Another topic about translations in games and people who ask for them

[ブリッジス テウタ]

Greetings,

I would like to discuss a theme that has already been discussed in many languages but there I go.

I don't know why, today, there are still so many people asking for translations in their own language ?


First point, let me talk about my own background regarding language and video games

When I was a kid, I got Starcraft 1 in English because they hadn't translated it in French. Only the game manual was translated. Fine, I was a kid, I struggled with the language but I had been struggling more or less since my first video game that was "The Lion King" on Sega Megadrive (yes). And Even my mom and Dad went to me with a dictionary to try to help me understanding the objective of the mission where you have to send two spaceships to save Edmund Duke (ship was the problem because they didn't say "space" if I remember). I then played a lot of great games in their translated version.

then translated games became more available. I've played FF 7 to 9 in French. But then, when FF X was released, I couldn't buy it in at my local game store because I was not in the same linguistic area... And I finished playing FFX in English while some of my friends played it in French. Conversations around the game were not easy as I knew the english names and them the translated ones. Many translations were bad (mainly during the late 90th-early 2000th).

Nowadays, I mainly play in English because I find translations in French being quite poor. Not that they are not professionally done nor that they are bad, but I see too many mistakes made in my daily life (even in professional context, even on governments websites) that I prefer the original version when I can understand it than a translation.

English has never been really a problem, I had good English teachers at school and I'm forever grateful for that (and to my other language teachers, whatever the language). Languages are not a big problem for me to be honest, even though I won't say i'm a top speaker in each of those I learned.

But I'm always impressed when I read that people want their games to be translated in Chinese, Brazilian Portuguese, Spanish, etc. It's like they don't want ordo not have the means to learn another language.

I live in Europe and in my country, driving less than 300 miles can bring you to another country with another language and my country has 3 different ones. so maybe that helps a bit ? Maybe a Brazilian person has less opportunities to meet other language (spoken, written, etc.) in their daily life ?

Or is there also a "laziness factor" that makes people begging instead of moving their bottom to learn something that can have an actual added value for them in their life ?

A corrollary question is : are those people asking for translations rather young people ? I'm sorry I've got no knowledge of the age of people around and I can't figure out if there are a lot of teenagers or young adults etc. So maybe the age is not a relevant variable here ?

Second point (shorter, don't worry)

Why not generalising tools for fan translations ? I'm sometimes intrigued by the fact that people can ask for a translation without making a mistake in English (yeah, Google trad can help, but if they can use Google trad, why not start learning, then ?)

Thanks for reading,

Regards,

[cinedine]

Learning another language doesn't come easy to many people. With age this ability actually decreases.
Also in your spare time you just want to enjoy some gaming and relax and not bother with the chore of learning something first, potentially over years.

It's really that easy.

Originally posted by アルティナ オライオン:

Why not generalising tools for fan translations ?

That's up to developers. Somme applications use a simple properties file like Valve does which can be easily accessed and modified. Some have them hardcoded, so there is no chance in hell without recompiling them. Some might have it in their asset packages and are harder to come by.
Some games have so much script though, that a fan effort is nigh impossible without good coordination.

---
Just took a quick dive into free XLIFF (standardized translation file format) converters ... there are barely any. So that doesn't make it any easier.)

[Cawakit]

Hey.
I liked reading about your past.
I was born in 2005, I had the same problem in childhood, only with the English language (if I'm Russian and correspond through Google translator)).
But for me this was not a problem, mostly I played shooters, sometimes a strategy, and did not understand the meaning of the game and what to do.
Yes, right now this is a hot topic.
Therefore, people create companies to localize translations or record voice, since we have Blizzard Entertainment, Akella, Buka, and so on. SoftKlab companies in Russia. People don’t hesitate and why not localize others.
Is this a discussion like nutrition?)

[Cawakit]

Gather people voice, translate games.

[ブリッジス テウタ]

Hey, thanks for answering, you two :-)

Originally posted by cinedine:

Learning another language doesn't come easy to many people. With age this ability actually decreases.
Also in your spare time you just want to enjoy some gaming and relax and not bother with the chore of learning something first, potentially over years.

Hum... I don't know, I'm in my early thirties and honestly I still plan on learning a few languages. But while it's my thing, I could accept that this is not everyone's hobby to learn languages. But if you take a good look at what's published in English and what is not, then as a gamer you had, so far, little luck to gain access to a wide choice of games.

And if you don't speak japanese, forget about the whole Japanese production and accept what they allow to translate in English.

Originally posted by Cawakit:

Hey.
I liked reading about your past.
I was born in 2005, I had the same problem in childhood, only with the English language (if I'm Russian and correspond through Google translator)).
But for me this was not a problem, mostly I played shooters, sometimes a strategy, and did not understand the meaning of the game and what to do.
Yes, right now this is a hot topic.
Therefore, people create companies to localize translations or record voice, since we have Blizzard Entertainment, Akella, Buka, and so on. SoftKlab companies in Russia. People don’t hesitate and why not localize others.
Is this a discussion like nutrition?)

Thank you,I like reading about your own experience too :-)

I understand your point. As games get more widely reachable thanks to the Internet, it could make sense to translate in more languages.

Maybe I shouldn't have taken for granted my ability to "abandon" my mother language and whatever pride that goes with it in order to be able to play/read things I like.

I'll take another example : Mangas in french are not always well translated. And when it's not due to time constraints, it's due to problems related to french itself. Sadly less and less people in my areas of interest can write french without mistakes. Even in professional context like I said in my OP. And in Mangas it's quite horrible. In French, the english "you" can be translated in two ways : "Tu" if you're familiar with the person you're speaking with or "vous" in every polite and formal contexts. And in a manga called "Perfect Crime", translators could freely go from a "tu" to a "vous within the same dialogue box and it's really weird and sound like a broken translation. I've written to the editor but never received any answer. They kept on releasing average translations...

That's why I decided to learn Japanese to get rid of that...

But at some point I will also stop to "fight" wars I cannot win. As a History teacher I fight against two things : Students spelling mistakes and the orders from above that say " outside French language classes, you cannot put marks on spelling and grammar". So I have to review quantities of averagely written homeworks where all the content is taken out Wikipedia and obscure blogs from all over the net.

I of course talk about y own experience, if any other french speaking person comes here and finds themselves to live a different life, then I'm fine. I'm not perfect either after all :-)

To come back to localizing and voice localization, I'm quite split between sticking to the original voice over and the localized one. French actors in video games can be very and very good. While I always set audio language to Japanese for my JRPG's, I did not with FF XV. FF XV was the first Final Fantasy to be voiced over in french. And dude, that foursome of heroes is so well voiced that I have played the entire game in French. Same for The Witcher, Mass Effect and Uncharted (the french actor who give his voice for Nathan is gold, in my opinion).

So yes I think a good set of actors in any languages can make a game great (same with Point and click, I never played Broken sword in English).

but sadly it costs a lot to localize a game... But you're right, it can help people who don't know the language to access great games.

[Cawakit]

Originally posted by アルティナ オライオン:

But at some point I will also stop to "fight" wars I cannot win. As a History teacher I fight against two things : Students spelling mistakes and the orders from above that say " outside French language classes, you cannot put marks on spelling and grammar". So I have to review quantities of averagely written homeworks where all the content is taken out Wikipedia and obscure blogs from all over the net.

This is normal)

Originally posted by アルティナ オライオン:

I'll take another example : Mangas in french are not always well translated. And when it's not due to time constraints, it's due to problems related to french itself. Sadly less and less people in my areas of interest can write french without mistakes. Even in professional context like I said in my OP. And in Mangas it's quite horrible. In French, the english "you" can be translated in two ways : "Tu" if you're familiar with the person you're speaking with or "vous" in every polite and formal contexts. And in a manga called "Perfect Crime", translators could freely go from a "tu" to a "vous within the same dialogue box and it's really weird and sound like a broken translation. I've written to the editor but never received any answer. They kept on releasing average translations...

I do not know French.
But I think that in every translation this happens.
As in translations from Russian into English.
What a single Russian word can translate as two English words in one meaning.
I’ve never read a manga. Is it worth reading it at all? Manga is like a comic book?

Originally posted by アルティナ オライオン:

So yes I think a good set of actors in any languages can make a game great (same with Point and click, I never played Broken sword in English).

i never played in style point-and-click games

[Cawakit]

Originally posted by アルティナ オライオン:

I hope you understand what I wrote. I do not write well in English

[ブリッジス テウタ]

1) What do you find normal ? :-)

2) Oh there are some very good Mangas out there you should read. Try Akira, Gunnm, Berserk, Perfect Crime, Ikigami and others. I'm not really into long series like Naruto, One Piece or Fairy Tales...

3) No ? Give it a try someday if you have the opportunity :-)

[ブリッジス テウタ]

Originally posted by Cawakit:

Originally posted by アルティナ オライオン:

I hope you understand what I wrote. I do not write well in English

I do not speak Russian and that's a shame. I should learn it someday :-) i once visited Санкт-Петербург I loved it (it was in 2008).

[Cawakit]

1)То что списывать из викепедий это нормально)

2)Прочитаю когда-нибудь,я не фанат аниме и мангов

3)Пробую)

[Cawakit]

Originally posted by アルティナ オライオン:

Originally posted by Cawakit:

I do not speak Russian and that's a shame. I should learn it someday :-) i once visited Санкт-Петербург I loved it (it was in 2008).

A lot of time has passed.How old are you?

[ブリッジス テウタ]

Originally posted by Cawakit:

1)То что переписывать из викепедий это нормально)

2)Прочитаю когда-нибудь,я не фанат аниме и мангов

3)Пробую)

haha this time I used google translate (for once ^^).

1) yeah copy/paste from wikipedia is normal but not accepted at University level. Not that Wikipedia is bad, it's just not accepted as a reliable source when ou have ancient texts and documents available.

2) Oh ok.

3) great !

[Cawakit]

Originally posted by アルティナ オライオン:

Originally posted by Cawakit:

1)То что переписывать из викепедий это нормально)

2)Прочитаю когда-нибудь,я не фанат аниме и мангов

3)Пробую)

haha this time I used google translate (for once ^^).

1) yeah copy/paste from wikipedia is normal but not accepted at University level. Not that Wikipedia is bad, it's just not accepted as a reliable source when ou have ancient texts and documents available.

2) Oh ok.

3) great !

hahah this is how I communicate with foreign people)So i'm learning fast.

1)Books are a very ancient and correct source. Right now there is such a world that people are too lazy to go to the library and search for books, if you can quickly type text on the Internet and find the answer

[Cawakit]

How old are you?