Translating games has almost nothing in common with translating books. - Nothing is linear - You often get the texts in disarray - Different UIs, menus & dialog styles = different contexts - Sometimes you don't even know which character's line you're translating

Riley Bruce@rileybruce.bsky.social · last mo.

What’s a thing from your area of expertise (or special interest) that you think it would behoove everyone else to know?

Do you have blood? Are you OK with occasionally having some of it outside of your body? Then you're in luck, looks like you can get a copy of Vampire Survivors + DLC for free if you donate blood and submit proof🩸 bloodmoon.poncle.net Really cool idea! 🧛

I'm thinking about getting a portfolio website (almost 6 years after I started freelancing full time, better late than never), mostly because I kinda want a blog (that presumably nobody would read), but I feel like it'd be a lot of effort to make it look the way I want it to look...

You may not like it, but this is what peak localization looks like (Asterix: Mega Madness (PS1, 2001))

good morning

Higashino Keigo wrote using a technique Japanese calls "opening up" kanji: spelling certain words (e.g., ones that might use rare or non-standard kanji) in hiragana so a page reads faster and lighter. It's a big reason his novels are beloved by people learning to read Japanese.

How Higashino Keigo Improved My Japanese

In the wake of the beloved author's death, our author shares how Higashino Keigo's accessible writing made his own Japanese better.

unseen-japan.com

Harrison Ford, the actor behind loveable scoundrels Han Solo and Indiana Jones, started his career as an on-set carpenter. That makes him a roguelike deckbuilder.

starting a collection of quotes like this

Me: well, the final revisions of the book translation are going surprisingly well. That one important pun I've left to deal with later:

Surprise Surprise Mother Fucker

ALT: Surprise Surprise Mother Fucker

static.klipy.com

“She’s just a translator” shows that you don’t understand what translation is. Some of this comes from the ‘automation’ of translation, through things like Google translate. It’s as though it’s just looking words up in a dictionary. No. It’s an art and a science at once. To get meaning and feeling.

I recently completed a LQA project that had me bawling like a baby (for like, good, narrative-related reasons), and it reminded me just how much I love this job. So, so incredibly lucky to still be able to do this, despite the depressing state of the industry. I'll never take it for granted.

📌 (summer '26 intro update) Cześć! I'm Anna, a Polish hobbyist multidisciplinary artist experimenting with various styles, digital and traditional. I usually draw animals (esp. birds) and other stuff inspired by nature. I often weave bits of Polish culture into the art as well. Dzięki za uwagę :)

Game developers, how do you know if you have a good localization company? Here are some green flags to keep in mind when selecting someone~! j-entranslations.com/green-flags-...

Green Flags When Picking Localization Company - J-En Translations

It can be hard to pick a localization company for your game, so here are some green flags to keep an eye out for when selecting a vendor.

j-entranslations.com

Rise and grind

I wish I could curse whoever it was that made Yahoo Chiebukuro not available in Europe. Them and ten generations of their descendants. It was such an useful resource for checking Japanese slang and similar things...

My desire to have a sensible sleep schedule clashes with the fact that I usually work best in the middle of the night.

...co robię? Czy to jest jakiś mem, na który jestem za stara, czy Youtube się przegrzało od tych temperatur?

One of my favorite kind of Next Fest games are the ones that clearly are using AI, have no AI disclosures, but think it's at all reasonable to assume they have paid to translate their game into every language under the sun.

Obsessed with this 1735 illustration of hammerhead sharks from Japan

I'll be a guest at my hometown library's book club, because they've been reading a book I translated and I kind of wonder what I should talk about... Is there anything non-translators find interesting or want to know about translation? #booksky

As a translator, having results automatically translated regardless of my settings is very misleading. I want to know how native speakers are actually writing in their language. Does anybody know a way to make every search contain -"?tl="?

Every year it gets harder and harder for me to answer when students (or other people) ask how to become a game translator. I feel like the industry has really changed since I was getting started (not that long ago! ...I think). Or maybe I'm just getting old?

ALT:

static.klipy.com

Definitely one of the hardest challenges our team's ever had to tackle, but also one that led to the funniest Discord convos

Let me tell you, the number of exclamation marks that I put in my reply after the lovely folks at LocQuest told me I'm going to work on this game was wildly unprofessional. I'm so pumped Paralives is finally here. Have fun! ❤️

LocQuest 🛡️ Ethical Localization@locquest.bsky.social · 4mo ago

The life sim game you’ve all been waiting for 🤗 @paralives.com is about building homes, lives and bonds. Through both hardship and success, where will your story take you? LocQuest’s story took us through over ❗️1,300 queries❗️ in 8 different languages. Now available in Early Access on Steam!

1/2 Let's catch up on what we've been working on lately! Once again, @kenney.nl and @wholesomegames.com trusted us with the localization of Make Room into Polish, Brazilian Portuguese, and European Spanish! Long live cozy games!💜 (Linguists' credits below (2/2)⬇️)

The best advice I ever got when I started freelancing was, if you have to turn down work, always suggest someone else who could do it. I have been so lucky to benefit from that over the years.

This deserves attention! A whole book written by a Japanese Studies expert on a topic of Korean history relies heavily on AI tools for accessing the sources and acknowledges it clearly in the preface. Is this the kind of future we want for humanities?

Wiem, że mam kilku mutualsów, którzy też tłumaczą na polski, więc podrzucam 😊

Stein Makes Games@steinmakesgames.bsky.social · 4mo ago

Anyone happen to know a human translation freelancer who does game localization ENGLISH --> POLISH?

The mood swings that come with translating a book are not for the weak. One minute I feel like I'm doing amazing work, a while later I think that I can't speak any language and I should not be allowed to work with words. Repeat ad infinitum (or until the book is over).