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如何面向世界市场进行游戏本土化设置

发布时间:2013-05-27 15:04:43 Tags:,,,,

作者:Will Freeman

很久以前关于本土化游戏的实践驱散了人们认为这只是游戏翻译的误解。

按照如今全球化游戏产业的快速发展,本土化也需要加紧脚步去适应并扩展它所整合的服务。

但是我们却感觉到本土化仍然落后于现实的发展。

事物一直在发生改变。所以并没有多少时间能让本土化公司去细细考虑过去。他们的视线必须朝着正前方,而随着市场正以指数比例向前发展着,他们也承受着维持质量不断提升的巨大压力。

localization(from qordobatranslation.com)

localization(from qordobatranslation.com)

Testronic游戏服务部门运营副总裁Alastair Harsant解释道:“在过去,本土化被当成是制作最后阶段才附加上去的一个元素,通常不带有任何人为输入并只需要使用翻译工具。”

“而现在,我们必须将任何区域看得与当地一样重要。如果一款游戏需要进行本化设置,你就需要尽最大努力做好这一点。”

值得进行高质量本土化设置的新区域越来越多,而新一波平台的出现也意味着如今的开发者比之前拥有更大的机遇。

Keywords International首席执行官Andrew Day说道:“我们很高兴能看到面向开发市场的游戏本土化的发展(基于电子游戏的渗透来看)。”

“同样的,在过去2年里我们所看到的社交游戏,手机游戏,休闲游戏和免费MMO等向高质量本土化的转变情境也非常鼓舞人心,并向我们证明了在一个充满竞争的环境下,质量永远是最重要的。”

在当前,像Facebook,浏览器以及iOS等平台意味着从地理上来看开发者们可以更轻松地触及更广泛的用户,自我发行和数位发行让工作室们可以跨越更多国家和文化边界而推广自己的作品。

Localize Direct业务开发总监Michael Souto说道:“人们对于本土化的需求正在不断提升着。”

“以前未具有本土化版本的国家现在已经不用愁了。”

Alpha CRC游戏部门业务经理Richard Sturgess补充道:“最近我们发现产业中已经出现了一些改变,即发行商们正在转向新兴市场,也就是不再只是面对着法国,意大利,德国以及西班牙等国家,已经延伸到了波兰,巴西,亚洲以及土耳其等等。”

社交发展

U-Trax总裁兼创始人Richard van der Giessen表示,当更多国家要求特别定制的游戏时,人们就会更加迫切想获得全球性的影响力。

他说道:“我们认为可以在当地创建办事处,并聘请地方语言专家进行翻译和市场营销工作,然后再逐渐扩展内部录音室而实现声音制造。”

除此之外,社交游戏和手机游戏的发展也创造了一种新的游戏定价方式,而这同时也意味着如今的游戏开发者将面临着更多工作和责任。

结合智能手机的普及性,售价为9便士的应用意味着拥有不到5000字对话的游戏值得翻译成一些不是那么常见多语言,因为比起基于原价的AAA级盒装游戏,我们更能够利用如此低价的游戏在新领域中赚得利益。

Universally Speaking的总经理Vickie Peggs说道:“随着浏览器的爆发,在线,iOS和Android市场正从传统‘标准’转向新市场,新区域以及新趋势。”

她补充道:“现在在Facebook上,我们的一些客户都在利用本土化策略将自己的作品翻译成超过40种语言,同时仍在继续推出新内容并进行真人测试。”

“一款真正成功的Facebook游戏可以触及全球超过数千万的终端用户。结合定制盈利策略的成功本土化策略能够为开发者带来巨大的奖励。”

Facebook在不同区域的成功证实了真正优秀的本土化策略对于创造出Peggs口中的“稳定”投资回报是非常必要的。

van der Giessen就社交领域的新机遇说道:“我认为让广大群众基于当地语言使用这些社交媒体将意味着本土化机构的工作量会大大提高。”

“希望这能够粉碎产业中一直存在的一些错误观点,即认为无需转译成荷兰语,北欧语或北印度语等,因为‘当地人的英语也很好。’”

“的确是这样,但是当他们真正在进行社交体验或享受娱乐时,如果缺少本土化,这便意味着反社交性。”

社交游戏同时也提供了基于另一种前景的定位器;也就是“动态”用户翻译,即采取一种潜在的众包方法,让公众进行翻译然后再回到项目中。

本土化专家Xloc的联合创始人兼总裁Stephanie O’Malley Deming认为,这非常适用于社交领域,因为在该领域“内容总是在不断更新与完善,所以这是让粉丝们能够影响自己游戏体验的廉价方法。”

但是我们也必须谨慎地对待Souto所谓的“玩家生成的本土内容”,他提醒道:“你必须保证拥有一个稳定的管理过程,否则整个场面会变得非常混乱。”

但是尽管这具有一定的挑战,但是因为像Facebook等平台都具有世界范围的普及率,所以即使是小型工作室也能够轻松地触及更多语言。

LAI的总裁兼首席执行官David Lakritz说道:“这为本土化呈现出了一种新机遇,但同时也带来了许多挑战,因为我们总是很难在市场上找到合格的语言专家。”

“不过,触及这些新用户并与之进行互动是一种激动人心的体验。”

不是寻常事

让小型工作室能够对自己的游戏进行本土化推广的机遇也是一种正面的开发,不过这也意味着曾经涉及过AAA级游戏的本土化公司现在必须学会面对拥有更少预算的小规模公司。

Day承认:“随着直接发行渠道的不断发展,独立发行的开发者们需要一些特定的本土化服务以及测试供应商,而缺少经验以及有关本土化过程的组织也在双方面前呈现出了挑战。”

不过Babel Media的首席执行官Richard Leinfellner相信,解决方法也在不断适应着这种改变。

他说道,为了适应小型工作室的需求,“我们可以使用技术,巧妙地进行翻译,并理解如何利用客户的预算去获得最大收益。”

Leinfellner建议道:“这也意味着放弃一些语言而去做好其它事,因为糟糕或廉价的翻译只会得罪玩家,并且除了语言还有许多可选择的优秀内容,要知道,用户只需要轻轻点击便可以转变内容提供者。”

VMC Labs的客户解决方案执行者Chloe Giusti主张本土化服务提供者必须具有足够的灵活性与效率,而他们也一直着眼于与小型开发者们开展合作,他说道:“你需要清楚小型工作室需要什么,并理解他们的运行,他们的优先选择以及能力等。作为服务提供者,我们能够支持各种规格的公司。”

Souto也表示赞同:“本土化提供者必须足够敏捷,灵活。”

“现在有越来越多人在制作游戏。我们需要采取最新型的方式去接受,本土化并回归内容。”

除了满足社交游戏,手机游戏和小型创造装备的需求,本土化公司也必须让他们的方法能够适应本土化QA。

根据CD Projekt的本土化专家Mikolaj Szwed(游戏邦注:最近致力于《The Witcher 2》的创造):“报告漏洞不只是关于特定问题的转化,同时也涉及了像截词,关卡的执行,声级等等功能。”

“因为在转化过程中,许多漏洞是看不见的,所以我们必须在执行文本和音频前对游戏的本土化版本进行测试。”

文化化

关于本土化公司的工作实践的另外一大影响便是Universally Speaking的Peggs所说的“文化化”。

Peggs(她认为电子游戏的文化适应“非常激动人心”)说道:“本土化机构所做的基于文化,视觉效果,风格,音频和幽默感的‘文化或全球化内容’其实就是非常微妙的文化变化。”

Peggs说道,在现代思潮中,如果不能从文化水平上深度了解目标市场,那么开发者便不可能创造出成功的游戏。

Peggs表示:“你只需要将《占星学2》当成一个高度优化且详细的本土化项目便可,即包括本土化的脸部和嘴唇同步以及完整的图像资产本土化。”

并不是只有Peggs如此热衷于潜在的文化化过程。

Xloc的O’Malley Deming说道:“地理政治和文化问题一直都是那么吸引人,并在我们的产业中变得更加普遍。关于这些问题我的意思是了解与你的多文化用户相关的政治和文化内容,如此开发者的创造性便有可能得到加强。”

破译未来

展望未来,上述所提到的趋势将继续增加本土化机构的工作量以及多样性责任,同时我们也必须意识到一些智能工具能够保证你们公司在高度竞争领域拥有一个健康且长远的未来。

“在技术领域,我们也拥有了比以前更多的工具,不管是在构建词汇,还是硬件制造商条款的数据库,通过使用工具,我们的客户能够有效地‘签到’并‘查看’文件,并提取与整合文本到游戏中。”

Babel的Leinfellner说道:“这一技术带来了巨大的飞跃,也方便了客户。”

VMC Lab的Giusti也认为,通过将这些工具整合到开发过程中能够进一步发展未来的本土化服务。

Giusti说道:“如今有越来越多人在进行本土化设置,这也意味着我们能够更轻松且更快速地修正漏洞。”

唯一的方法便是积极向上

如果说世界上的所有游戏本土化专家都具有一个共同点的话,那便是乐观向上。展现自己的方法多种多样,业务当然也是蓬勃发展着。虽然还有许多需要做的,但这却不是件坏事。

Testronic的Harsant总结道:“未来真的让人充满期待。云计算和游戏将推翻我们现在所认为的3大区域界限。”

“如此将出现一种新方法让上百万人去访问AAA级游戏,他们也将不再受到硬件的限制。”

似乎,积极性不大可能迷失于翻译中。

本土国际化

有人会说,本土化是推动当下电子游戏全球化的半个过程。

而另外半个过程便是国际化,根据专门研究该实践的公司,这是指创造一个不受地域约束的单一代码库,从而让应用可以无需改变源代码而面向不同区域进行本土化。

国际化公司Lingoport的首席执行官Adam Asnes解释道:“另一种方法便是去适应软件呈现和处理信息的基本逻辑和过程,从而让它能够支持任何语言,文化格式以及数据处理——从用户界面到其余应用部分,如数据库,数据处理以及报告。”

“国际化总是涉及到源代码的改变,而本土化主要是关于用户界面或辅助文件上文字呈现的转变。在对软件进行本土化之前,我们必须先处理国际化。”

尽管有许多涉及国际化服务的公司也打着本土化的旗号,但是Lingoport却拥有自己独特的实践。

地方性知识

一些主要的本土化专家为开发工作室如何与本土化公司合作提供了重要的意见。

Universally Speaking的总经理Vickie Peggs

“仔细选择合作代理,审查他们的在游戏本土化方面的经验,客户合作范围以及合作时间的长短。当你觉得这种选择是合适的话,你应该尝试着与对方建立友好的关系,让他们成为你们团队的组成部分,确保你能够提供一切他们所需要的内容,如此他们才会有效地完成你所交代的任务。”

Keywords International的首席执行官Andrew Day

“尽早在开发过程时提供给本土化服务提供者可多明确的内容。尽管时间表也有可能发生改变,但是事先告知对方可能出现的任何情况总是非常有帮助,这不仅能够让你们交换彼此的看法,同时也能够帮助本土化过程更顺畅地进行着。”

LAI的首席执行官兼总裁David Lakritz

“了解本土化提供者的工作流程,如此你便能够决定如何做才能让该过程更加符合自己的开发渠道。”

MediaLoc的总监Silvia Ferrero

“交流超级重要。如果你能够提供给对方更多有关游戏的信息,那么本土化专家便能够更加轻松地呈现出带有最初理念的作品。”

Testronic的游戏服务运营部副总裁Alastair Harsant

“毫无疑问,交流是维持关系最重要的元素。制作人必须先与本土化公司打好关系,并提供时间轴以及预算限制等信息。同时,本土化公司也需要询问一些适当的问题从而才有可能符合时间和预算的要求。”

本文为游戏邦/gamerboom.com编译,拒绝任何不保留版权的转载,如需转载请联系:游戏邦

Localisation for all the world

by Will Freeman

The practice of localising games long ago shook the misconception that it is merely about the act of translating games.

And yet, such is the pace of today’s increasingly globalised games industry, localisation is constantly moving forward, having to adapt and expand the remit of the services it incorporates.

As a result, the perception of what localisation is still lags behind the reality.

Things are changing, and doing so fast. So quickly, in fact, that there is little time for localising firms to consider the past. All eyes look forward, as the market expands at an exponential rate, and the pressure to maintain quality increases.

“In the past, localisation was seen as an element of a title tacked on at the end of production, often without any human input and using a translation tool,” explains Alastair Harsant, vice president of operations for Games Services at Testronic.

“We are now at the stage where each territory and locale must be seen with the same amount of importance. If a title needs to be localised, then it must be done well.”

New territories worthy of quality localisation are on the rise, and the new wave of ubiquitous platforms mean more opportunity than ever before.

“The increasing localisation of games for developing markets – in terms of penetration of video games – is very good to see,” offers Keywords International CEO Andrew Day.

“Likewise, the very rapid transition to high quality localisation for social, mobile, casual, and free-to-play MMOs that we have witnessed over the last two years is very encouraging, and proof that in a very competitive environment, quality counts more than ever.”

Platforms like Facebook, browser and iOS now mean it is easier for developers to reach wider audiences geographically, and self-publishing and digital distribution are letting studios cross more national and cultural borders than ever.

“As a result the desire and potential for localisation demand has increased,” offers Localize Direct’s business development director Michael Souto.

“There are countries which normally would not have received a localised version at retail but now can.”

“Lately we have seen a change in the industry where publishers are trying to get into emerging markets so it is no longer just about FIGS – French, Italian, German, Spanish – but about including territories like Poland, Brazil, Asia and Turkey for instance,” adds Richard Sturgess, senior business manager of Alpha CRC’s Games Division

SOCIAL CLIMBING

And the more countries there are demanding specifically tailored games, the more the need for a presence globally, insists U-Trax president and founder Richard van der Giessen.

“We feel this can only be done by creating local offices with local linguistic experts for translation and marketing, then gradually expanding with in-house recordings studios for voice production,” he says.

What’s more, the rise of social and mobile has created a new approach to pricing games that also happens to mean there is now a lot more work – and responsibility – for games developers.

Combined with the ubiquity of smartphones, the 69p app means that games of less than 5,000 words of dialogue are suddenly worth translating into less common languages, simply because it is ‘easier’ to make money back with games marketed at such a low price point in new territories than with a full-priced triple-A boxed product.

“Following the explosion of browser, online, iOS and Android markets we are seeing a shift in direction away from the traditional ‘norms’ and recognising a global swing in adoption to new markets, new territories and new trends,” says Vickie Peggs, MD of Universally speaking.

“Currently for Facebook, some of our clients are localising into over 40 languages, all in real time, with continually streamed new content and live testing,” she adds.

“A successful Facebook title can reach tens of millions of end users across the globe. A successful localisation strategy combined with tailored monetisation will allow for enormous rewards.”

As the success of Facebook in different territories can prove to be something of a lottery, good localisation decision making can prove essential to the generation of what Peggs calls ‘solid’ return on investment.

“I expect the power of the masses all using these social media in their own language will mean an increase in work for localisation agencies,” adds van der Giessen on the matter of the new opportunities in the social space.

“Hopefully it helps to finally destroy this false argument that is used throughout the industry for not localising into small and emerging languages like Dutch, Nordic and Hindi, because ‘they all speak English so well’.

“Yes, but not when they are being social or enjoying entertainment. Not localising, in other words, is antisocial.”

Social gaming also provides localisers with another prospect; namely that of  ‘dynamic’ user translations, where a potentially crowd-sourced approach sees translations from the public realm quality assured and managed back into a project.

It applies to the social space, says Stephanie O’Malley Deming, co-founder and president of localising specialist Xloc, because in that space “content is constantly being updated and improved, so this seems an inexpensive way for true fans to have an impact on their own gaming experience.”

However, the use of what Souto calls ‘player generated localisation’ must be treated carefully, he warns: “you will need to ensure you have a solid management process as this could get very messy.”

However, despite the challenges they present, it is because platforms such as Facebook boast a popularity and ubiquity worldwide that the number of languages that are now easily within reach to even the smallest studios has greatly expanded.

“This has presented new opportunities for localisation, but also many challenges because it is often difficult to find qualified linguists in languages in markets that were previously less accessible,” states LAI’s president and CEO David Lakritz.

“However, the ability to reach those new audiences and interact with them is very exciting.”

NO SMALL MATTER

The opportunity for smaller studios to begin localising their games with more reach is certainly a positive development, but it means localisation companies once largely concerned with triple-A games are now having to adapt to meet smaller budgets for studios of a less significant size.

“As direct publishing channels continue to open up and grow, self publishing developers need the services of specialised localisation and testing vendors, but the lack of experience and organisation of the localisation process can present challenges for both parties,” admits a frank Day.

However, the solutions are already in place to adapt to that change, believes Richard Leinfellner, CEO of Babel Media.

Adapting to suit the needs of smaller studios, he says, can be done “by using technology, by translating smart, and by understanding how to use a client’s budget for maximum return.”

“That may mean dropping a few languages to do others well, because a poor and/or cheap translation across a wider group of languages just gets you lots of unhappy players, there is lots of great content to choose from and the customers can switch providers with a single click,” Leinfellner suggests.

“You need to be smart about what smaller studios need and understand how they work, their priorities, and their capacities. As a service provider, we are here to support companies of all shapes and sizes,” adds VMC Labs client solutions executive Chloe Giusti on the matter, who advocates flexibility and efficiency on behalf of the localising service providers looking to work successfully with small developers.

“Localisation providers need to be agile and streamlined,” says Souto in agreement.

“There are far more games and people making games out there than ever before. We need to be able to receive, localise and return the content in the most streamlined way possible.”

Aside from adapting to meet the needs of social, mobile and smaller creative outfits, localisation firms are also having to adapt their approach to localisation QA.

That’s according to CD Projekt’s localisation specialist Mikolaj Szwed, who recently worked on The Witcher 2.

“Reported bugs not only concern translation-specific issues but other functional stuff such as truncations, level of implementation, sound levels, etcetera,” he says.

“It’s very important to test the localised versions of the game as many of the bugs are not visible during translation until the text and audio is implemented.”

CULTURE CLUB

Another impact on the working practices of localisation companies is the matter of what Universally Speaking’s Peggs calls ‘culturalisation’.

“Think of the works that localisation agencies do as ‘culturising or globalising content’, both in terms of text, visuals, style, audio, humour right down to very subtle cultural adaptions,” suggests Peggs, who admits she finds cultural adaptation of video games “incredibly exciting”.

In the modern climate, says Peggs, without having a depth of knowledge of target markets on a cultural level, developers can no longer expect their games to succeed.

“You just need to look at the level of detail StarCraft II as an example of a very highly polished, detailed localised project from localised facial lip synching, to full art asset localisation,” states Peggs.

And the Universally Speaki-ng boss isn’t alone in her enthusiasm for the potential of the culturalisation process.

“Geopolitical and cultural issues are always fascinating, and becoming more prevalent in our industry. By those issues I mean understanding both the political and cultural relevancy of your multicultural audience and how a developer’s creative vision can be enhanced by this understanding,” offers Xloc’s O’Malley Deming. “It’s fascinating stuff.”

TRANSLATING THE FUTURE

Looking further ahead, as the trends discussed above continue to increase the workload and diversity of responsibilities for localising agencies, there is recognition that smarter tools are an essential part of assuring companies in the highly competitive space a healthy and long-lasting future.

“On the technology side, we have in our armoury more tools than ever before, and whether that is building glossaries, or databases of hardware manufacturer’s terms, through to tools that allow clients to ‘check in’ and ‘check out’ files 24-seven, through to great tools for extracting and integrating text into the game.

“It is the technology that is bringing the biggest leaps forward and also savings to the client,” says Babel’s Leinfellner.

And it is those tools, claims VMC Lab’s Giusti, that through being integrated in the actual development process, can future-proof localisation services.

“More people are now doing it, and this means you are making bug fixing a whole lot easier and faster,” says Giusti.

“You still need to provide clean context to your translation team and you still need native language testers to conduct your localisation QA, but the pace of bug fixing and the time it will take your dev team to turn around a clean fresh localisation build is much reduced.”

THE ONLY WAY IS UP

If the world’s games localisation specialists share one thing, it is optimism. The opportunities presenting themselves are manifold, and business is certainly booming. There is a lot of work to do, but that is no bad thing.

“The future seems very exciting indeed,” concludes Testronic’s Harsant. “Cloud computing and gaming will surely push the boundaries o-f what we currently perceive as the three big territories.

“With that will come a new means for millions of people to access triple-A titles, and they will no longer be bound by the limits of the hardware.”

Positivity, it appears, is something unlikely to get lost in translation.

Internationalising localisation

Localisation, some will tell you, is but half of the process of globalising contemporary video games.

The other half is internationalisation, which, according to the firms who specialise in the practice, is the process of making a single code base locale-independent so the application can be easily localised to other locales with no source code changes.

“Another way to put this is that the fundamental logic and processing of how software presents and processes information needs to be adapted so it’s capable of supporting any language, cultural formatting preferences and processing of data – from the user interface on through the rest of the applications parts, such as databases, data processing and reporting,” explains Adam Asnes, CEO of internationalisation firm Lingoport.

“Internationalisation always involves changes to the source code, while localisation primarily involves translation of words presented in the user interface or help files. Before localising software, it first needs to be internationalised.”

While some companies include the internationalisation service under the localisation banner, Lingoport has made the practice its specialty.

Local knowledge

Key localisation experts offer advice for development studios looking to get the most they can from working with a localisation company.

Vickie Peggs, MD, Universally Speaking

“Select the agency you work with carefully, check out their pedigree in games and the range of clients that work with them and the length of those relationship.  Once you feel happy with your selection, engage with them, allow them to be part of your team and ensure you give them everything they need, to deliver back to you an excellent level of work.”

Andrew Day, CEO, Keywords International

“Give the localisation vendor as much visibility as possible as early in the development cycle as possible. Even though schedules are likely to change, advance notice of what is coming up is always valuable and provides a chance for an interchange of ideas and advice to help the localisation process run smoothly.”

David Lakritz, President and CEO, LAI

“Understand the localisation provider’s process and workflow, so that you can decide the best ways to make it fit within your own development pipeline.”

Silvia Ferrero, Director, MediaLoc

“Communicate, communicate and communicate. The more information you provide about your game, the easier it will be for the localisation professionals to get a feel for it and achieve a product that maintains the spirit of the original.”

Alastair Harsant, Vice President of Operations for Games Services, Testronic

“Communication is without doubt the most important single factor in the relationship. The producer must be upfront with the localisation company and provide timelines and budget constraints. Likewise the localisation company needs to ask the right questions in order to meet the timelines and budget constraints.”(source:develop-online)


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