We are looking for Chinese version bg2ee

socata

there is thousands player in China looking forward the Chinese language version of bg2ee.

According to steamspy, Chinese player is the vital buyer of gta5(nearly 1/5 of the global market). We don't pay for all games, but we do pay for some games of greatness, like gta, civ, or dota2.

We are sincerely looking for the chinese version of bg2ee. As a English translator in China, it's not that hard for me to finish the whole game in English version(actually I have finished the whole games 10th times). However, it's pretty hard for me to introduce the game for more people without the Chinese language version game.

As I have mentioned, I am a english translator in China. If there is anything I can do to help the production of chinese version bg2ee, please let me know. Just give me some txt of the game script or something, and we all try our best.

Anyway, please let Chinese community know what's going on and what's the hard part, and we will see what we can do.

socata

There is a Chinese forum of BG, If you can read Chinese, you may also vist there:

http://tieba.baidu.com/f?kw=博得之门&ie=utf-8

If you need translator or something, you may contact me.

Anyway, we only hope know an expanation about what's going on, and see what we can do to help.

NameLessOne47

We want to know what's going on about the Chinese Translation Project. About one and a half years ago you guys said that the project had almost finished with 85% completion. As far as I'm concerned, inthel's Chinese translation group should not have any time frame problems regarding the translation. I know a lot of Chinese hesitated to buy bg2ee just because of the translation issue.

gorgonzola

Welcome.
I don't know if Beamdog is interested in selling its games in the Chinese market or tho put the effort of having a Chinese localization. I am just and Italian player.
But if I would be Beamdog I would find what you tell sound, just beware that this forum has very strict rules against digital piracy and in the past an administrator told to a new member living in India, where the games are not distributed, that even if some game producers chose to allow piracy in the lands where they chose to not distribute, Beamdog's policy is not so. But as you are talking of finding a legit way to have the games available in China, with a proper localization, I see no problem, this is not supporting piracy...

I don't know why you post here, in the Italian boards, and suggest you to move the topic in the English speaking boards, you can do it using the edit button, here almost everything is written in Italian language and I suppose that the staff members of Beamdog (company, not forums) leave to the Italian moderator the task to read.

But as now we hare here I can tell you that it seems to me that, if Beamdog chose to have a localization their policy is to find a volunteering team of native speakers of that language and to give them all the work of translation, then the work already done is passed to Beamdog that do the coding work to have the localization working. I am not a member of the Italian translation team, but afaik, they are not payed for the work.

So, if Beamdog will be interested in a Chinese localization I suppose that you will have to find a Chinese volunteering team reliable and capable to do the translation work. But as I told you I am not Beamdog, I have no influence at all on their marketing strategy, I only tell you how the tings work for the Italian localization.

Edit: When I was writing my post @NameLessOne47 posted and the topic was also moved to the English section.
and I did not know that a Chinese Translation Project still exist.

yhl533556

Ten years ago, I was young, playing BG at that time, now I am old, because of this there is no Chinese version I can already browse the English Forum.

I don't want to wait until I was 80 years old when my grandson told me that BG2EE has a Chinese version finally !

socata

gorgonzola said:

Welcome.
I don't know if Beamdog is interested in selling its games in the Chinese market or tho put the effort of having a Chinese localization. I am just and Italian player.
But if I would be Beamdog I would find what you tell sound, just beware that this forum has very strict rules against digital piracy and in the past an administrator told to a new member living in India, where the games are not distributed, that even if some game producers chose to allow piracy in the lands where they chose to not distribute, Beamdog's policy is not so. But as you are talking of finding a legit way to have the games available in China, with a proper localization, I see no problem, this is not supporting piracy...

I don't know why you post here, in the Italian boards, and suggest you to move the topic in the English speaking boards, you can do it using the edit button, here almost everything is written in Italian language and I suppose that the staff members of Beamdog (company, not forums) leave to the Italian moderator the task to read.

But as now we hare here I can tell you that it seems to me that, if Beamdog chose to have a localization their policy is to find a volunteering team of native speakers of that language and to give them all the work of translation, then the work already done is passed to Beamdog that do the coding work to have the localization working. I am not a member of the Italian translation team, but afaik, they are not payed for the work.

So, if Beamdog will be interested in a Chinese localization I suppose that you will have to find a Chinese volunteering team reliable and capable to do the translation work. But as I told you I am not Beamdog, I have no influence at all on their marketing strategy, I only tell you how the tings work for the Italian localization.

Edit: When I was writing my post @NameLessOne47 posted and the topic was also moved to the English section.
and I did not know that a Chinese Translation Project still exist.

Sry for trouble. I am a new comer of Beamdog forum. Because I am not familiar of this forum, I mistakenly sent this post in Deutsch category.

FYI, it's pretty easy to buy Chinese version of bg1ee, and the origin version of bg1/bg2 have been introduced in China for almost 20 years.

Anyway, thanks!

mf2112

Welcome to the forums, I don't know what the status of the Chinese Translation Project but we do in fact have a Chinese forum here: https://forums.beamdog.com/categories/chinese. I wish you good luck with getting the full translation completed so you can enjoy the game more fully. The game dialog is is in the dialog.tlk file, under here normally.C:\Program Files (x86)\Baldur's Gate Enhanced Edition\Data\00766\lang\en_US\dialog.tlk or C:\Program Files (x86)\Baldur's Gate Enhanced Edition\Data\00766\lang\zh_CN. If you can get it done, you might tag @JuliusBorisov our forum administrator using the @ sign followed by his name, he may be able to get the translation to the right people in Beamdog.

JuliusBorisov

@socata Here's an official answer:

If a localization team wants to step forward and start working on it Beamdog would be glad to have your translation, but at present Beamdog has no contracts with an official translation house to do Chinese for BG2:EE.

socata

JuliusBorisov said:

@socata Here's an official answer:

If a localization team wants to step forward and start working on it Beamdog would be glad to have your translation, but at present Beamdog has no contracts with an official translation house to do Chinese for BG2:EE.

So some sources about 85% process of Chinese bg2:ee is officially confirmed as a rumor...




I have seen many Chinese language patches of Bg2:ee in China player community. They have almost finished the whole translation. It's pretty strange there is no official version of BG2:ee in Chinese language.

So how would a localization team's translation work would be adopt as an official version? Is there any guide, requirements or contract？

I believe we may have some misunderstanding or lack of communication among there.

mf2112

Let's see if @inthel might be able to help then. We certainly wouldn't want to duplicate a big effort when it is close to completion.

semiticgoddess

I would love to see a complete Chinese translation of BG2:EE. I wanted to try it out so I could practice reading Chinese while I play BG2!

JuliusBorisov

One thing is a volunteer translation, and the other thing is an official translation. There's no official company responsible for Chinese translation of BG2EE.

As for the volunteer translation, indeed it's good to have an update on the current state from @inthel first, so that later all people who would like to help could continue what has already been done.

gorgonzola

JuliusBorisov said:

One thing is a volunteer translation, and the other thing is an official translation. There's no official company responsible for Chinese translation of BG2EE.

True, but somehow misleading, as, how you worded the phrase seems that they are 2 opposite things.
Imo it would be better worded as "One thing is a unofficial translation, and the other thing is an official translation" as afaik the existing official localizations of the game are largely based on the work of not payed volunteers, so, at some extent, are both volunteer and official.

JuliusBorisov

As long as there's no translation for BG2EE from an official company, Beamdog will include a translation created by volunteers into the game. Volunteers are wonderful, they're doing a great job.

As for the process of merging translations created by volunteers and (if available) by a company, in each particular case it has its peculiar features and is decided in the best way possible.

gorgonzola

But it seems to me that in the very moment that Beamdog include a translation in a game, does not matter if it was created by professionals or volunteering players, it becomes official, while a translation distributed in other ways, even if a fan would pay an official company to do it and make it available for free on his own web site, has to be regarded as not official.

JuliusBorisov

Yes, I meant an official company that has a contract with Beamdog.

gorgonzola

I did understand this, but is only relevant to Beamdog, that in case of (very unlikely imo) legal problems can ask that the eventual financial damage is covered by who did the professional work of translation, while using not payed volunteers, at its own risk, probably is prevented to do it (probably the Canadian law would be used in such case, and I don't know it).

What I am saying is that in the very moment Beamdog decide to release something Beamdog becomes responsible of it towards the players/buyers. Is official because was released by the developer, and how the developer has obtained it, paying professionals, using the work of his employs or the one of volunteering fans, is not relevant.

But as we are going OT I say that is better to focus again on the topic, so the Chinese players (and @semiticgod ) can play the game in a proper Chinese localization. I think that both of us have made enough clear its point of view.

socata

JuliusBorisov said:

As long as there's no translation for BG2EE from an official company, Beamdog will include a translation created by volunteers into the game. Volunteers are wonderful, they're doing a great job.

As for the process of merging translations created by volunteers and (if available) by a company, in each particular case it has its peculiar features and is decided in the best way possible.

Okay, I get what happens here.

Seriously, if you want to make money from China player, you should pay more attention and respect to the community. Just look how dota2 or OW is doing their promotion in China.

China player won't pay money for every games, but we do pay money for some game of greatness. We have so many memory in these classic games, it's not that hard for us pay for bg2:ee.

Anyway, I will talk to inthel and see what we can do.

gorgonzola

JuliusBorisov said:

Volunteers are wonderful, they're doing a great job.

Is possible to add their names or nicks to the credits?
I would say that they deserve it, not only the coordinators of the volunteering teams, but everyone that has given a substantial contribution.
Something like:
"Special thanks to
German localization volunteering team
XXX
YYY
ZZZ
Italian localization volunteering team
AAA
BBB
CCC
and so on."
They have done/are doing, a great work, for free, to make the games playable also by not English speakers.
With great benefit for not English players.
But also for Beamdog, who earns money from their work as have better chance to sell in those countries (and that for me is fine, is not a problem).
I think that Beamdog owe that to them.

EDIT: I see some copyright problems in giving credits to volunteering people, as is possible that doing so they will own a copyright on the translations that they have done.
But I think that using some form of free license, like Creative Commons or GNU Free Documentation License, only for the translated strings, if the volunteering translators agree, the problem can be solved.

JuliusBorisov

Yes, adding volunteer names can be done. As I posted earlier, in each particular case it has its peculiar features and is decided in the best way possible. For example, when Russian localization is added to BG2EE, the names of all volunteers involved in the translation process will be included into the game.