What makes subs good and bad?
Are Netflix subs any good or should I just find some on nyaa?
More specifically, Fate/Zero and the Meguca movies.
While I'm on the topic of subs, why are certain sub groups preferred over the other?
I can't comment on netflix subs because I don't use them, but they probably use official subs from whatever the western distribuitor used. Most of the things that make subs good or bad is left to preference, but sometimes subgroups are just generally garbage at QC. A lot of the deciding factors is how much they localize, how reliant they are on memes, how they typeset, and a few other things.
FFF and commie are known to be pretty big memers unless they like what they're subbing.
I honestly can't remember any negatives Asenshi had, I think they're usually pretty ok.
Bunnyhat has really good encodes but the Toku void took him and he hasn't really touched anything since he encoded a DVD rip of Sailor Moon.
EG and OZC are both encoders and get their translations from somewhere else, If you have a choice between the two (they both do a ton of 70s/80s/90s mecha) and you have the space I'd go with EG, RX 78-2 doesn't encode anymore, but his encodes are straight up archive quality.
I'm pretty sure UTW was the go-to for 99% of the fate series, but they didn't completely finish it or they just didn't finish a BD rip/encode all the way.
Other than that I'm not sure who the best rip of the Meguca movies are, Although I think it might of been commie.
Also if you end up downloading from Nyaa stay away from fish anything (deadfish, bakedfish, etc). They're encoders who just turn horriblesubs rips into mp4s.
Also horriblesubs isn't a subgroup, it's some /a/non who owns a bot and some servers that rips from crunchy/netflix/amazon video/funi and then just uploads the video as a .mkv.
You should never download HS for a non-airing show if there's another group who's done a BD rip, or even TV rips might have nicer typesetting and a higherr bitrate.
>>137413
Thanks for the insight. Always thought deadfish was somewhat reliable
>>137413
Also, what's HS? I feel dumb for asking
>>137426
Jk I'm so fucking dumb
>>137413
Everything this anon says is right, just want to clarify some things about sub quality. Generally speaking there's not a lot of instances of blatantly wrong translations in either official subs or fansubs, they're both about the same which is 99% accurate (and not just because most fansubbers these days just work off the official script, original scripts are also about that accurate). What you look at rather than accuracy is style. Many official subs tend toward overly literal translations that lack a natural flow in English. They're serviceable, but dull.
You get a lot more variety in style with fansubs, but you have to take the good with the bad. Lots of the larger, more established fansubbers based out of nyaa (called the "fansub cartel" by /a/) favor localization, which in this case means no honorifics, rewritten puns, no Japanese speech quirks, and the injection of English vernacular, slang, and accents to replace their Japanese counterparts. If you like these sorts of things, then you'll probably prefer fansubs over official subs as a rule. However there are fansubbers who do use honorifics and go for more literal translations, even within the cartel. It's about personal preference.
If translation style doesn't matter to you then all that's really left as far as subs go is the typesetting, and fansubs have official subs beat hands down in that regard. Official typesetting is just plain shitty when you get down to it, it's not just lazy it's actually bad and confusing at times, especially Funimation's. Even setting aside some of the amusing shit Commie gets up to, even the humblest fansubber will outdo the pros pretty much any time. To give an example of what I mean by great typesetting, take a look at this example by Underwater's subs of Kill la Kill, then compare it to the professional one.
