Why is there so much English in foreign games?

[SlyGuy]

I find it quite odd when I'm playing a Japanese import game and I find a significant quantity of English in it. Words like "Score" "Time" "Ready" "Round #" "Fight" are all in English, often without Japanese equivalents. Do all Japanese people speak English? I know if I was playing the US version of a game and there were untranslated Japanese characters for my score, level, etc. etc. I would be confused as hell.

So, I'm dying to know, what's the deal with all the English in foreign games?

Edit: For example: http://dsmedia.ign.com/ds/image/article/72...28070958082.jpg

 

[Hanafuda]

The short answer is YES, all japanese people speak some English. They don't speak it well, but everyone knows a few thousand English words because they've actually been integrated into the japanese language as part of their everyday speech.

When the Normans invaded England in 1066, the Anglo-Saxon Old English was drastically changed by the influx of French words. This had already happened several hundred years before when the Saxons came in. And it had happened during the Roman occupation as well. This is why we have so many ways of saying the same thing in English.

The same kind of revolution is happening in the japanese language now,and has been for about 100 years. They use English they don't even know is English. Add to that the fact that all japanese people take 6 years of English as a foreign language during jr. high and high school, and you've got a culture that's very well versed in our basic vocabulary.

English words are "cool" in Japan. Very few pop songs don't have a short English phrase in the lyrics, and lots of coffee shops, bars, clothing shops and etc. there have English names. These names and phrases are usually rather meaningless though. Check out engrish.com.

 

[haohmaru6]

From some stuff I have read, Japanese people use English in their stuff as a cultural "coolness" thing, comparable much the same way to English uses of foreign language phrases and words like "Hasta la vista" "Sayonara" "Ciao" "Deja vu" "Auf wiederzein" etc.

 

[omegatr0n]

i think haohmaru had a good though thier

 

[CatScam]

Not to mention the US & Hollywood are responsible for most of the
big blockbuster movies out there. So if you watch movies even subtitled
your subjected to a large amount of English. And over time certain English
words become common even in a place like Japan.

 

[SlyGuy]

Thanks for the info! For a minute I thought they were doing it in games to make them import friendly!

 

[ridgecity]

I like english and spanish, there's even this spanglish thing like:

"estaciona el auto = park the car" So across the mexican/american border everyone says "parkea el auto" very silly but it works for them.