DraSa: Phileasson's Secret - Official Announcement & First Screenshots

Oh, interesting you say this, because NORMAllY, it is vice versa !

I guess you feel good with ANY game as long as it remains in the English language - why bother with the small, unimportant, uninteresting, tiny language-islands of so small, really unimportant so-called "countries" like France, Spain, Poland, Germany, Hungary, or even ANY african languge ?

Sorry, but did you read my post at all?

People, who develop the games, don't translate the games. Even if they do understand and speak other languages fairly well, translating whole texts is a different story. All the more as customers who speak said other language won't be happy if they buy a game at full price and get a bad translation for their money.
So, translations are made and should be made by experts who have the knowledge and vocabulary.

Now, while these experts translate, the developers themselves can work on other stuff. That may be bug fixes or may be new content for an expansion. If they don't work on anything while the game is translated, the translation won't arrive any sooner but all the people who can play the game in the original language have to wait longer to get new content. And the company would delay the development of their own next game.

So what would be the advantage for the people who are waiting for the translation if the developers wouldn't work on an expansion? I see none. Only disadvantages for the people who speak the original language of the game. Even the other customers would have disadvantages in the end because an expansion that is developed later will take even longer to be translated into other languages.
 
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The sense would be in putting as many people as possible on the job of getting the English release out. Currently, we're just P***** off that it's taking so long. I would think that they should have had people working on this 'translation' while the game was still being developed; it is the largest gaming market in the world!! (That's the english speaking market I'm referring to)
Sorry Corwin, in this case Siran is right and you're telling nonsense. ;)

Radon Labs' job is development. When one product is finished they move their people to next. Simply because they need to work to get the bills paid. The only other alternatives would be to fire people, let them run idle or close the company. They always have more than one game in the pipeline, among others the add-on and the real DraSa 2. TRoT is officially DraSa 1.5.

Publishing is dtp's job. We cannot know if they have trouble securing international publishing deals (-> they need partners) or if the late release is a strategic decision because they expect advantages from the delay.

The translation argument by dtp is bullshit. The locas are either already finished or there are reasons why they're delayed.

One thing which could make sense is that dtp wants to release a Gold Edition right away because they know (a) it would be the more complete product and (b) they would have no realistic chance to secure shelf space for an add-on for a niche game.

The official sales numbers are:
DACH: 150k, WW except DACH: 300k. As of last October, so it's probably significantly more now.
The average sales price (resp. the royalties for dtp & RL) was certainly much higher in DACH.

edit: Although the translations and voice recordings are done elsewhere it's quite probable that RL has to integrate them into the game. Which sounds like a terribly boring grind job.
 
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Maybe the problem this time is that the game has a lot more (full?) voice acting than the first, and that takes longer/costs more than the 'first sentence' approach of the first one?
 
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More voice acting would explain it. If it were just text, a full year to do the translation wouldn't make sense.

Hell, I'd prefer just the English text without translated voiceacting myself, if I could get it now. :)
 
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There is actually a LOT of spoken text in it ! It sometimes surprises me myself !
 
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Yes, I know. :lol:

Sometimes I have my "bad grammar days". ;)
 
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Oh, interesting you say this, because NORMAllY, it is vice versa !

I guess you feel good with ANY game as long as it remains in the English language - why bother with the small, unimportant, uninteresting, tiny language-islands of so small, really unimportant so-called "countries" like France, Spain, Poland, Germany, Hungary, or even ANY african languge ?

Why the agro? Nothing said here implies any issues with translating a game into many different languages. The issue is economy of scale. English IS the major language of gaming and thus one would expect a game to be released in that language as quickly as possible to engender SALES!! Working on other translations at the same time should also work; we're doing that with U6P for example. Many of the localisations are well underway by volunteers who are fluent in those languages. Our main world builder Alfie is french and he has nearly completed the french translation. If it can be done by a group of unpaid volunteers, then surely a professional company should be able to do it as well!!
 
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DTP does not have a track record of handling international releases of their games very well, just look at Divinity 2, Venetica and DraSa.
Apparently they don't need the international releases to make a profit.

For Divinity 2 the English version was ready before or at the same time as the German version, still they managed to delay it for months because they were unable to get international publishers in time or maybe they wanted to proof it is selling well in Germany (which takes time) and thus score a better deal with the international publishers.
 
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From what I understand most developers and publishers in eastern Europe and the CIS have problems with getting international publishers and especially when it comes to publishing in English speaking countries. An example is Deep Shadow which came out with 2 games last year and it looks like their international publisher bailed out on them and now it is not sure if White Gold and Precursors are coming out in English.
 
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Glad you reminded me Myrthos, what is happeneing with an English version of Venetica? Haven't heard anything in quite awhile.
 
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I've noticed it has been released in The Netherlands in English (so there is an English version). Dunno about other regions it has or has not been released in. Didn't buy the game though as I still haven't finished any of the games I bought in the last 12 months....
 
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Why the agro?

There are just some things that "trigger me". THEN I get emotional.

I've been angry about non-translated games for many, many years. The image the foreign language creates is not as direct as it would do in my own language.

Try to play a game in any language not ntive too you. Even though you might begin to think and dream in that language (I have no problems whatsoever thinking in English, in fact I do it any time I write a post here), it is not hard-cded8/i].

It is like … software emulation. Not hardware, which is imho much faster, directly connected on he mainboard. The current just flows much, much, much faster than *any* software emulation could ever do.

It's because there's *always* a step between the parts . translating. It might be highl optimized, but it *never* is *actually* hardware. Native.

That's why I have developed my theory programmers with English as their *native* language using keywords in programming languages that are derived from the English language have a slight advantage over *any* foreign people - read: people who do *not* have English as their native language - already 10-15 years before today.

I still hold the belief that programming languages *should* be developed to contain words i the native languages. Because this would speed up the understanding, because the native language is coded "hardware-side" into out brains, so to say.

It is different to me if I say I want to use the keyword "print" or the keyword "druck".

Saying "print line 42" is much more natural to you, if you have English as your first language, than it would be if the needed keyword was "druck zeile 42". Or the same in Español.

Some say "but they re just keywords !", yes, but they re much easier to memorize for people with English as their first language than for foreigners.

And if they are "just keywords", then why don't programming languages use keywords from Esperanto, for example ?

To me, it's always a matter of use of the language, and the processing of it. Any foreign language is "software emulation" to me, which I not ble to create the same, *direct* images in my head than my own language would be able to.

Edit : JUst an example that occurred to me : The name of the current Microsoft Operating system.

It is just called Windows", but to non-English-speaking people it's just a word. Especially if they don't understan English at all.

Translated into the German languge, the OS should be called "Fenster", and the version of it before Number 7 should be called "Aussicht". Same goes for the "Explorer", which should be called "Erforscher". MS Office would be MS Büro", and MS Access would be "MS Zugriff".

It's a bit like "Drakensang": It is almost an "tell-tale" name in the German language, but English-speaking people wouldn't quite understand it - or even ask themselves what this game has to do with drakes ? (You know, the animal otherwise known as a "duck". ;) )

Second Edit : And the word "Ent" just sounds to Germans like a shortened form of "Ente", which means "duck". ;)
 
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When I first saw the title Drakensang, I mentally translated it to Dragon Song. I thought we were getting an opera sung by Dragons! j/k
 
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There are just some things that "trigger me". THEN I get emotional.

I've been angry about non-translated games for many, many years. The image the foreign language creates is not as direct as it would do in my own language.

And what exactly are you attacking me for? I never said that you shouldn't translate games. I only said that it is stupid to expect developers to stop developing the next game while it is being translated into other languages.

Short OT to programming languages: In my company there are working people from all over the world on the same code. How would that work if the language wasn't the same for everybody? Besides: Think of all the code snippets you find on the internet. You wouldn't be able to use the code of a person that doesn't speak your language because you would have to translate the code before you could use it. Bad idea, really bad idea. And almost nobody in the world speaks Esperanto while most people speak at least bad English.

And before you jump down my throat this time: English is not my mother language at all. I started learning it in fifth grade probably the same time you started.
 
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When I first saw the title Drakensang, I mentally translated it to Dragon Song. I thought we were getting an opera sung by Dragons! j/k

I thought it meant Dragon Song too, is that incorrect? I could never figure out what the title had anything to do with the game, even after beating it.

Would someone please enlighten me? What does it really translate to?
 
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It's the name of the mountain the final battle took place on.

'dragon song' isn't that far away, I think. Although it's not 100% precise.
 
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