I'd like to ask for general tips on translating mods.

[Slammer64]

Ok, guys and gals, I'm at my wits end, I'd like to ask all the real modders out there how they do translations and what tools they use. I'm looking for concrete tips to speed up translation of mods, all mods in general and the Japanese ones specifically. I'm using Translation Aggregator from another forum and cut and paste now, how can I speed this up and maybe get a little more accuracy out of my translations?

[Sizustar]

Tes4trans and Egg translator seems to be the popular choice.

 

I'm still trying to get Egg Translator to work for me though.

 

[HanPL]

If if your willing to spend money then buy

http://www.tialsoft.com/multitranse/

 

Im using it and it's great

Also save already translated projects

This will speed up the translating work a lot.

If there will be new release just open plugin with saved project and save changes (and translate new text of course )

[Slammer64]

Ok, HanPL, I bought a copy of MultiTrans, I'll give it a shot.

[HanPL]

It's really good tool to translate mods from japanese/chinese or any other language to english.

[galgat]

Egg translator is very handy, once you understand its limits..

 

It will not recompile script.. and it does not read Pluggy strings, and it misses stuff..Plan and simple.

 

I use a combination of egg, and tes mostly.. with the translator tools of google.

 

and when in doubt, check the condition in tes, and the result box.. these can be very helpful in determining poorly translated text.

 

Then sometimes as I did early when translating the original Lovers and many of the loversPK Mods.. just try to get a feel of what the mod is doing, and ad-lib.

 

Play the mod awhile get a feel for what is happening, and you will see the area's of translation that you missed.

 

and don't over look translating the comments in the script. These can be very valuable in helping you to get a proper translation.

 

also if you have and existing translation of and earlier version of the mod. Export the script text and dialog, and names and so on from it with tes or wrye bash, and then place them back into the newer version, this can save a lot of time.

 

these are the procedure's I use. And they do pretty well.

 

Also track down all the functional Language .dll that will work with OBSE. these help you a lot.

 

And do look closely for places where the Mod has changed name's. when you go to ICMarket district, it would be nice if it said that instead of @%&*((). These are easy fixes, just have 2 Tes4 editors running. and swap between them to get the right name back where it belongs.

 

That is about all I can tell you.. May be it will be a little help.

[Symon]

Galgat has pretty much described how I do it. I'd add:-

"And do look closely for places where the Mod has changed name's. when you go to ICMarket district, it would be nice if it said that instead of @%&*((). These are easy fixes, just have 2 Tes4 editors running. and swap between them to get the right name back where it belongs."

 

This is often a 'dirty edit' You get a feel for them and this edit can often be removed in Tes4Edit. There is normally no need to rename a vanilla cell or object name.

[labrat]

I'd also recommend googling "japanese slang" sites and compiling your own lists of idioms and odd phrases.

 

Another thing I noticed was that the Japanese play with words like we do in english like verrrrrrrrry slooooooooowwwly so look out for doubling and other tricks.

 

One obvious thing I found out early on is the "censor" like ち〇ぽ (chi*po = c*ock) for ちんぽ (chinpo = cock) or マ〇コ (ma*ko = c*nt) for マンコ (manko = even cruder than cunt)

 

 

Sound and other effects also get a lot of play and are hell for automatic translators e.g. ニヤリと笑う (niyari to warau = ) or

うふふ (ufufu = ),

 

For an example of some of these try

さすが処女マ〇コ… キツキツだぜ… Sasuga shojo manko… kitsukitsu daze…

A reeeal stick-at-home virgin's cunt.....sooo tiiight...let's...

 

or

ぎちぎち締め付けて… そんなにちんぽがいいか！

Gichigichi shimetsukete… son'nani chinpo ga ii ka!

[sclisch...sclisch]...[tightening]...my dick feels soo good!

 

'though, translation being more an art than a science I'm sure HanPL would translate that differently.

 

oh, here's a goodie

 

あああああっっ イっ イクううぅぅっっ！！Ā ā a~tsu ~tsu i ~tsu iku ū ~u~u~tsu~tsu! !

Ho...ho...hooooooootttttt! I'm cuh...cuh.....CUhMMING! ....uuhhhh!

 

I've taken the atsui here as a stretched equivalent of 熱い (atsui = hot), a word that crops up quite a lot in these circumstances. Most auto translators just turn this into gibberish. NB. Since G££gle, in their wisdom, have stopped providing a phonetic transcription of non-roman scripts, it's become much less useful as a tool.

 

[Symon]

An excellent description.

You sometimes get some very weird translations out of machines.

One that cropped up again and again in Cursed Armour script comments was "plays the family"

From context, I decided what we had was:-

Plays the family -> player character -> PC

 

I usually play a mod and then make it idiomatic. Literal translations, even when they make sense, often don't come across as believable and are usually very 'not tamriel'.

 

Then there is your style. Do you want 'crude and graphic', 'erotic and sophisticated' or something in between?

You have to remember that one persons erotica is to another, toe-curling!

 

The very worst invitation to have sex I ever heard was from an eighties BBC radio series, "Legal, Decent, Honest and Truthful".

 

The female advertising executive would invite her husband (same job) to have sex with: (look away now if you are of gentle disposition)

"Would Terry Tinkle like to go walkies with Gerty Gusset then?"

 

Ugh!!!!

 

[Slammer64]

Many thanks all, and Symon, you made my day..............Gerty Gusset indeed!