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games in easy english
I often wonder whether the game designers/publishers of the English-spoken AGs are aware that there are some non-native English speakers out there who (buy &) play the games they make.
(buy &) play
I can complain just aboute one of these.
and I agreed. I dont realy understand how its working, but I knew that also the fact that not many old adventure games are translated to other languages is aresult of the same problem. just few game desiners made easy life for future translators. usuely its very complicaited or imposible to change the font in the games.
on the other hand, now I have more Motivation to learn english.
Without knowledge of English the biggest part of the internet will be a mystery to you. That alone is a reason to learn the English good! 
It was hilarious. It was even better than that Zero Wing game translation:
Lol, so that’s where the famous “all your base are belong to us” is from 
Duckman: Can you believe it? Five hundred bucks for a parking ticket?
Cornfed Pig: You parked in a handicapped zone.
Duckman: Who cares? Nobody parks there anyway, except for the people who are supposed to park there and, hell, I can outrun them anytime.
A bad translation will have the opposite effect.
Ironically sometimes bad translations can actually be easier to understand. Not that i’m advocating bad translations.
Sorry, but I don’t agree. If it’s a bad translation the foreign language of the translator will come shining through, so to speak.
Which is the very reason it might sometimes be easier to understand, if you come from a culture or speak a language that is e.g. closer related to German than English. Also i’m not talking about outright terrible translations or translations that turn into gibberish, just translations that might use simpler words, because the translator isn’t quite sure what the correct phrase is, and choose to simplify it rather then risk turning it into gibberish.
Anyway i don’t think we disagree very much, it is more a matter of nuances.
Poetry is harder.
Which is why it is not referred to as translating, but as rewriting a poem, at least where i come from.
Interesting. Where are you from?
Denmark, and ironically “rewriting” might in itself be a bad translation 
I wasn’t quite sure what the English word is, or if there even is an English word for it. The Danish word is “gendigte” where “gen” simply means “re” and “digte” can both mean “making something up” and “poetry”.
You have to play the game, to find out why you are playing the game! - eXistenZ
I often wonder whether the game designers/publishers of the English-spoken AGs are aware that there are some non-native English speakers out there who (buy &) play the games they make.
I think there is, but some tend to forget it.
Also i think it has become better in the later years compared to like 10 or 15 years ago. (Or my English has just become better)
You have to play the game, to find out why you are playing the game! - eXistenZ
I often wonder whether the game designers/publishers of the English-spoken AGs are aware that there are some non-native English speakers out there who (buy &) play the games they make.
My thought is that a lot of lot English-spoken AGs are not developed originally in English & the translation somethimes suffers! Of those that are, there can be lots of terminology, references & sublteties in humour that, even across English-speaking nations, don’t hit the spot!
The problem is that if a developer tries to cater for every nation in the world to understand you are just going to end up with games with no soul!
The great thing about games from anywhere in the world that are translated into your language is that they can offer an insight into the culture etc of that place & offer a learning process! If you don’t understand something you can ask on sites like this!
I’d like to add to chrissie’s post that there are even differences between regions/countries that speak the same language.
There are certain British words and proverbs that very few Americans or Australians will get, and there are certain Australian proverbs that few British people will get, etc.
I mean, there are a LOT of differences between Dutch Dutch and Belgian Dutch (Flemish), despite Holland and Belgium being right next to each other. A while ago, I used a Flemish proverb that Fien didn’t know, and I’m sure she uses some daily that I don’t know.
It’s very hard to cater for everyone when it comes to languages. Especially with each and every language having a bunch of untranslatable words. ‘Gezellig’, anyone?
Without knowledge of English the biggest part of the internet will be a mystery to you. That alone is a reason to learn the English good!
^ This.
When I need to look something up on the internet, I’ll always look it up in English, if only because that’ll yield infinitely more results.
The truth can’t hurt you, it’s just like the dark: it scares you witless but in time you see things clear and stark. - Elvis Costello
Maybe this time I can be strong, but since I know who I am, I’m probably wrong. Maybe this time I can go far, but thinking about where I’ve been ain’t helping me start. - Michael Kiwanuka
Without knowledge of English the biggest part of the internet will be a mystery to you. That alone is a reason to learn the English good!
and Monty python too…
all your base are belong to us.
To be honest, I didnt knew it is a famous sentence at all. and here is the funny thing. about eight years ago I played “warcraft 3” and I used cheats’ and the one to win the level was “allyourbasearebelongtous” well, I haven’t played warcraft since, but this strange sentence Stuck in my head. today I see this
It was hilarious. It was even better than that Zero Wing game translation:
and I have been shocked. I saw the light! a little search in wiki and all the story became clear.
thank yo timovieman. you made me a batter person.
Somehow, post #53 makes it look like I’m about to be deep-fried 
Duckman: Can you believe it? Five hundred bucks for a parking ticket?
Cornfed Pig: You parked in a handicapped zone.
Duckman: Who cares? Nobody parks there anyway, except for the people who are supposed to park there and, hell, I can outrun them anytime.
I always thought the Simon the Sorcerer games had easy English. Pretty much the scenes described what needed to be done.
And they have really funny expressions, like: “Naff off!”
Duckman: Can you believe it? Five hundred bucks for a parking ticket?
Cornfed Pig: You parked in a handicapped zone.
Duckman: Who cares? Nobody parks there anyway, except for the people who are supposed to park there and, hell, I can outrun them anytime.
I always thought the Simon the Sorcerer games had easy English. Pretty much the scenes described what needed to be done.
The first Simon game was translated to Hebrew. Pretty awfully (might’ve been an amateur job), but still.
I work quite a lot with people who are writing in English as a foreign language (mostly German academics, but some bilinguals who have translated their own fiction too). I’m going to tentatively disagree with Iznogood’s recommendation for Daedalic’s games.
I think it depends on what you’re trying to achieve. If you just want to play games, then I agree they might be easier to understand.
But if you want to improve your English… well the translations are really quite poor, so poor that I’ve stopped playing them because they remind me of work! I think you could pick up a lot of bad habits from them, especially if you’re at that uncritical stage of language learning where you absorb everything you see as “correct”. (That’s not quite the right way to put it. There’s no good or bad way to speak a language. But the Daedalic translations contain a lot of quirks and phrasings common to people who speak English as a second language. Many people want to minimise these.)
I’m afraid I find the writing in Carol Reed pretty wonky too, although I’ve only played the early ones.
The problem is that most adventure games have pretty poor writing, even the ones written in English!
I really think Simon the Sorceror will be too hard, especially if Day of the Tentacle was too hard to follow.
The “serious” Lucasarts games might be a good bet? The Dig and the Indiana Jones games are fairly easy to follow. LOOM barely has much language at all, and what there is is quite simple.
I always thought the Simon the Sorcerer games had easy English. Pretty much the scenes described what needed to be done.
The first Simon game was translated to Hebrew. Pretty awfully (might’ve been an amateur job), but still.
I know he was. the israel’ translators translate mainly the “almost without text” games.
like goblins and all the other games of the same company. and: simon the sorcerer. and disc world 2. god I don’t know why disc world. “disc world” screenplay have a lot of complicated meanings. and there is like 50 games i’d like too play first.
yet. they translated discworld.
and its right. loom have a very little language. and it was translated too.
Discworld is great, but I’m pretty certain that Terry Pratchetts humor cannot be translated to any other language.
Duckman: Can you believe it? Five hundred bucks for a parking ticket?
Cornfed Pig: You parked in a handicapped zone.
Duckman: Who cares? Nobody parks there anyway, except for the people who are supposed to park there and, hell, I can outrun them anytime.
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