Okay, so a lot to unpack here.
“Scarlight Red Dragon Archfiend.” It’s got an interesting first name, and I remember on its reveal the issues with translating this part.
In English, “L” and “R” sounds are distinct. In linguistics we’d say they’re allophones of different phonemes (just meaning they’re unique sounds).
In Japanese, however, “L” and “R” sounds are one in the same.
So back to the first part, in translating the name into English, we knew the beginning of sukāraito, “sukā,” was the English word “scar.” And we can see in the image above that this dragon has what looks like a wound of some sort on its arm. A “scar.” Easy enough.
But what about the other half? Given what we know about “L” and “R” in Japanese, do we translate this as “right” or as “light”?
Well, we do both. That’s the point. As “Scar-Right,” the dragon has a scar on its right arm.
But then “Scar-Light” has its own depth. This card, “Scarlight Red Dragon Archfiend,” is based on “Red Dragon Archfiend,” the trump card of the rival character from Yu-Gi-Oh! 5D’s.
Why is “Scar-Light” important? In this previous TV series, the rival character was paired against the main character, whose trump card and subsequent upgrades of it, “Stardust Dragon,” are all based on stars and other cosmic bodies, or on starlight.
Thus either translation, “scar-right” or “scar-light,” would be appropriate. There ya go.
(It’s official translation as “Scarlight” is much easier to read, as well.)
