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GDC: Localizing Star Wars: The Old Republic

The 2011 Game Developer Conference takes place this week and as scheduled, the first of BioWare's panels discusses Localizing Star Wars: The Old Republic called "Localization and Development: A Love Story...That Leads to Great Business!" Gamasutra brings us the details of this talk on Localization lead by Gordon Walton of Playdom (formerly Co-Studio Director of BioWare Austin) and BioWare's Localization Representative Ian Mitchell.

"We have dedicated teams building our localization toolsets," he said. "I can't stress enough how important it is to have good tools. [If not], your process can't be facilitated and it makes it impossible" to get the development team to work with you.

The tools are built "to empower the localization team"; it's a cross-project tool suite because this "encourages reuse and helps sharing of knowledge" He describes BioWare's localization tools as "an organic construction of tools that build on one another."

Check out Gamasutra for the article in its entirety.

Comments

  • Siros's avatar
    Jawa Trader
    • Posts: 717
    #12 Siros Posted 3/2/2011 10:04:49 PM
    I'lll go for the english version, years of denglish in EQ2 are enough to not even try it. I got friend which never had english in school and for them it's actually a good help to get into it. Still... good luck with the "right" localization, it's really hard to get it right.
  • Elkesai's avatar
    Jawa Trader
    • Posts: 230
    #8 Elkesai Posted 3/2/2011 4:40:21 PM
    I admit that I'm not a marketing person, and by no means an expert on the gaming market. But, wow, this article was one of the worst written. They go on and on about how important localization is, repeating everything several times, but they never actually talk about localization (at least, not in layman's terms)! "You have to do this and you have to do that." Okay, how? In what way? Why? How does that lead to a better game/more money?

    It's like:

    Step 1. Localization.
    Step 2. ?????
    Step 3. Profit.

    ...Except maybe "Localization" really is the ?????.

    As I said, I'm not an expert (perhaps it's my lack of interest, I don't know), so when I thought maybe they would open with, or at least give somewhere, a brief explanation of what localization is, maybe that wasn't logical. I had to think on it, and wow, I came up with the meaning all on my own, because you can't even glean the meaning because of its context anywhere in this piece. I looked it up on wikipedia, and there is a really nice article on it there. Far more interesting. And now I can put this Gamasutra piece in perspective. Shouldn't they have done that already?

    If you can't get quotes that aren't in marketese, how about translating? After all, that's part of an article writer's job (in my opinion).

    Wow, look at all those words. Maybe I should relax a bit. I know, TLDR.

    And yes...picture fail.
  • Mentok's avatar
    • Posts: 0
    #9 Mentok Posted 3/2/2011 5:13:12 PM
    It's the complete translation of a product: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Language_localization

    But a good localization is more than that. There are so many jokes and nuances that only work in the language the author has written it. And it's up to the localization team to make that work in another language. That includes: voice over, handbooks, tooltips, quest text etc. everything you can think of.

    It's important because in many many countries there are many many lazy students who forget all their school english and never touch the English language past the 10th grade. But when the developer goes the extra mile to do localization they open up a huge market that otherwise wouldn't have touched the product. The quality of it all is very important. You know if something was translated by a good author or by a student who minored in language X.

    I.e. France, Spain, Germany, Japan...
  • Elkesai's avatar
    Jawa Trader
    • Posts: 230
    #10 Elkesai Posted 3/2/2011 6:41:24 PM
    Thank you.

    Yep. I now know that it's important, and understandably so. But that article did nothing to really say much about what it is in the first place (as far as game development), as you did there to a degree. If they say something's important, but I don't know what it is, how do I know it's important, and what do I care?

    It's like procedures you read at a new job you have no experience with, and they were written by someone who knows everything about it and has assumed the reader does, too.

    It wasn't the fact that it's important, but rather what the hell it was in the first place. Why make me guess? I might've thought it was about servers and localizing them to specific zones. But it's really about making the game suitable for play in particular geographic areas.

    Conclusion: article was poorly written.
  • Jaramukhti's avatar
    Jawa Trader
    • Posts: 782
    #11 Jaramukhti Posted 3/2/2011 9:33:40 PM
    GDC is by game developers for game developers. Everything anyone says at GDC is coming from the position that you are already familiar with the concepts of which they are speaking---because they are speaking to fellow game developers who already know all their abc's.

    Almost any article you read from GDC is going to read like ancient Egyptian if you aren't already familiar with the meaning of localization, and various other forms of business and tech-speak. That goes doubly if the article is pretty much just a transcript of what was said during the conference (which Gamasutra's article was, in all honesty).
  • Dejarik's avatar
    Jawa Trader
    • Posts: 190
    #6 Dejarik Posted 3/2/2011 3:29:52 PM
    When I see reports of countless thousands of young educated people fleeing Ireland because the country is essentially bankrupt, it does give me pause about the decision to place EU localisation in Galway.

    I realise it was the place to be before the bank crash because of tech company tax breaks but now...?

    I apologise in advance to any Irish readers if the UK news has misled me on this one :P
  • Hardradi's avatar
    Gamorrean Thug
    • Posts: 48
    #13 Hardradi Posted 3/3/2011 12:37:14 AM
    Not sure why it gives you a pause. To my mind, I thought it would make it easier for BioWare to find good, competent staff quickly as there may not be as many other job opportunities for folks. Of course, my assumption is that many/most of the folks are leaving do to lack of personal opportunity.
  • Anticleric's avatar
    Jawa Trader
    • Posts: 250
    #3 Anticleric Posted 3/2/2011 9:40:31 AM
    It's a big pain in the butt for the devs. I've worked on a few titles that needed localization. Germany was always the worst. You're not allowed to kill people in German games... so every reference to people being killed has to be changed to robots, aliens or zombies. Not sure if that's still the case... but ya.. pain in the butt.

    In the case of the enormous games that BioWare makes, you would probably be better off paying for English lessons for everyone that buys the game.
  • Mentok's avatar
    • Posts: 0
    #4 Mentok Posted 3/2/2011 11:58:40 AM
    Well that depends on the age rating you're shooting for. If it's 18 and over you can do a lot. But no swastikas!
  • Mentok's avatar
    • Posts: 0
    #5 Mentok Posted 3/2/2011 12:06:50 PM
    Actually I can't think of an MMO that had to change something based on a age rating. Since MMOs are regarded as addicting they get treated differently and have automaticly a higher age rating then say a fantasy rpg. And since you need a bank account with certain credit cards for the subscription fees you need to be at least 16 anyway. Unless of course Mom & Dad pay for that.
  • sgtsavage's avatar
    • Posts: 0
    #2 sgtsavage Posted 3/2/2011 8:05:04 AM
    Picture FAIL. Really? They could not put up a suitable TOR Screenshot... instead they have a KOTOR 2 one... I bet there will be 10+ stupid comments now saying "Man, I wish they would have made KOTOR3 instead of this MMO ... do you guys think they are still going to make KOTOR3 after they finish making the MMO?" OMG just wait.

    Where is the localization in Chinese and Japenese for our Asian gaming friends?
  • MechaGodzilla's avatar
    • Posts: 0
    #7 MechaGodzilla Posted 3/2/2011 4:09:10 PM
    picture fail indeed
  • Mentok's avatar
    • Posts: 0
    #1 Mentok Posted 3/2/2011 5:57:36 AM
    Huh, interesting. I'd rather have them spend that money on other stuff. Every "hardcore" gamer I know plays MMOs in their original English version. In some cases I have gone out of my way to import them if it wasn't possible any other way. I get angry when there is no English version included in the games. (I'm looking at you Halo)
    When the MMO that shall not be named first started there was no localized version and people played it anyway.

    But it's true I guess that localization opens up the game for a larger audience. I doubt that the silver surfer generation of gamers would've picked up a English only MMO.
  • agentwred's avatar
    Jawa Trader
    • Posts: 298
    #14 agentwred Posted 3/3/2011 3:37:13 AM
    Not to mention that the voice over and story is very important for the game. That can't be truly appreciated in a different language. Localized versions of this game is more important than a localized version of EQ or even the early WOW.
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