The 'Language Translation Problem'

[JulyForToday]

I was thinking of this as I read the thread about expanding Uru's audience to other countries with different languages.

If we link to an age we have just written, and there are inhabitants in the age, their language would be foriegn to us. So the problem is how do we overcome the language gap that will ever-grow as Age writing expands.

The truth is, if someone who spoke Dutch wrote an age (as is the case with Jonae), they would speak and write in Dutch. So my experience with that age is the sames as if all this Uru and Age stuff was real. I'd walk into their age, and it's all in Dutch! Good for realism. Not so much for accessibility. IC wise, the only plot device that would seem to work relatively okay is if the writer 'conveniently' translated their personal journals for us. Better than Star Trek's universal translator maybe, but barely. And I don't think we can use Farscape's convenient translator microbes in Myst. So either it's a distortion of reality, or some sort of far-fetched story device.



I could say "in New Mexico we speak English, the DRC speaks english, and most explorers do too..." which is generally true. But then I could be terribly mean and say "...if you don't like it, tough. Learn English." Now if that were actually done (to the exclusion of those speaking another language), anyone who didn't know English would be forced into a position that if they really wanted to know that information, they'd need to manually translate the written/spoken content of the game.

What I'm proposing is similar to such a concept (without the being mean part). Instead of putting players in a position of manually translating content (which many people would not be willing to do, myself included), we could have what I guess could be called (for lack of a better name) an "Instant Tanslation" dictionary or device.. or whatever you want to call it.

Basically it's like having a dictionary of the known languages in Uru (meaning human (english, french, japanese, ect) and well known non-human languages (D'ni, narayanese, rivenese (well maybe not rivenese)).

If you really wanted to you could sit down with something written in Latin (Lorem Ispum maybe?), and translate it word for word using a latin-english dictionary, or AltaVista's babel fish.

This device would be nothing more than an instantaneous version of sitting for hours translating something. Storywise, it be as if you did the work to translate with a dictionary and a lot of time. OOC and in respect to the fact that we are playing a game here, it would save *lots* of valuable time that many players may not wish to spend in such a pursuit. Particularly when it comes to human languages. Most of us real fans are willing to translate D'ni, but if something is in italian, and it's not Cyan, I'm really not going to be motivated to translate it. Thats when I whip out the handy-dandy Instant translation, and POW! Now I can read a translation in English.

And as far as character and voice info, it could be like EoA, where the 'speeches' are written down, and then can be translated to your preferred language.

So you'd have a little book down by your Relto book and Journal that would be your overall Lexicon of languages.

This Instant Translation idea will be majority useful for international users with other languages, as it provides a reasonably okay IC and OOC way to get that information into another language. And it can also be used for Non-human languages, but only in the case of learned languages. So if you have *just* linked into an age with natives, it wont do you any good. IC wise..

Technically speaking though, the translations would have to be prepared before the ages release by whoever made the age. Unless we want to incorporate babel fish into Uru.. Which is not a great idea.. lol..

This idea greatly implies that Cyan would have to be the one to incorporate such a feature, and each age would have text info for each language that an age supports. Whether that would be in the pak files, or a separate text file, I don't know.

[Trylon]

The truth is, if someone who spoke Dutch wrote an age (as is the case with Jonae), they would speak and write in Dutch. So my experience with that age is the sames as if all this Uru and Age stuff was real. I'd walk into their age, and it's all in Dutch! Good for realism. Not so much for accessibility. IC wise, the only plot device that would seem to work relatively okay is if the writer 'conveniently' translated their personal journals for us.

Two small things (ok, nitpicking I know ):
- Jonae isn't written in Dutch, it's in German
- Your point is pretty thin with Dutch written ages, since someone who spoke Dutch would in all probability write an age in English. (Germans and Frenchies would be better examples )

About the instant translator - while a good idea in itself (though I'm still keeping my little babel fish ) - I'm not sure how that could be implemented, I don't think we can even do it in the short term and not-so short term. Perhaps we'd better concentrate on actually writing the ages first.

[Gorobay]

To overcome the IC problem of how this works, there could be a new function of the KI. It would scan a piece of text put it front of it, translate it into one of a list of compatible languages, and display it in the big KI screen. This could be accomplished by having a "Texts" list appear on the left (under Buddies and Age Players) with any nearby journals that have translations. (This is similar to how posting on imagers works.) Then, when you click on the journal's name, it sends you a KI called "Translation of Journal Name Here". This obviously wouldn't work unless Cyan changes the KI's display slightly, so I wouldn't count on this one.

Another solution, which makes more IC sense: whenever there is something in a human language, make lots of translation journals nearby. So you'd see a table in a new Age Written by Germans, and it would have a journal on it in German. Then, next to that journal there would be multiple others in other languages.

Both of these involve someone manually translating before the Age is released so they take about the same amount of work, except people might not want their Ages full of translation journals.

[Trylon]

One thing that I'd like to express is the feeling:
Don't impair creativity by all kinds of superfluous though well-meant restrictive rules.

Please do not - even with the best of intentions - impair creativity, by e.g. forcing people to have all sorts of translations in their age - it takes the fun out of agebuilding.

Having ages in multiple languages does add to the diversity.
Most people here speak English - moul itself is in English, so forcing English journals to be translated seems a bit overdoing it. Yes, having a translation feature would indeed be a cool feature, but would it add much to the experience right away?
Just having an age in German or French (no translations) would be fun too, it might help people to brush up on those languages, or motivate them to learn it.
(and, just my opinion, learning an existing language would be more useful than learning D'ni)

Not saying that having translations isn't a good idea, it can add to the experience. But I do think we need to leave the decision of having them or not at the writers of that age. We should guard ourselves against making rules about it, since too many - seemingly arbitrary - rules can take the fun out of writing.

[Gorobay]

I agree with all that, Trylon. Actually I think it would be kind of fun to see an Age all in a language I don't know. (After the initial fun I'd ask someone what it meant, but I'd still like it.) I'm just saying that if a group wanted (not felt forced to make) everything translated, they could use one of those ideas to keep it IC.
How many people in Uru do not understand English? If it isn't a lot I think we should concentrate on other things, and let people translate, or not, whatever they want.

[Whilyam]

My opinion would be that the writer should write in whatever language he or she wants to, but they should be aware that the language they choose to write in will affect who and how many people come to the age and get enjoyment from any texts in the age. Just like there's a Dutch neighborhood I don't drop by (not because I don't like the Dutch, but that I don't speak the language and don't want to make people feel pressured to speak in a way I can understand) the Dutch Ages I might not frequent if most of the Age revolves around texts. I don't think we need a rule about it, though. I think this is one of those things that will sort itself out.

[Jojon]

What COULD be done, is to incorporate a "preferred languages" setting in ULM, having it work exactly as the same one in a web browser. If the writer has provided his/her/their age in more than one language, you automagically get the version available, that corresponds to your highest priority choice.

[Erik]

If a Writer writes his Age in Dutch, then the writer needs to accept the fact that his Age may be visited less frequently than others. I don't see any problems though (especially not in reading Dutch, hehe ), I think it should be the Writer's choice. Language shouldn't be an obstacle to Writers, although it would be nice if the Writer could include a book with translations somewhere in his Age.

EDIT: I just looked in the ULM and it says that Jonae's Age is Deutsch (German!), and not Dutch.

[Trylon]

EDIT: I just looked in the ULM and it says that Jonae's Age is Deutsch (German!), and not Dutch.

That's what I said

I seriously doubt that many ages will be written in actual dutch

[Jennifer_P]

Not saying that having translations isn't a good idea, it can add to the experience. But I do think we need to leave the decision of having them or not at the writers of that age. We should guard ourselves against making rules about it, since too many - seemingly arbitrary - rules can take the fun out of writing.

I quite agree; there's nothing worse than the tons of little arbitrary regulations that rule-makers create to try to replace commonsensical behavior. Having multiple translations of in-game text is a valuable and desireable feature for an Age to have, but not a necessity.