Since its original release in 1998, Square's science-fiction RPG Xenogears has achieved a reputation as one of the company's best games for the original PlayStation, thanks to its complex and multi-layered story that weaves in elements of psychology, philosophy, and religious symbolism.
But those same elements that made the game great are also what made its localisation a "total nightmare" for Square to translate into English, with its "formidable" and controversial content causing fears inside the company about whether they'd ever be able to finish the project, and what the reaction might be to releasing a game "about killing god."
Recently, Time Extension had the opportunity to talk to Richard Honeywood, who was a key figure in establishing Square's localisation department in Japan in the late '90s and also ended up being the localisation coordinator / and localisation project lead on Xenogears. As part of this interview, he gave us a special insight into what it was like working on the project, speaking about some of the objections that Square US had about the content, and how he ended up being much more hands-on than he initially anticipated.
When asked for his memories of the project, for instance, Honeywood told us that "some US staff were [...] scared about what the response would be", with certain individuals believing there might be religious protests in the US or even potentially attacks on Square employees. As a result, he found himself in a position where he ended up asking the team to "tone down" some of the content on behalf of the American office. This includes changing the Japanese name of a group, called The Church, to The Ethos:
"They wanted us to remove the word Church, with a capital, because it might appear to be the Catholic Church. So I was [...] having to go to the development team before the Japanese version launched, and I was telling them, 'Please tone down some of this stuff.'
As Honeywood recalled, his original job on the project was simply to coordinate the localisation effort, with Final Fantasy VII writer Michael Baskett, working alongside two new hires, [Yoshinobu "Nobby" Matsuo] and Brian Bell, to translate the game's text.
However, while the project was still ongoing, there were some changes within the US office, with Baskett leaving the studio over an alleged falling out with the company.
Honeywood recalled:
"I think Michael wanted a bit more respect inside the company, but the Japanese management wasn't having any of it. So there was a falling out that I wasn't fully aware of, and I wrote to Nobby to find out what was happening. He said, 'It sounds like Michael's quitting.' Although they had only finished the first batch of text to translate, both Brian and Nobby made it clear that, for various reasons, they wanted off the project at that point. We moved Brian onto Chocobo Dungeon 2, I believe. I let Nobby help out on some other projects that needed to be done (but I later brought him back on Xenogears to help with QA), and that's where I had to become a lot more hands-on with the translation myself."
As Honeywood told us, taking over the project was no easy feat, not least because of the difficulty of getting access to some of the English and German books referenced in the game. At the time, Wikipedia was obviously not yet a thing, so instead, he had to travel to the National Library to find foreign books that could explain some of the concepts he was encountering.
Honeywood said:
"Remember, the internet was only just becoming a thing at Japanese companies back then. At that time, we had just gotten an intranet at the company, so we could email our American office, but we still didn't have fast data sharing. Even our QA bug reports had to be done by fax! We couldn't just go on Wikipedia and research some of this stuff, so, as you can imagine, it was a total nightmare!
In the end, I nearly killed myself on that title, and people knew it. People saw me sleeping in the office every night and coming up like a zombie. We got to the point where I hardly ever went home, and I was just trying to get that out. At that point, they realized, 'This guy really is passionate about our titles and cares about them.' So we're not giving it to some foreigner who will just turn around a shoddy translation."
Remarkably, despite these issues, Xenogears did eventually end up shipping in the US, going on to generate a sizable cult following in the country.
Upon experiencing the game, Electronic Gaming Monthly's John Davison, for instance, showered it with praise, comparing it favourably to Final Fantasy VII and calling it “easily one of the most sprawling [..] games yet on PlayStation,” in its December 1998 issue and a story "full of intrigue, action, and most importantly, genuinely exciting and different themes."