In the past few years, many popular Japanese MSX games have been translated by amateurs to (mainly) English and Portuguese. The latest developments consider several projects that start with translating to Portuguese and are intended to be translated to English later.



Although I can understand that it's easier for Portuguese developers to translate a product to their own language, many people have commented this. They would like to see an English version first, because much more people can enjoy an English translation than a Portuguese translation. I didn't really mind, because the developments meant we would get an English translation in the end...



However, the Snatcher translation project which is as good as finished in Portuguese seems to make little or no progress in the English version. This is quite strange, as all the scripts were already translated to English by Takamichi. Correct me if I'm wrong, but IIRC these English translations were translated to Portuguese first, in order to make the Portuguese Snatcher.



Other translations seem to remain Portuguese only. I'm not sure if this is the good thing. I'd like to know how you feel about these translation methods. Perhaps even the translators themselves can drop a line?

It would be a shame if those currently portuguese-only translations do not get an english version. The hardest part (translating from japanese and hacking the game) is already done, so what is the hold-up?



I do hope these brasilieros can keep a promise and not let the rest of the MSX community dangle in the dark for 10 years or so.

I'm looking forward to an English version of Snatcher, Illusioncity, Shalom etc. etc. etc. so I hope our Brazilian translation friends will not forget about us.

I still hope they will do a japanese Illusion City for MSX 2 first, in stead of doing both portugese and MSX 2 adjustments in one go.

It's nice to see the Snatcher translation moving on (both the portuguese as the english version). And about a Illusion City translation/msx2 version, if they release early like with the Snatcher translation, you'll more or less have a japanese msx2 version (given that they start with that first, but I would because it increases the number of people interested instantly)

I agree with BiFi here... I asked on the Mailinglist, but I got no reply...



~Grauw

What is it again with Illusion City? It only uses the 256kB RAM, right? And MIDI.....Nothing else? No special R800 instructions or typical CPU speed? Interesting.........

Yeah, it's a scam really. Microcabin tricked us, and for that they have to make web based application software for eternity!

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What is it again with Illusion City? It only uses the 256kB RAM, right? And MIDI.....Nothing else? No special R800 instructions or typical CPU speed? Interesting.........

Indeed it uses 256kB RAM and MIDI, but also R800 speed. No special R800 instructions, but the only new R800 instructions are MULUB/W.



On Z80 it's really pretty unplayable. On the other hand, the code can be optimized better.



But as a general rule, putting a 'MSX2 with 256kB RAM' logo on a game in japan is equivalent to turboR anyways, because almost no MSX2's or 2+'s with more than 64kB RAM exist. In order to avoid angry/confused customers/users, the japanese put a turboR logo on all games requiring more than 64kB RAM.

We have seen many things like this before. With translations like these, I would like to see a patch for the original version first, so it can run from HD or on MSX2 or other bugs are avoided. Then an English version and after that further localisation. Nowadays it's often the other way around. The end result is the same (I hope so, at least) but most users (e.g. the English reading users) have to wait a loooooooong time.

Personaly, I would say WHY translate a game into portuguese FIRST (and maybe ONLY):

1) Portuguese is my mother language, so I can rewrite the texts making them shorter whithout asking somebody else... and wait two years to receive an "I did not had time yet" answer.
2) Besides the fact "many more people can understand english", my statistics shows about 35% of downloads being the portuguese version, so... the amount of people speaking portuguese (the seventh most spoken language in the world) is being misjudjed here. Anyway, if it was about "most people undestand" maybe I should consider translating the game into mandarin.
3) When translating games, many things must be adaptated together with the texts: the jokes. Many japanese and north-american jokes are not understood by most brazilian people. That means they'll think "Who's the dork that made these jokes?". And I love to translate jokes! (^=
4) I made a translation so my personal friends could play the game. Most of them can understand english, but they do understand portuguese much better. So, there is no reason in creating an english version for these guys.
5) I DO like my language. I think in english only as a "necessary evil".

In the case of Snatcher, the english texts were HUGE and I saw it would require a lot of work to make it run "smoothly". Therefore, releasing a portuguese version first would be FASTER and would provide me lots of bug reports.
Another thing: I think softwares done as hobbie should not be sold. Therefore, the hobbist do it as he likes.

I made an english version in respect to the foreign comunity, and as a prize those helped me (Takamichi, Artemio, Marteen (which translated the superb Metal Gear 2), Nestor...). They asked for an english version, and I always like to contribute to my friends' happiness.
Just as a conclusion: the next translation projects will be, probably, portuguese only. I was never so demanded about anything I had done as a hobby! I received about 40 e-mails "demanding" an english version, as if I was obligated to do it...

I don't know what other brazillian translators think about it, but I think it's wiser to do more and speak less.
This is why this is my first and only note about this theme.

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Anyway, if it was about "most people undestand" maybe I should consider translating the game into mandarin.

Most people in the MSX scene, which is what we're talking about here, understand english.

Too bad this is your opinion. Still, thanks for the english Snatcher. Although it really really needs to be proofread and corrected by someone more fluent in english.

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I'm looking forward to an English version of Snatcher, Illusioncity, Shalom etc. etc. etc. so I hope our Brazilian translation friends will not forget about us.

Shalom portuguese and Shalom english are exactly in sync.

Please note that snout's message was posted a year ago, in 2003
I think everyone in the non-portuguese speaking MSX community is very grateful for your efforts, Ricardo!
Ofcourse even portuguese-only translations could benefit the english-speaking community because more people can translate from portuguese to english than from japanese to english.

Let me expose three reasons to translate a game to my mother language first, and after this translating it into english:

1) I speak portuguese, so I can do a better job translating the game to portuguese first. After that, I can translate the texts to english much better/faster and ask an english native speaker to proofread it (it will also be a fast job, since it's proofreading, not translating).
2) Most words/phrases in portuguese are longer than their translation to english. So, if I manage to fit the portuguese translation into the game, the english translation will fit with a chance of 99,99%.
3) Portuguese has accents. English don't. If I manage to get a portuguese translation, our spanish/french/etc MSX friends can get the game in their own language too just translating the texts (there's no need of any extra routines for accent treatment).