Confirmed: German dubbing and French subtitles (page 2)!

[taumel]

Just because one person at TTG offered his personal experiences, indicates in no way that the whole industry works this way. Put me on the opposite list where i worked on several projects where this worked out fine, once we found the right people.

Again with the right priority this can be done.

I find it kind of a questionable style closing threads in such a way. It has a bit of teenagers are moderating this forum, lacking experience and tolerance.

[Bloody Eugene]

By the way, my only questions is about TT "keepin' all these mysteries and secrets" about translations and localization being done.
What are they afraid of?
Is it so difficult to say "we have no plan to translate Sam&Max3 in French right now"? Or to say "We are making agreements for a Spanish version of Tales"? Or "Strong Bad will never be localized"?

Why it's all so super-secret? What's the problem? Why even close the thread and shutting down the talking aboiut it?

And BTW, there are many small software house doing localizations. Frictional Games - a 5 (!!!) members games company - released all their games in 5 languages within a year, and "Amnesia", their last game, was multilanguage from day-1.

[divisionten]

Originally Posted by Bloody Eugene

By the way, my only questions is about TT "keepin' all these mysteries and secrets" about translations and localization being done.
What are they afraid of?
Is it so difficult to say "we have no plan to translate Sam&Max3 in French right now"? Or to say "We are making agreements for a Spanish version of Tales"? Or "Strong Bad will never be localized"?

Why it's all so super-secret? What's the problem? Why even close the thread and shutting down the talking aboiut it?

And BTW, there are many small software house doing localizations. Frictional Games - a 5 (!!!) members games company - released all their games in 5 languages within a year, and "Amnesia", their last game, was multilanguage from day-1.

Having once done some work for a radio station, I can tell you that we were often made to sign agreements as to when- and how much we could- release information for things like CD releases. Telltale may be under the same sort of agreements, and may simply be unable to talk about these things. It's the same reason why actors have to be careful in saying what sort of projects they're working on, etc. It's written into their contracts what they are and are not allowed to talk about.

There are many reasons or these sorts of agreements- sometimes they're tentative and not yet reached price negotiations or the like. They'll tell you when they can. Until then, all we can really do is be patient.

[doggans]

Originally Posted by taumel

Just because one person at TTG offered his personal experiences, indicates in no way that the whole industry works this way.

I would imagine that Telltale Games' experience would be the most relevant information in a debate about whether or not Telltale Games is able to provide a translation. :P

[taumel]

I wouldn't say so. If one car manufacturer pretends that it's impossible to design working brakes but all the others deliver, then i would more question the statements from that specific manufacturer.

[doggans]

Originally Posted by taumel

I wouldn't say so. If one car manufacturer pretends that it's impossible to design working brakes but all the others deliver, then i would more question the statements from that specific manufacturer.

That analogy is flawed, as (A) brakes are vital to car safety, and (B) brakes work universally; you don't have to create many different types of brakes for many different customers.

A better (but still not great) analogy would be a car manufacturer that only makes silver cars, versus manufacturers who make red, green, and blue cars. The other companies prove it's possible to make multicolored cars, but perhaps they have a contract with a company that makes different paints, or somebody in the company who can provide their own paints, while the first company only has access to metallic silver paints in their area. Maybe they'd even like to offer multiple colors of car, but they fear if they start offering a few colors, the floodgates will open and they'll have to offer EVERY color. What's more, they don't have the same contract with the paint company, and they don't have it in their budget to buy all the paints unless they remove, say, the car radio, and they feel the car radio is more important than multiple colors.

As you can see, I know even less about car manufacturing than I do about game design. :P

[divisionten]

But this isn't car manufacturers. This is more like comparing cars, trucks, busses, etc. Yeah, they're all vehicles, but they all have different needs and problems, as well as different market audiences.

EDIT: Looks like I got beat. ^__^

[Bloody Eugene]

My take:
If from day-1 they say that there will be localization in ie: French, Spanish and German, you avoid that fan-made subtitles appears on the web broking the market for an official import version.
Do TT want this? I don't know - I think that fan-made subtitles give better (and sooner) sales of the English game through their website.

BTW, I know people that are already prepared for a BTTF fan-made subtitles translation.

[taumel]

@doggans
Nope, it's in no way flawed. It just illustrates in a very simple way what's going wrong here since years. More if you've worked on your own at other companies who build working brakes.

[doggans]

Originally Posted by taumel

@doggans
Nope, it's in no way flawed.

Um, it IS flawed, in at least two ways, which I just explained and even helpfully labeled "A" and "B". How are MY points wrong?

[taumel]

You're wrong because you're arguing like a politican, you seem to enjoy talking a lot but without the focus on what the discussion is all about. You seem to lack the experience for doing so, you exclude common sense and prefer getting on semantics and such instead of the core of what the discussion is all about. This might be interesting at high school or in similar places but it's mostly not in real life anymore. That's the point where it gets boring, at least for me, again.

So do you really expect me to continue your weird argumentation about brakes like to tell you that a) support of native language also is vital for a noticeable percentage of the adventurer players (people who don't understand english at all or this well or just enjoy their native language a lot more) and b) that a.o. Toyota has nicely shown that not all brakes are working as they should?

Come on, if you join the discussion then please involve some respect for the intelligence and time of the others taking part in a discussion and spare us the hot air.

[Vainamoinen]

Continue this path of personal insult and you WILL have to find another place to discuss this.

[taumel]

This is not an insult, this is a clarification as i would prefer a reasonable discussions about the topic and not some time and space wasting blahblah which doesn't deal with the core of the statement anymore which at least in my opinion is quite obvious.

[doggans]

Originally Posted by taumel

You're wrong because you're arguing like a politican, you seem to enjoy talking a lot but without the focus on what the discussion is all about.

This discussion is about whether or not it is feasible for Telltale to provide translations, right? You claimed that it is, by using an analogy. I explained why that analogy doesn't work, while attempting to provide my own which tied it back in with the subject at hand.

But I can do this without analogies, too. I don't think anyone at Telltale is against doing translations IF THEY CAN. You seem to believe that just because some companies, even small ones, can provide translations, it means EVERY company should be able to. I say that there are other factors at work that we don't know about because we don't work at Telltale.

Originally Posted by taumel

You seem to lack the experience for doing so

Define "experience". Experience in debate, or experience in game design?

Any experience in debate I may or may not have is hardly relevant, but I'm well aware of my lack of experience in game design. My argument, again, is WE DON'T KNOW why Telltale might not provide a translation, because WE DON'T KNOW what factors go into such a process AT TELLTALE. Even if I had worked for countless other gaming companies, I still wouldn't know how these things happen AT TELLTALE.

Originally Posted by taumel

So do you really expect me to continue your weird argumentation about brakes

You're the one who started the "weird" brakes argument, my friend. But as long as we're still on it...

Originally Posted by taumel

like to tell you that a) support of native language also is vital for a noticeable percentage of the adventurer players (people who don't understand english at all or this well or just enjoy their native language a lot more)

It's only vital for the ones who don't understand English at all. It's just a bonus luxury for people who know English but prefer their native language.

Originally Posted by taumel

and b) that a.o. Toyota has nicely shown that not all brakes are working as they should?

That's not the point I was making. The point I was making is that with brakes, you only need one basic design. You don't need to start from scratch and create different brakes for Spanish, German, French, etc. speakers. Therefore, brake manufacturing is not a good analogy for language translating.

Originally Posted by taumel

Come on, if you join the discussion then please involve some respect for the intelligence and time of the others taking part in a discussion and spare us the hot air.

It is not my intention to disrespect anybody's intelligence or time. I'm not just saying random stuff; I'm saying things that I actually believe are good points. If I raise an objection, it's because it's something I genuinely think your argument doesn't account for. If I ask a question, it's because I'm actually curious what your response is, not because I'm trying to waste anyone's time.

Just to make sure I'm understanding the debate properly (correct me if I'm wrong here), you're arguing that Telltale is definitely able to provide translations and they have absolutely no reason not to, right?

All I'm arguing is, we don't know if that's true. We don't know what reasons Telltale would have for not providing translations. We don't even know for sure that they're NOT providing translations, do we? I'm simply arguing that we cannot make assumptions about Telltale's resources and process, no matter how much we know about the way other companies work.

I'm not trying to be mean, or unreasonable, or anything. I'm not anti-translation. I'm just confident in the fact that if Telltale isn't providing one, they have a good reason, even if we don't know what it is.

[PedsterUK]

As I stated in another translation related thread...

Correct me if I'm wrong and missing the point here, but the translations wouldn't be that easy, well, if TT wanted to do them properly. It would mean changing the model's face expressions too in relation to the language. No?

[taumel]

@doggans
a) The analogy works, if you get it.

b) If TTG would be really interested in translations then we would have seen them since quite some time. I say this based on my experiences as a gamer, as a developer and as someone how amongst others knows many people doing translations in their daily job as well. On top of that they have so many options offering them, afterwards by digital distribution, by the end of the season for the DVDs. Once again the competition is doing it. TTG has grown a lot, ... it simply is not on their priority list.

c) Experience in a lack of developing games or applications which invlove multilingual versions.

d) I'm aware that this list also contains people which seem to prefer believing almost everything TTG says but that doesn't mean i have to do this as well and throw years of experiences over board. You can do that if i you want to or have them, i won't.

e) I don't think you've brought up good points so far. Sadly discussions in this form on the internet have several disadvantages which you don't have when you're doing these kind of things sitting next to each other, face to face.

f) I say it for the x time, that if translations would have been important to them then we would have seen them since a pretty long time and this is based on several indications/facts which have already been stated above and in other posts before. I'm sure translations due to some reasons aren't in TTG focus and it's not because they aren't do or financeable. There does exist a conflict of interests though.

[Cyphox]

i quote myself here @Pedster

Originally Posted by Cyphox

take movies for example, if every movie sync would be properly, they'd have to reshot the whole movie for every single country they're gonna release a translated version.

so no, i dont think changing facial expressions is neccessary or useful at all

enough crossposting, thats evil

[doggans]

Originally Posted by taumel

@doggans
a) The analogy works, if you get it.

I guess I don't get it, then. No matter which way I look at it, the comparison doesn't work for me.

Originally Posted by taumel

b) If TTG would be really interested in translations then we would have seen them since quite some time. I say this based on my experiences as a gamer, as a developer and as someone how amongst others knows many people doing translations in their daily job as well. On top of that they have so many options offering them, afterwards by digital distribution, by the end of the season for the DVDs. Once again the competition is doing it. TTG has grown a lot, ... it simply is not on their priority list.

Bingo. Translations are not a priority. That DOESN'T mean they're against the idea of doing them; it simply means they have other things on the plate that they view as more important first. I'd be willing to bet that those other companies that offer translations don't offer some other feature that Telltale does offer.

Originally Posted by taumel

d) I'm aware that this list also contains people which seem to prefer believing almost everything TTG says but that doesn't mean i have to do this as well and throw years of experiences over board. You can do that if i you want to or have them, i won't.

I'm not trying to follow Telltale blindly like a sheep, but I have no reason to distrust them. And it just makes sense that if they're not doing translations--something that would expand the game to a wider audience and generate more income--then they have a good reason not to.

Originally Posted by taumel

e) I don't think you've brought up good points so far.

That's fine. Not everybody is going to agree with everybody else's reasoning. But it helps me understand your points better when you explain why my points aren't good, instead of merely saying "you're wrong" and accusing me of "excluding common sense", a statement I found rather insulting.

[Alan Johnson]

Feel free to continue the conversation, but I do not want to see a flame war start in here.

[Strayth]

Bingo. Translations are not a priority. That DOESN'T mean they're against the idea of doing them; it simply means they have other things on the plate that they view as more important first.

Meh, doesn't work, that's what they said for Tales of MI, etc...

If that means we either have to :

- Get it way too late


- Don't get it at all

- Get a horrible job (Sam and Max season 2, that wasn't even dubbed in some places and was pretty outrageously dubbed in some others)

It's not really helping us to wait for BTTF, when we look at what happened to the previous games...

Of course TellTale CAN'T translate themselves, no one is asking them to do so.

But I think they could be a little more regarding and motivated to find the right persons to do the job...

Cause there's not only Americans on earth, that are gamers, adventure games lovers, and BTTF fans ...

It would be like not releasing the Bluray edition in other countries... No point, right ?

I can accept the fact that Monkey Island is being... VERY late, cause it's an "old" licence and now gamers are kinda playing Call of Duty and crap like that, rather than good old Guybrush.. (though I think ToMI did fine, and the special editions sold well)

But as for BTTF, it's just so HUGE.

Moreover, Germans seem to get more "things" than others.

It also seems a german translation is already in the work.

Would be cool if we could hear about Spain France and Italia. (And yes it's arbitrary, but I didn't invent the famous "multi 5" which is Spanish English French German and Italian ... Those markets are pretty similar to the american market, that's why they often get favorized)