Support of languages in game

usa

<div class="IPBDescription">Will be?</div>There will be in NS2 a support of languages?
Russian will be?
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Excuse, but English language I do not know, therefore has taken advantage of the program the translator=)

locallyunscene

There was a similar question asked <a href="http://www.unknownworlds.com/forums/index.php?showtopic=103288&hl=blog" target="_blank">here.</a> Short answer. Yes, but probably not right away.

schkorpio

does it really need to ?
i've played many japanese games, and i don't have a clue as to what they are saying or what i'm reading, aslong i know how to set my controls and other options which is easy enough to figure out.

i'd say all of that would be supported out of the box by steam anyway right?

and NS2 is multiplayer where you would type and speak your local language <img src="style_emoticons/<#EMO_DIR#>/smile-fix.gif" style="vertical-align:middle" emoid=":)" border="0" alt="smile-fix.gif" />

Crispy

Do you really think you could have learnt to play NS in Japanese? Sure, some of the basics are like other games, but there's so much info you would have to rely on other players for. Most people just won't play a game if it doesn't have support for their language.

Steam doesn't automatically give you translations, all it does is let you download the game.

You seem to have forgotten about localisation of:
- Controls
- Front End menus
- Installer instructions
- In-game menus
- In-game text (e.g. HUD info, including map locations)
- Tutorials
- In-game hint messages
- In-game voiceovers
- External language services (e.g. a localised area of the official website, FAQs, Beginner's Guides and Customer Support)

All of this is a lot of work. Many languages require more space on the screen than English, leading to text bleeding out of dialogue boxes or even off the screen. It's not a quick process to provide language support, it requires highly skilled translators, more work by the devs and thorough language testing.

Here's an example of what can happen if a translator isn't a native speaker:
In a game I tested when you quit a mission, Spanish-speaking players were asked: "¿Eres seguro?"
This literally means 'Are you a secure [i.e. mentally stable] person?'
(Instead, it should have been: "¿Estás seguro?", which means 'Are you sure?')

You can't just whack your game through Babelfish, it has to be done by professionals, and that costs money and takes time.

locallyunscene

<!--quoteo(post=1681228:date=Jun 16 2008, 07:28 AM:name=Crispy)--><div class='quotetop'>QUOTE(Crispy @ Jun 16 2008, 07:28 AM) <a href="index.php?act=findpost&pid=1681228"><{POST_SNAPBACK}></a></div><div class='quotemain'><!--quotec-->Here's an example of what can happen if a translator isn't a native speaker:
In a game I tested when you quit a mission, Spanish-speaking players were asked: "¿Eres seguro?"
This literally means 'Are you a secure [i.e. mentally stable] person?'
(Instead, it should have been: "¿Estás seguro?", which means 'Are you sure?')

You can't just whack your game through Babelfish, it has to be done by professionals, and that costs money and takes time.<!--QuoteEnd--></div><!--QuoteEEnd-->
That's an amusing example <b>Crispy</b>. I agree it would be a large time/money sink for official language packs. The devs seem to be including support for additional languages, so maybe they expect the community to do some of the translation with unofficial packs? I'd imagine there won't be a lot of voice acting in English for the game so maybe it's something that the community could take on. It might be important <a href="http://games.slashdot.org/article.pl?sid=08/06/08/1736222" target="_blank">since the weakened dollar is causing some companies to focus more on the EU.</a>[slashdot.org]

Raza.

Most european clans are multinational by now, as most national scenes died long ago.
Same goes for pubs. At this point, having multiple languages would actually be a little confusing, with different room names and such things.
Maybe localized versions should only have translated help texts, options, etc. and just leave the things that are important for communication in english.

Cereal_KillR

Well, you don't have to be a professional to translate... You just need to have to find someone who isn't English, but fluent enough in English, and he could translate everything. Voice acting would then be easy, as there would be no need for every actor to translate. Having the community work on this could be an easy way to do it, as there are people from all around the world.

It's actually quite common to find people with fluent English as a second language (and capable of translating from English to their language) with English being so important today and all that... Though it usually depends on the country.
I know by personal experience that French people usually can't speak English worth crap, but fear not, I can do the job just fine <img src="style_emoticons/<#EMO_DIR#>/nerd-fix.gif" style="vertical-align:middle" emoid="::nerdy::" border="0" alt="nerd-fix.gif" />

And it won't be too long to do. We're not translating a novel or anything, just a handful of spoken sentences of maybe ten words each at most, plus some in-game menus, the game isn't cut-scenerific so there aren't any extensive dialogs.

KungFuDiscoMonkey

You also have to worry about QA. You don't want people making joke translations (has happened before).

Crispy

Plus you do need qualified translators who are familiar with games terminology and naming conventions, not just someone who can read English doesn't but know the game-specific translation of 'map', 'level', 'tech tree', 'damage over time', 'Front End', etc. and can't find the correct translations in their pocket/online dictionary.