Teams and translation quality Options

[Baronius]

First of all, I would like to react to Rigel's post (see the general part of my post in its last paragraphs):

it's mold in the meaning of "moisissure" in French. That is why the golem is green.

I began modding by making my own trad of The Grey Clan cause i really liked it and was thinking "wow it's one of the greatest mod ever why its not already traduced in french!!!" and despite the fact that the Doghmatiques where working on it already with your agreement (i'm a rebel). So i've made the trad of The Grey Clan quite entierly and i traduced "mold" after big brainstorming by "moisissure " like you say . In the french current trad made by the Doghmatiques "mold golem" is traduced by "golem de mousse"; "mousse" means its like a bob sponge golem or something like that ; i'll speak about that detail to Graoumf the coordinator of the Doghmatiques or maybe you can change it yourself in the .tra if you want Baronius, after all it's your MOD; however the trad is good and it's a detail !

Here one exemple of a line from the current trad :

@77 = ~Animer le Golem de Mousse~

Too bad for The Grey Clan Episode 2 but maybe a day ! I know it's hard work to mod and it takes so much time...

See you one day when i'll got to ask for a prefix and i wish the best to you and BWL

Thank you for your kind words and reassurance about GCE2. One day when I both have enough time and motivation/mood to prefer (i.e. to give better priority to) GCE2 and my modding, I might return to it.

About the mold golem: yes, inform Graoumf about it, so they can update their own translation. I will update in GCE1 in the next update I'll release (I don't know when it will be; probably not in the near future), I think I have other things to include in it anyway (such as the Russian translation); currently, these things are available through the GCE forum to players.

The general part. My principles about translations:

• I find quality important in every respect (especially with the technical design and implementation of mods), however, I have no time to deal with translation verification. (It would be quite complicated to get reliable help for each given language, to get the quality of translations verified, which teams to prefer etc., it just wouldn't be worth it, obviously.) So I trust the skills of the translators who translate the mod to their own language.
• Due to the above, I usually say yes to the first translator who would like to translate my given mod (and unless there are serious counter-arguments to it, this translation will be considered the "official" one included in the mod).
• While I don't intend to spend time with the translation aspect (generally, I don't intend to -- and mostly cannot -- spend much IE modding-related time), I'm open to examine individual cases. So if a person believes that the team has made a really poor work in a translation to his/her language (or just has some suggestions) and his/her requests have been ignored by the original translator(s), he or she can contact me. As far as it's possible, I will examine these cases to find an alternative (for example, even my mod can contain two translations in the same language, and players can choose; of course, these are exceptional cases).

[Graoumf]

We dithered a long time for this term, as Rigel. I would like to say it's not just a mistake from us.
Basically, Mold could be translated by "moisissure" or "humus" in french (the effect or the effect's consequence). If the golem has some acid's attacks, "moisissure" is better (and "Golem de humus" sounds strange to ears).

But you must know that some french words have many meanings in english. I want to say that for one word in french, there is several translations in english. It's due to the fact that our words are allowed by an entity (The French Academy) -> there is maybe 800 00 words allowed in french for some millions in english.
"mousse" for exemple is translated in english by : moss, foam and others... http://www.wordreference.com/fren/mousse ; it couls be "mousse" on a beer, the effect of a soap in a bath, and "mousse" can also be an effect of the "moisissure".
"moisissure" by mold, mould, mildew. This french term could designate terms in green, white (some rinds of cheese, as camembert, for example: you say rind, we say "moisissure") or brown... for me, "moisissure" is between white and brown.

If we must change our translation for one man, for each mods, well... it will be endless. Because all people will report some typos then, because they would translated such a word, or such a sentence differently. That's why I think it's better to talk about terms' problems between french people, before reporting it to a modder who isn't french and don't know, generally, all the subtility of the french language, which is natural.
About this word "mousse", Rigel was the only one to report in one year. As I say above, we have dithered a lot for this translation. Our choice was made (and I'm still thinking that "mousse" is the better term, because "mousse" can also be an effect of the "moisissure" in its organic behaviour and green attitude), and we wouldn't have changed the translation for one man.

To summarize, after all is said and done, modders must trust translators, or it would be endless.
The d'Oghmatiques are enough serious to change their translations if there is a typo. But it's not the case, here, according to us. But we can change if you want, it's not a problem.

Edit : I'm sorry if my tone could seem abrupt (it's not the goal, but english is not my mother language), but I'm not someone who sticks up some ideas with sugarcoat arguments. I would have to make this post before, I'm sorry, but it took me 2 hours to write it... if we must explain every time like this, it would be also endless. In french, it would take me 15 mn.

This post has been edited by Graoumf: Nov 22 2009, 01:19 PM