Mask of the Translator: Walter Benjamin and Metal Gear Solid’s Difficult Relationship with Localization

Abstract

Jeremy Blaustein’s liberal translation of Metal Gear Solid (1998) was a critical creative intercession which helped facilitate the successful localization and positive reception – in the west – of a crucial early project in the development of 3d games. It can also be seen as an unacceptable liberty taken with a carefully produced script, one which too often puts the needs of a western ear ahead of faithfulness to the original. Walter Benjamin’s essay ‘The Task of the Translator’ and its inheritors in translation studies offer a definition of translation and its utility with which one can justify such a creative intervention as a necessary continuation in the life cycle of the original work and an honest interpretation of the game’s paratextual environment; in the localization of Metal Gear Solid Blaustein performed the task of the translator as Benjamin conceived it.