Looks like Japan have finally ditched the Son "Gokou" spelling!

[Metalwario64]

I always assumed Majin Vegeta was okay because of Majin Kaioh in Fist of the North Star. He's not literally a magical or demonic being, but he considers himself so evil and powerful that he's given himself that title. Plus Vegeta was influenced by Babidi's magic, albeit in a limited fashion, so to me it's not so bad.

Kaioh's title is "魔神" (demon god) which is named for his strong 魔闘気 (matouki, demonic fighting spirit aura) surrounding his body. It's not the same as "魔人" of Buu though they share the same pronunciation. However, linguistically speaking, it is still possible to call Vegeta "Majin" as you pointed out, but the point is that it is already an in-universe term specifically used for Buu.

Ah, I see. Thanks for the clarification. I haven't seen Hokuto no Ken all the way through in a decade, and I was going off of Toei's awful subs. Plus I'm not well versed in the Japanese language, so you've explained to me things I never knew. Thank you!

[Baggie_Saiyan]

Update.

Dub spellings have now hit Japan for Vegetto, Freeza & Boo. It's over...

Dub spellings hit everyone overseas this past year so was only inevitable that Japan would get infected.

[Metalwario64]

Update.

Dub spellings have now hit Japan for Vegetto, Freeza & Boo. It's over...

Dub spellings hit everyone overseas this past year so was only inevitable that Japan would get infected.

I just don't understand why they're doing this... Why are Bandai (and Toei?) letting an inferior foreign product control their naming schemes?

[dbgtFO]

Update.

Dub spellings have now hit Japan for Vegetto, Freeza & Boo. It's over...

Dub spellings hit everyone overseas this past year so was only inevitable that Japan would get infected.

I just don't understand why they're doing this... Why are Bandai (and Toei?) letting an inferior foreign product control their naming schemes?

It's easier to stick with what has been the case for so long, than use energy to demand changes.

[Zeon_Grunt]

Update.

Dub spellings have now hit Japan for Vegetto, Freeza & Boo. It's over...

Dub spellings hit everyone overseas this past year so was only inevitable that Japan would get infected.

Oh great, now I can look forward to even more arguments online about the way I spell those names and how they're "wrong," because Funimation says otherwise.

[TheGreatness25]

I guess Funimation's version is the official English-speaking release and if they'll spell the names in English, they want to use the official spelling.

I sincerely doubt this, but could the names have been a Toei demand from the start? It is harder for Katakana to be more creative with spelling and maybe they didn't want the puns to be so on-the-nose? I mean we do use "kakarot/Kakarrot/Kakarotto" instead of "Cacarrot."

I have mixed feelings about this. On one hand, Toei acknowledged Funimation as its official version, but on the other, there are some bad name changes out there.

I'm curious what their position is on a name that's totally different than intended.

[Metalwario64]

Are they going to start using Korin and Hercule next?

[Baggie_Saiyan]

Are they going to start using Korin and Hercule next?

Only other change I have noticed is "Kefula" is now "Kefla", but Korin is still Karin, Satan Kamesennin & Tenshinhan are still the same.

Krillin is Krillin not sure if it was always that and it seems Androids have dropped "No."

Anyway here are the links to the new badge sets:
https://www.neowing.co.jp/product/NEOGDS-381611
https://www.neowing.co.jp/product/NEOGDS-381610
https://www.neowing.co.jp/product/NEOGDS-381608
https://www.neowing.co.jp/product/NEOGDS-381609

Here was one of the releases from 2015 for reference:
http://www.hobbystock.jp/s/item/view/hby-ccg-00039330

The dub spellings were on the Kakarot V Jump cover but was un sure if that was only for Kakarot marketing but now Brujula are using the dub spellings and they were the first to use "Son Goku" so that more or less confirms that Japan are getting these spelling changes.

"Frieza" "Vegito" I just do not understand as I know there is arguments for using "Buu" but the former make no sense especially when FUNi themselves started using Vegetto.... so baffling.

[kei17]

Geez, this is nothing but a really absurd decision. I'm going to send a protest letter to Dragon Ball Room in Shueisha. I'm not joking.

[KBABZ]

Geez, this is nothing but a really absurd decision. I'm going to send a protest letter to Dragon Ball Room in Shueisha. I'm not joking.

I agree. I personally prefer Goku and Frieza, but Funimation/ViZ's romanization decisions shouldn't have any impact on Shueisha and Toei's.

[Thanos]

Geez, this is nothing but a really absurd decision. I'm going to send a protest letter to Dragon Ball Room in Shueisha. I'm not joking.

Please do. I don't mean to be dramatic but I find this all kind of sickening. There's a very specific charm to seeing those (correct) spellings of things. If anything, FUNimation needs to adapt to Japan... not sure why Toei feels the need to conform to a foreign market--let alone the arbitrary decisions made 20 years ago by some guys from Texas. "Vegito" makes no sense as a spelling, there is no 'i' in either name and "Frieza" kills the pun, among countless other examples. I don't like this homogenization at all. These markets should stay separate. It's been this way for 35+ years, no need to change.

[Metalwario64]

More Japanese businesses seem to be moving towards globalization, and by that I mean just adapting their works to fit western sensibiliies. I don't know how widespread this is, but it's happening with Dragon Ball, and it's happening with TakaraTomy and Hasbro with Transformers.

Takara used to have higher quality paint jobs, and characters had their Japanese names, but now they are getting the exact same budget limited US releases even with the US names, so now they're getting characters that technically never appeared there (they got Dreadwind and Darkwing instead of Hydra and Buster from their own series "Super God Masterforce"), and they're also starting to get "Optimus Primes" now instead of "Convoys" (I think this was always the case with the Bay films, though, right?), and the worst part is the Japanese customers are now paying the same prices they were before for less paint apps and western TF names and packaging.

Dragon Ball now seems to be moving towards this senseless ideal of "brand unification".

[KBABZ]

Dragon Ball now seems to be moving towards this senseless ideal of "brand unification".

I feel it would have been less senseless if it were there from the start and Toei gave a crap about it from the beginning. If they cared about how their biggest franchise was adapted in the west, they would have taken the rights away from Funimation as soon as they heard about Goku's purely heroic characterization and his father the brilliant scientist.

[SuperSaiyaManZ94]

Dragon Ball now seems to be moving towards this senseless ideal of "brand unification".

I feel it would have been less senseless if it were there from the start and Toei gave a crap about it from the beginning. If they cared about how their biggest franchise was adapted in the west, they would have taken the rights away from Funimation as soon as they heard about Goku's purely heroic characterization and his father the brilliant scientist.

That's the thing about FUNi's decisions of the time plus all of the things about their long outdated localization practices from Barry Watson and co's time (script re writes, dialogue punch ups.etc) which were fairly common of quite a few dub companies back in the late '90s/early 2000's but not so much anymore barring some exceptions. It honestly shocks me that the creators of the show were not absolutely appalled or mortified by their bastardization of the show in all of the above ways. But it seems they've never really had a deep seated desire in having the integrity of their productions maintained by licensees, Dragon Ball included. If a company licenses one of Toei's many anime properties for their own market and butchers it seven ways from Sunday (As 4Kids did with One Piece's initial dub run, for instance) then no skin off their nose, no big deal.

It's really sad honestly, that something you'd think would be among their bigger things to oversee (as in making sure the foreign company acquiring dub rights to their shows adapts it right) means almost nothing to them.

[KBABZ]

a deep seated desire

I thought it was deep-seeded?

[SuperSaiyaManZ94]

a deep seated desire

I thought it was deep-seeded?

Really? I was sure that's how it is said unless i made a typo there when i meant to say seeded.

[KBABZ]

a deep seated desire

I thought it was deep-seeded?

Really? I was sure that's how it is said unless i made a typo there when i meant to say seeded.

Just Googled it, looks like I was wrong! What a twist!

[Beiga]

It does suck that official merchandise will now bear the weird Funi spellings, but I'll keep writing the names the way I feel makes the most sense given the katakana/puns.

Goku
Vegetto
Freeza
Boo
Karin
Tenshinhan
Chaozu
Satan
No. 17 and No. 18.*

*I've never liked the Western term "android" for them. Only 8, 16, and 19 of the original set could be considered androids. The others were cyborgs. Which is why I like "artificial human" best for them. Though, for brevity's sake, No. 17, No. 18, etc. worked for their names for me.

[Dragon Ball Gus]

Thank Kami "Satan" and "Tenshinhan" remains unchanged in Japan.

But yeah, Japan now using "Vegito" and "Frieza" instead of the correct spellings really sucks. Same thing with Buu and Krillin, and this is coming from someone who actually prefers those spellings/names over "Boo" and "Kuririn", because even though those are my personal preferences, I know they're not the correct names, and Japan should know that too.

What could possibly be next? "Bulla" over Bra?!

[MasenkoHA]

Are they going to start using Korin and Hercule next?

Joking aside the dub doesn’t use Hercule outside of kids broadcast friendly edits