Butz Jokes: The Story of a Game That Got Left Behind
May 1, 2017 1:27 PM Subscribe
One day in the late 1990s, Myria walked into the Irvine High School computer room and spotted a boy playing Final Fantasy V. There were two unusual things about this. The first was that Final Fantasy V had not actually come out in the United States. To play the 1992 Japanese game in English, you’d have to download a ROM, then install the unofficial fan translation patch that had recently begun circulating the internet. Myria knew about this patch because of the other unusual thing: she helped make it.
Or was this comment intended only to pacify the limited portion of this article's audience who might have known 'Barubary' as a guy back then?
This is the internet. If the article hadn't clarified her status, some weirdo would have come crawling out of the woodwork to complain about women stealing credit for work done by men.
posted by Faint of Butt at 2:05 PM on May 1, 2017 [6 favorites]
This is the internet. If the article hadn't clarified her status, some weirdo would have come crawling out of the woodwork to complain about women stealing credit for work done by men.
posted by Faint of Butt at 2:05 PM on May 1, 2017 [6 favorites]
komara, I'm with you. I think it was included with good intentions: to offer respectful visibility (and Myria herself seems fine with it), but there is an element of any-story-about-trans-people-must-disclose-whether-relevant-or-not, plus the implication you mention, which is a thing that really gets under my skin for multiple reasons beyond the scope of this post.
Nonetheless, it is a really cool story. I was one of the kids playing this patch back in the late 90s. The GBA translation is my favorite by a wide margin, but I feel lucky to've been able to play the game in English years before there was an official translation, and thought it was neat to hear more about how the unofficial one got done.
posted by byanyothername at 2:09 PM on May 1, 2017 [1 favorite]
Nonetheless, it is a really cool story. I was one of the kids playing this patch back in the late 90s. The GBA translation is my favorite by a wide margin, but I feel lucky to've been able to play the game in English years before there was an official translation, and thought it was neat to hear more about how the unofficial one got done.
posted by byanyothername at 2:09 PM on May 1, 2017 [1 favorite]
If it hadn't been for the "presented as male" comment I would have had the wrong story in my head: I was reading it as a story of a young woman in the 1990s contributing to a male-dominated activity. It came a bit of a jolt, but I'm glad I was given that corrective info.
Beyond that, I appreciate learning about people who have done great things and by the way happen to be trans.
posted by Koheleth at 3:04 PM on May 1, 2017 [7 favorites]
Beyond that, I appreciate learning about people who have done great things and by the way happen to be trans.
posted by Koheleth at 3:04 PM on May 1, 2017 [7 favorites]
Also the comments on the article are great. Myria shows up and says hello. I didn't expect that from a Kotaku article.
"Wow, really great article! Not to derail the subject too much, but I’m really happy that Myria felt comfortable sharing that she is transgender, because people who do that really help increase the visibility for transgender people. Although to be completely honest, I had sort of suspected she was transgender before I got to that point in the article given the statistical improbability of a cisgendered girl in that era being so into Final Fantasy games and computers. Being very into technology from a young age has kind of become a stereotype for transgender people (at least male to female).
Incidentally, I also happen to be transgender, and I worked on a project to undub/re-translate Grandia II..."
posted by kittensofthenight at 3:19 PM on May 1, 2017
"Wow, really great article! Not to derail the subject too much, but I’m really happy that Myria felt comfortable sharing that she is transgender, because people who do that really help increase the visibility for transgender people. Although to be completely honest, I had sort of suspected she was transgender before I got to that point in the article given the statistical improbability of a cisgendered girl in that era being so into Final Fantasy games and computers. Being very into technology from a young age has kind of become a stereotype for transgender people (at least male to female).
Incidentally, I also happen to be transgender, and I worked on a project to undub/re-translate Grandia II..."
posted by kittensofthenight at 3:19 PM on May 1, 2017
If it hadn't been for the "presented as male" comment I would have had the wrong story in my head: I was reading it as a story of a young woman in the 1990s contributing to a male-dominated activity. It came a bit of a jolt, but I'm glad I was given that corrective info.
I mean, arguably that is the story though? Presenting as male doesn't mean she was male... Certainly, saying 'I was thinking she was a young woman, but I was glad to be corrected' in response to someone being identified as a trans woman is... an unfortunate phrasing at best.
posted by Dysk at 3:30 PM on May 1, 2017 [4 favorites]
I mean, arguably that is the story though? Presenting as male doesn't mean she was male... Certainly, saying 'I was thinking she was a young woman, but I was glad to be corrected' in response to someone being identified as a trans woman is... an unfortunate phrasing at best.
posted by Dysk at 3:30 PM on May 1, 2017 [4 favorites]
clockzero, TFA explicitly points out that connection ("Myria (who at the time went by the internet handle Barubary; both names are references to Breath of Fire)"). I'm not sure why you seem to be expressing surprise at this.
posted by hanov3r at 4:37 PM on May 1, 2017 [1 favorite]
posted by hanov3r at 4:37 PM on May 1, 2017 [1 favorite]
If it hadn't been for the "presented as male" comment I would have had the wrong story in my head: I was reading it as a story of a young woman in the 1990s contributing to a male-dominated activity. It came a bit of a jolt, but I'm glad I was given that corrective info.
It would have been a lot harder for a young woman of the time to have done so, that's for sure.
This is part of what we must not forget.
posted by tully_monster at 5:07 PM on May 1, 2017 [2 favorites]
It would have been a lot harder for a young woman of the time to have done so, that's for sure.
This is part of what we must not forget.
posted by tully_monster at 5:07 PM on May 1, 2017 [2 favorites]
Since this thread is becoming about gender instead of the game or its translation, I may as well elaborate on why some of this gets under my skin, I guess...
Jumping off from Dysk's comment, a trans person is who they say they are; some people might individually have different understandings of themselves at different points in their life when they might have presented in different ways, and that should be respected, but typically trans people aren't Xs who become Ys. They were always Ys. This is the story of a teenage girl who got involved in programming and translation.
Related to that is the "common wisdom" that trans women are more likely than cis women to get into something STEMy like game programming and translation...
...which is almost certainly less of a true correlation than a sort of slipping under the gatekeeping. If sexist gatekeepers perceive someone as male, they're less likely to be quite as openly hostile as if they perceive someone as female. There have actually been quite a lot of girls and women, cis and trans, doing stuff with game code; it's just unwise to make your gender something publicly known, there.
All the "girls are less likely to be doing something like (this project)" narrative is a self-fulfilling prophecy. Yeah, when everyone questions your expertise and ability and sincere interest based solely on your gender, you're either going to move on or mask it. That doesn't make anyone who's slipped under the gates - whether due to presenting as male, or simply relying on pseudonymity - less of a girl/woman.
And this is why including throwaway comments about someone being trans that aren't really relevant to the story sucks.
posted by byanyothername at 5:20 PM on May 1, 2017 [18 favorites]
Jumping off from Dysk's comment, a trans person is who they say they are; some people might individually have different understandings of themselves at different points in their life when they might have presented in different ways, and that should be respected, but typically trans people aren't Xs who become Ys. They were always Ys. This is the story of a teenage girl who got involved in programming and translation.
Related to that is the "common wisdom" that trans women are more likely than cis women to get into something STEMy like game programming and translation...
...which is almost certainly less of a true correlation than a sort of slipping under the gatekeeping. If sexist gatekeepers perceive someone as male, they're less likely to be quite as openly hostile as if they perceive someone as female. There have actually been quite a lot of girls and women, cis and trans, doing stuff with game code; it's just unwise to make your gender something publicly known, there.
All the "girls are less likely to be doing something like (this project)" narrative is a self-fulfilling prophecy. Yeah, when everyone questions your expertise and ability and sincere interest based solely on your gender, you're either going to move on or mask it. That doesn't make anyone who's slipped under the gates - whether due to presenting as male, or simply relying on pseudonymity - less of a girl/woman.
And this is why including throwaway comments about someone being trans that aren't really relevant to the story sucks.
posted by byanyothername at 5:20 PM on May 1, 2017 [18 favorites]
Mod note: Couple comments deleted. The article isn't really about the trans angle at all, or the women-in-coding angle -- so having noted the points made here, probably better to steer away from a fight about how the article covers those not-the-point aspects, back toward discussing the actual story.
posted by LobsterMitten (staff) at 7:36 PM on May 1, 2017 [1 favorite]
posted by LobsterMitten (staff) at 7:36 PM on May 1, 2017 [1 favorite]
My thoughts: Nintendo, like the ESA, thinks that all software piracy is bad regardless of the circumstances. Fuck them all.
posted by BiggerJ at 11:05 PM on May 1, 2017
posted by BiggerJ at 11:05 PM on May 1, 2017
FF V was IP of Squaresoft (as was Seiken Densetsu 3, Romancing Saga etc.), so Nintendo didn't have much to do with it.
Nice write-up, that patch was very welcome back in the day and when some of the bigger translations of late-SNES era dropped, it was impressive what a SNES could do when pushed.
posted by ersatz at 7:19 AM on May 2, 2017
Nice write-up, that patch was very welcome back in the day and when some of the bigger translations of late-SNES era dropped, it was impressive what a SNES could do when pushed.
posted by ersatz at 7:19 AM on May 2, 2017
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"(Myria presented as male at the time, which we mention, with her permission, to paint an accurate picture.)"
but I failed to understand its relevance to the story as a whole. It was - to me - a momentary jolt out of a fascinating story. I guess the implication is that in the late 1990s it would have been strange for a girl to be disassembling ROM code? If so, that's unfortunate. Or was this comment intended only to pacify the limited portion of this article's audience who might have known 'Barubary' as a guy back then?
Aside from all that, I thought this was a great article about teenagers' timeless inability to understand the statement "you can't do that".
posted by komara at 1:51 PM on May 1, 2017 [4 favorites]