Destiny: “The Awakening” – What kind of a shitty name is that?

In Destiny the name “The Dawning” gives our author Schuhmann headaches.

When Bungie presented the new update for December at the PlayStation Experience, I had to write this. Originally, Ttime was supposed to take over, but he just mumbled “Last Guardian – wooooah” and “Last of Us 2 – aaaaaah,” was lying in the corner with foam at the mouth, staring up.

Bungie had just shown a trailer live, and I immediately went to YouTube and looked for the German version on Destiny’s channel. The guys are quick; I knew that from before: 50 seconds after the trailer aired in Anaheim, it was on YouTube in German. And I cheerfully wrote “Destiny announces update for December – The Dawning of the Iron Lords – The Dawning!”

“The Dawning!!!”

“The Dawning of the Iron Lords” instead of “Rise of Iron” was already no feather in the cap, but now “The Dawning?” Really?

Where I come from, “The Dawning” is what one would say about a broken barrel of beer. Or for all I care: “Is the arm completely broken now?” – “No, it’s just a dawning!” But I would never have thought of calling the dawn “Dawning”.

The Dawning? Worse than “Butterfly!”

Just look at how the update is called in other languages:

• English: “The Dawning”
• Italian: “L’Aurora”
• French: “l’Avènement”
• Portuguese: “A Alvorada”

Poetry! And what about us?

German: “The Dawning.” Oh, it gives me chills. It’s like with “Butterfly” – everyone else has a nice name for the creature: Butterfly and Mariposa – and we say “BUTTERFLY” – as if one had to shout it on a battlefield to drown out the hail of grenades.

Next time: Hands off!

Admittedly, this is a serious issue faced by the German translator of Destiny. The title means “a waking, an awakening” and uses the dawn as a metaphor. When a new morning begins, when something fresh happens, a new era begins. In English, “The Dawning” is the dawn. A nice short word.

In German, however, it is more complicated; it doesn’t work like that. Because “Dämmerung” refers to both evening twilight (when it gets dark) and morning twilight (when it gets light). Just writing “The Dawning of the Iron Lords – the twilight” would be misleading. “The Dawning of the Iron Lords – the dawn” is right, but too long.

It is not the first time that translators have faced the problem of getting “The Dawn” over into German: How did they do it? They kept their hands off!

That’s why the title of the horror film “From Dusk till Dawn” has simply been left as it is in German, and they didn’t start with “From the twilight to the twilight.” “Breaking Dawn,” the thing with sparkling vampires, has been called “Breaking Dawn – Bite to the End of the Night” in German.

And what is the name of the game in question? “Destiny” and not “Fate.” So if nothing nice comes to your mind, dear translators – next time just keep your hands off, okay?

There are also nice things to tell about “The Dawning”:

Destiny: Eisbrecher – So bekommt Ihr die „Jahr 3“-Version und das kann sie