Wario speaks German (So ein Mist!) @Novizprimas

Novizprimas Just uploaded this voice sample to clear it up once and for all: In some games, Wario does speak German. He says "So ein Mist" which roughly translates to "Aw, darn" ("Mist" literally means "manure", but translating the phrase as "Aw, crap" would be too vulgar).

People usually mishear this as "Oh, I missed" or "D'oh, I missed", but you can clearly hear the affricate (the "s" sound) at the beginning of this voice sample. Not that the perceived English sentences would have made much sense in the first place (who would say these, let alone when they are hit by something, which is when the sound is played in Mario Kart 64?).

The voice actor is Thomas Spindler, the German translator of Super Mario 64. Back then, the company had a habit of exploiting Nintendo of Europe and Nintendo of America employees to record a few lines every once in a while. Note that this voice sample was first used in the Japanese version of Mario Kart 64 but later appeared in some other games as well. This particular version is from Mario Party 2.

Some even say that Wario spoke more German in Mario Tennis (Nintendo 64) in which he supposedly shouted "Achtung". I couldn't verify this, however. The one sample that comes close isn't really anything beyond a mere interjection. Also, he was voiced by Charles Martinet there rather than by Thomas Spindler.

So ein Mist!

On September 28, 2015, Thomas Spindler himself reached out and confirmed these claims to be true:

"This is 100% correct. Wario speaks German: he says (or rather, *I* say) 'So ein Mist!' The recording was done in a studio of the former Nintendo head office in Kyoto (not the new Nintendo premises in Kamitobaguchi), under the direction of Mr. Takashi Tezuka. Back then, I worked on the script for another Nintendo project with my French friend and colleague Julien Bardakoff (who voiced Toad/Kinopio). My company T.S. Word Co.Ltd. also translated and edited the German script for Star Fox which can be verified in the credits of Star Fox 64. The concept behind Wario was that of a German character and those responsible for the voice-overs at Nintendo back then intended him to speak German. I hope that this resolves the issue once and for all."

updated 12 years ago

Wario speaks German (So ein Mist!)

Novizprimas 2014-05-12 | Just uploaded this voice sample to clear it up once and for all: In some games, Wario does speak German. He says "So ein Mist" which roughly translates to "Aw, darn" ("Mist" literally means "manure", but translating the phrase as "Aw, crap" would be too vulgar).

People usually mishear this as "Oh, I missed" or "D'oh, I missed", but you can clearly hear the affricate (the "s" sound) at the beginning of this voice sample. Not that the perceived English sentences would have made much sense in the first place (who would say these, let alone when they are hit by something, which is when the sound is played in Mario Kart 64?).

The voice actor is Thomas Spindler, the German translator of Super Mario 64. Back then, the company had a habit of exploiting Nintendo of Europe and Nintendo of America employees to record a few lines every once in a while. Note that this voice sample was first used in the Japanese version of Mario Kart 64 but later appeared in some other games as well. This particular version is from Mario Party 2.

Some even say that Wario spoke more German in Mario Tennis (Nintendo 64) in which he supposedly shouted "Achtung". I couldn't verify this, however. The one sample that comes close isn't really anything beyond a mere interjection. Also, he was voiced by Charles Martinet there rather than by Thomas Spindler.

So ein Mist!

On September 28, 2015, Thomas Spindler himself reached out and confirmed these claims to be true:

"This is 100% correct. Wario speaks German: he says (or rather, *I* say) 'So ein Mist!' The recording was done in a studio of the former Nintendo head office in Kyoto (not the new Nintendo premises in Kamitobaguchi), under the direction of Mr. Takashi Tezuka. Back then, I worked on the script for another Nintendo project with my French friend and colleague Julien Bardakoff (who voiced Toad/Kinopio). My company T.S. Word Co.Ltd. also translated and edited the German script for Star Fox which can be verified in the credits of Star Fox 64. The concept behind Wario was that of a German character and those responsible for the voice-overs at Nintendo back then intended him to speak German. I hope that this resolves the issue once and for all."

Legend of Zelda: Breath of the Wild — main theme music from E3 EXTENDED / NO SFX

Novizprimas 2016-06-14 | A tribute to diverse sound design and ingenious gameplay decisions!

Heard this at least a thousand times today, so this must be the main theme of the game. Enjoy!

...Seriously: just fix this, there's still plenty of time until the release. There was a huge backlash with Twilight Princess and Skyward Sword, with players complaining about constant text messages that popped up whenever you collected a rupee or another small item after booting up the game. Breathe of the Wild amplifies the problem since you can find many more items and the jingle is played *every* *single* *time* you pick up a new one.

It's not that hard: either don't play this jingle or include an option to turn off the messages.

Nobunaga no Yabou: Tenshouki – Opening cutscene comparison

Novizprimas 2015-02-25 | This is a comparison of the opening cutscene from Nobunaga no Yabō: Tenshōki, the sixth installment in Koei's simulation game series. It shows the differences between the PC-98, FM Towns, PlayStation and PlayStation Portable versions. The PC-98 and FM Towns cutscenes were originally about twice as long, but I adjusted them to match the duration of the PlayStation and PlayStation Portable versions for a better comparison. Annotations annoy me to no end, so read the following to see which corner is which version (clockwise starting from top left corner):
- PC-98 (1994)
- FM Towns (1995)
- PlayStation (1996)
- PlayStation Portable (2005)

The song is "Ransei no Taka" ("A Hawk in Times of Turmoil") by Yoko Kanno, performed by the Warsaw Philharmonic Orchestra.

Secret of Evermore retranslation (proof of concept): first text hack

Novizprimas 2014-07-13 | A short text hack I whipped up using Alchemic's ROM map on Data Crystal. The English version is pretty straightforward as far as the text compression goes, now I only need to find out the special controls (pause after a word etc.) and figure out the German version.

Would probably be easy to create a text converter but I suck at programming, heh!

Resident Evil: Dead Aim Heroes Never Die (Save Room) without sound effects

Novizprimas 2014-03-13 | Rip of the save room theme from Resident Evil Dead Aim (Japanese version is called GunSurvivor 4 Biohazard Heroes Never Die) for the PlayStation 2.

Should be the first YouTube upload with no sound effects. This is actually a shorter, instrumental version of the vocal theme "Heroes Never Die" sung by Raj Ramayya.

Composer: Nobuyoshi Sano (佐野信義) / sanodg

Dimitri erfährt den Sinn des Lebens

Novizprimas 2014-03-09 | Dimitri findet raus, was der Sinn des Lebens ist.

Terranigma retranslation (proof of concept): rhyme in Sylvain Castles dungeon

Novizprimas 2014-02-26 | This is just a quick and dirty fix for the scripted scene before the Bloody Mary boss battle. In the Japanese version, the four dolls sang the nursery rhyme "Kagome Kagome" which ends exactly as the dolls stop spinning around Ark, thus giving him a clue on which enemy to hit ("Who is it in front of behind").

The official English version instead used the following text which is only loosely based on "Kagome Kagome":

"Round, round and round we go.
The watcher's in the bush we go round.
When oh when will the watcher rise?
At the dawning of the long nighttime.
When the early bird does take flight.
Who's in the eyes of the one behind?"

The problem is that the English text has more characters which caused the end of the text and the dolls' movement to be completely out of sync, thus making the clue useless (the dolls have long stopped when the last line appears on the screen). Yesterday, I fixed this problem by correcting the text speed. Took me 30 minutes, so this could have been possible in localization (maybe they had a tight deadline).

Today, I wrote a short poem also loosely based on "Kagome Kagome" but that instead takes the backstory of Sylvain Castle's queen into account. The text is also in sync with the dolls stopping. Sorry for the lackluster poem, just trying to show it's possible.

Note: This uses mopoz's hack for the width of the letters. He worked on a variable-width font hack some time ago but I don't know if he dropped that project.