Who publish the official English translation of One Piece?
One Piece is published as a serial in the Weekly Shonen Jump (WSJ) magazine in Japanese language. In each of WSJ, a new chapter of One Piece is published on weekly basis which are later compiled into volumes. Shueiesha is the publishing company that releases the WSJ. The English translation of WSJ and the One Piece volumes are published by ViZ Media which is also owned by Shueiesha.
What is the difference between translation and scanlation?
Scanlation is the process of scanning a manga from original Japanese magazines or books + translate the Japanese texts to English + placing the translations in the appropriate sections. Translating Japanese to English is just one part of the whole scanlation process. You can get a more clear idea of the process if you watch this tutorial about scanlation.
What are the One Piece scanlations currently available?
Mangastream has been running scanlations for quite some time now. Even though mangastream is pretty good, they also make errors frequently. If you are a casual One Piece reader, then mangastream is fine for you. But if you are a One Piece nerd or want to engage in hardcore debates with other nerds, then you probably shouldnt use mangastream. A very interesting thread from BellisarioFaith used to compare ViZ and mangastream translations
http://www.arlongpark.net/showthread.php?t=44215
A few years back, Powermanga used to be the best scanlation site as they used translations from Cnet128. A few words about Cnet128 aka Carlos Net. Cnet128 is also very skilled and quite popular among One Piece fans. He started to translate One Piece from chapter 463 back in 2007. He still regularly publish his scripts (texts) in mangahelpers.
Jaminisbox is the new kid in the town. They are probably doing a good translation job as I dont see them getting called out that much. They also release the chapters very quickly.
I guess nobody uses shitty scanlations from mangapanda anymore
ViZ is official, so they are the best, arent they?
The current translator of ViZ, Stephen Paul, is very skilled and well respected in the One Piece community. Official translators gets more direction from Oda/his editors too, as it happened with the naming of Law's Shambles/Chambers
Thats why, in a debate, ViZ has more credibility than unofficial scanlations.
Unfortunately, Stephen Paul hasnt always been the official translator of One Piece. He started to be the official translator from volume 65. So he had to continue the horrible Zolo or Teech used by old ViZ translators.
Is there any translations/scanlations better than ViZ for earlier volumes?
Fortunately, for chapter 1 to 545, there is a better alternative than official ViZ! Stephen Paul published his One Piece translation scripts (no scanlations, only texts) till chapter 545. You can find the texts from here,
https://web.archive.org/web/2010031...gascreener.com/stephen/onepiece/onepiece.html
Stephen was the pillar of the whole English community back in those days. Even native Japanese speakers recommends his scripts over ViZ's old volumes. A native Japanese said the following in Aarlong Park,
"Most of the early chapters available online were translated from the Chinese version, and not by anyone with anything resembling fluency in English. The later chapters tend to be better, as they are translated directly from Japanese, though your best bet is really to take the Japanese version and read along with Stephen's scripts."
http://apforums.net/showthread.php?t=21197&p=1030837&viewfull=1#post1030837
What about volume 55 to 64? For these volumes, we dont have Stephen's scripts and he was not the official translator of One Piece too. Is there any translation or scanlation available for those volumes thats better than ViZ? This is a very difficult question. Some say Cnet128 can be a better alternative for these volumes.
Aohige, a good translator from Aarlong Park also has some translations for some of these chapters.
http://apforums.net/showthread.php?t=26311
Ask the translators directly
Nobody is perfect. Even the best translators can make mistakes. Even though ViZ's early translation is not so good because of silly mistakes like this.......
Nami gives Luffy half of 10 million, which should be 5 million, not half a million.
......... they got a few things right that Stephen translated wrongly.
For example, Stephen's scripts says in chapter 234,
"Marine Headquarters" and "Seven Armed Seas"... two conflicting groups of equal power holding a "round table" is a meaningless thing"
That gives us an impression that shichibukais and the marines are equal which is incorrect, while ViZ translated it correctly as,
So if you have doubt about a translation, you should ask a credible translator directly.
One Piece is published as a serial in the Weekly Shonen Jump (WSJ) magazine in Japanese language. In each of WSJ, a new chapter of One Piece is published on weekly basis which are later compiled into volumes. Shueiesha is the publishing company that releases the WSJ. The English translation of WSJ and the One Piece volumes are published by ViZ Media which is also owned by Shueiesha.
What is the difference between translation and scanlation?
Scanlation is the process of scanning a manga from original Japanese magazines or books + translate the Japanese texts to English + placing the translations in the appropriate sections. Translating Japanese to English is just one part of the whole scanlation process. You can get a more clear idea of the process if you watch this tutorial about scanlation.
What are the One Piece scanlations currently available?
Mangastream has been running scanlations for quite some time now. Even though mangastream is pretty good, they also make errors frequently. If you are a casual One Piece reader, then mangastream is fine for you. But if you are a One Piece nerd or want to engage in hardcore debates with other nerds, then you probably shouldnt use mangastream. A very interesting thread from BellisarioFaith used to compare ViZ and mangastream translations
http://www.arlongpark.net/showthread.php?t=44215
A few years back, Powermanga used to be the best scanlation site as they used translations from Cnet128. A few words about Cnet128 aka Carlos Net. Cnet128 is also very skilled and quite popular among One Piece fans. He started to translate One Piece from chapter 463 back in 2007. He still regularly publish his scripts (texts) in mangahelpers.
Jaminisbox is the new kid in the town. They are probably doing a good translation job as I dont see them getting called out that much. They also release the chapters very quickly.
I guess nobody uses shitty scanlations from mangapanda anymore
ViZ is official, so they are the best, arent they?
The current translator of ViZ, Stephen Paul, is very skilled and well respected in the One Piece community. Official translators gets more direction from Oda/his editors too, as it happened with the naming of Law's Shambles/Chambers
Thats why, in a debate, ViZ has more credibility than unofficial scanlations.
Unfortunately, Stephen Paul hasnt always been the official translator of One Piece. He started to be the official translator from volume 65. So he had to continue the horrible Zolo or Teech used by old ViZ translators.
Is there any translations/scanlations better than ViZ for earlier volumes?
Fortunately, for chapter 1 to 545, there is a better alternative than official ViZ! Stephen Paul published his One Piece translation scripts (no scanlations, only texts) till chapter 545. You can find the texts from here,
https://web.archive.org/web/2010031...gascreener.com/stephen/onepiece/onepiece.html
Stephen was the pillar of the whole English community back in those days. Even native Japanese speakers recommends his scripts over ViZ's old volumes. A native Japanese said the following in Aarlong Park,
"Most of the early chapters available online were translated from the Chinese version, and not by anyone with anything resembling fluency in English. The later chapters tend to be better, as they are translated directly from Japanese, though your best bet is really to take the Japanese version and read along with Stephen's scripts."
http://apforums.net/showthread.php?t=21197&p=1030837&viewfull=1#post1030837
What about volume 55 to 64? For these volumes, we dont have Stephen's scripts and he was not the official translator of One Piece too. Is there any translation or scanlation available for those volumes thats better than ViZ? This is a very difficult question. Some say Cnet128 can be a better alternative for these volumes.
Aohige, a good translator from Aarlong Park also has some translations for some of these chapters.
http://apforums.net/showthread.php?t=26311
Ask the translators directly
Nobody is perfect. Even the best translators can make mistakes. Even though ViZ's early translation is not so good because of silly mistakes like this.......
Nami gives Luffy half of 10 million, which should be 5 million, not half a million.
For example, Stephen's scripts says in chapter 234,
"Marine Headquarters" and "Seven Armed Seas"... two conflicting groups of equal power holding a "round table" is a meaningless thing"
That gives us an impression that shichibukais and the marines are equal which is incorrect, while ViZ translated it correctly as,
So if you have doubt about a translation, you should ask a credible translator directly.
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