("Super-Duper-Mega-Bummer!" Selphie exclaims; this is an escalation from a previous line where she said "Mega-Bummer!" that I didn't realize might be a running gag.)
In Japanese, Selphie just goes "shippaaaaai", which is a drawn-out 失敗, meaning just "mistake" or "failure". So she's effectively saying "that's an oof" here.
I didn't catch what the initial "Mega-Bummer" would be, but I admit I can't think of anything that would be just a few tiers lower than "Super-Duper-Mega-Bummer" in the equivalent Japanese. The only emphasis Selphie gives is drawing out the syllable (and the exclamation mark), but she does that to everything anyway.
Zone: "Ouch… Take care of Rinoa, will you? I'll kill you if anything happens to her."
Zone is rather scarier here. The Japanese is the common "If anything happens to Rinoa, I won't forgive you". Possibly translators of the time felt that "will not forgive" was too mild for the intended feelings, so they ramped it up in translations. Entirely understandable, since "I won't forgive you"/"you won't be forgiven" is also used in the typical shounen battle scenes where someone is swearing eternal blood vengeance.
Squall has a rare moment of overt empathy and tries to tell Rinoa that they'll all be fine, however, he is drowned out by Selphie yelling and gesticulating to get into the passenger compartment and he has to personally go and open it for her. Rinoa asks if he was trying to say something, and once again we have the option to try again or to tell her to forget it.
The choices in Japanese are "Never mind, it's nothing important" and "It's nothing important, but...". So either way, he's downplaying his attempt at building morale.
Given his actual line is merely "we somehow made it", it's certainly not that big of a deal if anyone else was saying it. But this is Squall, so it's kind of a tiny step forward.
From what I can see in the Japanese script site, there
might be a bit of "but thou must" in at least some of these dialogue choices. There's no alternate dialogue for the options here, but I don't know if that means the dialogue option is
irrelevant and Squall would say "we somehow made it" either way, or if the Japanese script site author just hadn't filled in the alternate dialogue yet.
And previously, in the lead-up to the assault on the Timber TV Station where we had the option to decline commenting on Rinoa's leadership, the way the script site is formatted makes it look like even if Squall went "I'm not going to say", Rinoa will
insist on Squall elaborating. She even puts it as "this is an order from your client". So I think Squall would have snapped at Rinoa anyway.
Dollet is kind of one of these places there's more and more of where I have to question my approaching to LP writing because nothing plot critical happens here, it's pure vibes, literally just building ambiance from the world; on the one hand ambiance is incredibly important, on the other hand I don't want to find myself just paraphrasing or transcribing a dozen atmospheric conversations and turning this into busywork, you know?
Yeah, the Dollet side dialogue page on the Japanese script site has quite a bit, although I can't find some of the interactions you did mention (eg the couple scavenging mech parts), so it might not even be all of them. The script site divides it by general area, so I have to kind of guess.
Other potentially interesting interactions include a guy at the harbour area who's lamenting about how he's a horrible unfilial person who left home to find his fortune, failed so far, and hasn't contacted his home in five years. So he goes deeper and deeper into despair, until he lets out a scream about how he's an idiot. The next line has him panting and terrified, since he just remembered that he can't swim, so he thinks he might really be an idiot.
The script site doesn't show any stage directions or actions, so I can only imagine what this is supposed to be, but it
sounds like the man
tried to jump off a pier into the harbour. Then he got second thoughts about suicide, and made it back to shore.
I'm not sure if this was something you encountered in this visit to Dollet, since "attempted suicide played for comedy" is kind of a writing decision that is both very 90s and also the sort of thing I'd expect would cause some amount of discussion.
On a less grisly note, there's also apparently two children playing hide-and-seek, in the area of the path leading to the beach (where the Dollet repairman supposedly is). The little sister is calling out to confirm that she can uncover her eyes and go seeking, and Squall can actually play along by pretending to be the older brother responding.
If he says "Not yet" (in a sing-song way, pretending to be the person hiding), the little sister takes a moment to realize that this is a complete stranger responding. At which point she scolds Squall for interfering, and calls him "old man". ("Ojichan", which sometimes gets translated into "uncle" or "mister", but the point is the person is at least middle-aged "old".) Squall is momentarily stunned by how he is suddenly considered an old man.
If Squall says "ready", the little girl goes off to find her brother, seemingly not noticing that it's a complete stranger who responded. We can also find the older brother's hiding spot, where he first tries to hush Squall since this is his
hiding spot, then congratulates himself on finding such a "perfect" hiding spot, especially since the kids have bet today's snacks on winning this game.
However, the boy immediately realizes that he needs to pee, and can barely hold it in. Which is when the little sister finds him with a loud declaration, startling him enough to have a little accident.
So yeah, peeing oneself as comedy. I can't say this is a 90s thing, since I've seen it in a lot of contemporary anime too. In almost every case, it was added into the anime while the original source did not have it, so I wonder if this is from some weird yet persistent lineage of story writers.
Squall, mentally: "(I don't believe in relying on others.)"
Rinoa: "Don't you understand!?"
Squall, mentally: "(...Whatever.)"
Squall's line about not relying on others is more aggressive in Japanese: "Isn't it too naive to receive (help) from other people?" He doesn't just deny wanting to receive help personally, he thinks
anyone who relies on others to help them is naive.
The "... Whatever" here is "... Urusai na", which is one of those phrases well-known to have many contextual translations. It's literally "So noisy", but can also mean "So annoying" or "Shut up" or any mix of those.
Instead, Zell has been replaced by Quistis, and both him and Rinoa get to stay perfectly awake and watch the other three as they slumber.
Zell does comment that the unconscious people "must have gone to that world". "World" here is 世界, which does literally mean "world", but is fairly generic; it could be used for "the world of FFVIII" (ie the setting), "the world of sports" (ie the community around sports), "the world outside" (ie society in general), "the other world" (ie literally isekai), and so on. So I'm a little curious what word the English translation used.
I unironically love it when there's a place that signaled as different from the rest of the setting by having a quirky genre aesthetic baked in at the troop level. I'm not talking 'country of hats' stuff where everyone is a different national stereotype; I'm talking about a world that mostly has a codified aesthetic (in this case, "90s casualwear and industry with an Art Déco/Art Nouveau aesthetic") and then there is one nation who inexplicably has super sentai cyborgs as their basic unit model.
I love how Laguna also comments that the Esthar military uniforms are "as fancy as usual". I don't know the intended tone, but it does slightly feel like he's a little envious.
Laguna calls the ships below "boats" and Kiros corrects him that they are 'vessels', but his own voice is fading. It's honestly kind of moving.
This has a couple of extra bits from the Japanese script. Using the English translation's terms, Laguna says he spotted "boats", and they should get on. Kiros then says (minus the halting speech due to severe injury) "In other words, vessels. As they're usually called".
This is a callback to immediately prior, when the trio first approach the cliff. Laguna goes "Look, the sea! We're saved! What luck! We'll be able to escape to Galbadia!"
And Kiros says "In other words, we're cornered. As it's usually called."
It's really very moving. Despite their injuries, Kiros and Ward are willing to banter impromptu comedy skits with Laguna, when for all they know they are seconds from death.
The other bit is the English translation seems to have swapped the terms Laguna and Kiros used. Laguna calls what he sees "ships", ie 船, which is a generic term for all seafaring vessels. Kiros, meanwhile, corrects him to say they are "boats", ie ボート. Which is "boat" in katakana, and used to refer to rowing boats and the like.
The idea is Laguna is calling these vessels "ships" like they're fully functional with amenities, and the trio can recover and receive medical attention while on board. Kiros has to correct him to specify that they're rowboats, and so they still have to
row across the ocean before they are anywhere near safe.
Squall: "We'll just be wasting our time trying to figure it out. Let's keep going."
A bit harsher than the Japanese text. There, Squall is saying "We won't figure anything out here. Let's hurry on."
The part about "here", ie in the middle of a forest, should have been left in.
They still have a lot to work on. I don't mean as a couple, at this point it seems pretty clear Rinoa's main relationship is with Seifer, I mean as a team. But maybe there's hope yet.
To be honest, given how much Squall is thinking about how well he knows Seifer and comparing the current situation to What Would Seifer Do, I would say Squall's main relationship is also with Seifer.
