Formal request for Spanish as a new language for ARR.

[Abriael]

Props for you for being able to pick up the English language without much difficulty. However, don't assume its just as easy for everyone else. The older you get, the harder it is to retain a new language. How old were you when you started playing games in English? Pre-teen maybe? That is the ideal time to pick up languages and sounds.

Sure, but it's not the last language I learned. Learning languages is not a matter of luck. It's just a matter of effort, especially when study material is so abundant as it is for English.

In this day and age people simply use localizations as a crutch, and as an excuse not to learn English, which is well within anyone's possibilities.

For many, learning a language will take a lot more than just video games. Their lives may be too hectic, with work, kids, etc. Many just want to relax and enjoy a form of entertainment, much like they do when they watch a movie or listen to music. And the same goes with movies: without subtitles or dub overs, how much of the movie can they really expect to enjoy?

Sorry but those sound like excuses to me. Learning languages can be easily done as part of one's entertainment, and it's useful too.

And you are incorrect about Latin-based languages not carrying over well from English (I can't comment about Japanese since I am not fluent). I work as a translator (and tutored ESL, which was an uphill battle for the older people who WERE trying to learn) and I can tell you it is very much possible to convey the same meanings. It's all about wordplay. It's the same from JP to English on here: Fluff words are added to the English text that may not accurately reflect what the original Japanese text. If you want a good example, look at all the theories that came out regarding the "Commemorative Coin" based on the English description wording that did not read the same in Japanese, or even French for that matter.

Sorry, but you're the first i meet that works in localization that doesn't admit that a part of the original is always lost with a localization. There's simply wordplay that cannot be translated, and has to be replaced with the nearest possible approximation. The job can be done better or worse, but there's no "perfection" to be reached.

Add to that the fact that video games don't even have an adaptation phase, but just a translation phase. That means that instead of having a two-men team working on the same part of the script, one native in the original language and one in the target language, like you have for film or (good) anime. This almost invariably means that the localization will have a degree of awkwardness (especially for a latin language) or it won't be as precise as it should be.

It's not the same as from Japanese to English, unfortunately, as in the gaming industry (and unless they changed it very recently, Square Enix isn't an exception), translations aren't done from Japanese to all target languages. They're made from Japanese to English, and from English to all the target languages for reasons of budget and convenience. While a translation loses a certain percentage of its meaning, a translation of a translation is way worse.

[Vilhem]

Sure, but it's not the last language I learned. Learning languages is not a matter of luck. It's just a matter of effort, especially when study material is so abundant as it is for English.

In this day and age people simply use localizations as a crutch, and as an excuse not to learn English, which is well within anyone's possibilities.



Sorry but those sound like excuses to me.

They are not so much excuses as they are the reality of the situation. Try teaching English or your native language to a mother who has to go home after work, after class, do chores, cook dinner for their kids and keep themselves involved in their activities. I'm not saying it can't be done, but it is a difficult situation for some. Again, don't hold others to your standard of success.

Sorry, but you're the first i meet that works in localization that doesn't admit that a part of the original is always lost with a localization. There's simply wordplay that cannot be translated, and has to be replaced with the nearest possible approximation. The job can be done better or worse, but there's no "perfection" to be reached.

You twist my words. I never said there was a "perfect" way to translate. I think you can agree with me when I say translation is an art, not a science, and that every translator/interpreter's output will be slightly different. But the meaning is what counts.

Yes a part of the original will always be lost, that is always to be expected. But you saying "Latin" languages don't translate well is just the same as saying JP doesn't translate well to English. There IS a loss with English too. We're unable to log on, but I tested this very thing playing back the cutscenes with voice acting with the different subtitles (JP French and German). The Japanese subtitles almost did not match up what the English voice overs were saying in the Gridania opening scenes. Yet the French subtitles more or less went with what the English voice overs were saying. So even with our English language client, we are not playing a close "original" translation of the JP text.

The gist of the story is there in the localized languages we have (even English). So why wouldn't the same be said for a Spanish language client?

[Abriael]

They are not so much excuses as they are the reality of the situation. Try teaching English or your native language to a mother who has to go home after work, after class, do chores, cook dinner for their kids and keep themselves involved in their activities. I'm not saying it can't be done, but it is a difficult situation for some. Again, don't hold others to your standard of success.

As a matter of fact, my aunt is in the process of learning English and she is exactly in this situations. She keeps it fun and relaxing (watching movies, reading books and studying grammar during dead times), and she enjoys it and is learning well.

You twist my words. I never said there was a "perfect" way to translate. I think you can agree with me when I say translation is an art, not a science, and that every translator/interpreter's output will be slightly different. But the meaning is what counts.

The problem is that even part of the meaning is lost, otherwise, if you mean just the general meaning of things, even a superficial knowledge of the language is sufficient to get it.

Yes a part of the original will always be lost, that is always to be expected. But you saying "Latin" languages don't translate well is just the same as saying JP doesn't translate well to English. There IS a loss with English too. We're unable to log on, but I tested this very thing playing back the cutscenes with voice acting with the different subtitles (JP French and German). The Japanese subtitles almost did not match up what the English voice overs were saying in the Gridania opening scenes. Yet the French subtitles more or less went with what the English voice overs were saying. So even with our English language client, we are not playing a close "original" translation of the JP text.

The gist of the story is there in the localized languages we have (even English). So why wouldn't the same be said for a Spanish language client?

Never said that the English localization is a good one. As a matter of fact it isn't. It's not awkward, which is good, but it distances itself a LOT from the original, to the point that some characters are dreadfully warped.

The reason why I talk about latin languages is that they are all much more nuanced than both English and Japanese in their grammar structure, causing most translators to slip rather badly when they work on them.

Japanese translates much easier to English that it does to Italian, French or Spanish (when the translator knows how to do his job). And English doesn't translate very well itself to Italian, French or Spanish. The result is that a double translation that passes by english is normally dreadful.

I agree with you here in that they SHOULD be focused on the game itself more...but these are two separate teams working here. The dev team doesn't handle localizations nor even the marketing of the game they develop.

I'm very aware of that, but while manpower is different, resources are not. The game has a budget, and localizations have a cost that fishes from that budget