Tokyo Fan Fest - Only keynote to be translated

[Transient_Shadow]

They normally have English in the text below Japanese so we'll get the gist of whats being said when they present it. I mean I understand the frustration but this doesn't seem like too huge of an issue

[Bonbori]

I think all events, fan-fests and live-letters should be hosted in Chinese. That is, after all, probably the largest audience.

[Anselmet]

Japanese is a lot more complex language than most other. That's why translating anime, manga or games from Japanese to English can take so long. It's very easy to make translation errors, even in speech. Then there's the different construction of their phrases which is always a problem with translating on the fly between two disconnected languages.

It is possible to translate on the fly, yes...like every language...but it is difficult to do it both fast and accurately.

An actually trained translator sole job is to do translations on the fly you know that, right? Have you ever listened in on the UN or the EU? A trained professional translator can translate as a person speaks and usually only has a topic sheet. If a translator can translate a politicians tirade in the EU, I am more than certain that they can for a fanfest MMO that can feasibly give them material that can prep them on what they will be revealing. It would not be difficult for a professionally trained translator even if it is Japanese. The live stream should have this option. I can understand if the event does not have it, but there is really no reason that the livestream does not have this feature.

[Kaedan]

An actually trained translator sole job is to do translations on the fly you know that, right? Have you ever listened in on the UN or the EU? A trained professional translator can translate as a person speaks and usually only has a topic sheet. If a translator can translate a politicians tirade in the EU, I am more than certain that they can for a fanfest MMO that can feasibly give them material that can prep them on what they will be revealing. It would not be difficult for a professionally trained translator even if it is Japanese. The live stream should have this option. I can understand if the event does not have it, but there is really no reason that the livestream does not have this feature.

1) Not to nitpick, but that is an interpreter, not a translator.

2) Interpreters also usually have prepared memos with what the person speaking is intending to say. It is never comprehensive, but enough to allow the interpreter some shortcuts. (point of note, for the Paris FF, they had scripts of what was going to be said).

3) Professional interpreters are EXPENSIVE. I should know, I'm in the business myself (though not to the level of interpreter, I just do translation).

3a) There's no reason to pay the exhorbitant cost of interpreters for the Tokyo Fan Fest. They are going to be providing English translation for the Keynote, which is all that is necessary. The side panels are really not important and will be translated eventually anyway.

[kikix12]

An actually trained translator sole job is to do translations on the fly you know that, right?

A professional game developers job is to program a game that works, yet there are bugs all over most of them nowadays.

Read what you quoted. I didn't say it's not possible. I said that it requires more thought than many other language combinations and thus normally either takes longer or is less accurate.

Have you ever listened in on the UN or the EU? A trained professional translator can translate as a person speaks and usually only has a topic sheet. If a translator can translate a politicians tirade in the EU, I am more than certain that they can for a fanfest MMO that can feasibly give them material that can prep them on what they will be revealing.

You are comparing languages which are similar to one another or to English, with a language that is from the other side of the world and is entirely different?! It's like comparing a sauce from a jar with a home-made sauce from fresh ingredients. Both are the same thing and preparing both is called cooking, but the former is far easier to do.

There is simply no comparison. Implying that on-the-fly translation between Japanese and English is as easy as between English, Spanish, German, Polish etc. is just naive.

[Shougun]

There is simply no comparison. Implying that on-the-fly translation between Japanese and English is as easy as between English, Spanish, German, Polish etc. is just naive.

Yeah, our syntax and grammar structure is different so you have to reorder the things you've heard on top of changing the language.

I bet Japanese to Korean and probably the other way would be a really smooth experience though, they've got a lot of similarities, almost like what you might feel from English and Spanish and other "western" languages. Similar order, syntax, and sometimes pronunciations, with a very old relative relationship to each other through Chinese.

Probably why you see the interpreters pause a bit longer on these languages though (English / Japanese) lol, have to hear more of the sentence before being able to recreate it?

That said I don't think people need 0 second delay translations, so I still believe SE could achieve a smooth English presentation - especially if they had two presenters (Koji, Aimi, Foxclon seem like they might be able to face that challenge). One presenter talking about the previous thing, or interacting (like lore questions peppered in), while the other is working on the currently said item.

On another line of thought.. Did/does Blizzard do any sort of translating service for it's community? I don't think SE should scoff at the idea as we're a huge part of their customer base (there are more English speakers than Japanese speakers), and clearly they don't because we get some translations pretty quickly/early already, but I was just curious if SE is in their own sort challenge world because i'm not sure this happens else where.

[Barraind]

On another line of thought.. Did/does Blizzard do any sort of translating service for it's community?

You can watch Blizzcon streams in:

English, Spanish, French, Italian, German, Russian, Portugese, Korean, Vietnamese, Japanese, Chinese and Thai. And limited content in Polish and Turkish.

Theres really no reason to not expect translations for the common language of 65% of their playerbase for events like this, including the regular live letters.

Hell, you can watch Games Done Quick marathons in multiple languages at this point.

[Shougun]

You can watch Blizzcon streams in:

English, Spanish, French, Italian, German, Russian, Portugese, Korean, Vietnamese, Japanese, Chinese and Thai.

Hell, you can watch Games Done Quick marathons in multiple languages at this point.

Is that afterwards or live even? And does it include the whole dev presentation or just the intro? Very impressive selection if live lol.

I tried some google searches which suggested they translate the entire event, like.. all of it. But youtube didn't really reveal any videos which is either because of copyright strike city or maybe its not true.

However - I just went to their blizzcon website, and it appears even their news caster/interviews are being dubbed (but I can't tell if that happened live or later).



Though I still don't know if that's done live or not, could be added later. Do you know if those options are up at the time of live (still counts even if its just delayed a little lol).

[Barraind]

It might be on a short delay, but you can select all the stream options on their website to watch "live".