Video Game Localization: the Analysis of In-Game Texts

Abstract

Globalisation acts as a driving force to present a variety of commercial products, including games, in different languages simultaneously so that they could reach auditoria and be enjoyed around the globe at the same time. Being the member of the European Union, Lithuania is not an exception in the process of globalisation. With the help of localisation various types of documents, software and products are adapted to the Lithuanian culture and market. However, the industry of game localisation of high or at least acceptable quality is still lagging behind. The aim of the paper is to analyse the application of different translation theories as well as Chroust's localisation pyramid in localisation of video games and to accomplish the empirical research related to localization of the video game Magic Encyclopedia: the First Story. The theoretical part deals with the layers of localisation and the source-orientated and target-orientated approaches to translation. The empirical research analyses the cases of application of source-orientated and targetorientated approaches in the process of the chosen game localisation. The research has revealed that the Skopos theory would be the most suitable tool to be used for game localisation, though the analysis of the translation of in-game lexis of Magic Encyclopedia: First Story mainly relies on Recker's theory of Regular Correspondences.

Reading Aloud in Human-Computer Interaction: How Spatial Distribution of Digital Text Units at an Interactive Tabletop Contributes to the Participants’ Shared Understanding

“…Looking more closely at research on text material being vocalized in participants' reading-aloud actions in game activity contexts, studies show that these so-called ingame texts [3] provide valuable resources for the players' joint goal orientation within the game activity [9]. It can also be found that the way they are located, formulated [10] (and translated [11]) influences the degree of supportiveness for the activity and the way the participants turn towards these written informings and similar activity-relevant information [12].…”

“…Thereafter Ted expands his previous read-aloud turn (l. 7) with a stressed and stretched pivotal marker ('so', l. 9) [see e.g., 24 or 25]. When no one jumps in offering relevant information, Liv makes an account for her understanding of the way (at least) the steering is handled ('it's me who could control it', l. [11][12]. She does that with intonation rising high at the ends of both sentences, prosodically realizing a question for clarification.…”

“…Thereby she keeps on following her exploratory interest of how the steering is conducted, while at the same time responding to the read-aloud accounts of Bob and Ted. As the other two utter respectively share that they are in charge of each 'damage' and 'minerals', she states her understanding of being responsible for the steering 'control' (l. [11][12], and that the two others cannot assist her with that.…”

“…Ted's response is designed for Liv to inform her about his understanding of what she is responsible of ('you have energy control', l. [13][14]. He is, on the one hand, responding to her question raised if her task in this game and player configuration was to control the steering all by herself ('it's me who could control it', l. [11][12], and, on the other hand, providing her with the information about what her personal station's label is actually saying. His account is a paraphrasing utterance, incorporating a readaloud information into the syntax of his utterance (first part: Ted's own speech material, adjusted to address liv: 'you have', and second part: a read-aloud utterance from Liv's control station: 'energy control').…”

Integrating localization into a video game

“…As in Mateusz (2014), video game translation is interwoven with the source code of a particular product. As presented in Šiaučiūnė andLiubinienė (2011), Chroust (2007) elaborates localization as multi-layered process in the form of pyramid performed at different levels:…”