About translations

^{This is the “Plakan Manta” according to the publisher}



We are constantly translating board games here, and I am participating quite lively in this. Because, for example, I can not bear to explain the “night table” with gestures or to draw a “base camp”.



Recently, a small packet of rakes has accumulated, which may be useful to you.

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Names in the examples



Almost everyone understands that Alice, Bob and other alphabetical comrades should participate in the examples. At the same time, in the mnemonic system there are still characters Eve and Mallory, which do not fall into a sequence, because this is Eavesdropper and Malicious attacker, that is, passive and active intruders. In our mnemonic system the intruder plays Zinovy, which often gives a special chic to the translation of examples.



Guess the word



The most frenzy is an attempt to translate games for guessing words. A literal translation turns such a game into a branch of hell. Full work requires 4-5 passes through the entire database of names, that is, simply incredible patience. I twice played words on words before entering the Russian market, and now I know what serious mistakes even the biggest players make.



The first classic rake is a translation into the exact term. Here you need to catch all the situations when one Russian makes two Russians out of one word. For example, the same basecamp or something like that. Sometimes they can be rolled up into one single word that a Russian person can understand: you can still make a "BMP" out of the "infantry vehicle", but more often it is better to replace it with a similar one.



The second problem is the choice of the word to be guessed from the extremely rarely used part of the lexicon. For example, it is very difficult to distinguish tights from the trousers when showing gestures - and it would be better to translate them as “trousers”. Here, too, the check is fairly simple - you can drive all the words into Yandex.Wordstat with a bundle and check the frequency of their mentioning. If it is below a certain threshold, then it is necessary to search and choose the one that is suggested by Wordstat as a relevant request.



The third problem is polysemy. Chopper - this is a knife, and a helicopter, and a bike. It’s not a fact that the translator saw the picture when he translated the word, so you should definitely look through the finished publication for such surprises.



Currency and units



Obviously, you need to translate them into SI units understandable to the player. Almost all translators understand this, but in the quiz “Bet” we have a problem with humanitarian education. The fact is that many people confuse weight and weight, as well as numbers and numbers. Therefore, on the last pass, I had to, for example, brush questions like “What is the weight of the fattest cat in the world?” And replace it with “What is the weight of the fattest cat in the world?”.



Another problem is the translation of invented currencies such as space loans: the word “credit” itself has too many meanings in Russian, so we try to replace them with something like a space-ship.



Big Letters



Suppose there are five characters in your game — for example, a captain, a major, a lieutenant, and two ensigns. So, for some reason, translators regularly forget that in Russian many words, as written in small letters, continue to be written. If you see in the rules of the game Captain, Markers of Damage or Experience Points, you should know - it is the translator first to blame, and then the proofreader.



At the same time, by the way, the Rabitz grid, the Gatling gun and the Maxim machine gun are obliged to the names Karl Rabitz, Richard Gatling and Hyrum Maxim (and Maxim is generally a German last name).



Proper names, names and terms



Quite a difficult part of the translation - to think through a through dictionary of game terms. The procedure is as follows: to begin with, a couple of books are read from the subject area of ​​the game. For example, about submariners, fire or nuclear development, if the game is about that. Then all the gleaned terms are compared with the game. We so recorded “yellow cookies” - uranium ore, which in professional literature is called just yellow cake, without translating the second part. Or, for example, there was a “specialist in gas removal in case of a fire” - we have this person called a gas and smoke protector. From the same places grow all sorts of "car operators" instead of drivers.



On the other hand, quite often the names and abbreviations contain important plot information. I will give an example from a real IT practice - we somehow long ago by no means accidentally handed over the “Vehicle Management and Control System”, knowing that drivers will call it by the first letters simply intuitively.



It is often difficult to translate gaming terms. The most ridiculous example I saw was “Hot seat”, that is, “Hot seat” (according to the rules, this is the one who answers the quiz question now). Here it is important that the translation be related to the gameplay - for example, due to the inability to adequately transfer the term, we simply introduced the concept of “active player” familiar to other games. The meaning is not lost, the translation is smooth.



The names of the authors, we also began to translate from some point. In the original language we indicate at the end of the rules, and in Russian letters on the box. Otherwise, this is not a name, but a rebus. The key point is to ring the voice to the author himself and find out how exactly the name is pronounced.



Character names



The names of the characters in the games are a song. The fact is that the authors often break away from them, conveying character. I love to remember the translation of the game "Overboard!", Where there is a gopovat sailor named Frenchy. There is a whole gamut: both sea origin, and the criminal past, and a little thug attitude. In general, it appeared scoop.





^{Here is this hero}



But Dr. Harter did not give up - there were options with Kostoprav and Dr. Lecturer, and the like, but they did not. On the other hand, I imagine how difficult it will be to translate our Vasya Kursky and Sasha Central to English.



Oh, by the way, about the characters. Did you know that Schrödinger had a cat, not a cat, but lost its gender in translations?



Quiz questions



A separate topic is the translation of quizzes. The first localization approach, of course, is understandable: for example, if the question is “How many turkeys are slaughtered in the country for Christmas”, then it is better to replace it with something more understandable like “How many Easter cakes are eaten in the country over Easter.” There are often questions about local rock stars, actors, and so on - also direct substitutes for our comrades. Sometimes questions are connected with local customs or norms: it is better to replace them altogether. For example, it is rather difficult to estimate how much a hot sauce of Tobasko is eaten by a resident of Cuba, but rather easily - how much vodka our compatriot drinks in a year.



The second aspect is more interesting, and it concerns most often American quizzes. The fact is that it is necessary to localize not only the game itself, but also patriotism. For example, the questions "Who was the first man on the moon", "When was the Gettysburg battle" or "How many aircraft carriers in our fleet" are waiting for you, but you will never find the questions "Who first flew into space" or "When we retreated from Vietnam. But about other countries, the questions will be simply excellent: “How much Russian is on average in prison,” “What percentage of Mexicans are criminals,” and so on. It is important to have a sense of proportion - and leave reasonable questions about America, from time to time replacing hurray-patriotic. You can not do this, but I just really don’t like it when they are trying to export culture to us too. Therefore, in the localization of “Bet”, there were questions about Gagarin and Tolstoy, for example.



Component Names



As a rule, each object has its own name. For example, in Alcatraz there are “locations” —cards of separate prison blocks — the direct translation of “places” does not reflect the essence very well, but I do not want to leave a crudely borrowed word. Therefore, the translation - "rooms". A similar story with “token”, “tile” and “meeple”. You need to look at the situation. The first is most likely a marker or a token, the second is a token or something similar, and the third is a figure.



Tiles, for example, almost always succeed in tying to gaming reality, so that additional terms for the player do not appear - for example, if we are talking about ship module tiles, then they should be called modules, and if about submarine compartments, then, accordingly, compartments . The difference is: “Put 4 gangster chips on each city map” and “Put 4 gangsters on each city”. The first is more definite, but with the high complexity of the game, it gradually begins to resemble mathematical analysis, and the second is easier to read and understand, but if used incorrectly, it can introduce uncertainty. It is necessary to decide on the situation.



Rod



For example, there is a base for 2000 words, you need to translate into Russian. We look at the rules, it turns out, players need to add an adjective to each word to explain, and the words are secret. In Russian, adjectives (unlike the original language) convey a genus, for example, “red” and “red”, which is already a direct hint for players. The solution is either to change the rules, or, as we have done, take the entire base of words and translate as strictly as possible into the male gender, and, accordingly, make a bunch of substitutions.



Specialist check



Even after the transfer of profile games, we almost always give rules for proofreading to the representative of this profession. For example, before transferring Flashpoint, we already knew that there was little that could offend a specialist like “Firefighters rolled out the hoses” - not “firefighters”, but “firefighters”, and, in general, judging by the context, they stretched hose lines.



When Steam Torpedo came out, we sent the rules to this submariner. As it turned out, we almost didn’t mess up - he just replaced the “cabin” with the “central post”. But at the same time our expert, alas, did not understand that the game about the invented world of steampunk, and gave a detailed technical justification why the Gatling gun with one of the cards will not shoot under water. Never.



PS Now tell, if not difficult, what are your rakes with translations.



PPS Beerlander from comments has published the topic about software translations.