Basically, some things shouldn't be translated.
The worst fansub I saw was for No. 6. I had to sit through that entire show (it was 11 episodes, but still) seeing Nezumi's name translated to "rat." It's his name. Don't do that. His name means rat, but his name is not rat.
This actually reminded me of a good example of translating character names. In Princess Tutu, if a character was named with the Japanese word of the animal they were, then it'll be translated appropriately to keep the intention. So "Ahiru" became "Duck and "Neko-Sensei" became "Mr. Cat".
If the series takes place in someplace like say England. DO NOT KEEP THE HONORIFICS! NOBODY in England or most English-speaking countries use san, chan, kun, dono, sama, sensei, sempai or kohai. They are very out of place which is one of the reasons they are NOT included in Black Butler's English adaption. It is the same with Final Fantasy XII, a game that is primarily Western Fantasy based.
Nice-u nice-u! Verry nice-u, Caesar-chan!
Since JJBA; Battle Tendency is on the brain, I was so thankful all of Joseph's Engrish were completely Woolseyized for the English dub. Especially his "Happy, joy-py, nice to meetcha-py!" line, which is Japanese wordplay using English words. It makes absolutely no sense in English! The localizers really understood Joseph, and the changes honestly feel more in character than what was in the original. It's not often that can be said.
Cardcaptor Sakura is a prime example of how translations should work. The honorifics are left intact but animals are referred to as the animal would be in English. Tomoyo doesn't say kawaii in Romaji, but uses various English equivalents. Leaving the Japanese Katakana background sound effects however is perfectly fine because to edit it you have to erase sooo much of the image and you lose the onomatopoeia effect. Which a lot of times, their sound effects actually sound closer to the sound they represent than the English Comic Book equivalents.
Another thing is how the onomatopoeia is even drawn will convey the sound.
Really though, translations should be handled on a case-by-case basis.
*nods in agreement*
On a related note: Subbing errors. Yuki Usagi DOES NOT mean 'Yukitoad'. [glares at NIS America for screwing up CCS subs] Yuki Usagi is Snow Bunny. Kero calls Yukito Snow Bunny NOT Yukitoad.
That bothered me so much! Okay to give my thoughts on it, if Kero wanted to say Yukito's name mockingly in an English dub, "Yukitoad" would actually convey that pretty well without having to give any emphasis or whatnot, however I don't believe he ever really meant "Snow Bunny" that way, or at least not to the degree "Yukitoad" would have, and I believe these types of alterations should be avoided in subs, because it does wind up changing what's being conveyed.
And if I had things my way, I would use "Bunny-boy" for an English dub of this.
sometimes an english translation being too close to the japanese dialogue can be just as bad as bad translation. I love when translators can hit the same important beats that the original did, while also having fun and making it feel natural in English.
^This. Japanese doesn't work the same as English, and what may sound good in one language may not translate over well in another. When translating, one can't
just translate the words, but need to understand the intentions in order to find good equivalents to convey the meaning of what's being said. Even subtitling requires some localization.
