LocJAM 2 Barcelona Workshop

Carme Mangiron

Friday, 27th February, 11-13 h, UAB

LOCJAM

• Started in 2014.

• Non-profit videogame translation contest.

• Organised by

– Team GLOC (Alain Dellepiane)

– Localization SIG of the IGDA

– IGDA Japan Chapter

OBJECTIVES

• Spread the word about game translation

and localisation.

• Open the door for translators wanting to

specialise in this field.

• Have fun!

PARTICIPANTS LOCJAM 2014

LANGUAGE AMATEUR PROFESSIONAL TOTAL

CastilianSpanish

99 87 186

Italian 97 37 134

French 23 37 60

German 18 24 42

LA Spanish 29 13 42

Japanese 14 6 20

TOTAL 280 204 484

LOCJAM 2

•22nd February to 1st March at 23.59 (Greenwich Mean Time)

•Do not leave it to the last minute to avoidproblems with the website

•Languages: EN, FR, GE, IT, JA, SP, LA SP, RU, BP

COMPETITION

• Only one entry for participant

• Amateur vs. pro categories

• Prices: studio tour or diploma

GAME

GAME

• Interactive story similar to the Choose yourown adventure books.

• Developed with Twine.

• 5000 thousand words, but some repetition in the Inventory in the second part.

GAME

• Requires Mongoose editor to view it.

• Character encoding UTF8

• Text with code tags.

• Work with Notepad++ or Sublime Text (set View>Syntax>Regular Expression to clearly

differentiate translatable text and control codes).

TEXT WITH CODE

• \n, text within <<>> and codes like tt42 tags are control codes used by the game and should not be modified for the translated version.

• KITCHEN:\n\n[img[kitchen-hat]]\n\n"YAY WE FOUND IT!"\n\n[img[Poor Torn Hat|badhat45]]\n

LOCALISATION PROCESS

• Familiarisation

• Glossary and style guide

• Translation

• Editing

• Integration

• QA

• Submission

FAMILIARISATION

• Game mechanics

• Theme

• Characters: Emi, a little girl, and hergrandfather

LANGUAGE

• Literary and descriptive language

The dusty, bittersweet smell of weatheredbooks and century-old furniture waftedthrough the door as Emi and Grandpaentered Grandpa’s office.

LANGUAGE

• Dialogue with colloquial language

• “Hurray!” Emi said. “We had an amazingadventure, didn’t wee, Grandpa? And I reallyhelped, right? I hope you are proud of me!”.

• You have a reeaally creepy shed, Grandpa.

• Just kidding! Hehehe.

LANGUAGE

• Terms of endearment

– Grandpa

– Little one

LANGUAGE

• Options for players

• Could you fix my hat now, little one?

• Read the last entry in my diary.

• Look in the fireplace.

• Oh, never mind then.

SYSTEM MESSAGES

• Emi obtained Poor Torn Hat.

• Next.

• Emi fixed Grandpa's hat.

ONOMATOPOEIA AND INTERJECTIONS

• Hurray!

• Hmmm…

• Oops

• Ew!

• YAY WE FOUND IT!

• Aww, it’s okay, Grandpa!

VERBAL TENSES

• Combination of present and past

Emi and Grandpa are outside the familymausoleum. A grim atmosphere surroundedthe ornate structure.

INVENTORY

• Humour, alliteration, play-on-words, creativity

– Muddy Yucky Paddle

– Weird Metal Thingy

– Poor Torn Hat

– Big Bad Crowbar

– Teeny Tiny Key

– Colorful Wacky Thread

CULTURAL REFERENCES

• Begin teatime

• Boogeyman

• Fedora

ORTOTYPOGRAPHY

• Inverted commas for dialogues in English vs. long hyphen(raya) in Spanish.

—¡Qué le vamos a hacer! —exclamó resignado Ash.

—Está bien —dijo Misty—; te acompañaré.

—¿Puedo irme ya? —Se puso en pie con gesto decidido—. No hace falta que me acompañe. Conozco el camino.

http://buscon.rae.es/dpd/srv/search?id=kyRrDVgsOD6Xup8Dpt

TRANSLATION STRATEGY

• How to make your translation stand out?

• Idiomatic language

• Literary register

• Creativity (inventory)

• Correction: extremely important!

EDITING

• Review the translation thoroughly.

• Read it aloud to make sure it sounds natural.

INTEGRATION

• Just save the file.

• Do not change the file name.

• Choose Translate in game title page to load your translation.

QA

• Play the game several times, to make sure you view all the text on screen.

• If you can, get somebody else to play it as well and take their feedback on board.

• Check for spelling mistakes, style issues, inconsistencies, etc.

• Correct any issues in the file, save it and load the game again.

QA

• Check any errors that you corrected, to make sure they appear OK.

• Copy and paste your final translation onto a word processing tool in order to spell-check it.

• Upload the final file. Only one entry for participants. Good luck!

• Winners will be announced in May, picked by a jury made of specialised game localization agencies.

Jury of LOCJAM 2014

• Criteria for choosing best translations

• Correctness: no

• grammar or spelling mistakes.

• Style: naturalness

• Humour

• Creativity

• Cultural adaptation

• A translation that feels like an original

• Maintain suspension of disbelief

MORE INFORMATION

• IGDA LOC SIG’s group in Facebook

• Frequently asked questions

• Official chat

PHOTO COMPETITION

• Tweet event photos with #LocJAM2 and #itranslateworlds to win a classic Nintendo Famicom

Questions and discussion