I was listening to an interview with a senior EU translator several years back, and he said that these days, he normally does the first pass with Google Translate, then manually cleans things up. My guess is that to some extent, most human translations likely incorporate some AI translation already.
Comment on This game has 100 endings, and it's pushing the creators to the brink of bankruptcy | PC Gamer
Lucky_777@lemmy.world 3 weeks ago
Translate using AI and call it a day.
tal@lemmy.today 3 weeks ago
psx_crab@lemmy.zip 3 weeks ago
Correct. But the AI bro here think AI translation is the final work, while translator that use google translate still required the language knowledge to proofread.
brucethemoose@lemmy.world 3 weeks ago
I don’t think OP came off as “AI Bro.”
Pure machine translation would indeed be sloppy, but games have done it before. An automated 1st pass with a last check from a human contractor seems reasonable for a studio about to fold.
psx_crab@lemmy.zip 3 weeks ago
“and call it a day” is all the sign i need.
sugar_in_your_tea@sh.itjust.works 3 weeks ago
My SO did translation as a contractor for a little while, and that’s what they did too. Run it through a translator, and fix whatever it messes up. A lot of the output is totally fine, but not all of it, so you need someone experienced with both languages to make sure the result is good.
RightHandOfIkaros@lemmy.world 3 weeks ago
There shouldn’t be any problem in using AI to translate something, translation is more or less static. Its no different than someone using a calculator for mathematics equations.
Localizers will still need to check the AI output for contextual accuracy, but they will be able to complete this faster as they can essentially skip a step.
My only issue with translation currently is that localizers often go too far with the liberties they take. Its necessary to ensure people from another culture can understand what is happening. For example, in a language that has no word for “rye bread” or a saying like “you are what you eat” specifically, the localizer may substitute the closest word or phrase that conveys a meaning as close as possible to the original. What is not okay is completely altering large portions of the work because of the localizer’s personal opinion. And unfortunately, because this is entirely on the localizer, no amount of AI can help prevent that. Unless translation AI can be so good that it can even understand context from the various bits of text needing to be translated. Then the developers can just use it themselves. But AI has a while to go before it gets to that point.
HeyThisIsntTheYMCA@lemmy.world 3 weeks ago
a member of my extended family spent a decade or so as an interpreter. when they got their certification, the little ceremony we attended had a panel of level 5 interpreters (the highest score you can get on the test they were taking) interpret a speech from one of the more popular interpreters in the local union. i doubt one of them used the same word at the same time. when we did the national anthem, because of course we did, there were two scripts because two languages. i hate saying it, but it really kind of depends what you’re translating/interpreting, but usually translations can be fluid.
Iheartcheese@lemmy.world 3 weeks ago
Your ideas are bad and you should feel bad
FartMaster69@lemmy.dbzer0.com 3 weeks ago
That still has associated costs my guy.
Quality not withstanding you’ve got to pay for access to the model or electricity to run your own local model, pay people to run the lines into the model and stitch them back into the game and pay people who speak the language to proof read the outputs to ensure it’s not giving you gibberish.
And if you’ve got voice lines now that’s a whole other can of worms of paying for TTS ai models, paying for audio mixing specialists, inserting the lines into the game, paying to once again have a speaker of the language QA test the output.
Katana314@lemmy.world 3 weeks ago
I think about the creativity that goes behind translations like Ace Attorney, and lament that people are skipping past the nuance. Ex:
- The name “Naruhodo Ryuichi” means nothing to me. However, their invented name “Phoenix Wright” evokes a popular image on its own. Same for a great many of their pun names. There are many detective games I’ve played from a Japanese theme where I actually couldn’t put clues together because I couldn’t remember “Udo Rayoge” was a noodle shop owner and “Ero Gotaro” was the police deputy that was taking bribes and was murdered - because those names form no connections in my mind.
- Maya Fey eats burgers. Before translation, it was ramen; but at time of release, Americans associated ramen with being extremely cheap and low-nutrition (thanks to Cup Noodles). Changing it to burgers accomplished the intended character theme of being junk-foody and gluttonous.
- Quite often, linguistics have some effect on the visual clues of the game (and Danganronpa mysteries just as much so), which means they often have to go very creative with something like a torn letter or a message written in blood.
finitebanjo@lemmy.world 3 weeks ago
Yes, this will turn their potential studio shutdown into an guaranteed studio shutdown! Problem solved.