kaisoumods: (0)
Kaisou Mod Account ([personal profile] kaisoumods) wrote 2022-10-06 01:43 pm (UTC)

Hello! That's a great question!

For a situation like that, it would depend on the level of fan translation we're talking about. If its a canon that has a complete and reliable fan translation that covers the whole main part of the canon (such as fan subs on an anime series, scanlations, etc. And by main part, I mean the core series that most people would read/view and it's fine if obscure side material like a character fact book isn't translated) that is easily assessable to people - then that's okay to app them!

However, if it's a situation where the fan translation is an incomplete translation (aka only parts of it have been translated) and/or is just summaries of what happened - then I would say no.

This is because in my experience with incomplete fan translations/summaries, they tend to either leave important details out that lead to inaccurate information -- or they turn out to be very skewed in biases/perception. A good example that I encountered is a fan translator's summary of a game not out in English insisted that two characters were in a heterosexual romantic relationship, which was really surprising considering the woman was a canonical lesbian. When the official English version was released a couple years later, it was revealed...they were just close friends and she was still a lesbian. The fan translator had just jumped to conclusions based on their own assumptions and shortcomings in their translation skills.

TLDR: if the canon has a reliable and complete fan translation that's assessable, then it's fine to app a character from a canon with no English release. However if it's an incomplete translation or just summaries - then I'll have to say no, that's not enough reliable information to app a character on.

Thanks! I hope this clear things up!

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