Lighting Gels
Member
Mmhh... No
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Gordon Van Dyke: "Skip translationg into italian, it's a waste".
- Thread starter Ludens
- Start date
I don't really understand what you mean here. How is it a con? It's simply a financial decision. There's no secret agenda here, the Italian market is simply to small to spend the time and money on translators for their story heavy games (and their very strict production schedules).
Almost no games get translated into Dutch, and in the rare occasions that it does happen I can't imagine anyone choosing the Dutch version instead of the English one. The market for Dutch games is obviously very small, and people here generally have a good enough handle on the English language to manage (for me personally games like Monkey Island helped me to learn the language a lot quicker in my formative years actually).
KillerMan91
Member
hydrophilic attack
Member
i mean in a country like italy, where there are so many tourists, not learning english seems pretty rude tbqh
yeah, right. dumb answer.
why arent you able to read and write japanese, if you play console games?
same dumb shit.
YianGaruga
Banned
Dutch was one example I chose because I know almost everyone speaks English there at a decent level. The only releases I can remember getting Dutch localizations are Sony first party titles tbh.
Not getting dubs for your movies/TV shows can be a blessing as well, as you learn english and don't have to suffer through terrible dubs for everything like in Germany
Learning a second language is great, English is super useful. It's really not bad to be forced to use it more.
Tal Shiar Agent
Member
Why would any developer translate a game into French, German, or Italian if they were on a budget?
Honestly it can be assumed that if you live in France, Quebec, Germany, Austria, Italy, or Switzerland you know English.
If I was a dev and had to pick and choose languages I'd pick:
English
Spanish
Mandarin
Cantonese
Brazilian Portuguese
Russian
Mass_Pincup
Banned
That list is completely false at least in regards to France.
There's 66 millions french in France, 8 millions people in Québec, part of Belgium and Switzerland are speaking French not to mention the huge amount of African country having french as the official language and speaking it.
That would be the other way around, native have no reason to adapt to tourist. I don't expect people living in New York to speak french when I go there.
French are AWFUL at english, like really really awful. Like the only countries worst then us are Turkey, Russia and Azerbaijan in Europe.
D
Deleted member 126221
Unconfirmed Member
Rude!? Oh fuck off...
How many languages do you speak?
I'm expecting something along the lines of "only english because it's the only worthwhile one".
YianGaruga
Banned
You're very wrong. Even in Germany, a large percentage of people doesn't speak English at a level that allows you to enjoy games/movies/books in that language. Probably even worse for Italy. Even at University in Germany I've met plenty people whose English was barely good enough to order a coffee.
I agree with your language choices btw, but still.
That's more basic common sense than capitalism actually. If you are not providing something essential for the livelihood of people, you should be able to make those calculations in any system that requires a form of transaction.
It's not a matter of absolute numbers, I think, but the actual impact the translation has in the sales for a particular game due to the rate of English language proficiency (or lack of thereof) among the particular niche each game targets in each country.
Countries like Russia and Brazil are known to have low rates of English language literacy, even among gamers and IT professionals, so you're bound to get a sales boost worthy the localization costs there.
Countries like Russia and Brazil are known to have low rates of English language literacy, even among gamers and IT professionals, so you're bound to get a sales boost worthy the localization costs there.
Yeah growing up without dubbed movies helped a ton. People often underestimate how much you can learn as a kid as long as your exposed to another language often (and how quickly that can happen).
From my experience (younger) Germans are very capable in English as well though, even though they dub the hell out of everything. Most of the Germans I met were students back at university though, were being able to read/write/speak English at a reasonable level is pretty much a must of course.
Tal Shiar Agent
Member
It'll give them a reason to get better at it then.
Yeah, because now we are a bigger and more influential market for videogames, its all about that.
If the efforts put into translating are worth it they will do it, pretty simple
So people living in popular tourism locations exist for the sake of the tourists? I don't think the rude one here is who you think it is.
hydrophilic attack
Member
I thought that poster was Swedish, maybe I have him confused with someone else.
YianGaruga
Banned
Because these are some of the largest VG markets in the world.
The amount of people blaming this on discrimination is too damn high. We can assume this guy has numbers, and the numbers state that translating into Italian isn't a good financial decision. That's all there is to it.
I personally wished Italy, but also Spain, Germany and France would learn English. We, as Dutchies, have been screwed so many times by those countries. We always get our games in English anyways, but we always had to wait on the European release because those countries needed their own translations. Like, gimme me my English game already, and let hem wait if they want something special.
I personally wished Italy, but also Spain, Germany and France would learn English. We, as Dutchies, have been screwed so many times by those countries. We always get our games in English anyways, but we always had to wait on the European release because those countries needed their own translations. Like, gimme me my English game already, and let hem wait if they want something special.
Well it's simple, don't buy their games (well i do because i think that are crap so no change for me).
Radical Edward
Member
I have lots of friends in italy that know little or no english.
That said, we never game when I'm there. Too many social things to do. Such an awesome place for hanging out and enjoying the night life
BreezyLimbo
Banned
Actually the Italians say cest la vie
Actually cest la vie is derived from Polish, being coined during WW2 when Nazi Germany demanded obedience and the Polish famously said "Chek Le Vita" later becoming corrupted into "cest la vie"
D
Deleted member 126221
Unconfirmed Member
Taking decisions based exclusively on numbers / financial reasoning can very much create discrimination, I don't get why those have to be mutually exclusive.
EDIT: This is not an attack on that dev or anything, it's just reality. Capitalism is by definition discriminatory.
omg, this is so ignorant... lmao
fabricated backlash
Member
Eh, I enjoy a good italian translation, as they sometimes have amazing VAs.
He has a point. Italians are a bunch of uneducated lazyasses.
I agree. That's how I began learning English back in the day.
Certainly not at school.
I'm Italian.
I agree. That's how I began learning English back in the day.
Certainly not at school.
You're taking this far too personally. They aren't going to translate if the money would bring a bigger return elsewhere. He was pointing out that older translation paradigms probably don't hold true today.
I really don't get the jab at paradox though. Even if you don't like their niche they put out some clearly high quality games.
Lux R7
Member
Jon Carter
Member
Wow.
HerjansEagleFeeder
Member
This is the difference between an economically sound and an aesthetic decision. Aesthetically, Italian would be a great choice to make. Corporations have no taste confirmed ;-)
KillerMan91
Member
I was pretty shocked when I first time visited Germany as a kid and turned the tv on when I was at the hotel. Everything was dubbed. I can understand that people watch animation movies/series and play games dubbed but live action movies. WTF. I will never understand that. it feels so wrong.
johancruijff
Banned
sale grosso
YianGaruga
Banned
I'm sorry you had to experience this.
I hate dubs but I'm part of an extremely small minority with that. Once you know English enough that you can understand the original VA I find it impossible to go back.
Seems discrimination had a very different meaning back when I was in high school than it has now. Guess the world really has become more sensitive in the past 25 years.
Discrimination as we learned it would be actively preventing the Italians from buying your game, or preventing them from learning a required language for said game. Not presenting everything on a silver platter hardly seems like discrimination to me. But, like I said, long time ago. I'm getting old, so I'm probably wrong then.
Rightfully so. Not a very classy commentary.
Succinct Verbosity
Member
From what my Swedish girlfriend tells me the dubbing in foreign languages is almost always horrible anyway, so most people would rather just play in English.
KillerMan91
Member
Does even younger people still use dubs in Germany? I have sometimes thought that maybe live action dubs in central Europe will die with new more global generations.
You better start learning chinese then cause that's the way the market is going.
Well, it's not so much horrible IMO, it's mainly that we're so used to English translated games after 25+ years that playing a game in your native language feels totally weird. When a company puts some money into it, it can be done just fine, just like Japanese->English.
To me it feels like a waste of time and money though. Gimme my game 4-6 months earlier and leave it in English. I'm pretty sure I'll manage.
YianGaruga
Banned
Everyone uses dubs since everything is dubbed. It's almost literally 100% of content that is shown on TV and in theaters.
You mean to tell me my Vita is a damn nazi weapon?
That is cool af but also explains why it was a miserable failure.
Also some of the posts I'm reading seem to be taking this way to personally. These developers and publishers aren't discriminating, localizing a game is extremely hard to do right and benefits very few people especially when so many games don't rely that much on reading anyways.