual who often does work and travel alone, the majority of his career is in the company of others, whether it's his early years fighting alongside Ferid in some war(possibly the Jowston-Highland War), or fighting alongside Barbarossa in the Succession wars, or even fighting as a star of destiny in either the Sun Rune war or the Dunan Unification war, Georg has traditionally been a part of an organization, not a lone wolf. It would be out of his character to have spent significant amount of time in the Grasslands, long enough to earn title, without him being involved with an organization or group of some kind. he just doesn't ever seem to have enough personal motivation to get involved majorly in events unless his working with inspiring figures or close friends.

basically, there's no reason to disbelieve the Richmond investigation of Georg. indeed there's much more circumstantial evidence to support that it is accurate, given that every other fact about georg is confirmed by suikoden 5.

[Iesous]

this one actually makes sense. it's providing the names of various military groups he's be a part of. he was 1 of the 6 great generals of the scarlet moon empire, 1 of 6 royal(queen's) knights of falena. if we know those two facts to be true, then which makes more sense to put in between those two, he was known as the black moon warrior in the grasslands, or he was one of the (if pattern serves, 6) ebony moon knights in grassland. could the translators have misstranslated the name of the group, sure, but it's pretty clear from the context that Georg was a member of a group, not a solo warrior with a superhero name.

Your reasoning actually supports the opposite assertion. In textual criticism (which is what we are now doing, and what I am getting my master's degree in) you choose the more difficult reading. And here's the reason: a translator is more likely to 'fix' or change the original so that it fits better with the context. Therefore, the translator sees warrior Y in between warrior X and warrior Z and harmonizes the idea; either purposefully (for the aesthetically pleasing aspect as you said) or subconsciously because he either doesn't know the target language very well or the original language very well.

You're also right that a, b, c is a normal way to phrase something, but it's also a boring way to phrase something. There are tons of different ways to phrase things. It could be graded (either increasing or decreasing in number), sandwiched (as is possible here, where a and c are the same but b is different), etc. The point is that there are lots of different phrasing options, and just because one of them supports your claim, doesn't make it better.

also consider that although Georg is a prodigious individual who often does work and travel alone, the majority of his career is in the company of others

I think you made too many assumptions with this statement. We know for sure the 6 generals, and the Queens Knights, but we don't know that he was in any other elite organization (and you can't include Ebony Moon because that's the issue in question and that would be circular logic). His previous wartime experience with Ferid is never expounded upon and therefore cannot be assumed to be an organization. Likewise, he didn't receive a title during the Dunan Unification war. A string of 2 is not enough grounds to assume the third.

Despite my disagreements with you, I'm not saying that you're wrong. Mainly because I can't read Japanese. You could very well be right. But your logic doesn't back up your claim. Sorry. I simply have to trust other people's translation. Up until today, I was sure that it was "part of the Ebony Moon Knights" because that was the only translation I have ever seen. But now, it seems to me that Vextor is saying that that translation is faulty. So, if you read Japanese and have read the Japanese line in the game and therefore know exactly what it says and how it should be translated, then by all means, tell us. But your evidence so far hasn't won me over; it has in fact pushed me to the other camp.

[eldrasidar]

given you generally don't go to war with just you and your best friend in areas neither of you have any personal connections to, i think it's a pretty safe assumption that georg and ferid were fighting together with a large number of people, who were probably at least loosely organized into an army. likewise he was in an the dunan unification army, title or not. so I really do have a string of 4 that says if was in grassland for an extended, he probably was working with other people in a group, lending an hand as his personality seems want to do.

i'm aware that there are other phrase structures besides a, b, c, however boring it might be. but when you already know part A and part C follow pattern X and we can validate them as we can here as being correct, it's basic occam's razor that part B most likely also follows pattern X in light of there being no evidence that it doesn't or can't. yes, one could sandwich in a completely different formula, but there's no motivation to, and it's no more informative. also note that the richmond quote begins with, "He's got a hell of a history. " that's a basically setting up the reader to expect of list of historically important things Georg has done in the past. now the order in which the list is told could be in any which way you please; chronological, alphetical, most to least fun, or even random, but whichever way you say it, it's gonna be a list. in this case, it appears to be a list of prior jobs he held. the last line of the richmond report, "He just threw it all away." supports that all three of things listed were something he could walk away from like jobs, whilst obviously still keeping his identity(he never hides the fact that he is Georg Prime, or any of the events of his past when asked about them, although he is occasionally cryptic when it tactful to be). if the middle phrase was supposed to be 'in grassland, he was called the ebony moon knight', how could he throw that away? could the translator have gotten in wrong by accidently overlooking some part of the sentence and molding it to fit a pretty structure, he could have. but more likely(given their job as a translator), they faithfully represented the original sentence.

whether you agree with me or not, basically the argument right centers on whether you think a translator screwed up or not. I'm looking at this sentence and seeing well-phrased English, with 2 pieces of verified information, and 1 piece of disputed information. so far, the only evidence suggesting that the disputed information is false is an uncited look into the Internet, which as we should all know, is not the greatest source of accurate information, and the circumstantial evidence that translators and editors make mistakes, neither of these pieces of evidence are particularly compelling, at least no more compelling than the evidence in favor of the disputed claim's validity. in lieu of the original japanese from which we could translate ourselves, it's simply makes more sense to trust the translation provided in the game.

[Raww Le Klueze]

if the middle phrase was supposed to be 'in grassland, he was called the ebony moon knight', how could he throw that away?

Uh, by leaving the grasslands and throwing away a life of being revered as a hero? This shouldn't be a new concept to you, there's a whole game in the series about a guy that did just that.

The Grasslanders aren't likely to have just met him in an alley one day and then decided to call him the Black Moon Warrior for the hell of it. He probably did something to earn the title.

I'm looking at this sentence and seeing well-phrased English

So you're seriously suggesting that the translators are so retarded that if they translated a sentence that came out as gibberish they would just leave it as is instead of trying to make it comprehensible?

Your whole argument is ludicrous. What it boils down to is: I think it sounds right so it probably is.

I see well-phrased English when I read "Please accept the job." as well, I wouldn't dream of calling it accurate or even sensible.

[Antimatzist]

You can't really bring the english translations as reasons for your point... I mean in Suikoden II, it's Howling Voice Guild and in Suikoden III it's Roaring Brotherhood. Even though (I guess) they are the same words in japanese.

So we either need the japanese text and a good translator or we should stop discussing.

but more likely(given their job as a translator), they faithfully represented the original sentence.

I had to laugh really loud when I read this sentence

[Iesous]

given you generally don't go to war with just you and your best friend in areas neither of you have any personal connections to, i think it's a pretty safe assumption that georg and ferid were fighting together with a large number of people, who were probably at least loosely organized into an army. likewise he was in an the dunan unification army, title or not. so I really do have a string of 4 that says if was in grassland for an extended, he probably was working with other people in a group, lending an hand as his personality seems want to do.

No one is arguing that he wasn't part of an army or that he was some kind of vigilante. We are discussing his inclusion in an elite group, such as the 6 imperial generals, or the Queen's knights. He can have a title (such as Deathblow George or Black Moon Warrior) that has nothing to do with the name of the group he is involved with.

but when you already know part A and part C follow pattern X and we can validate them as we can here as being correct, it's basic occam's razor that part B most likely also follows pattern X in light of there being no evidence that it doesn't or can't.

You're leaving out a part of Occam's Razor, and that is, 'all things being equal, the simplest explanation is the best." Not all things are equal in this situation. You have a translation provided (in game) by a translator (or translators) who often screws up, versus a translation provided by someone (Vextor) whom I know reads Japanese because he himself is Japanese.

so far, the only evidence suggesting that the disputed information is false is an uncited look into the Internet...

in lieu of the original japanese from which we could translate ourselves, it's simply makes more sense to trust the translation provided in the game.

I think you misunderstood Vextor's comment

Clarification: There's no source for "Ebony Moon Knights." The only official info I can find is that Georg Prime was called the "Black Moon Warrior," in Grassland, so the term is never meant to refer to any group of people.

I could of course be wrong, but I think that the 'official info' that he's talking about is the Japanese text from the original game. The translation is his own; he doesn't need to cite it. So it's Vextor versus the translators. If that's the case, I'm going to go with Vextor.

Since it has come this far, I'd like to see the Japanese text in a screen shot (even though I can't read it) and maybe a transliteration and translation so we can compare the two phrases to see if it's the same word as is used in "Queen's Knights."

[Vextor]

Attached is the Japanese from Richmond's investigation on Georg (somehow this forum doesn't like Japanese text directly posted)

So here it says "Kuroki tsuki no senshi," which would be Black Moon Warrior. No idea why Jeremy Blaustein (translator) translated it to "Knight," but he had a really tight deadline so we can't blame him too much.

Oh yes, and it does say "no hitori," meaning Georg was "one of the Black Moon Warriors." Thus, there would have to be more than one Black Moon Warrior.

[carmelenigma]

During the Dunan War, It would have been neat to have some dialogue between lorelai killey and georg , seeing as they havent seen each other for 10 years. Come to think of it, wouldnt Humphrey have known of him too?

[FliktorForce5]

Well I don't know about actually needing dialogue between Georg, Killey, Lorelai, or Humphrey. Despite the fact that the games were made out of chronological order, and there would be no real way of knowing that any of these characters would know each other, except for the Georg/Humphrey connection, and Humphrey isn't exactly known for his skills in conversation. Moreover there isn't necessarily any tie between the two other than that they fought in the War of Succession on the same side (The Kalekka incident was at the end of the War of Succession right? Or was it more recent? Memory's a bit fuzzy on that one...) but that doesn't really mean that the two of them ever really crossed paths. And with the Killey/Lorelai thing, well they really only care about the sindar, which Georg never really took any interest in, so aside from a vauge recollection as maybe a "guy who looks a lot like that guy with an eyepatch who was always gone on some blamed secret mission or whatever when I was researching the sindar ruins in Falena" I doubt they'd even recognize him.

As to the whole Zexen/Ebony Moon thing, Wasn't Zexen originally a member of the grasslands until the Merchant's guild decided to form the Zexen Federation and secede from the grasslands as a whole? And doesn't "federation" imply several factions merging under one canopy faction? That being said, could the Ebony Knights/Warriors/translation errors have been part of a faction of warriors that were brought under the now unified banner of what would be called the Zexen Knights by the (newly formed) Zexen Federation, thus why they were never mentioned by name in S3? No evidence to support this by the way, just my own rationalization.