Episode Transcription

MELISA: Hello, everyone, and welcome to the last episode of Open World. I’m here with Lali and Ale, and we are finishing this season on a high note. We have a very special guest today, Arthur Flew. We’re so excited to have you with us. Thank you so much for coming. We are big fans of yours. So would you like to introduce yourself to our audience?

ARTHUR: Sure. First off, thank you for having me. So my name is Arthur Flew. I’ve been doing localization for 17 plus years at this point, most recently at Epic Games. And then previous to that, I worked at Blizzard Entertainment.

MELISA: Nice.

LARA: So cool. How can you say that being so chill?

ALEXIS: This man’s luck is like this, you know?

LARA: Yeah.

MELISA: Well, we wanted to start talking about cultural adaptation. And, my first question is, can you share a specific instance where cultural adaptation led to unexpected but fantastic results in some of the iconic games that you worked through the years?

ARTHUR: Yeah. I mean, I think generally you’re always pleasantly surprised whenever you try something new when you’re doing localization. But I think… I think it’s easy to sort of go through the motions of doing the same thing over and over again. And so, whenever we have an opportunity to try something sort of out of the box, you never know how it’s gonna land. We had this one opportunity once where the game I was working on decided to have some DJ radio station in the game, and, you know, the normal way to go about it would be to, you know, hire some local voice actors and have them record those same lines. But we decided to go a little bit extra on it and talk to the marketing teams and the regional groups and things like that, and see if we could actually find some local DJs for the different countries that we localized in and try to maintain sort of the same vibe and feel of what the English DJ was doing, but kind of adapt it more culturally for those countries in it. We found some up and coming or just, you know, recently popularized DJs in every one of those countries and have them record, and it really gave those countries, like a little bit more, authenticity, right?

ALEXIS: Authenticity. That’s the word that I was thinking, yeah.

ARTHUR: Yeah.

ALEXIS: It’s authentic.

ARTHUR: Exactly. And the DJs really liked it. And I think it really hit a chord with all the audience in those countries. And it was a really good, good experience. Everybody loved it. And it was outside the norm. We had to, you know, make all kinds of new contracts and work with them on, you know, what we could and couldn’t do and what they could and couldn’t do and all that kind of stuff. But it was, I think, a fun vibe for everybody.

MELISA: That is so cool. I love it. That’s definitely what cultural adaptation is about, at the end of the day. Like you want to connect with the different audiences and, you know, have a similar experience. If you had a DJ in your original language, you would be like… It’s just so cool that everyone had the same experience, like different countries. So it’s really, really cool.

ARTHUR: Yeah. It was a fun experience.

LARA: Yeah, with the rise of diverse voices in gaming, how do you approach inclusivity within localization? Because, I mean, I think this is very related to what you’re saying right now, having diverse voices to approach these different cultures. I think that’s amazing.

ARTHUR: Yeah. It’s always an interesting topic when you try to do inclusivity. Obviously, from a cultural standpoint, you really want to try to be as authentic as possible. So where you can, you know, you don’t try to do a straight adaptation of the content, you try to make it make sense for the region you’re adapting it to. But even more so, like, not even just cultural adaptation, but LGBTQ+ adaptations and things like that. It’s a bit harder for some languages than others. You know, some cultures are less inclined to support that kind of content. But where we can, we try to do that stuff while staying true to the source material, right? We don’t want to rewrite the original content, but try to adapt things so that it fits and works for that culture. But yeah, even within the language itself, right, you look at a lot of the Latin based languages which have genders, like, this is this word is a masculine noun, a feminine noun. Try to figure out ways to kind of get around that so it doesn’t feel like we’re injecting that stuff into the content using neutral pronouns and things like that, we don’t need to specify masculine, feminine, that kind of stuff. My team at Epic was really good about that.

MELISA: That is really cool. It’s happened so many times that I, like, choose the feminine character and then the text in Spanish is masculine, even though I chose a feminine character, so like talking to me as if I was a boy. So, yeah.

LARA: It happens. Yeah, I’ve seen that.

ARTHUR: Hopefully, it’s never happened in any game I’ve done.

LARA: No. No, don’t worry about it. No, no.

ALEXIS: I really don’t think so. I really, really, really don’t think so. So, Arthur, beyond these things that are… that really cater to gamers of different identities, from different places, you know, where accuracy is also involved. You were talking about different things that you’ve tried to make some elements of the games pop. What do you consider to be the secret sauce to some really outstanding game localization? Maybe this is too much of a broad question, you know, but take it wherever you want it to be, whatever you want it to take it.

ARTHUR: Sure. So, you know, so accuracy is important, but I don’t think it should be the number one driving force behind the approach to localization. So like, you want to be accurate, but you also want to adapt, you know? The easy example is, an English joke may not land in French, right? So you want to try to figure out a way to make that joke have the same sort of feeling that you would expect it to have. But, beyond that, there’s a couple of things that I think are truly important when you’re dealing with trying to localize content is, you want a team that really understands the source material. You know, anybody can translate a sentence into another language, but if you really hone in on trying to understand what the original source is trying to convey, you’ll get a better translation than you would otherwise. So like a good example would be, like, if you’re trying to translate something sort of goofy, like Cuddle Team Leader from Fortnite, you could take that in a lot of different directions, in every language. And so you really want to try to hone in on what the source material was trying to do with it, find something that makes sense for those languages. But the other part of it that I think often gets overlooked is the tools, specifically the tool set that you’re working out of. A really good pipeline and functionality behind everything really makes or breaks what you can and cannot do with localization. So the flexibility inside the original product, you know, even things like allowing gender tokens or allowing plural forms, all that stuff really determines whether or not you can provide a quality localized product. And so a lot of times what ends up happening is you have a bare bones product from a localization standpoint, it’s just you have a string and you can localize it. And so you will often find those situations like you described where you might have picked a female character, but they only had the opportunity to write one version of a line, so they default to male or something like that. And so that flexibility needs to exist inside the product. And I think it’s an often overlooked aspect of localization.

MELISA: Absolutely. What you were just saying it’s like, a lot of the things have to be considered in a previous stage, like, in the developing stage.

LARA: Yeah. Once it comes to localization, you’re like, what do I do with this? So this is like the perfect intro for my question. Like, have you ever encountered major ethical dilemmas while localizing and how did you navigate them with your team?

ALEXIS: That’s a great question. Sorry, but that’s a good one.

ARTHUR: I don’t think I’ve worked on a product that hasn’t had ethical dilemmas. It’s one of those things where they’re often innocent, like people who are making the content or things like that, they don’t know everything about other cultures. I don’t pretend to know everything about other cultures. And so, you know, they’ll build something and they think it’s cool. And then, you know, it comes to us and we take a look at it and go, you know, “This is maybe not the best idea.” And, you know, it’s not that uncommon for it to happen. And so what we usually do when that comes across our plate is we take a look at it and we try to sort of build a document explaining why this is a problem. If it’s minor, it’s something that we might just directly talk to whoever designed the content. But if it’s something more significant or we think it might have legal repercussions or significant impact on sales or something like that, then we would definitely draft something up that we would then bring up as a concern to the team at large and try to find a solution from there. And usually it’s resolved, it’s a matter of discussing things. The designer is usually not so gung-ho about something that, you know, that they wouldn’t make changes to it. And there’s compromise there always to be found, right? Like, the only thing we need you to change is this little thing over here, and then the problem goes away because nobody’s going to associate it with whatever it is.

ALEXIS: That’s a good way to put it as well.

ARTHUR: Yeah. I think it’s fairly common, and it’s just a matter of discussing it with… The issue is if it happens too late and it doesn’t get caught and it goes live. But thankfully, I think that’s only happened sort of once for us. For me. Long time ago on Diablo, during beta. Diablo 3 during beta. We hadn’t noticed it, but at some point, I guess, somebody had taken the cover of the Quran and placed it as the cover of one of the books inside the game. And, if you play Diablo, you can click on the bookshelves and all the books fall off onto the floor, and you can’t have the Quran on the floor. So that caught a little bit of an uproar. And it was fixed as soon as we were notified. But that’s something that, like, sometimes those slip through the cracks.

ALEXIS: Now, to be fair, when the books fall on the ground, they’re like this.

ARTHUR: Yep.

ALEXIS: Very, very small. That’s having quite a keen eye for detail.

ARTHUR: And for sure the artist didn’t realize that he had grabbed the cover of a Quran either, right? So it was completely an innocent mistake that happened to fall through the cracks. But since then, you know, we’ve put things in place to make sure those types of things don’t happen.

ALEXIS: Nice.

MELISA: That was really, really interesting. And I think that’s also cool kind of like to talk about more for… Because, like you said, a lot of times it’s like, most of the times it’s not even, you know, intentional. So just, if culturalization is taken into account beforehand is always good. So thank you for that. And now I wanted to ask, can I change topics here and introduce the metaverse? I know you’ve worked in this, like, developing concept of the metaverse, and I was curious about, like, what’s your vision about it? Do you think it’s something that will be localized? Like, how do you envision that happening?

ARTHUR: So the metaverse is interesting. I’m going to preface this by saying that I have no idea what shape or form the metaverse will ultimately take. And I think anything can happen between now and that day, should it ever happen, that could dramatically alter the course of things. But in my opinion, and I’m no engineer, I’m not a professional in this space, but in my opinion, I think, like, the technology of today or the near future wouldn’t necessarily allow us to build a world that millions of people could be in at the same time. So I would expect something where we have, like, you know, worlds within a platform that exists, that can be thematic. Something like, you know, this is the Japan world, or this is the Star Wars world, or this is the…

LARA: I will be there.

ARTHUR: The Nike world, or whatever.

LARA: You can find me there.

ALEXIS: If you build it, they will come.

LARA: Yeah.

ARTHUR: Yeah. And so you’d have these… I don’t know if you saw Ready Player One, but I think they do something similar where they have one world for, like, the school and a world for, like, you know, gaming places and blah, blah, blah. So I think sort of that idea is probably the most immediately achievable concept of the world. And… As far as whether or not we localize it, I think yes, I think the answer to that is yes. But I think that it’s going to take a few different approaches. And I don’t think that one solution to encompass the entire thing makes sense, right? So like if, as an example, if the Government of Japan had decided that they wanted to make a replica of Tokyo inside this world to allow people to come visit Tokyo for whatever reason, I don’t know that it necessarily makes sense to localize all the signs in the streets and things like that. Like you want that authenticity forthe people that are going there. But I could see something like, you know, an overlay where, like, you look at a sign and there’s some kind of translation that pops up over it or something that’s optional for you if you wanted to actually understand what you were seeing. So I could see that making sense. But if you’re looking at a Star Wars world or something like that, I think that you would want to localize and make that experience more I guess inclusive of all the different cultures that are out there. And I think, like, if you look at something like that, it’s absolutely way too much. If you’re building a platform that anybody at any time could submit content to and prop up the world, there’s no way one single entity can try to localize all of that, right? Like, it’s just too much. So I think that… sort of similar to how, if you want to put out a content on Sony PlayStation or Microsoft Xbox, you have to submit the localization for it, I would expect something similar to that where, like, Nike wants to put out a Nike building where you can go in and look at all the different shoes that you can buy from Nike, that they would supply whatever localization is that they want. And there’d be certain requirements that the platform would have, like number of languages or, you know, no cuss words and blah, blah, blah, whatever it is. But that they would supply it and it would maybe go through a round of QA or things like that to make sure everything looks okay, just like any other content submission platform. But yeah, that’s sort of what I would expect, where the people making the content would provide the localization, and there could be an option of hiring providers by whoever makes the metaverse to help localize it as well. But, yeah, that’s sort of how I imagine it working.

MELISA: That makes sense, yeah. This is such a such a fascinating topic, honestly, because, like you said, we don’t know, like, what’s going to look like in a few years. But it sure would be very interesting to see what happens.

LARA: Yeah. And if you find out, like, some kind of metaverse world about Star Wars, call me, please. I will be there. Yeah, yeah. So beyond video games, what other forms of media or artistic expression do you think will benefit from your unique localization expertise?

ARTHUR: Uh… So… So, for me… This may sound a little weird, but I think localization as sort of like a solution that’s been solved, in a lot of ways. Like, we know how to take a file and localize it and give it back. Like, that’s not a complicated process. What I really enjoy is solving the pipeline of localization, like going to the roots of, like, hey, we have this product, we want to localize it, how do we get the product in a way that makes sense to get localized and make it easy for the people to do that actual work? That’s what I really enjoy ultimately out of the work. So it’s not so much about the content for me, I guess, as much as it is the technology and trying to figure out ways we can make that better. And for me, something like the metaverse would be a super interesting challenge. Something like AR I think would be super interesting to try to solve, like how do we overlay content on the real world without it being annoying? That kind of stuff to me is super interesting. And not to say like, you know, a movie or TV stuff wouldn’t be interesting, but like it’s a solved problem, right? The problem is the volume, right? Like how do you tackle so much content and get it back in time? But that’s, you know, more hours or more time. Pick which one gets done.

ALEXIS: Yeah.

ARTHUR: So, yeah, for me, it’s the technology. It’s finding ways to make lives easier for everybody finding solutions.

LARA: I love that. Beautiful.

ALEXIS: Yeah. And especially AR. I mean, AR really… I mean, with the VR thing, I get dizzy, on a personal note, but the AR thing, I think that once it explodes, once it’s done like just right… And there are many companies that are really aiming towards that. I’m looking forward to what’s going to come in, I don’t know, I wanted to say five years, but even a year from now.

ARTHUR: See, for me, like, I’ve tried the VR headsets and I’ve tried, like, I’ve looked at the new Apple Vision Pro or whatever you call it, I don’t remember, but, like, they’re still too big and they still require you to have cables and all that kind of stuff.

LARA: Oh my God, yeah.

ALEXIS: It’s like the initial cell phones, right?

LARA: Yeah. Ughh!

ARTHUR: I need it to get to a point where it’s literally like my glasses.

LARA: Yeah, exactly.

ARTHUR: That’s what I want. And the day that happens, I think it blows up. Like if I don’t need to carry around like this heavy headset, if I can just put my glasses on. And I think Google announced like years ago this Google Glass thing, which is supposed to be a tiny thing.

ALEXIS: Yes they did. I think they didn’t move forward with it.

LARA: It failed because society was not ready for it at the moment. It was just like, no.

ALEXIS: You know what I want? I want to go like Aloy, you know? Like… The Focus. Something like that would be fine.

LARA: You’re asking way too much, bro. We’re just asking for glasses.

ALEXIS: Okay. With the glasses.

MELISA: He’s thinking further into the future, kind of like when we’re grandparents.

ALEXIS: Hey, ten years from now. For my kid.

ARTHUR: But that’s what I want, I want it to be simple, right? And I think the public at large is waiting for that, right? Like, it needs to make sense for people to walk around with these things. And until that happens, I don’t think these things are really going to take off. They’re cool, but they’re not massively popular until then.

ALEXIS: Arthur, let me change the subject a little bit. And for someone who has been in the industry for so long, in such massive companies for so long, working in so many IPs, projects, developing pipelines, I’m sure you have funny anecdotes. This question, it has a structure, right? But I just want to ask if you could share something funny, unexpected, without breaking any NDAs, of course, but something that really still makes you giggle to this day.

ARTHUR: Yeah. So let’s see. I guess this one isn’t a secret anymore. So back in the day, we were working on Diablo 3 and we had already shipped the PC version, and we had decided to ship a console version post-launch.

ALEXIS: Yeah, because it took a little longer.

ARTHUR: Yeah. It required a lot of changes to the UI, and we had to add couch co-op and things like that to it. And so it took about a year for us to get the console version out after PC. Don’t quote me on that, it’s been so long. But yeah, we were nearing the end of the release, it was getting close to submission time, and the designers had come up with this cool idea of creating a secret level where you can…

ALEXIS: The cow level?

ARTHUR: No, that one was in the original PC version. But it was a secret level you could access where, if you got in, you could kill all the people on the team, so all the developers on the team. And they would have, you know, their names and then a title underneath them. And… I was one of the monsters that you could kill in there, as with everybody else. But… The title they ended up giving me was Destroyer of Dreams, and it was sort of a funny tongue-in-cheek moment because, as we sort of neared, you know, the console submission, this was Blizzard’s first console title, I want to say, in 15 or 20 years or something like that, I had to more regularly tell them, no, you can’t do that, that that would cause a lot of changes for us, so no, you can’t do this thing. And so, that was the nickname I was dubbed.

ALEXIS: Inside joke.

ARTHUR: Yeah. The Destroyer of Dreams. It was a fun one. Everybody laughed when we saw it, but it was it was….

MELISA: Is that your bio on social media now, “Destroyer of Dreams”?

ARTHUR: No, no.

LARA: It should be. So cool.

ARTHUR: I try not to say no, usually. I want to give designers and UI people as much freedom as they can do. But, you know, there comes a point in the project where you can’t change everything anymore, where we need to ship things. So… Yeah.

MELISA: That’s hilarious, I love it. Arthur, thank you so much for everything you’ve shared so far. And the last question I wanted to ask you, looking back on your career, what’s one piece of advice that you’d give to someone aspiring to get into game localization?

ARTHUR: So as I mentioned, I think one thing that often gets overlooked is understanding how everything works behind the scenes. So one thing that I often encourage everybody that’s worked for me is really sort of dig in and understand what happens when you press run. What does that button actually do? Because it helps you troubleshoot things a lot when things break unexpectedly. If it breaks in a certain way, you can go, “Oh, it’s because of X, Y, Z,” and you can go and either fix it yourself or tell whatever engineer you’re working with, “Hey, it’s broken in this location and we need to fix it.” Really understanding how things work I think is an undervalued skill set for anybody working in localization.

MELISA: That’s like really good advice. And I’ve never heard anyone say it. That’s awesome. So thank you for that.

LARA: So I want to know, Arthur, what are you playing at the moment?

ARTHUR: Right now, I am in my fourth playthrough of Baldur’s Gate 3.

LARA: Oh, my God, same! Yes!

ARTHUR: I’ve played the first time as a goody-two-shoes Paladin. And the second time I played as a Dark Urge character and went the full evil route, which was harder than you would think. Not in the sense of difficulty of the game, but actually pressing the evil options.

LARA: Oh, my god, yeah. “Minthara would be so proud of you.” “Minthara is thrilling for you right now.” I hate her.

ARTHUR: It’s harder than you think it is, but yeah, I managed to pull that off. And then, I think my current playthrough is, I wanted to try a Bard because it’s not a class that is part of the companions that you can get, so I just wanted to get a feel for what it plays like.

LARA: That is my class. I’m a Bard.

ARTHUR: Yeah? You like it?

LARA: Yeah I love being a bard.

ARTHUR: So…

MELISA: There’s something…

ARTHUR: Go ahead.

MELISA: No, it’s just it’s really funny because it was the same thing we were doing. We’re playing with my boyfriend, and I’m always like, “No, we can’t harm this person,” so I’m always choosing… And then he was like, “Okay, but then we can have to start again and choose all the evil options.” So I will have to go through that thing very soon.

ARTHUR: Yeah. It’s harder than you think because you feel bad.

LARA: Yeah.

ARTHUR: But yeah, it’s fun. It’s really interesting how different the game feels based on the choices you make. They did a really good job. I don’t know that I’ve played a game before where, you know, it sort of doesn’t matter what choice you pick, the game just keeps going forwards. So if you just take too long to do something, the game doesn’t care, just moves on. And it’s really interesting. Normally it’s like you can just sort of wait until the right time to make decisions. But now here it’s just like, okay, you’ve made this choice. We’re just going to factor that into everything that you do going forward. And it’s very interesting, it plays out surprisingly differently. And believe it or not, I have found things in the game on my fourth playthrough that I did not know existed. I somehow missed them in my first three times around, so I think that’s really cool.

LARA: Yeah, absolutely. I mean, the hardest part for me in the game is not to fall in love with Astarion, because I love him so much. But, yeah, I mean, I’m in my fourth playthrough and it’s just like insane the amount of things I’m finding out the fourth time I’m playing.

MELISA: It’s a well-deserved Game of the Year for sure, in my opinion.

ARTHUR: On my Dark Urge playthrough, I decided to romance Lae’zel, and it was fun because on my good playthrough, she was probably sort of the meanest or most, you know, reproachable character in the game. And then, in my evil playthrough, she was the nicest, because everybody else was super mean, right? Like, you know, you get Shadowheart to go evil and you get Astarion to follow his questline and become evil, and so she was the nicest.

MELISA: Wow. That’s amazing. I love it. Honestly, I would make this episode like three hours long.

LARA: Yeah.

MELISA: It’s so great to hear you and all of your kind of like wisdom that you shared with us in this episode. We really appreciate it. And for everyone hearing, thank you so much for all this season. It’s been a wild ride. And yeah, thank you for listening.

ARTHUR: Thank you for having me.

ALEXIS: Thank you, Arthur. Thank you, everyone.

LARA: It’s an honor. It’s a pleasure. Thank you so much.

MELISA: Bye-bye!

ARTHUR: Bye!

ALEXIS: Bye-bye!

Episode Transcription

MELISA: Hello, everyone, and welcome to another episode of Open World. I’m Melisa, I’m here with Lara and Ale.

LARA: Hi!

ALEXIS: Hi, everyone!

MELISA: And today we have a little different of an episode. So what we did is ask our community what they wanted to hear, what they wanted us to talk about. And after a few days of voting, the people spoke, and the topic that was chosen is culturalization. So this is what we’re going to talk about today. And it’s a term that we use a lot in the industry and sometimes it’s mixed up with localization. So how would you guys define culturalization?

LARA: For me, culturalization is taking that little step forward from localization because it’s just a little bit more than just localizing our content, because we know that localization, it goes with words, with everything. But culturalization just makes it more of the culture, more of the target culture. You can see things that, yeah, maybe I localized these texts, but this is offensive in my country. You know? That’s just an example. So it has to be rewritten or it has to be rethought or… I don’t know.

ALEXIS: Yeah. I mean, it’s tailored even more to the game, even regarding current events or news that are relevant to when the game takes place. It’s taking a step further.

LARA: Yeah, it’s taking a step further in the meanings of, I don’t know, making something more accurate or something more relatable because maybe, if I have this joke and I localize it, right? Maybe the joke doesn’t have the same punch if I add my culture into that joke, you know what I mean?

MELISA: Absolutely.

LARA: So it’s just like, yeah, it’s taking that step forward from localization and trying to own that content that you’re trying to localize.

MELISA: Absolutely, and it makes me think of our episode about Spanish from Latin America and Spanish from… European. If you haven’t watched it…

LARA: Please, go watch it. We explain a lot about the differences and how to appropriate your own language.

MELISA: Exactly. And how can these cultural differences, in the case of, you add that step of culturalization, how can that change a video game?

LARA: Well, in the case of video games, it changes because sometimes you have this absolute great idea of a video game, but you don’t realize. I don’t know, for example, in Fallout, you don’t realize that cows are sacred in some religions in India. And in the Fallout series, you have a two-headed cow that you can actually shoot and kill. So it’s just like, that had some sort of repercussion over the culturalization part of it, because maybe if the game was culturalized for that specific market, you can remove the cow entirely. I mean, it’s just like you can remove it. Just it won’t be as offensive as it looks like right now. Even though it was not the intention, of course. It is unintentional, right? But because only one person cannot know all the cultures that they have in the entire world. So that’s why I think also it’s so important, because you do your research and you try to make your game for that specific market.

MELISA: Absolutely.

ALEXIS: Yeah, I mean, also it’s taking into account the symbols, body language, gestures… even hands, I mean. In Japan, fictional characters like, I don’t know, Crash Bandicoot has five fingers instead of four, like it has in America. Even Bart Simpson has four.

LARA: Yeah. It’s amazing because I remember seeing pictures of the Simpsons, and in this side of the country… in this side of the world, we have four fingers for all of the characters, but in Japan specifically, they have to have five. And it looks so weird.

MELISA: It’s so interesting. Yeah, definitely.

LARA: And another example talking about Japan is that, in Fallout, you have a gun that is called The Fatman and the name has been changed. This is not like a major change of the entire history of the game, but it has been changed because it was too close, it was too relatable to Hiroshima and Nagasaki, so they had to change it for cultural respect and everything. But yeah…

ALEXIS: But it can get extreme, like Far Cry 3. I mean Far Cry 3 was completely banned from Indonesia because the local authorities thought, they weren’t that wrong, but the game makes it as if living in Indonesia was a living hell. So they don’t think that that’s appropriate for their culture, for their people, and they banned the game.

MELISA: Yeah, so I think culturalization must be like really important to avoid these type of things from happening, like when you have your game banned from a country, and you want to reach that audience and, you know, sell your games in those countries. So in that way, would you say that culturalization is a market enabler for video games?

LARA: Yes and, at the same time, I would love to add that culturalization for me is that little step that you’re taking to take care of your community. Because you might find some things offensive. I don’t know, I’m thinking, if you’ve seen the latest episode of European Spanish and LATAM Spanish, I mention this Grim Fandango character that is supposed to be evil, right? And he was Argentinian, and the depiction of the Argentinian character and how… It didn’t sound right. It was just like, “Um…”

MELISA: Yeah, it’s like a stereotype…

LARA: Stereotyping. Yeah, you could’ve done your… I know it’s a really old game, but I think you could’ve done your research. I mean, it’s a matter of researching or having a diverse team on your own team so you can see different perspectives or in which ways this can be offensive. So to open these kinds of discussions between the teams and make the game go into a very much interesting direction, I believe. Another example that comes into my mind regarding culturalization and laws is that, for example, there was a law in Germany that prohibited every single thing that had to do with Nazi propaganda. So when you have, for example, the game Wolfenstein…

ALEXIS: Yeah, you can’t even show Adolf Hitler’s mustache.

LARA: Yeah. Or the Nazi symbols and everything. But then, when the law got removed, because I think they removed that law, the game was patched so that everyone could see how the game was in the rest of the world. So it’s just like, it is a constant thing of changing, of making the game more suitable.

MELISA: And adapt it to different…

ALEXIS: As the world changes, I mean, video games should change as well. I mean, culturalization is a market enable… a market enabler, sorry, if you think about it as a tool, you know, in order to better reach the market that maybe the game that you originally made has things that just don’t see eye to eye with, with an audience, you know? But it’s a tool.

MELISA: Like a tool to avoid disasters.

LARA: Yeah, and as a translator, I believe it’s so important to be, like, the gatekeeper of your own culture and flag the things that you believe are going to be offensive on your culture or on your language. I believe it’s so important because it’s going to deliver a better experience, and maybe the client is going to be thankful for your input.

MELISA: Yeah, so culturalization goes beyond just language, right? It can be a lot of things in your game, so it’s kind of a bit more like a holistic kind of view of your game in general, how it impacts different cultures, different, like, geopolitical situations. And I think our point in this episode is also just to bring awareness again to a topic that is really important in our industry.

LARA: I believe also what is really important in terms of culturalization is context, because, without context, how can you culturalize something, right? And we have, I believe, as translators, we can culturalize things in a way, but sometimes we don’t have the chance to change completely or an entire video game, right? So sometimes we have to adjust things as we can, or maybe the client doesn’t want that, so we have to take also that into account. So, as a translator, we want to be, like, the gatekeepers of our culture and everything, but also taking into account what the client says, the content…

MELISA: Having enough context for sure.

LARA: Enough context is just… Yeah, absolutely.

ALEXIS: I like that expression, the gatekeepers of our culture. I mean, in order to do that, you need a clear communication with your client so that they’re satisfied with what you’re bringing to the table.

MELISA: Yeah, and it shows that you really care, right? About your work.

ALEXIS: “Hey, this is not gonna work.”

MELISA: Yeah, because you want the game to be successful in the market that you want to…

LARA: Absolutely. And talking about context, because imagine what kind of culturalization you could do if you had enough context and if you knew your culture. Then you can maybe transform this into transcreation.

MELISA: Yeah, that’s another term that is quite used in the industry. And, yeah, like transcreation, culturalization, and they all refer to different aspects…

LARA: Transform… Yeah.

ALEXIS: Yeah, not translating, transforming into something that makes sense in the target language.

LARA: Exactly. I’m just thinking, when the first thing that came into my mind is, we all know Pikachu, right? But there are other Pokémons that have changed names in different countries, in different languages. There are a lot of examples of this.

ALEXIS: Well, just to name one, Lickitung, that we all know in Spanish is also Lickitung, in German, he’s called Schlurp, like the onomatopoeia. Or, I don’t know, the first three legendary Pokémon. I’m gonna mention the first era because I lost after Cyndaquil, Totodile and Chikorita.

LARA: We’re too old.

ALEXIS: I’m too old.

LARA: Even though I played Pokémon Scarlet, I don’t know why I’m throwing myself away from…

ALEXIS: But I don’t know where to start if I… It’s fine, let’s talk about it later. For instance, the first legendary birds Moltres, Articuno and Zapdos. That’s clearly, like, one, two, three, you know? But actually, in Japanese, the names are Freezer, Thunder and Fire, straightforward names with the elements with which they attack, right? Like, the legendary bird of thunder, Zapdos.

MELISA: Yeah, and it definitely, of course, has to do with the culture, what they think will impact…

ALEXIS: Be appropriate.

MELISA: Yeah, exactly, like people will, you know, get it a bit more if it’s more straightforward, maybe. Like, you know, all of that has to do with the culture, the country that they’re targeting.

LARA: Yeah, absolutely. And sometimes, not taking these extra steps as a developer, right? Because, as a translator, I believe we all do this, we all try to gatekeep our culture and everything, but sometimes developers don’t take this extra step. And sometimes there is like some bad and negative information or, like, repercussions with that game. Maybe you even kind of have legal problems with this too. And I believe you want to avoid that at all costs. So maybe your game that is doing so well in America will not be properly done if you want to launch it in Japan. I don’t know.

ALEXIS: You need to make some changes that are things that don’t actually impact the game, but they’re gonna work best, they’re gonna be better.

MELISA: Yeah, absolutely. I think that’s what part of culturalization also, what’s known as, like, the proactive and reactive culturalization, which depends on the moment in the process. And there are certain things that you can think when you’re planning your game, you know, you can think, “Ok, these aspects, I can change them a bit around so that people…” Because you already know you wanna ship your game to different places, so you think, these things can be culturalized and they can connect a bit more with the target audience. What types of things do you guys think can be adapted?

LARA: To me… Yeah, there are some things. For example, there’s no need to adapt everything, because I know you might want to keep the essence of your game.

ALEXIS: Yeah, you’re gonna lose something in the process.

LARA: And you’re gonna lose something. But to me, the things that have to be changed, the things that could be prohibited because of religions or insulting or offensive, or goes against any laws. So to me, those things have to be changed.

MELISA: That is more like the reactive side of…

LARA: Yeah, that’s more the reactive side of things. For example, if you have a game like Far Cry 6, right? And you want to create this cultural immersion into the game and to let you know that you are in Latin America, that it’s today and you are in Latin America, you’re in 2023 in Latin America, the first thing that comes into your mind is the music. Because, for example, for me, that’s the best case, because whenever you get into a car with Dani and she turns on the radio and she starts singing with the radio, all these Spanish songs and all these… I mean, at least for me, that I know, Gente de Zona, all these bands that are so welcoming and from Latin America. The level of culturalization that they have done to make things culturally appropriate for that game is just, to me, amazing. I cannot believe how… how is it possible that you make me feel like I was at home.

ALEXIS: On that same spirit, I think it’s a constant that we mention Ubisoft as doing many, many things right.

LARA: Yeah.

ALEXIS: Like keeping the players in mind first. But I also remember some cultural aspects that were taken care of with absolute love in the latest Assassin’s Creed games. I mean, in Odyssey, they worked with Greek actors with actual insults that they used back then. And even in one game before that, Origins, one of the key elements of the story is Bayek finding some stones in a certain form or shape help him remember things and has some visions that each of these stones represent constellations that were meaningful for the Egyptians, even back then. So all of those things that are from the developers themselves, are so well-thought-out, you know? And that’s what I appreciate as a gamer.

LARA: Yes, absolutely. And sometimes you hear music, for example. I just… When you hear, for example, the radio in GTA 5, you are transported into the place, you know? And… yeah, I love it because they took like normal songs and, for some reason, your brain now is attached to that memory, and you’re like, yeah, I’m driving my car into the highway like… It’s so good. I mean, when the culturalization is taking part in the development of the game, you can really tell.

MELISA: Yeah, exactly, because there’s these, like, tools that you can plan ahead and then connects really well with your audience.

LARA: Absolutely. We had last year Kate Edwards, she worked on Age of Empires. If you haven’t seen that episode, please go check it out, because, when she talks about culturalization, she takes it to the absolute next level because she’s a genius. And when she explains about the maps and how that could be culturally inappropriate, you start thinking, oh, my God, this is not… good. I mean, you have to make it good. That’s what she does for a living, she just goes researching culture everywhere. So yeah, maybe also it would help having a diverse… I know I always say the exact same thing, but for me it’s important to have different perspectives of the world because it will make the game more rich and more beautiful, in general, right? Like, it is going to hit that spot.

ALEXIS: On that same note, one of the things that is important to have culturalized is what gamers see in the stores, right? The message that comes to them before they buy the game. And even the currency that they buy the game in.

MELISA: Yeah, yeah, yeah. The marketing content, I mean, how important it is culturalization, transcreation in marketing. I think that’s already really established, as well.

LARA: To me, it’s just simply, to make like a conclusion of this, it’s just do your research. If you want to get to a specific market and you think that the content that you have is not going to be suitable for that market, please do your research. Have a diverse team. I think everything could be so beautiful like that, it could flow so well. And, yeah, it could avoid disasters, to be honest with you. It could avoid you losing money, too.

ALEXIS: And it can make you earn far more fans.

MELISA: Exactly. I think people will definitely appreciate you going the extra mile, it will have a positive impact, we can assure you. Thank you so much for watching or hearing this episode. And if you wanna know more about culturalization or you have any questions, please let us know. We’re happy to hear… we’re gonna be reading all the comments. And yes, that’s it. Thank you so much. Bye, everyone.

LARA: Bye-bye! Thank you!

Episode Transcription

LARA: Hi, everyone! Welcome to another episode of Open World. Hi, Ale. Hi, Meli. Today we have a special guest with us, Olga Petrova. Hi, Olga! It’s so nice to see you here with us. Thank you for joining us.

OLGA: Hi! Thank you for having me.

LARA: It’s a real pleasure. Like, we are really excited to have you.

MELISA: Yes, thank you so much for joining us, Olga.

ALEXIS: Olga, for everyone that’s watching us, can you please introduce yourself, provide some background on your experience on video games localization, and a little bit about your journey?

OLGA: Yeah, sure. Once again, thank you for having me. I’m super excited to be here and share a little bit about what I know about localization and what keeps me going, for more than 15 years already, going on 20, I think. Yeah. I’m mostly in project management throughout my career, managing teams and projects and video games localization. I have participated in localization of over 200 games, roughly. Triple A titles, MMORPGs, mobile games. So when I started, I was just a freelance translator, so I actually took the full path from being a freelance translator to being a professional. And I was lucky to have worked on some of the most successful projects in the gaming industry from…

ALEXIS: I was gonna ask you if there was any OP that you’re most proud of or that was very successful.

OLGA: So big companies like Activision, 2K, Capcom, Bethesda, Rockstar, I did projects for those.

MELISA: Dropping names.

OLGA: Yeah, I know. And then, yeah, so I used to work for a big… for the largest original publisher in Russia, and that’s when I got acquainted with big names. And then I moved on to work in the development studios, where I was able to do some influence on the development process and become a localization advocate and evangelist. Yeah.

ALEXIS: Yeah, it’s needed. It’s needed. Especially in indie studios. I started…

LARA: Not only in indie studios, but yeah. It’s just like…

ALEXIS: Everywhere. I remember one of my first steps in the video game industry was to be a localization something, you know, advocate, consultant or whatever in an indie dev studio.

LARA: Yeah. Yeah, it’s really needed. And you can tell when someone puts into the game localization early in the stages because you can tell that everything runs smooth, the localization is perfect, all the cultural aspects are taken into account. So, yeah. That’s awesome.

ALEXIS: Sorry I interrupted you, Olga.

OLGA: Oh, that’s okay. I couldn’t agree more to everything you guys are saying. Yes, it’s extremely important. And I’m, like, I’m still… It’s hard to believe that in 2023, we’re still talking about why we need localization to be a part of the game development, right?

LARA: Oh, my God. Yeah.

MELISA: Absolutely. That’s why I think it’s so important what you were saying. And since we’re already talking about this, I hope it’s okay, I’ll ask you the next question, which is very related. And that’s, what are some common challenges that arise when localization is brought in too late in the development process? And how can these challenges be mitigated?

OLGA: Yeah. Where do I start?

MELISA: A lot to say about this.

OLGA: Yeah. I sometimes call localization a Cinderella of the game development. We rarely get invited to the ball.

LARA: I love it!

MELISA: I love it. That’s so funny!

ALEXIS: Can I use that? I’m using that. I’m sorry, I’m using that.

OLGA: It is true. For a lot of companies, we are the least favorite stepchild, and it is what it is, right?

LARA: And we are so important. Like, come on. How? How can this happen? We’re like… We’re like Cinderella, you know? And you’re inviting us like… No, there’s no way.

MELISA: If you invite us, we’re gonna make an impact. Just saying.

OLGA: Yeah. Maybe drop a shoe or two. But yeah, in all seriousness, just, I think, for the most part, it’s never intentional. It’s just because the developers don’t know better and they just don’t think about it when they start their journey. So… bringing us late in the process essentially cost you. And you end up doing a lot of reworks, a lot of changes or just accepting a quality in localization that is… that is lower than what you have in English or whatever original language your game is created in. So you might be telling a joke that, when it is translated, will not get understood by most of the players who don’t speak English. You might have a puzzle in your game that a person who doesn’t speak English won’t make any sense and will leave them confused. Um… Your user interface might not support text expansion and it will just end up playing font size Tetris when you try to put in the translated text in that small box. What else?

MELISA: These are great examples. They’re very practical, like, very to-the-point ways to know how, like…

OLGA: It’s like, I am a manager, but I’m always very close to what I’m working on. So that’s also one of the things why you have to have localization people on your team. They will spend time, they will invest and make an effort to get your game. They will be on your side. They will be protective of the product that you as a developer are creating, and they will try to make it as good in other language as it is in the language that you used to conceive it. So yeah.

LARA: Yeah. I mean, when you were mentioning…

OLGA: And we haven’t even mentioned the cost here, right? So all that comes up when you bring in localization late, that means more money is gonna be spent on the work that can be done early in the process and therefore be cheaper.

LARA: Yeah. So when you were mentioning the challenges, I could easily like recall games that had those problems that I already played, you know? And I was like, oh my God, this could have been such an easy fix from the early stages, but here I am, playing this game, facing these challenges, and it’s like, Oh, this joke is not even funny in my language. So I totally agree. Um, I have the other question now. From your experience, what are the benefits of having a localization expert collaborate with the development team from the early stages?

OLGA: It’s a really good question, and I think we touched a little bit on that already, but let me just expand and see what else comes to mind when I think about the benefits for the developer. Well, let’s start with money. Because I think that proverbial return on investment from localization that everyone expects is one of the things that you can really justify and can really separate what exactly was the localization role apart from the marketing or user acquisition campaign or the game itself. Maybe the game is so genius that it doesn’t have to have all the bells and whistles that localization brings into. But the money is just, you keep the costs down. You… You avoid the expensive do-overs because you get it right the first time. So one of the games in my last workplace turned out to be extremely successful, but it was not created with localization in mind. They had it in English for the longest time. At the same time, the management realized that they’re leaving a lot of money on the table because, well, there are players who don’t speak English all over the world that could be enjoying the game and bringing in money, the revenue. So that need, it was there, so the decision was made to actually finally have the localization in the game. So without like even any numbers, I’m just gonna tell you that it took nine months of work for two engineers revamping the code and making the localization possible.

LARA: Oh, my God. Like the amount of money, time and effort. Oh, my God!

OLGA: The translation itself didn’t take that much time.

ALEXIS: Right.

LARA: I imagine. Oh, my God, it’s insane. I get, like, goosebumps. It’s insane.

OLGA: It can be really expensive. It can be, like, it can save you a lot of money if you think about internationalization. If you have the right people in the team who can guide the developer and tell them that there are certain things that are better avoided or there are certain things that need to be done from day one that, even if you don’t launch with multiple languages, even if you only launch in English, by the time that you make a decision to localize, it’s not exactly going like that, but very similar. And it does save you a lot of money and time to make it happen.

LARA: Money and time, two things that we could all have more of.

OLGA: And that’s the famous triangle, right? Money, time and quality.

LARA: Yeah.

OLGA: At least you hit two of those. And then quality is up to the professionalism of the localization people that you have.

ALEXIS: Olga, you’re talking about the quality, the professionalism that translation, localization, when taken in the right time and place of the development process, saves you money, saves you time. But I want to go back to the professionalism aspect and the cultural considerations that come with the localization process. Do you think that there are any cultural considerations, like in a broad aspect, that are particularly important for game developers to be aware of when creating content for different markets?

OLGA: Absolutely, Alex. It’s a very good question. Again, like it’s very relevant to the daily work that localization teams are doing around the world, right? We are bridging the cultural gaps. We’re doing it every single day. And we help because we’re bringing players together, and making us all a little bit closer to each other. So there are linguistic considerations. So language and humor, you don’t want to have any puns and jokes that might not translate well. It’s like, if you tell a joke that only makes sense in one language and you hear crickets from the audience, right? So you don’t want to run into this. And don’t get me started on geopolitical sensitivities. I can give you two very fresh examples and one not so fresh one.

ALEXIS: I was gonna ask for examples. Please, go ahead.

OLGA: Oh, that’s fine because I do have it. Say that Spider-Man game that was just released and the flag SNAFU with mixing up Cuban and Puerto Rican flags.

ALEXIS: Yes. I saw that.

OLGA: If they had a culturalization expert on the team or if they paid maybe more attention, they could’ve easily…

LARA: Oh, my God. Yeah.

OLGA: And that was…

LARA: It was so simple.

ALEXIS: It’s simple. We’re doing the same expression, Lali. We’re both like…

LARA: It’s just like, oh, my God. Yes, I saw it, and it was like, no way.

OLGA: It takes a certain like… It takes some skills, right? It takes a certain… Um… You need to be attuned to certain things in a game or in a movie or in a book to be able to catch up on these things. And that’s why you need people who can help you with that. The same thing with the Barbie movie that was banned in Vietnam because of the nine-dash line and that map that they were referring to, it didn’t even look like a map, but it was significant for Vietnamese people, right? And it was a big issue for them, so it was justified in their eyes. From my own experience, I can tell you that we had really big problems with Call of Duty: Modern Warfare 2 that was released in Russia with the level that Activision actually took away from the Russian edition with the terrorists killing civilians in the airport.

ALEXIS: Yes, that famous/infamous level.

LARA: Oh, my God, yeah.

OLGA: But we had quite a big backlash from inside the country that was pointed at the company at that time, the publisher. So they blamed us for neglecting this particular sensitivity in this particular case, even like considering releasing the game in the country. So just like, you know, like three quite bright examples, but there are so many more and they happen all the time. I actually, myself, I have a collection of the movies that make some funny things with the Russian language just because they sort of entertain me, and I find it interesting that, with the amount of money and the budgets that Hollywood has, they just neglect double checking so many things.

MELISA: I would love to see that collection.

OLGA: Well, the movies that have actually Spanish speakers in them, you probably, like, you can totally relate.

ALEXIS: We can do the same with the Spanish. It’s a horror.

MELISA: Yeah. But I think the point that you were making about the movie and why this, like, those are great examples. And it’s so painful, there’s a lot of effort and money and people working for years sometimes in some of these games, and just, you know, to get ruined or banned completely for a completely full audience like of several countries and stuff like that just for these tiny mistakes that, you know, can be avoided. That’s like how important I think this message that we are here trying to spread thanks to Olga. It’s like… You know, I think that’s a great proof of our point.

OLGA: And it’s heartbreaking for the teams because, like you said, they’re working so hard, they’re putting their heart and soul in the game and then they’re being criticized for something that could be easily corrected or avoided at all. So, yeah, those were my examples.

MELISA: Yeah, those are a great examples.

LARA: Great examples.

ALEXIS: Thank you for those great examples.

MELISA: And related to what I just said, can you share some advice for those game developers who may be listening to this episode and may need to become more familiar with the importance of early localization involvement?

OLGA: Yeah, let me try. So, I would tell that they need to be curious, because a lot of times, the developers speak only one language. And there’s nothing wrong with that. You can’t expect everyone to be bilingual or be interested in learning something about the different culture. But it pays off when you try and do that. So just be curious. Try to understand and embrace the landscapes of different cultures and languages. Do the research, ask questions. I think not being guilty to ask questions, and not be afraid to ask them is one of the most important things that a person can actually have in them. I think that the ability to ask questions and to show curiosity is actually showing that people are not indifferent and they’re passionate about what they’re doing. And that’s really important. And it usually shows in the results. What else? So besides curiosity and asking questions, building a diverse team.

LARA: Oh, my God, yeah.

MELISA: I love this.

OLGA: Different backgrounds from different countries speaking different languages. That usually helps. My biggest release so far was a game that was published on Netflix platform, and we launched in 15 languages and we ended up having 33. Obviously, I don’t speak 33 languages, but we had a lot of team members who were able to help out with a lot of them. And that did help. And because, again, like having people on the team who were able to give you advice about their culture, who can tell you what’s acceptable and what’s not, what is… what aligns with customs of the country and what doesn’t, and sometimes are able to tell you the peculiarities of the language. And, if you have a problem with, say, Hindi, which we didn’t know that Unity had, but we had some Hindi speaking people on the team and we were trying to assess how serious this issue is, can we actually release the game with this issue or do we need to change all the words in the game that have this particular glyph or this particular character in it to something else and try that approach instead? Right, so, there are those small things, but they add up to being very important and the quality, never going down. So, yeah, that’s… Definitely brings a unique flavor to the table, for sure.

MELISA: This is some great advice. Thank you, Olga, that was…

OLGA: In fact, with the Netflix release, there was… My mom was actually… Well, I was bragging on my social media, and she was seeing that and was asking, “But how do you translate in 33 languages?” Like, “Mom, it’s okay…”

LARA: I love that!

ALEXIS: I love that. It’s a constant that I found in many people working in the localization industry, that moms usually don’t quite grasp what we do.

OLGA: And that was after 15 years that I’ve been doing that, she was still very naive.

ALEXIS: “My daughter is a translator.” Right?

LARA: Yeah, that’s what my mom says, like, “Yeah, my daughter works translating video games.” She doesn’t even have a clue what goes into it.

OLGA: And I think that’s actually a common misconception that we also have to fight, because for… A lot of times for the management, we are just glorified translators, for some reason, who earn more than they deserve. But that’s not the case. Like a lot of work that we as localization professionals do is language agnostic. It needs to be done in your product no matter how many languages you support. You need to have your conversation with the Game Designer to find out what was put behind each and every player phrase and string in the game, you need to have it documented and you need to know the context for that game because the translators, they’re gonna ask you. And if not the first time, then maybe the second time around. And you need to have that localization Bible like I call it, like it’s usually based off on game design document, but it’s so much more, right? So you build up on that and you use the questions that are asked by the translation team, you add on to that and then, when it’s time to launch in a new language, you have it already and a lot of questions are already answered. So yeah, it’s so much more than just translation and just sending files back and forth. You have to think about so many things besides just having the text translated, starting from, I don’t know, choosing the right font, making sure that all the characters are there, like I said. When I started in localization, I was translating into a language that was not part of EFIGS. So very rarely the developers had an idea that there are certain sets of characters that will be used for displaying the text in the game. So a lot of times, we were receiving a localized version, no characters were seen or, the best case, we had like the tofu squares.

ALEXIS: Yeah, I remember those squares.

OLGA: I can’t count the times I had to get back to the developers and ask them, “Where’s my Cyrillic font? Why don’t they have a Cyrillic font?” So, it’s better now for sure. And a lot of phones have like a full set of characters for alphabetized languages, but it’s still, like, for a lot of them, it’s still a work in progress. And usually, the… the game designers, the UX, UI people, they like to work with the fonts that are pretty, that create a certain atmosphere. Like, imagine something like Bioshock, with its art deco vibes, right? So those fonts, they rarely have support for all the glyphs. So you need to think about that because your engineers, game designers, even your UI, UX people might not, and you need to help them. So, yeah, it’s part of the job. Very exciting, actually.

LARA: Yeah. Yeah, I love that. I love that. I mean, we in Spanish, we have special characters all the time too. And it’s actually funny because the tofu squares that, like you mentioned, I find them always, all the time, and it’s just like, oh, it was just as simple as changing the font. But yeah, there you have it. It happens.

OLGA: Yes. Or just testing, right? So just bring the pangram, use the pangram and you will be able to tell right away if any of the characters are missing. But it’s just because engineers are not trained and the game developers rarely think about it from the start, especially Hindi, right? Like they’re thinking about creating something so special, so new, so exciting that they just don’t have time to think about all the intricacies that might come with actually making a global release. So it’s just the nature of the work. And that’s why localization exists as a discipline and that’s why we need it.

LARA: I love it. I love it. This episode has been one of my favorites. Like, thank you so much, Olga, for your time. This has been amazing. Guys, I don’t know if you want to say anything else.

MELISA: Olga, everything you said was so on point. I think everyone listening, like, it’s just great, great advice, great examples. So thank you so much for joining us.

OLGA: Oh, thank you for having me. I really… I love my job. I really like what I do.

LARA: We can tell. We can tell, we can see the passion that you have.

ALEXIS: Thank you for sharing your own personal stories as well. That’s very important.

OLGA: I find it that some people usually want to hear something personal rather than just very abstract…

ALEXIS: We do it, too.

LARA: Yeah, 100%. We really appreciate it. Thank you so much, everyone. You that you are listening or hearing or watching this episode on YouTube or wherever you are listening this, too, thank you so much for joining us today. We will see you again in another episode. Bye-bye!

MELISA: Bye, everyone.

ALEXIS: Bye-bye.

Episode Transcription

MELISA: Welcome, everyone, to a new episode of Open World. I’m here with Ale and Lari, and today we have the pleasure to interview Hi-Rez’s Localization Director, Estelle Bailly. We are extremely excited to have you with us today, Estelle. Thank you so much for joining us.

ESTELLE: Well, thank you for inviting me. I’m very excited too.

LARA: Yeah, this is extremely exciting. And I have the honor to ask you the first question. So here it goes. What inspired you to pursue a career in linguistics?

ESTELLE: Oh, I’ve always been interested in having an international career. I wanted to be a diplomat, actually, so… I thought that, you know, languages would open new horizons to me, so I studied German and then English. And after college, I thought about maybe studying international business, but I wasn’t too sure, so… and I was a good student. So I went to what is called in France Hypokhâgne. It’s a preparatory school. And basically, once you’ve done that, you can apply to very elite schools to have international careers or do politics, you know, fancy jobs. Well… it depends on what you want. So the program is in two years and I did… one month. So, yeah, it was my first fail. There were so many things to learn, to be honest. So many books to read, essays to write, lots of things. It was like being back to college, but… worse. And you’re 18 and you want to have your student life you’ve been hearing about, right? You want to go out with your friends and do stuff, still, do some studies but, you know… have a good balance. So, after a month, I decided to quit and I signed up at uni to study English and German because that was the only two courses that I really enjoyed during this preparatory school. So that’s how it all began, I think.

MELISA: Great that it was just one month. Your decision was pretty quick. I mean, a lot of people start a career and then you’re like after a year or two… “Actually, this is not for me.” But you, immediately… “No.”

ESTELLE: “Diplomats? That’s really cool!” And after one month you’re like… “These people are not for me.”

LARA: That’s so cool. Yeah, I wasted like a year doing a career I didn’t like, and it took me a year to figure it out. So, if you figured it out in a month, that’s incredible. Yeah.

MELISA: And sometimes you force yourself, like you want to like it. Okay, I already made the decision, like, I have to do this now. But, you know, you don’t, so… It’s always good to, you know…

ESTELLE: Yeah, exactly. Or maybe I was just too lazy to, you know, to stay more than a month. I really enjoyed it.

MELISA: There was something telling you you had to go a different way, so…

ESTELLE: Yeah, yeah, yeah. Uni was better for me, I think.

ALEXIS: So, could you describe how was your journey in the world of video game localization from where it all began to where you are now?

ESTELLE: Oh, sure. So I was at uni, and I had to work to finance my student life.

ALEXIS: That’s always a good drive away. You know, I need money.

ESTELLE: Yes, I needed money. I did various jobs and then one day I saw this offer at uni, actually. It was to translate video games and it was in an agency not too far from where I studied, so I thought “Oh, that’s perfect.” And at that time I played video games quite a lot. And I have never thought… It was in 1999. Oh, the last century! Oh my God, I feel so old.

ALEXIS: Okay, wait. But do you remember what were you playing?

ESTELLE: Um… yes, it was more… more a girly game, but more like adventurous game. The 7th Guest, Grim Fandango. Remember Grim Fandango? Yeah, it’s the best one. Yeah, these kinds of games. I really liked it. The 7^th Guest, and I think the second one was The 11th Hour. It was not that good. The 7^th Guest was good, I remember that one. And then console games like The Mario thing and, you know…

ALEXIS: Sorry, I wanted to ask, but I love that you remember all the games that you were playing.

ESTELLE: Oh, yeah, yeah. Grim Fandango is still one of the best I’ve ever played. And that was… Yeah, last century, right? So anyway. Yeah. I didn’t know there was a job who could really need both my passions at that time, translation and video games. So, you didn’t know it existed, right? It was very… a while ago, I mean, a long time ago. Anyway… long story short, I applied, I got the job. A minimum wage, maximum working hours. You know, it was a true… How do we call that? Startup, you know.

ALEXIS: Putting your foot in the door.

ESTELLE: Oh, yeah. And you do everything yourself, right? But the team was lovely, very small. We would not outsource anything. And we were working almost nights and days, you know, seven days a week, for sure. On Friday nights you could go out, but then Saturday would be in the office. But I liked it. So it was a team of passionate people. And we all got along very well, so… When I think about it today, I think “Oh, that was a bit crazy.” But, um… actually I really enjoyed it at that time. And because we were doing everything ourselves, I learned so much. I really worked on all aspects of the localization pipeline. Well, obviously translation, but proofreading, project management, account management, I even did some assistance for our direction in the recording studio. Also recruitment, training of the new hires, going to conventions, and meeting with clients and team management throughout the end. So it was really hard work. I learned so much. I also discovered that I wasn’t that good after uni. You know, at the end of uni, you think that you know everything but actually, you know nothing. But it’s okay. You learn. And I had a mentor and good people who were passionate enough to teach me stuff, so I learned how to do it. And working at a localization agency, you adapt. You have to adapt so many… I mean, so much, because during the day you will work on six, eight different projects for as many different clients, jumping from one translation guide to another, one tool to another. And one day my boss told me: “Once you know how to handle the pressure and the work in a loc agency you can do anything… publisher, developer in localization because it will sound easy to you.” And I was like “Oh really? I want to try that. I want to go on the other side.”

ALEXIS: I want to see if you were right.

ESTELLE: Yeah, I want to work less. And so I tried to go to the other side to developer or publisher several times. I was looking for a job in France and there was not that many opportunities. And each time I got the same thing, you know, I ended up in the last two candidates and people said: “Oh yeah, you have some experience, but you don’t have experience as a publisher or developer. So we are going to pick the other candidate.” And you’re like… “Yeah, that’s why I applied to get this experience.”

ALEXIS: That’s what I’m trying to get.

MELISA: It’s a typical cycle. “You need the experience.” But I need to get in to get the experience.

ESTELLE: It’s like when you’re looking for an internship and you’re like… “Yeah, but you’re too new to know.” “Yes. That’s why I’m going to be an intern.” “Yeah, but, you know, you have no experience.” Yeah, it’s always the same thing, right? So, anyway, in parallel I became a mum and Paris is a lovely city, a very busy city. And it’s great. Just if you want to have a family life, especially with young kids, it’s not probably the best city you could live in. So, with my husband, we decided that maybe I could apply somewhere else. He’s self-employed, he just needs an internet connection. A good one, but, still… that’s convenient. So I started to apply to jobs in other cities and other countries, and that’s how I joined Hi-Rez in 2016. I didn’t know this company, actually, before applying to it, but the Free-to-play monetization model really interested me as well. So, anyway, I got the job once again and we all moved to Brighton in the UK with the kids who couldn’t speak a word of English at that time and that was quite an adventure, I have to say.

MELISA: How old were the kids then?

ESTELLE: They were six and eight. Yeah. In France, we start learning foreign languages very late. That’s why we are bad at foreign languages. But yeah. So, when we arrived here, a teacher said: “Well, you know, after three months, they’re going to pick a few words here and there. After six months, they’re going to start to understand. And after a year they’re talking.” And that’s exactly what happened. And now, you know, when I talk to their teacher and tell them that their native language is French, they say: “Oh, really?” They don’t know. While, when the teacher hears me, after 5 seconds: “You’re French, right?” I wonder how you guessed.

MELISA: It’s such a big change for everyone in the family, right?

ESTELLE: Yeah, but, I thought…

MELISA: It turned out good.

ESTELLE: Yeah, exactly. It was a great change.

MELISA: I love hearing your whole journey and through how you got to your current role. And now my next question is: What do you find most rewarding about your current role and why?

ESTELLE: Team management, definitely. I like being a team leader. I started in France. I had a great team in France as well, brilliant project managers. I was very lucky to have them. When I arrived at Hi-Rez, we developed the team, the localization team, and we had great people joining and learning with all of them. It was a multi… it was a multicultural team obviously, and that’s so interesting and I love being a team leader, taking care of people. I think… I’ve always known I like caring for people. But I think the older I grow, the more interested I am in human beings, you know, rather than projects. Sorry, no offense to Hi-Rez projects. I still like our projects. But I do love our people at Hi-Rez. And I think this really reflects my way of managing people. You know, if you ask me or if you talk to me about OKRs. Do you work with OKRs? Do you know what OKRs are? Well, if you don’t, you can Google it or just don’t Google it. It’s just like setting objectives and to each of your team members, you know, in a specific period of time and you need to achieve these and that and, and if you ask me to do this, I probably would run away because I’m more like on the human side… “Okay, tell me, what are you interested in? What kind of games do you want to work on? What kind of skills do you want to develop, to focus on?” You know, I try to keep that in mind when I sign a new project. It’s not always possible. I’m not saying: “Oh, I’m perfect.” I’m not perfect. So, definitely it’s not always possible to please everyone. But to me, if I can give a project manager a game they want to work on as a project, then I’m quite certain that they will do their very, very best to deliver an excellent job just because they would be motivated. You know, some people say “pressure makes diamonds.” I really don’t like that. I really prefer “motivation makes diamonds.” You know, that’s my motto, actually. And let’s say that when you’re motivated, I think half of the job is already done. Kind of.

MELISA: I love it. Motivation makes diamonds. I love it.

LARA: Yeah, it speaks wonders of you, honestly. You’re putting people first. I mean, nowadays, in this industry in particular, it speaks wonders, so.

ESTELLE: I try to do it. I’m not saying. Yeah.

LARA: But you are trying it at least. That’s something. Yeah.

ESTELLE: I think it is quite well, so, yeah.

LARA: Yeah. I have the next question. And how has your career evolved over the years and what lessons have you learned along the way?

ESTELLE: Oh, um… Well, as I mentioned earlier, I think I did all the roles I could possibly do, I believe, in the video game loc industry, not that I can’t learn anything anymore. But you know, from translation, proofreading, project management, recruitment, I even did some LQA at some point on casual games, and it was in my early years. But yeah, Team Leader and now Loc Director… Yeah, that’s pretty quick. I did a lot of things. There must be other things I can do. But the lessons I would say, a few lessons. Well, motivation. Motivation is key. Try to motivate your team. You know, that’s how they will want to stay in your company. Not necessarily stay in your team, but at least, you know, make them feel part of the they belong to a group, a team. I think that’s important. To focus on their motivation and on your own motivation as well. And obviously, communication, communication is key. Work-life, private life… communication is always key. I keep saying that to my kids. And communication is key. Not always when it’s bad, you know, to talk about the thing that went bad. If things go well, say it as well, you know, because, like, when you work with a vendor, you know, don’t be too shy, you know, and send them an email when you’re happy with them delivering the job with good reactivity, because they respected all instructions or because it went well. It’s not because you don’t have a bad comment to say that you shouldn’t communicate with them. So, yes, communicate. When you’re not happy, but also when you’re happy. It’s important. Communication is key.

MELISA: I think this is such a good point because I feel like feedback, a lot of times it’s like you just give feedback when something wrong is happening and so the other person might feel like… “Well, I’m doing everything wrong” But that just little positive feedback might give them that motivation. “Okay, I did a good job.”

ESTELLE: Yeah. And when you’re French, you know, French tends to focus on the negative. “Oh, you should have done better this, that.” And all this is not really good. “This is not really good.” It’s not really the positive education, even at school. So I think it’s really important that once in a while to send an email just to say thank you for your commitment, thank you for being there because, you know… you’re really part of our success as well. So it’s good to say that. And also send feedback when they didn’t think exactly what you were expecting as well, because otherwise they can’t know what they have to improve, obviously.

ALEXIS: And that’s something that you need to know how to do as well, right? To give that feedback the best way possible.

ESTELLE: Yes. Yes, exactly. Exactly. And also to accept the feedback. But yeah, definitely it’s super important. Communication. Be humble as well. Always. Don’t be afraid to be too vulnerable. I think, especially, when you are in the leadership team and Yeah. You can’t know everything. You can’t have the answer to every single question or you can’t solve every problem. You’re not perfect, so, yes, accept it. And try to just be humble and be open. You can learn from everyone any time. Well, overconfident people tend to make me feel very uncomfortable. That’s my impostor syndrome. So, yeah, humility is key. I prefer humility in human beings. Also don’t be an asshole. That’s one of our motto at Hi-Rez. Don’t be an asshole.

MELISA: I really like this message. Because usually it’s confidence that gets praised. Like you have to show yourself really confident, like you know everything. and, you know, being humble… is also really, really important. It shows really good things. For me, at least, you know, when I see a leader that is humble and it’s open to learn new things like you were saying, you’re like… “Oh, wow, okay.” You know, we connect a bit more, I think.

ESTELLE: Yes, exactly. Don’t be an asshole. Be nice with others. Assholes, they never win, in the end. Except in politics, but that’s another discussion. Yeah. And the last thing I would say it’s maybe this is just work. It’s important as well to remember that because especially when… If you are like me and tend to feel like an impostor and then you tend to push yourself to work as hard or as much as possible because you want to show to people that “Yes, I belong here, I deserve my promotion.” Or, you know, you want to prove something to others, then the burnout is never really too far from you. So learn to stop before it’s too late. I went through burnout as well in my early years in France, and that’s really not something you want to go through. It’s not nice. And it takes time to recover. So we’re not saving lives. We’re just doing video games, right? So it’s cool. It’s really cool, but just don’t forget it. It won’t change anything if you answer this email in half an hour. Just go for a walk. A short walk. Get a break. Yes. I mean, it’s just that you would be so much more productive. And yes, I don’t need to answer you email constantly. Because I was like… I would stay in front of my desk. Not going to the toilet or to go and get food. And, you know, just because I thought… “Oh, if I go back to my desk, there would be so many emails to answer. And you know, I need to answer right away because the clients need to know I’m on it. I’m on it.” You know, that was always my… “I’m on it,” you know? Yeah, actually yes, I’m on it, but I can be on it, like in half an hour and take care of yourself as well. It’s really important. And I think after COVID years, oh, I got to realize a bit more that it’s important, but it’s definitely the most important thing. Yes. Yeah, absolutely. You know? And yeah, yes. Because I’ve been working on my impostor syndrome recently, I try to be more gentle with myself and to accept that I’m not perfect. And some people have been in my team no more than I do, and actually it’s fine. Probably it’s because I was good enough to hire them. So I hired the right people probably. And I shouldn’t be afraid if they are better than me. Um. Yeah, I try to be more comfortable with my weaknesses as well. It takes time. I’m not going to lie, but, I’ve been there.

MELISA: That is such a good point. Being gentle with yourself. And you know how people say all the time there’s things like how we… we are so used to lifting other people up, and how a lot of things when something happens around a situation, we talk to ourselves like we would never talk to a friend, like we talk to ourselves and say… “Well, how is that possible?” We’re not being that compassionate with our own selves.

ESTELLE: Or we don’t have a lot of friends, right?

LARA: I mean, it’s so important because also I believe after COVID and remote working and everything, it was just harder to separate your personal life from work, you know? And for me personally, I have to constantly remind myself it’s just work. Like tomorrow is going to be okay If you send these like two hours later, no one’s going to die.

ESTELLE: Yes, my manager in Paris used to say that all the time. And I keep saying it because it’s true. No one will die. It’s just work. It’s just games. Even games are important.

LARA: Yeah, a hundred percent.

ESTELLE: But, yeah, no one will die, and that’s the most important thing.

ALEXIS: So, Estelle, with so many people experiencing impostor syndrome at some point, beginning or even when they get a high position. But you have presented some excellent talks about this subject, right? So, I don’t know how to phrase this question, but maybe it would be what strategies or techniques have you found effective that you’d like to share with us in fighting these feelings of inadequacy, self-doubt? I don’t know. You take it from whatever you want.

ESTELLE: Okay. First, allow me to… because of the terminology, because of my translation background. So it’s going to be a terminology minute.

ALEXIS: Yes.

ESTELLE: I know we all say “impostor syndrome.” I do say it all the time. In fact, the official historical term is “impostor phenomenon” or “impostor experience,” because it is an experience rather than… When we say “impostor syndrome,” it makes people feel that it’s a clinical diagnosis, which is not. So the right term should actually be “impostor phenomenon.” But, that’s the end of the parenthesis. “Impostor syndrome” is the term that is widespread. Indeed, just to confirm what you were just saying, it does affect 70 to 80% of the global population at one point in their lives. So if you do feel this way, you’re not alone. And I’m here.

ALEXIS: I have to say that I love that it’s a phenomenon, right? It sounds more interesting than something clinical that something is actually wrong with you.

ESTELLE: Yeah.

ALEXIS: We should spread around that it’s “impostor phenomenon,” not “impostor syndrome.”

ESTELLE: Yeah. I’ll try to use phenomenon in the rest of the interview. Yeah, talking about some tips or strategies or things I’ve learned with my research and my training so far, the best one, or what I find is the best one, at least to me, is to consider myself as a work in progress person. Someone who is constantly learning things. And then it allows you to make mistakes. It allows you to accept that you’re not perfect because no one is. You are not perfect, sorry, team. I’m not perfect. And it allows you as well to accept that good enough is actually quite excellent. Sometimes, as an impostor, you just… “I’m not good enough.” But actually you are. And good enough is good because you can’t be perfect. So, considering myself as a work in progress person is actually one of the best advice I received. And I keep repeating it to myself very often when I don’t have the answer. And that it’s fine. I’m learning. I’m open to learn, you know. Yes, I keep learning every day from everyone, so that’s fine. Don’t be afraid, we mentioned that earlier as well, you know, to ask for feedback or to ask for help, wise people actually ask for help. There’s nothing to be ashamed of and to be vulnerable as well, you know, especially as a leader, but not only as a leader. Yeah, asking for feedback is actually a good way to know where you are or where you think you are. And there might be a big difference, especially if you feel like an impostor. And be gentle with yourself because yes, believe it or not, you are entitled to make a mistake once in a while. So don’t be too hard with yourself. Self-compassion, I mentioned that in my talk. You know, if you’re good at being an impostor, you probably suck at self-compassion and you should consider self-compassion as a new friend, actually, because it can really help you to silence the negative self-talk or message that pops up in your mind each time the impostor syndrome, impostor phenomenon, is triggered. You know, well… “I’m not good enough.” “I don’t deserve my role.” “What am I doing here? I feel so stupid.” “They know better than me.” “They are better than me.” All these negative thoughts, they don’t define you. And, you know, self-compassion. Try to be more gentle with yourselves. And of course, talk about it. Normalize it. Break the silence. It sounds easy to say it like this, but in fact, when you’ve spent most of your life trying to hide that you feel like an impostor, trying to hide one of your biggest weaknesses, it’s not that easy to talk about it, but it’s really worth it. And also, consider the source, right? Try to contextualize the impostor phenomenon. Are you the only woman in this board meeting or the only person of color? Are you a student whose skills are constantly assessed? Exams, tests. Are you the first graduate in your family? Do you work in a creative field? In a highly competitive field, or in a field where everything changes so rapidly? You know, we talk about AI a lot at the moment, and I think you can quickly feel overwhelmed if you work in this field. So there are lots of societal and situational factors to take into consideration if you want to get a bigger picture of the impostor phenomenon.

MELISA: That’s such a great point that you just made. Like Ale said before, you know, the thing about “oh is there something wrong with me?” And a lot of times you can explain it, like you were saying, with the context as well. There’s a lot of things, you know, inequalities in the society and in the private sector, in companies and leadership roles, so a lot of times it makes sense that people feel that way because they’re not actually being represented. There’s no other people like them in the room. So it’s really hard not to feel that way.

ESTELLE: Yeah, exactly. It has a lot to do as well with diversity, inclusion, equity and yeah…

MELISA: And like you were saying, talking about it, you know, the phrase “fake it till you make it” and then people just feel like they’re faking all the time because they can’t really feel like they deserve what they’re doing, they know what they’re doing. And I was very shocked, also for everyone that’s listening, how we met Estelle. It was one of her talks at a conference, and I’d like to say it was one of the most popular talks in the conference. The room was full. Everyone was so interested in participating. And then, when you were asking people to raise their hands, everyone, in different parts of the talk, they were feeling represented. Everyone in the room. So you can tell how many people actually feel this way.

ESTELLE: And, you know, I’ve done these talks several times and each time I can’t help but being surprised, but in a positive way to see how actually people in the audience feel comfortable to open up about their own impostor experiences. You know, at the end I tried… Well, we didn’t have enough time in the talk when we met because it was limited, but I did another one with more questions at the end and I tried to do… I’m not a medical expert. So the Q&A at the end is more like an open discussion for people to share their experience if they want. And you know, rather than really… “Oh, what should I do when I feel like this?” And each time people really open up and talk about their experience in front of people they’ve never seen before, you know. And sometimes in front of their own colleagues as well, you know, who discover that “Oh, that’s how you feel,” you know. So that gives lot of discussion as well. It’s super interesting. It’s a topic I’m really passionate about and talk about it for…

MELISA: You’re very passionate as well.

ESTELLE: I’ve just completed a new training. It’s actually an impostor syndrome informed coach, so I can coach now. And it was delivered by the Impostor Syndrome Institute, who is actually co-founded by Dr. Valerie Young, and the conclusion of this training was actually the only way to stop feeling like an impostor is to stop thinking like an impostor. People who don’t experience impostor phenomenon, they just think differently when facing a challenge. They are not more intelligent or more capable or more competent than people with the impostor phenomenon are. It’s just that they think differently. I think it’s a good thing to keep in mind.

LARA: Yeah. I mean…

LARA: Yeah, I started, early in my life, doing some sort of switch. I still suffer impostor syndrome. I still have that monster in my bedroom. It’s still there.

ESTELLE: Oh, a monster? I call it my friend.

LARA: Yeah, it’s a monster. No, mine is a monster because it haunts me all the time. It could be a ghost, too. You just throw the Halloween theme there. They’re like…

MELISA: You have to turn it into a friendly monster.

LARA: Perfect Halloween costume: The impostor syndrome. Yeah. I mean, I started doing something about it. I am really hard with myself, you know? So every time I make a mistake, usually I will go like, extremely, super hard on me. But then I realize that if I don’t make that mistake, I’m not allowing myself to learn from that mistake. How else am I going to learn? So that’s something that like, I don’t know, interrupt in my mind one day and I was like… “Oh, well, it’s not that bad then,” but it’s so hard. So hard. I always try to remind myself it’s extremely hard.

ESTELLE: It is extremely hard, that’s for sure, but it’s worth trying to remember that because you’ve done this mistake that you are who you are today. Sorry, that sounds a bit cheesy, but it’s true. And you learn so much from your mistakes. It’s just… you have to do mistakes. Otherwise, you would never really improve or change. It’s part of the experience, the whole life experience, I think. During the training, I forgot the name of the guy, but we talked about this TED talk about a guy who thought about… We were talking about the importance of failure and the way you could see how failure actually helps you grow up and help you grow. And this guy actually presents himself only with his failures. You know, rather than… I’m going to try that in my next talk. I think I noted that down. But I want to try. You know, when you do this talk or presentation, an introduction, and there you would say… “Oh, I’ve done this and I’ve worked there and I’ve worked on that many projects.” And so it’s a good…

MELISA: All your achievements.

ESTELLE: Yes. And then, when you see these TED talks is just like focusing on “No, I’m not the best.” “I failed this, I tried this and it didn’t work” or “I had this company. Well, you know, I had to close it down.” And that’s what I learned. And that’s another way of presenting yourself. But I think that’s so much better. That’s my opinion. But yeah, I really liked it. I was just like… “Yeah, actually, you know, people know about your achievement.” They could just go to your LinkedIn profile and they have your achievements. Because you sell yourself, right? If you send your CV to a recruiter, you might not just list your failures, obviously. But I really like the way of introducing yourself or presenting who you are to an audience and see how they react as well. So. Yeah, in doing other talks I would try to do it.

LARA: I love that. It’s so cool. So I have the final question for you, Estelle. Are you ready for it?

ESTELLE: Oh, yeah, sure.

LARA: What advice do you have for those aspiring to follow a similar path in the video game localization industry?

ESTELLE: Uh, that’s a tough one. You get the tough one at the end. So. Um, my background is translation. Right. So first I was a translator. So, if someone wants to be a translator right now or aspires to follow these kinds of paths, my gut feeling would be to pick another career path, maybe if you still can, or at least be prepared to evolve in your job as quickly as the technology or AI does. You need to work with the machine, not against it, right? Talking about it. Actually, last week I had a realization. Yes. It happens sometimes. Do you know Asterix? The comic books, Asterix and Obelix.

ALEXIS: Yeah.

ESTELLE: Yeah, you know.

ALEXIS: The little guy and the big guy.

ESTELLE: Yes, I was in France, and so the new Asterix was out. I think in English it’s The White Iris. I bought it. I read it in French. And now I’m actually desperate to buy the English version. I need to order it. There are so, so many references, like cultural references, to the French culture. Songs, proverbs, obviously all the names of the characters are puns or references to French persons or culture. So honestly, it’s full of it. So reading it, I was like… “Oh, I hope translators had notes and contextual reference.” I’m sure that they had it for such an important release. But when reading it, obviously I thought with my translation mind. So I want to read it in English now because I want to see which miracles the translators have accomplished, to be honest. I think even for the English version, you would need a British English version, an American English version, an Australian English version to adapt this Asterix properly. I checked. I think there’s only one English version, which is sad, but I really want to see what they’ve done. My point is… my realization was actually Translators: yes, they have a future. Yeah, it’s good? I’m sure you’re relieved.

ALEXIS: That’s a great take away.

ESTELLE: But I mean, yes, because one of the most important aspects of translation is all the cultural and linguistic context of the texts, right? So, yes, AI has made amazing progress in natural language processing. I won’t deny that. I can’t deny it. But AI is still unable to get all the nuances of a culture or language, you know, like idioms, proverbs, puns, jokes. I mean, while AI can be useful in certain fields for language professionals, it cannot replace, I think, the expertise and the cultural awareness of a human translator, at least for now, right? So what I’m trying to say is that most probably my job… because it was a question. My job as it’s been over the past decades or as it’s still today, will keep changing, evolving as new technologies, AI progress are used. So probably for students today, it might be more useful to study linguistic engineering, maybe, if such a thing exists. Or if you’re not really into IT, to focus your studies on the cultural aspects of languages to become a cultural expert because we will keep needing that. And our chance in the video game industry, I think, is that the texts we translate are mainly creative and our human expertise adds a massive value to the final localized products. And, as I said earlier, you need to work with the machine, not against it. So you also need to know where your added value is. And as a video game translator, your added value is most definitely in the knowledge of all the linguistic nuances and the cultural references of your native language.

MELISA: Yeah. I think that’s a great advice, that you can adapt. And there’s a lot of changes happening in the industry, so… we’ll see what the future holds for us.

ESTELLE: I think there are a lot of uncertainties that we are trying to navigate, but it’s still uncertain at the moment.

MELISA: Absolutely, yes. Well, Estelle, thank you so much for joining us. This was a great episode. I’m sure everyone listening will agree. And all your advice is very valuable. So thank you so much.

ESTELLE: Thank you for inviting me. I had a great time. So, hopefully everyone had too.

LARA: I had a great time too, so I bet they have.

ALEXIS: Thank you so much.

LARA: Thank you so much, Estelle. It was amazing.

ESTELLE: Thank you.

ALEXIS: See you, everyone.

ESTELLE: Bye.

Episode Transcription

ALEX: Hi, everyone! Welcome to another Open World LocFact. Now, before we tell you what game we’re talking about today, don’t forget to follow us on all of our socials that you’re seeing here below.

FLOR: Yes. Today’s LocFact is about one of the best-selling PlayStation 4 games, God of War.

ATREUS: So I’m a man now. Like you?

KRATOS: No.We are not men. We are more than that.

FLOR: The 2018 game is still acclaimed and loved by everyone that plays it for its story, role design, art direction, music, graphics, combat systems and characters. The game is inspired by Norse mythology, with the majority of it set in ancient Scandinavia in the realm of Midgard.

ALEX: This is the first time that in the game series there are two main protagonists. Kratos, we all know him as the Greek god of war that is the only playable character in the game, but now he has his son Atreus with him.

FLOR: Having survived his final encounter with his father Zeus, Kratos has since traveled to Midgard in ancient Norway and now lives with his young son Atreus in the world of Norse Gods, the savage land inhabited by many ferocious monsters and warriors.

ALEX: In order to teach his son how to survive in such a world, Kratos must master the rage that has driven him for many years and embrace his newfound role as a father and a mentor. Now, Kratos keeps his troubled past a secret from Atreus, who is also unaware of his divine nature.

FLOR: The story keeps the fans absolutely involved with the game. From beautiful fan art to what brings us today’s LocFact, fans translating the God of War runes.

ALEX: The runes in God of War are primarily written in Elder Futhark, the eldest form of runic alphabet. This alphabet has been used from the 2^nd to the 18th century, and these runes appear all throughout the game.

FLOR: Some determined fans translated runes from an item in the game’s collector’s edition and were able to unearth a secret item. Since then, other fans have sought to uncover similar secrets or simply learn more about the game story.

ALEX: Now hold up. Here’s where we say that if you haven’t played the game, stop here, fast forward or something, because there are spoilers ahead, okay? Yeah, okay.

FLOR: Yes. You’ve been warned.

ALEX: So, one of the major things… You’ve been warned. One of the major discoveries that were made is the meanings behind Baldur’s tattoos.

FLOR: That’s right. The large red runes on Baldur’s back spell “cursed.” His arms feature a repeated phrase that roughly translates as “never to forget.” While the circular tattoo on his chest has been interpreted as, “Lights confine me with warmth so that I might feel something.“

ALEX: As if those runes weren’t ominous enough, Baldur’s neck bears the words, “I mark the twilight of the gods.” There are fans that believe that this phrase alludes to Baldur being the sign of Ragnarok. If only Atreus could have translated this rune to give Kratos a heads up about the world’s end.

FLOR: If only, right?

ALEX: Yeah.

FLOR: And that’s the end of today’s LocFact. Stay tuned for today’s interview with Renee Gittins, the executive director of IGDA. Thanks for joining us. See you next time.

ALEX: Thanks, everyone. Bye.

FLOR: Hi, everyone! Welcome to another episode of Open World. Today with us we have Renee Gittins. Renee is the executive director of IGDA. IGDA is the International Game Developers Association. How are you today, Renee?

RENEE: I’m fine, thank you so much for having me here.

FLOR: Yeah, we’re very excited to have you today, and we’re really excited to learn about your journey within the gaming industry, what it takes to be part of IGDA? What are you working on? So not many of our audience, not many people that tune in are familiar with IGDA, so we’re really excited to have you here and learn more about what you’re doing. So we know that you are a programmer and a game designer, right? So we wanted to learn a bit more about what’s your favorite part within the game design of a video game, and what are your inspirations or even concepts that you take into account during this stage to not miss direction.

RENEE: Yeah, absolutely. So what I think really compels me about video game development in general is that it brings together so many different disciplines and studies. Pretty much anything you learn can be practical within video games. Of course, there’s programing and arts and composition and design. But you know, if you have a history degree, you know, you can provide historical insight. You know, if you have a literature degree, you can help with writing in-game books or with the dialog creation. I just love how games as a medium bring together all of these different elements of human creation and creativity and innovation. And similarly with game design, which I really appreciate about it, it is problem-solving, but not technical problem-solving. Certainly, there’s technical problems. I’ve always been somebody who loves solving problems, but when it comes down to it, math problems and science problems and problems that have straightforward answers are, in my opinion, a lot easier than soft problems. You know, people problems, design problems, encouraging and evoking emotion and satisfaction and curiosity. Those are very difficult problems.

ALEX: It’s a bit trickier.

RENEE: Yeah.

RENEE: Yeah, you get more personal, so you have to be very careful where to draw the line or where to get more involved, right? In the narrative.

RENEE: Exactly. And I love that kind of problem-solving. And that’s what compels me about game design. So I wouldn’t say that I’m necessarily the most inspired game designer I know. I have a very good friend who has literally journals like books and books and notebooks of game designs. He just has game designs come out of his brain all the time and has to write them down, and then we’ll eventually pick one to try to make. I design through frustration.

ALEX: That’s a nice fuel, right?

RENEE: Right? I will play a game and I will just get so frustrated about some aspect of it. And these are generally large concepts, not like, “Oh, I hate this mechanic” or “I hate this UI.” I’ll get frustrated with like an entire game concept, and then I will design a game based on my frustration there. And the game that I’m currently working on, Potions: A Curious Tail, it’s an adventure crafting game where you play as a young witch, she brews magical potions and she uses spells to battle monsters and solve puzzles. But the reason I created that game is because I was playing a game called Pixel Dungeon on the phone, and it was a rogue-like dungeon crawler. And it had two elements that I found not great. One is you had to eat food and each step you took slowly decreased your food you’d had and you could starve to death.

ALEX: Your energy. Yeah.

RENEE: Right. And then the other element is you wanna find the entrance down to the next level of the dungeon, but you have to kill all of the monsters on the level in order to level up enough to beat the boss monster that’s like five or ten levels down. Which meant that, if you were playing the game and you found the entrance down early, it was bad. It was a bad thing to find the exit to the next level because it meant that you had to still clear out the rest of the level and you’d lose your food, energy and things like that on your way. I was like, this is so frustrating. It’s so frustrating that something that should be satisfying and that feels good, like, “Oh, yes!” Like going deeper in the dungeon should feel good instead of the exact opposite.

ALEX: Because you weren’t prepared to be in the second level, right?

RENEE: Right. And that put me on like a whole tirade of like, why do games work the way they work? And it brought me to a conclusion, that I don’t really like the experience, like the leveling up experience. It’s just funny because I play lots of RPGs. They are generally very, very experience-based, but it encourages bad behavior. For example, you’re usually a hero of these games, but you get praised for just being completely psychopathic and murdering everything you see, right?

ALEX: Grinding.

RENEE: Right, grinding! You know, it’s like instead of just like, oh, kill some bunnies for some bunny fur, but if you keep killing bunnies, you still profit from it, right? Like, even when you’ve slayed like thousands of bunnies, far more bunnies than you should ever kill. And it just doesn’t feel… it doesn’t feel very heroic. And so I wanted to make a game that was balancing the cost of fighting with the benefit. And that’s why I came up with Potions. It’s all based around potions because that is resource management, and you literally don’t have an ability to kill anything unless you’re using resources to do so. So it means that as you get stronger, you don’t want to go through and murder everything because it’s a waste of resources to try to do that. And similarly, the way you progress throughout the game is you learn new things and you figure out new puzzles and you’re sort of expanding the tools or resources available to you. So it feels more personal, your growth, instead of just like, you got some numbers and your number bar went up and now your number of bars is bigger, right?

ALEX: You’re stronger because you killed a bunch of bunnies and you got XP out of it.

RENEE: Yeah, exactly.

ALEX: I know that you are a witch in your game, right?

RENEE: Yes, yes.

ALEX: I know that you’ve been working for quite a while in your game. Do you have an E.T.A.? And other than that, how’s the dev process behind this game that you’re so passionate about? And I want to know then if you are thinking about localizing it. I know that that’s quite the task as an indie developer, right? But what can you tell us about that whole process?

RENEE: Yeah. So we launched our alpha last December, and we’re getting close to beta. We’re probably about 85% of the way done with the game content. And right now I’m actually bringing on a designer or two. This is the first time I’ve announced it, so.

FLOR: Wow! We have the news.

RENEE: You do. Breaking news!

ALEX: Breaking news!

RENEE: To help with the final polishing, you know, additional puzzles, additional elements in the dungeons, you know, helping with tuning the boss fights. So we’re getting real close. I won’t say a date, but…

ALEX: That’s my idea. Okay.

RENEE: But I have a date in mind. I just need to make sure all the parts are falling into place there. Now, localization is a really interesting question because something that you might also know about my game is that it is very culturally inclusive. It’s actually inspired by fairy tales and folklore from around the world. So we have, you know, Baba Yaga from Slavic lore, and Tripitaka and Sun Wukong from “Journey to the West,” you know, traditional Western European fantasy, and things like the Zaqqum fruit from Islamic legend. And bringing those all together, I wanted to make sure that this was quite a worldly game. And because of that, I was thinking about localization from the very start. I don’t… You know, whether or not it will be localized, that is one question, but I built all of our systems with that plan. The only thing that I didn’t plan out yet was buttons, like the button text. I don’t have a lot of button text, so that will be something that will be fairly easy to go in and provide updates for. But all of the dialog I based around the ability to be able to localize it, because I knew that most localization companies like to use csv or xml files, and so I built our dialog system to be fed by xml files. I think when people are first making games, they’re sort of tempted to hard-code in their dialog, which is bad in so many ways, right? Like not only does it make your dialog much less accessible to anyone who is not technical, like you’re sending some poor writer in there, but it makes it very, very hard to localize because you have to cut and paste it all out and then send it over and then cut and paste everything back in. Whereas I have it where I could just export a bunch of csv files, send them in, and then… even the titles can change. Like they don’t even have to be like consistently named files. I could just throw them all in a folder and it magically works. It goes through, it processes all the keys, and I can then change elements such as the language very easily.

ALEX: But that’s like the ideal stage for a game that’s in the alpha stage, right? So that’s, that’s amazing. That’s good enough for an alpha stage game, almost beta, to have localization in mind from the very first moment. And then you can work your way around that. You’re certainly creating that space to make it easier for the future, right?

RENEE: Yeah, absolutely. And, you know, setting up your csvs properly, using unique keys for triggering dialog events and things like that allow you a lot of flexibility to add an additional functionality apart from localization. So I have audio triggers that I can put into those files as well. I have the visuals for characters who are talking, and then I have prebuilt ability to like change their facial expression, even though right now everyone just has a simple dialog image. It’s built so that, if I want to have multiple dialog images so they can look like angry or happy or surprised, that’s very, very easy to integrate.

FLOR: I think that’s amazing that you are taking all these considerations beforehand and not having localization as an afterthought, like we like to say. But I’m curious on how you learned that lesson, and was it the hard way that you start hard-coding your first games? Or was it something that you learned by reaching out to colleagues and friends within the industry?

RENEE: Um… Gosh, I think I learned it just… Like I said, I really like problem-solving, and one of the things I wanted to do is make sure that I was future proofing without over future proofing. And because of that… You know, I believe in that very strongly. Any time you’re architecting any system, whether it is games, whether it is mechanical engineering, which actually that’s my background, you want to make sure that you’re building it in a way where you can expand upon it if you think it’s going to expand in a certain way with minimal cost. And, you know, right now I don’t have a localization system in Potions, but adding a localization system will be very easy because I structured my game to support that. And that’s how I have tried to develop the entire game and the games and projects that I work on as well. I make sure that I’m considering what directions the features, the product, the game might take, and that those are considered in the base architecture and design. And I think that is sometimes learned through the school of hard knocks, but you can prevent a lot of that school of hard knocks learning if you just, you know, really sit down and consider the features that you want to have.

FLOR: Oh, yeah, for sure. I think that’s great advice for everyone who is starting with their project and don’t know what to plan for. And well, going back to IGDA, because of course we’re eager to learn what you’re working on, and we also know that you work towards different initiatives related to video game localization. So I was very curious to know, is there anything specific that game developers are interested in when it comes to localization? Or are there any questions that are repeated over and over in terms of localization when it comes to developers?

RENEE: Um, I think that one of the biggest questions that I’ve seen among developers is sort of twofold. One is what languages should we be localizing into? And the second…

FLOR: The million dollar question, right?

RENEE: Right. And the second is, how do we ensure that on the game side we’re getting easy-to-integrate localization? And obviously having these modular systems, making sure you can integrate the dialog translations easily is one thing, but you actually even have to think about the UI you’re using, which text you’re using. I think a lot of people forget that your font might not support, you know, all the languages you’re localizing into, and so you also have to add, you know, additional functionality to change the fonts along with the languages, you know, you’re providing localized text. I actually… I saw… One of my friends had a… like a technical test or like a technical producer test for an interview they were having, and in that there were some like “gotchas” in all of the problems. And I noticed when they were… One of the problems was like, “Oh, we need to do a global launch. We wanna make sure that everything’s localized. We have it all localized in EFIGS.” And as you’re probably aware, EFIGS is not like the current standard. For those who are not familiar with EFIGS, it’s for English, French, Italian, German and Spanish. Which is a whole bunch of languages that don’t work for pretty much a majority of the world, right? Like English has like…

FLOR: Exactly.

RENEE: But if you’re looking at like simplified Chinese, it’s gonna get you a far larger market than Italian is going to get you. No offense to Italians. Italians are great, but…

ALEX: No, but it’s very important to have, like, the proper market research, you know, and not just, let’s go EFIGS because that’s what you have to do, right? No. Know where you want to get your game published, then what languages does the gamer that you wanna reach out talk, right?

RENEE: Right, yeah. Doing research on similar games and seeing, you know, looking at Steam’s stats and seeing what languages they’re being played in, like what regions are playing them as well.

FLOR: Exactly. Yeah. I think that’s super important, to understand like what genres work on each specific market, right? Sorry, Ale, go ahead.

ALEX: No, please, Flor. It’s okay. I think that this may be like something that comes in the future of what we are talking like really. But if you had a chance to look into this future of the video game industry from your position as both things, right? As the IGDA CEO and as a developer, I don’t know, ten years from now, in the near future or whatever, what do you think or what would you absolutely love to see like happening on a regular basis that you think that there’s lacking right now?

RENEE: What I’m seeing the growth of and what I am excited to see grow more is the development of games from more regions. I mean, obviously there are game developers now everywhere, but we’re seeing a lot of enterprising game industry markets coming from regions that have previously not had that presence. You know, Africa is the big one that’s up and coming. We’re also seeing countries who have often provided outsourcing, like India, bringing more development in their in-house to develop their own projects instead of just providing assistance for other people’s. And I’d like to see that more and more, because obviously games are the largest entertainment industry in the world, but they have so much more room to grow in terms of supporting in all of these different regions and cultures because, they haven’t been fully global, at least not until more recently. And we absolutely can see more of that. And I’m seeing more of that up and coming every year. This is Calcifer. He says hi.

FLOR: Okay. Yes. We need a proper introduction.

RENEE: Go say hi, Calcifer.

ALEX: Hi, Calcifer!

FLOR: Oh, my goodness!

ALEX: He’s gonna make it to the episode, you know that, right?

FLOR: The fact that he’s called Calcifer is just great.

RENEE: Yes. Yes. Named after the Fire Demon in Howl’s Moving Castle.

ALEX: Yeah. It suits him.

RENEE: Yes.

FLOR: He’s like, “Mom, stop it.”

ALEX: Yes. “Mom, can I please go?”

RENEE: He likes being cradled, so he’s perfectly happy here.

FLOR: Well, welcome, Calcifer. So picking up on your last comments on the industry in general, it feels like you’re aiming towards more diversity, equity and inclusion within the gaming industry. And I know this has been a really hot topic in the last years, but this is something that you’ve been advocating and working towards for many, many years, regardless of the current status of the industry. And I know that there are many people out there trying to fully understand how they can collaborate and work together and create partnerships with different associations such as IGDA, even Women in Games and other associations that represent minorities within different markets and different countries. And is there any way or path you would recommend to game developers that want to get more involved in these initiatives and don’t know where to start?

RENEE: Yeah, absolutely. You know, the IGDA has many, many resources that can help on all different levels of that. If you’re interested in just learning more about creating an inclusive workspace and a healthy work culture, we actually published a paper during the summer called Guide for Game Companies: How to Create and Sustain a Positive Work Culture, which talks about tools for DEI, but also for, you know, just creating a healthy work culture that’s going to best support your employees and their mental health and their wellness and well-being. And of course, you know, equity and inclusion is a large part of that. We’re also just about to publish another paper that is called Inclusive Game Design and Development. It’s about how to create inclusive game development projects from building your initial team and, you know, concepting the gaming world all the way through the design of the game, accessibility considerations and all the way through marketing and community development. So those are gonna be great resources for anyone who is interested in learning more about those subjects. If you are passionate about, you know, improving the resources for the industry or helping others taking a stand, we have special interest groups, both affinity and discipline-based. So we have Women in Games, LGBTQ+, Muslims in Games, Blacks in Games, all the way through disciplines, such as game writers, game designers, quality assurance. And those communities come together from all over the world to help uplift each other and to provide support to these topics that they’re passionate about.

FLOR: Well, that’s amazing. And when do you think this paper is going to be published? Do you have a date for that?

RENEE: I do. It’s gonna be early December.

FLOR: Excellent. And what if someone from our audience wants to reach out to IGDA and get more information about how to become a member or even how to collaborate in these different initiatives or special groups that you’re mentioning?

RENEE: Yeah. All of that information is available at IGDA.org. If you’d like to become a member, of course we’ll welcome you, but you’re more than welcome to join our Discord communities. Even without membership, we have studio affiliation if you’re looking to get assistance for supporting all of your studio members. And, of course, we have all of these wonderful resources on our Resource Library that you can find right on that website as well.

ALEX: We’re gonna leave all the links below from the IGDA and from Potions: A Curious Tale at the Steam page as well.

RENEE: Thank you.

FLOR: Oh, yeah.

ALEX: Yep, yep, yep.

FLOR: All right. Well, how do we feel about going through the memes now? It’s about time, so I’m gonna share my screen. So “Doctors: Googling stuff online does not make you a doctor.” Programmers are like, mmm…”

RENEE: Oh, boy.

FLOR: Let me think twice about that.

RENEE: Yeah. I have to Google things all the time when I’m coding. I’ll forget something silly, like the exact formatting of switch statements or something like that, and I’ll just go, “All right, you know, the C-sharp switch statement. Easy enough, look it up.” But yeah, always, always looking up things, especially when you’re working in a game engine, you know, it requires so much documentation to understand how different calls are operating and what you’re getting back. So absolutely constantly Googling things.

ALEX: But please, everyone, go see your doctor. This is just for programmers. I don’t know.

FLOR: And now that you mentioned engines, what engine are you working on right now?

RENEE: So Potions: A Curious Tale is being made in Unity. I’ve found that its combination of 2D and 3D tools was really compelling, plus its ability to export easily to pretty much any platform.

ALEX: Nice.

FLOR: Excellent. “The two states of every programmer: I’m a God versus I have no idea what I’m doing.”

RENEE: The Googling comes in on one of these.

ALEX: Yeah. I can imagine that the guy on the left has a Google tab open somewhere.

FLOR: I think it can come in both.

RENEE: I have had to… So a funny thing about Unity is a lot of times the way that you write the code is you’re writing monobehaviours and they don’t run unless they exist in the scene. And so you’ll spend all this time writing new code and new functionality, and then you’ll test it and it’s not working. You put in print statements or you try debugging it and it’s not being called and it’s not printing. And I have spent, you know, up to 30 or 40 minutes trying to figure out what’s wrong. And I forgot to add the code to the scene. I just didn’t like drag and drop it. Oh, boy, yeah.

FLOR: We all have those moments, like we’re both geniuses and this dog with no idea what they’re doing.

RENEE: Yeah. And it’s funny because I go straight from “I have no idea what I’m doing” to “I added in and it runs perfectly the first time,” then I’m, “I’m a God!”

FLOR: Never didn’t have it.

ALEX: These are interchangeable.

RENEE: Oh, absolutely. Yeah, 100%.

FLOR: Oh, okay.

ALEX: Shower thoughts.

FLOR: How often does this happen to you?

RENEE: Oh, boy. When I’m doing a lot of programing, it happens all the time. I think that what I really appreciate about this meme is that… This is not the original version. The original version, when she’s in panel four, is like… existential dread, you know. Hence the face. But it works perfectly for when you’re thinking about that bug as well.

FLOR: Also bugs can be existential dreads.

RENEE: Pretty much. Yeah. You know, the funny thing is, human brains work better when you’re not just constantly focused on a problem. So this is 100% happens. I can get too much into it, but there is actually a lot of reasons why, if you get stuck on a problem, you should go take a walk.

FLOR: Yes.

RENEE: Or shower or whatever you need. I recommend some light exercise because that feeds your brain. But yeah, get away from your problems instead of just bashing your face on your keyboard.

FLOR: Yeah, some fresh air, sunlight, and just get the blood flowing and then come back and everything will feel a little better.

RENEE: Mm-hmm. 100%.

FLOR: For sure. Okay, this one. Poor thing. She has no idea what’s going on.

ALEX: I have to say that I needed context. The first time I saw this, I needed an explanation. I thought it was just, like, the cutest thing, but no.

RENEE: It was cute. I… I really enjoy, like, dark humor that’s hidden, you know? I don’t like over the top dark humor or in-your-face dark humor, but I love dark humor that’s under a few layers of understanding. That just tickles me. And yes, this is very dark.

FLOR: Well, would you like to walk our audience through this? Because maybe some people need also an explanation.

RENEE: Yeah, I imagined. So if you’ve not watched “Fullmetal Alchemist,” this is a spoiler. So if you’re gonna watch it, don’t listen for the next like minute. This guy is like a scientist, he does experiments, but one of the things that he does is he combines his daughter with the family dog into a chimera and creates this horrific suffering creature that wants nothing more than to be put out of its misery. So this filter of, you know, seeing her like a dog…

FLOR: Yeah, it’s really dark.

ALEX: Yeah. It’s very dark.

FLOR: Of course, he has no idea what’s going on. He’s like, “Come on, I’m gonna take a picture of you.”

RENEE: Yeah.

FLOR: Again, Googling.

RENEE: It’s… Yeah.

ALEX: Again, interchangeable. One thing comes with the other.

FLOR: One thing can be two things, so.

ALEX: Yeah. Two things can happen at the same time.

RENEE: I would say the hardest thing about game development…. So I’ve actually mentored high school students before, and the hardest thing isn’t coming up with game ideas, it is figuring out how to solve problems you haven’t faced before. And 90% of that, aside from just like the initial approach of figuring out what the problem even is, is figuring out how to type it into Google. Because obviously, like, how do you phrase this? What sort of terminology do you use? If you’re a self-taught programmer, you know, I was a self-taught programmer or a self-taught game developer, a lot of times you don’t even know the terms that you should be using to describe the problem that you’re facing or what you’re looking to solve or the tool you’re looking to access. So being good at Googling is a very, very important skill to be a good game developer.

FLOR: Oh yeah, for sure. And the same applies to video game translators because most of the time, well, more often than we’d like to, we don’t have enough context. And if we’re lucky enough, we’re working on a franchise or something that we can Google. If not, we’ll have to go into the deep web and find how that specific term or word can be localized into your culture and into your language, right? So Googling is a really good skill.

RENEE: I have to ask about that. How do you handle names?

FLOR: Well, that depends on, of course, the game that you’re working on and the client, and if they have a style guide or if they… Because maybe you can open the discussion and decide together with them, because sometimes they have a clear vision and they know that they want their games to be fully localized, because the names may refer to something within the narrative or a characteristic of the…

ALEX: The character.

FLOR: The character. So you may want that to be localized and sometimes you don’t, but it’s a process that you go through together with the game developers or even the publisher, because of course, if you’re going to localize and look for the same impact, you have to come up with a whole new name sometimes. So it can be tricky.

RENEE: Yeah, absolutely. I mean, that’s something that I’ve been thinking a lot about with my game because I have characters who are literally named from lore, right? Like Tripitaka and Sun Wukong, the English translation version that is used in the “Journey to the West” copies that are really popular over here. But obviously, like, they are quite popular lore and they have different names in different regions that are attached to them. And I imagine a lot of the fairy tales or folklore from Europe that I use similarly probably have multiple different names based on what region that they’re being sold in.

ALEX: Yeah, I mean, one of the things that we like to say…

FLOR: Yeah, that’s something…

ALEX: Sorry, Flor.

FLOR: Oh, go ahead.

ALEX: One of the things that we like to say every time that we have the opportunity is that video game translators, localizers, are the gatekeepers of their culture, right? So to have that safe space to talk with the developers, to see what’s the best thing for each market, for that particular game, to have that open communication and to have that knowledge to like, “Hey, this would be interesting to localize it for this market because it would be more approachable or easy to understand.” And that’s always like the best-case scenario, so to speak.

FLOR: Yeah. And in your case, like your game, if you make reference to so many… if you have so many cultural references, you definitely want to investigate and make sure that you’re using the right term, since there’s probably already a validated version in their language.

RENEE: Absolutely.

FLOR: That’s very important. And you’ll have to Google a lot for that.

RENEE: And that’s why you go to experts, right? This is why people need to go to experts who do localization versus just trying to like throw it all into Google Translate.

FLOR: Oh, yeah, absolutely. We Google, but we don’t Google translate. That’s the thing.

ALEX: If you’re gonna do that, then don’t.

FLOR: Unless you want a Frankenstein or something out of the translation. Okay. “When you see Superman using the car you’re still making payments on as a weapon.” Like, why?

ALEX: I love the fact that his face is smiling, but he’s like in terror.

FLOR: That expression, it’s like… oh, boy. “Four years after college and all of my peers are getting married, and I’m just sitting here making video games.” Well, and having cats.

ALEX: That’s your leading character, right?

RENEE: It is. It is. And the picture behind her is her familiar. It’s been edited in there, too. A subtle additional extra. Yeah.

FLOR: That’s so cool. I feel like it’s so interesting that memes are a new way for game developers to connect with their communities and to get their characters out there and more relatable. So this is great.

RENEE: Yeah. That’s also very old. I’m ten years out of college now, so…

ALEX: You’re gonna need to, like, erase the board. But it’s okay, you can get away with the four, don’t worry about it.

FLOR: “When you’re working really hard on code for an upcoming deadline.” And bugs.

RENEE: There is that wonderful song, “99 little bugs in the code, 99 little bugs. Take one down, patch it around, 117 bugs in the code.“

ALEX: Like I just feel sad for the poor little Charmander here.

FLOR: Yeah, his little sad face, like. Yeah, I can definitely relate. Well, I think like throughout all of our episodes and interviews, one of the most common memes was the one of the dog that says “This is fine” while everything is on fire. So I think this is everything is on fire, taken to a next level.

RENEE: So, yeah, you’re taking things, you’re trying to put out the fires causing more fires, right?

FLOR: And you are on fire.

RENEE: You are on fire. Yeah. Try as you might.

FLOR: Yeah, yeah, yeah. And that’s the end of our memes. Thank you so much, Renee, for sharing…

RENEE: Oh, it’s a pleasure.

FLOR: …those with us. I love to learn what makes our guests laugh. And thanks for making us laugh, too.

RENEE: Happy to share the laughs.

FLOR: Yeah, of course. It was so nice to have you, so nice to learn more about IGDA and about your project. We’re really looking forward to see when it’s gonna be released. So as soon as you have more information to share with us, please do, because we’re very excited to learn more about it. And thanks everyone for tuning in. See you on our next episode of Open World.

ALEX: Bye, everyone. Thank you.

Episode Transcription

FLOR: Hi, everyone! Welcome to another Open World LocFact. This time we’re going to be talking about the cultural aspects in one of the most famous multiplayer online battle arena games… Yes, you guessed it: League of Legends.

ALEX: That’s right. Thanks to Riot, we got to know that some of our favorite playable characters have been influenced by different real-world cultures.

FLOR: Yes, let’s start with the beautiful Ahri. The initial concept was based on a mythological character known as Kumiho, a nine-tailed fox. The East Asian influence on Ahri further expanded into her skin lines, such as Popstar and, later, K/DA.

ALEX: Now, I remember the time when the Popstar skin came out, I know that many people were obsessed with it! In 2018, Riot ventured into the K-Pop world with K/DA. Now this is a musical group that is in the Korean Pop Genre. They’re led by Ahri and integrated by Kai’Sa, Ahri, Akali, and Evelynn.

FLOR: I absolutely love them! Another character that has an interesting backstory is Neeko. Neeko was heavily influenced by Brazilian references. A bold move by the localization team was to record Neeko’s English voice-over in Brazil with the support and supervision of the Localization team, of course. And that had a clear positive impact on the final product. Through these examples, we can see the importance of having a solid localization team behind the curtains.

ALEX: Totally. You can really tell when a team puts real work and effort in the localization of their video game. Another character with Latin American influences is Qiyana. The Qiyana concept was inspired by ancient Mexican civilizations, and we learned that the central teams even collaborated with some aspects of her voice-over.

FLOR: These are such powerful and strong characters! Thanks again Riot for this insightful LocFact!

ALEX: Yeah. We are so honored to have received this insight directly from the Riot Localization team. Huge shout-out to those folks and to the amazing work they did portraying different cultures and lore so seamlessly into the game.

FLOR: And thank you guys, our viewers, for all the support and love you show for Open World! See you all next time in the next LocFact!

FLOR: Hi, everyone! Welcome to another episode of Open World. How are you today? We have a very special guest with us today. Her name is Denisse, she’s the Head of Global Localization Production at Riot Games. Welcome, Denisse Kreeger. Thank you so much for joining us today. How are you?

DENISSE: I’m great. How’s everybody doing? Thank you for having me. It’s obviously different temperature where we are, right?

FLOR: Yes. We were just mentioning that because I feel like an old lady here, like with this blanket in my shoulders, because it’s chilly in Buenos Aires. Ale was mentioning that he looks like out of the “It” film.

ALEX: I look like George. I’m gonna find It in a sewer somewhere with this jacket.

FLOR: No, please, don’t bring him.

ALEX: No, we don’t need It today. Please.

FLOR: So, Denisse, we are super excited to have you here. And we really want to learn about your story and what you’ve been doing in the localization and the video game fields. So first of all, I wanted to know, because I know that you’re super active in different associations such as Women in Localization and Women in Games, as well. But I’m super curious on, where did you start and what motivated you to be involved in those associations? And if there’s any other association that you’re collaborating with nowadays.

DENISSE: Yeah. So I’m actually the Chapter Manager for L.A. on the Women in Localization group. That’s one of the organizations I officially am part of. But just to take a step back for everyone, I’ve been in localization for close to 15 years, but throughout those 15 years, I’ve had so many different roles, right? So I even worked for the federal government very early on in my localization career, which was completely different.

ALEX: Wow. I didn’t know that.

DENISSE: Yeah, So I worked in, you know, investigations, doing translation work and so on. And so, as I moved into the entertainment industry through my master’s degree, I went to the U.K. and did a master’s in audio visual translation, I got in touch with the localization community and as well as the academics behind it, because a lot of people in localization, especially in the United States, outside of Europe and other countries, learn localization on the job, right? There is no formal training for it. And so through my master’s in the UK, I really developed a network of academics that study, you know, why are subtitles timed in a certain way? How many characters, you know, who determines how many characters are used, and so on? And that there’s a science behind that. And so through these networks, attending conferences like Languages & the Media and so on, has allowed me to be someone that talks about the importance of localization through different platforms. And that’s one of my biggest goals. And why I’m part of Women in Localization is to talk constantly of the value of Loc across the board in all the different industries, because localization exists all over. Everything you’re interacting with has an option of localization. Are you using Google Maps? Are you using your Facebook? People around the world need localization to have that, right? So that’s one of my big missions. So to answer your question, I’m working with lecturers, academics, people who are doing research behind the scenes, and then through the Women in Localization network, just trying to join more events and expanding that network. And whoever wants to talk to me about localization, I’m always open to it.

FLOR: If there is someone listening to this show and is interested in joining these associations, should they reach directly to you or is there any specific platform they could access to get more information about this?

ALEX: Yes, we can totally put it in the comments, if that’s the case.

DENISSE: Yeah. So we have our organization. You can look it up, womeninloc.org. We have LinkedIn groups, Facebook groups. And so the organization is actual actually global. So depending on where you live, you can look up to see if there’s a chapter associated with it, and then you can join that chapter. You can be a member, you can volunteer your time. Sometimes we’re recruiting and looking for people to help us out with different roles. So, yes, and if you can’t find it, feel free to reach out. The best way to reach me is LinkedIn. I do try to spend, uh… once every couple of weeks, I go through my inbox and try to make sure that I can help anybody that has questions about localization in general, career, mentorship. I sometimes speak to students. That’s another way that I stay in touch with the community, students that want to hear more about, how do you get into this career and how does that work and what happens behind the scenes? I also recently did a talk for the State University System to talk about careers that can lead to localization, that are in technology, that are in the arts, UX/UI design, programmers. There’s just so much in localization that overlaps. And I see this becoming even more and more crucial to be part of the skills of others. So yes, hit me up on LinkedIn.

FLOR: I love that you’re so in touch with the community, especially with the students, because sometimes it can be a bit overwhelming having so many options, and to reach out to people that may have so many years of experience in the industry can be even intimidating at times, right? So to stay close to the students and to understand their needs is super important. So, well, thank you for your work, Denisse.

ALEX: Yeah. I mean, it’s super important, and that’s kind of one of the reasons that we invited you, you know, because of your career, what you have experienced throughout. I didn’t know that you were that many years in the localization industry, in different areas. But we want to step back to your time dubbing at Netflix. What made you like do the jump to video games? And are there any similarities with the localization process between the entertainment industry versus the gaming industry?

DENISSE: Yeah, I get this question pretty often, and I think, traditionally, there’s been a very [cut-off audio] separation between both industries. And I think more recently we’re starting to see a little bit more of an overlap or talent that’s jumping from one industry to the other, which I think is great, honestly. I think it promotes different practices and points of view on how to scale localization and so on. So little fun fact, when I did my education for my audio visual translation degree, I intended to go get it so that I could go into the video game localization world, because part of the modules that I studied, in addition to dubbing and subtitling, it was video game localization. I was a gamer, I grew up, you know… I am a gamer. I grew up playing video games because I’m an only child. So I was always, you know, very into gaming, especially console gaming, and in the more recent years as a way for me to just entertain myself, too. It’s an outlet for a lot of us, right? So I had that interest. But when I joined that master’s, I got an internship at a localization vendor company that supported film and TV, and that’s how I started my journey in film and TV, and then got an opportunity at Netflix, where I helped build a lot of the infrastructure for localization, for subtitling, as well as dubbing. And so when I had the opportunity to sort of come full circle, I took it, right? Of, “All right, I now kind of developed this expertise in localization for film and TV, I wanna know what it’s like to develop it as well for gaming.” And I made that jump. And I’m so happy I did because it’s allowed me to really grow and see different processes. So to answer your question, the fundamentals of localization are the same, right? So there has to be a creative aspect to translation, to adaptation, voice recording for characters. But the things around the fundamentals are what are different. So processes and tools, workflows, cadence in which, you know, things have to kind of move. One thing that I always tell people is, if you have a film or you have a series, it kind of has a beginning and an end date. With games, you can keep going for years and years and years.

ALEX: Yes, ongoing localization. It never stops, right?

FLOR: So that’s actually, if you work with big franchises, right? And when you have marketing campaigns or release live-ops, and it’s so fast-paced, right? Compared to other industries.

DENISSE: That’s right.

FLOR: And I wanted to know a bit more about your role within Riot Games. What is it like to be part of such a huge company that represents so much within the gaming industry nowadays, right? What were your expectations when you started?

DENISSE: Well, Flor, I think that’s a really good question, especially my particular role. So I head Localization Production, and many people don’t know what that means, right? So figuring out how that discipline is such a key and important aspect of ensuring that localization happens has been mind-blowing to me. So as I was mentioning, the difference between film and TV is that it’s very linear. It sort of starts and it ends, and the workflow’s kind of the same no matter what every project. Whereas with game development, there’s different game engines, there’s different processes and cadence. And so every time you’re gonna spin up a new game, you have to build an entire pipeline that will help localization happen. And that’s essentially what my team does. So my producers go in and say, “Okay, we have this new game, let’s build a pipeline, let’s put all the processes in place.” And so when you work for a company like Riot, where now it’s not just one product, and previously I was at Blizzard Entertainment, which again, has quite a few games, you have to really understand what’s the nuance and the difference from all of those. And so I will tell you that my favorite part of joining, you know, the gaming space in Riot is that I get the best of all worlds. What I mean by that is that my production team works with the development teams for games, with publishing teams for marketing, they work with website localization, they work with campaigns, events. I mean, we touch everything, and I think that’s super exciting.

FLOR: I love that you bring this because a lot of people think about localization, video game localization and they immediately think about in-game content, and there’s so much in between that it’s not just limited to that, right? And I find it fascinating because you get to learn from all these teams, the different perspectives, and to see the lens through the publishing team or even the marketing team is super interesting.

DENISSE: That’s absolutely right. They just cover so much. And then we are negotiators, we are, you know, producers at the core, we’re dealing with all these different teams to make the magic happen.

FLOR: Exactly.

ALEX: Yeah. I mean, you can, you can set any example, right? The cement that glues everything together or whatever. Yeah, you are everywhere. But going back to your team, right, is such a diverse team that works in so many different areas. We know that you promote yourself a healthy work culture, and not only within your team, but among teams, right? Can you share any specific tips that you have involved within [cut-off audio] or your communication?

DENISSE: Sure. This is a big one for me. I care a lot about promoting and ensuring that there is a healthy work culture, an environment where people feel empowered to grow and to be able to develop themselves, but also bring their authentic self to work. So I would say those are one of the key areas, right? Be yourself. Don’t try to copy how someone is or try to portray someone that you’re not. So be yourself. Be honest. And collaboration is a huge one for me. I always feel that the environment in which people grow the most is when they get to work with others. In some companies, there’s a lot of space for creating silos where people kind of work on their own.

ALEX: Yeah. Like bubbles.

DENISSE: Yeah, exactly. So you compartmentalize your team and the next thing you know, morale is low or, you know, there’s burnout or there’s that sense that you’re not really kind of stimulated by anything else. And so that is one of the key areas that I focus on. I always try to drive initiatives where people can work together to solve problems. I think that really helps people feel like they have a purpose. And on top of it, like I mentioned, you know, being yourself, opportunity for feedback, allowing vulnerability, you know? Being able to say, “Hey, I made a mistake.” Even me as a leader, as a manager, I like to call out, you know, “Hey, keep me honest, I screwed this one up,” you now. Let me learn, let me make… help me be better. Right? And so that’s part of the journey of leadership. I think it’s not about just telling your team what to do or how to do it, but it’s about growing with them and understanding and adapting to their needs, and trying to forecast changes in the business so that you can adjust so that they are in a good place. I mean, there’s a lot of different things I can talk about this topic, but I think, at the core, is allowing people to be themselves, leveraging their strengths, and also helping overcome their so-called, you know, challenges or opportunities.

FLOR: I think that’s great advice. And one of well, for me, for example, one of the most challenging aspects is breaking these bubbles or popping these bubbles and trying to keep communication flowing, because sometimes, when you have so many people involved in the process, they may have different goals, they have a different agenda, and you have to align those planets and make it work somehow, right? Going back to your role, because I know that you mentioned all the stakeholders and all the teams that you collaborate on a daily basis, but I would like to know, how does the localization process look? Depending, of course, on the content, it may vary, I guess. But is there any specific method that you use or, for example, depending on tools or even for quality assurance, is there anything in particular that you would like to share with us?

DENISSE: Yeah. So… It’s complex, right? Especially as I mentioned, because we touch so many different types of assets, in-game as well as out of game. So we have different pipelines for those and different groups and departments, and what we call requesters, which are those within, let’s say, Riot that require localization services or localization practice. So we are constantly educating. We have a ticketing system for requesting, you know, anything that they require. So we have a lot of communication channels for that and like, “Hey, I have a need for something. Can localization help?” So we have that set up. We also have our regular operational workflows where we use things like CAT tools and content management systems. Also, one of the really, really cool things that we have at Riot on the localization department is we have a localization technology team. So that’s a team dedicated to help incorporate tooling, ensure that we’re meeting our stakeholder needs, but also that we’re scaling our operational footprint downstream. Because another thing that we do is, while my team is centrally located in headquarters with a few in Europe, a lot of our regional teams also are doing localization work. So it’s quite a lot to manage, and so we have to have the appropriate tools in place and LQA practices, partnerships. It’s quite a lot, really. But our technology…

FLOR: I bet.

DENISSE: Yeah. Our technology team helps a lot with trying to solve some of the process areas and ensuring that, in the future, we can continue to do the work that we can at a high-quality level without exploding as a team, right?

ALEX: Right. And to oil the communication between all teams the best way you guys can, right?

DENISSE: That’s right.

ALEX: So let’s… I mean, you told us that you’re a gamer, Denisse, okay? But we don’t know what you’re playing right now.

FLOR: Is there anything that you can recommend?

ALEX: Is there anything that caught your eye, maybe, I don’t know, in the E3 that happened just now? Or your go-to game. For example, my go-to game is Bloodborne on my PS4.

DENISSE: That’s a good one.

ALEX: I’m a big Bloodborne fan. I suck at it, I die a lot, of course.

FLOR: Yeah. Were just talking about, for example, one of our colleagues and I don’t like dying a lot, so it’s a bit frustrating for us.

ALEX: I was trying to explain to them that it’s part of the game’s mechanics, right? You have to die in order to get better. But what are you playing right now?

DENISSE: So I… Because I’m a manager, I am talking all day with people or trying to help make decisions. So rather than… like, for a lot of us or a lot of people that like to have a community when they game, I like to be on my own. It’s kind of my me time.

ALEX: Understandable.

FLOR: Love it.

DENISSE: So I like single player type of thing. I don’t like to kind of get into… I just want to be in the zone, be on my own and do my thing. So I’ve been playing a lot of the Spider-Man game. So the first one as well as Miles Morales. Miles Morales is the one that I’ve been playing a lot, and I love it because I also have this weird obsession with flying ever since I was a kid. I always liked heights and I like anything that’s kind of like the feeling of flying. And so I get in that game and I know I can just swing around and look at the… It’s a beautiful-looking game as well. I just swing around. And I like, you know, the mechanics and so on of the fighting and… Yeah, that’s my go-to. I sit down on my couch, I grab my PS5, and that’s how I decompress. So that’s been definitely my go-to. I’ve also been playing Cyberpunk, but not as much. Not as much.

ALEX: Well, it’s a…

FLOR: I love the…

ALEX: Sorry, Flor.

FLOR: Go ahead. Go ahead. It’s all right.

ALEX: I was gonna say that Cyberpunk is a whole different experience, right? Where the world is big and everything, but it’s a more complex RPG kind of element thing, right? You have to think a little bit more probably than just, like, sit back, chill and relax with a Spider-Man game.

DENISSE: Exactly.

FLOR: I love that that you mentioned the idea of flying. I have the same thing, but for swimming. And lately I’ve been playing Subnautica: Below Zero a lot. And I get that feeling that I’m underwater. And, well, here in Buenos Aires, during the pandemic, I haven’t got the chance to go to a swimming pool, so that’s my go-to and my escape, too. So I love that about games, that you can find that headspace and relax and connect to what makes you you, right? So…

ALEX: Single player games… Sorry…

FLOR: Go ahead. Go ahead. It’s your turn, Ale.

ALEX: Single player games are so important as well, right? I love playing with my friends, but single player games are just kind of like a need sometimes to decompress. But moving on from games because I’m going to stay talking forever.

FLOR: Yeah, we can be talking for hours.

ALEX: We would like to know a bit about diversity and inclusion, right? We would like to know about Riot’s plans in the topic, about diversity and inclusion, whether it’s something in the short term or the long term that you might like to share with our audience.

DENISSE: I’m glad you asked that question. It’s a very important question. I think it should be asked across the board, you know, constantly, because it has to be top of mind. When it comes to Riot specifically, I can say that, you know, it definitely feels top of mind, and there’s a lot of activities happening around ensuring that there’s that awareness and that there’s also not only the awareness in the talk, right? Because it’s easy to just talk about, “Hey, yeah, we need to be better at this or we need to be conscious of this.” But the actual action behind it is what we need more of. We have a lot of internal groups where we help with consultants for even some of the products, which I think is something that’s needed and really fantastic. So we have more diversity happening in things like our agents for Valorant, and we have more diversity just across our champions and stories and representing, you know, diverse voices. I personally always, and I’m a big advocate for D&I, and I always join groups and accessibility groups as well. I think it’s super important. I’m part of the LGBTQ community, I’m Latina, you know? So I always want to make sure that we are stepping forward. And Riot, from a personal… I’m not speaking for the company, but from my personal perspective, I really feel that we’re prioritizing this, right? I really feel that there’s room, there’s always room for improvement. I’m not saying it’s…

FLOR: Yeah, absolutely. Always. For everyone.

DENISSE: Of course. But the investment of, you know, okay, let’s do the right thing, let’s ensure that we have safe space and that we are also not just putting products out there with a notion of representation, but let’s bring the people that can actually represent properly. And I think that’s one really cool thing that I’m seeing currently, and I see it happening more and more, and I’m looking forward to it becoming a part of the process, right? You want to incorporate a new champion, you want to do something new, a new environment, a new map? Let’s bring the people that can actually represent that properly, not just the person that can do the research.

ALEX: Right, that can interpret…

DENISSE: Interpretation, exactly. Exactly. So I think that’s really cool. I want to see more of that across the board for everything. And it also gives opportunity to bring in more talent, right? Because we want to represent the world truthfully in everything that we’re interacting with, in games and all of entertainment. So if we look at our own companies or our own teams and we’re not seeing that representation, that’s a call to action to us. And I think that’s what it’s about, right?

FLOR: I love that there are so many new initiatives happening, and what a time to be part of this industry, right? Because we have the opportunity to generate so much change and to bring new voices and to bring this representation that is so much needed right now.

DENISSE: Absolutely.

ALEX: Yeah. It’s very inspiring as well to see that point of view from your perspective, right? In leadership, as well. So thank you for that, Denisse. Awesome.

FLOR: Yes. And for the people tuning in, they probably already saw the LocFact section of this episode, that we included a lot of information about the champions and how you came together and brought those characters to life bringing different perspectives from different cultures. So we love that, also.

ALEX: Now, Denise, we know that Arcane is coming. So can you tell us a little bit about that? Whatever you can.

DENISSE: Yes. So I’m very excited about Arcane, I’m not gonna lie. It’s been really fun working on it. Riot is obviously new at producing this type of content, and one of the really, really fun facts here is that joining Riot from my background and experience has been a really nice fit to help them build localization infrastructure for content such as this one. I can’t share a ton of details, but all of you know there’s…

FLOR: We have to wait.

DENISSE: Yes, you have to wait. But we’re working really hard on getting this out. You know, we’re partnering with Netflix on it, which is super exciting. And of course, localization is a massive part of it, so we want this to be a global experience. And that is about as much as I can say. But stay tuned. Definitely watch it. It’s really, really good.

ALEX: Now, it’s set for Autumn, right?

FLOR: Yeah, that’s what I was gonna say. It’s announced for Autumn this year. Next year, is it?

DENISSE: This year.

ALEX: This year. That’s September. Something like that.

FLOR: Maybe next time for season two, you can join us and give a little bit more details on this project. And congratulations to everyone who’s working behind it.

ALEX: Yes, we are very excited, guys. Thank you for doing this, by the way.

DENISSE: Thank you. I’m sure the League of Legends fans out there… It’s gonna be fun to see, you know, these characters and their stories really portrayed in this series. So I’m really looking forward to that, as well. And yes, maybe by next time, we can talk a little bit more about it.

ALEX: For sure.

FLOR: Yeah, we would love to. So, yeah, now we’re gonna jump to our memes.

ALEX: Now, this is relatable, to say the least.

FLOR: Yeah. And it’s totally related to the fact that we are gamers and every single one of us has a different zone, like you mentioned, so. Well, this is pizza and rain, but do you have any specific moment or scenario that makes it perfect for you?

DENISSE: Oof! I mean, who doesn’t love pizza, right?

ALEX: Pizza and raining outside, I mean…

FLOR: Yeah. Make it a Friday and that’s perfect for us.

DENISSE: And some chocolate chip cookies for dessert, you know?

ALEX: Yeah.

FLOR: And a little milk, you know? That’s perfect. That’s it. Yeah, I mean, that’s my Friday night right there.

DENISSE: So that means in a few hours, hopefully?

FLOR: Yeah. My plans. Feeling a bit old, but yeah, what can I say? That’s me. It happens.

DENISSE: Yeah. That’s me all the time. All the time.

ALEX: Yeah. I mean, even the Dark Souls tutorial can be a little bit like the Dark Mario here as well. Maybe if you’re facing Gundyr or if you’re facing the Cleric Beast, it can get pretty shady as well.

FLOR: Well, for me, it’s like for every single game, it doesn’t matter how hard it is. Being a perfectionist, every single time I face a new game, it’s like I have to master it like the very first second I start playing. And I know that it doesn’t to work like that, but that’s just me. I don’t know.

ALEX: Yeah. And I call it like being bad at Dark Souls. Even though I love the game, I love the games, yeah, I suck at it. That’s you, Flor, right here! You being a perfectionist.

DENISSE: This one’s great.

ALEX: That’s like Devil May Cry, right? Triple S style. You’re kicking ass in style.

FLOR: Aww! Yeah, this feeling. I’m definitely gonna relate. How many times I tried to hug a character in a game?

ALEX: My God.

FLOR: Is there any specific game that you remember playing when you were younger?

DENISSE: Oh, no! I I’m gonna date myself really terribly.

ALEX: I’m 32 years old, so I’m gonna beat you to it.

FLOR: I’m almost 34, so you’re good.

DENISSE: I beat you both, so… you know. I obviously loved the Nintendo games back in the day, right? I mean, I even had a chance to play with my cousin’s Atari. I mean, that’s how far back, you know, I go. But I used to love Mario 3.

ALEX: Oh, that’s the best one, in my opinion. The raccoon tail.

DENISSE: Ninja Turtles. It was the Ninja Turtles game I used to love. And then I was really into the Sonic games when I had a Sega. Those were fun, but yeah.

FLOR: Yeah. I remember spending hours with my sister and my cousin also playing Sonic as well. So, yeah. You’re fine with your references. And it makes you even cooler because you have so much information that some kids don’t even know about, right?

DENISSE: That’s right. I can even tell you from back in the day of the original Doom, like playing it on PC, the very first version ever.

ALEX: Yeah. With the diskettes and everything.

FLOR: You’re not alone in this. Trust me.

DENISSE: You know, using the floppies, you know? Oh, man.

ALEX: The floppy disks. Right.

FLOR: Yeah, probably there’s people tuning in that don’t know what a floppy disk is.

DENISSE: No idea what we’re talking about.

ALEX: We can put a floppy disk somewhere so people can see it, right? Like, right now.

FLOR: Yeah, somewhere over here, so they know what it looks like. They’re probably in a museum right now.

DENISSE: Yeah, exactly. I was gonna say, we can go visit them at the museum.

ALEX: My God.

FLOR: Aww! Look at this one.

DENISSE: I can relate to this one.

ALEX: I don’t know if I look that cute on a level 1 armor, but hey, the pupper nailed it.

FLOR: Mm-hmm. Yeah. Yeah. Absolutely.

ALEX: This one kind of hurts, especially when they carry your ass.

DENISSE: Random, come back! Come back!

FLOR: Why are you doing this to me? Don’t leave me alone. Yeah, but if you’re into single players, then that’s not happening too often.

ALEX: It’s all you, buddy.

FLOR: Yeah. And that’s the last one of our memes, so I hope you enjoyed it as much as we did.

ALEX: That was fun.

FLOR: Yeah, it was. Thank you so much, Denisse, for joining us today. And thanks, everyone, for tuning in. See you next time on our next episode.

DENISSE: Thank you so much. ¡Gracias!

FLOR: ¡Gracias! Take care.

Episode Transcription

LORE: Hello, everyone! Welcome to another Open World LocFact. Today’s LocFact is about one of the best-selling PlayStation 3 and 4 games: The Last of Us.

FLOR: The Last of Us is considered among the greatest video games of all time. Set in post-apocalyptic United States, it tells the story of survivors Joel and Ellie, as they journey westward together through what remains of the country in search of a cure for the plague that has nearly decimated the human race.

LORE: We all know that The Last of Us has unique storytelling, captivating characters, and outstanding art design, but let’s get into its localization.

FLOR: The Last of Us was released simultaneously all over the world, achieving what is called a simultaneous shipment, or “sim-ship,” so it makes sense that the name of the game was not translated, remaining “The Last of Us” in every market.

LORE: Yep. The game was fully localized in different stages. It was localized upfront from English into these languages on screen. Then they included this other set of languages. And eventually they decided to explore markets such as… these other languages on screen.

FLOR: Yes, and one of the factions of The Last of Us II is the W.L.F. This acronym for “Washington Liberation Front” makes an easy phonetic leap to “WOLF,” in English, of course, but it was very difficult to maintain this same connection in other languages, though. In Spanish, for example, it was decided to call the group “Lobos,” or “Wolves,” but translate the acronym as “Frente de Liberación de Washington,” since it appears on-screen and the characters themselves discuss its meaning in the game. On the other hand, it was decided not to use the feminine of “wolf” in Spanish, “loba,” for the female characters since it has a pejorative meaning.

LORE: Probably a good call.

FLOR: Yeah.

LORE: Now, let’s talk about the resistance group researching a vaccine for this infection, The Fireflies. The organization’s symbol, a stylized representation of a firefly, is often shown in the game, and the player can collect Firefly pendants with the same logo.

FLOR: The Italian translators, though, chose not to translate the expression literally, as “lucciole.” The problem here was that “lucciola” refers not only to that beloved nocturnal beetle, but it’s also a euphemism for a prostitute.

LORE: Yes. And since the leader of this group is a female character, Marlene, and is even referred to as “Queen Firefly,” the translator thought it best to translate “The Fireflies” instead as “Le Luci,” or “The Lights,” thus preserving the reference to light while avoiding a possible association with prostitution.

FLOR: So we’ve come to the end of this LocFact. Thanks for joining. Is there any other game you would like us to include in this section? Do you know any other interesting facts about any video game in your language? Please hit us in the comment section, and thanks for joining. See you next time!

FLOR: Hi, everyone! Welcome to a new episode of Open World. Today, we have a very special guest. His name is Hugo Miranda. Hugo began working in the video game industry as a translator back in 2006. Can you believe that? Hugo has been part of the Blizzard Entertainment family since 2011 and he’s their Language Specialist for Latin American Spanish. Hi, Hugo. Welcome. How are you today?

HUGO: I’m good. How about you guys? Thank you for inviting me here. Very excited to join you.

FLOR: Yes, I mean, I know that it’s been a while since we’ve been trying to make this happen. And like I said, we’re very excited to get a chance to talk to you and for you to share your knowledge and wisdom in the localization field.

HUGO: Awesome. Great. Thank you.

ALEX: I’m very excited, Hugo. Thank you very much for accepting our invite. So I’m going to kick off with the first question. Now, we know that your first language is Spanish, right? So I want you to let us know, what was your first experience with another language, and why did you study English to begin with? And I also know that you are quite proficient in Mandarin. So if you can give us a walk through your first steps into the languages?

HUGO: Sure. How much time do you have? So anyway…

ALEX: Uhmm, I have about…

HUGO: I first had this intuition to follow languages when I was pretty young. There was a show called Telematch on TV, I don’t know if you’ve ever seen it, and it was a German show. It was a competition show where they had games and they were wearing these big bobble-heads…

ALEX: Big bobble-heads, yes. It was called Supermatch in Argentina. But yes, I know this show. Yes.

HUGO: And the special thing about that show is that they had a countdown in German. And I just picked up on that. I was like… Well, I just naturally picked up on repeating the numbers. I just loved making those funny sounds. But anyway, nobody really noticed anything, you know, like I had the ability to learn languages back in the day, until later in high school. I just got interested in following the lyrics of songs in English. And, of course, we had English classes, which were really easy. And I took French at the time too, which I was not too attuned to at that time. And later, in English… Well, my father, migrated to the U.S. back in the eighties, and later I followed. Well, maybe ten years later, I followed. And that’s when I continued high school here in Los Angeles. Actually, a high school that is very close to Hollywood. And something very interesting happened because at the time, in my native Costa Rican high school, I was a very, very bad student, very poor. I mean, failing a grade… failing a few classes meant that you failed the grade and you had to repeat the whole thing. Well, that happened to me. But then when I got to the U.S., it was all brand new. All of a sudden, I was an A student. And I would tell back to my other friends in Costa Rica, “Hey, guess what? I’m like an A student here.” “Yeah, right.” Nobody believed me. And then I would tell my friends here, “I used to be a pretty bad student.” Nobody believed me. So that was my encounter with English. I picked up my first book from my teacher’s desk. And, you know, it had some skeletons on the cover, and then I just opened it. I picked it up, I opened it, I flipped through the pages and I saw Punta Arenas. And then at the time I thought, well, there’s two Punta Arenas in the world that I know of. I think one is in Chile or Argentina. It’s all the way…

FLORES: Yes, it’s in Chile, if I’m not mistaken.

HUGO: It’s in Chile, right? And so I saw that and I was, “I have to make sure that this… which Punta Arenas it is.” And it was Costa Rica, so I picked up the book and I read it because it said Costa Rica. The title of the book was “Jurassic Park” at the time

FLOR: Look at that.

HUGO: Yes. That got me excited into reading and I did a lot of reading in English. And so of course I excelled in that. I graduated high school and then I did some college until I went back to Costa Rica to become an English teacher. And I did that for about four years until I was pretty tired. Costa Rica is a very small country and there’s very limited opportunities to what you’re exposed to. And I always dreamed of being a sort of Indiana Jones, you know? Remember that scene where he breaks into a foreign language when he’s in India? And I was like, “Whoa! How can he do that? I want to do that.“

FLOR: You keep repeating all of my favorite stories, Jurassic Park, Indiana Jones. Which one’s next?

HUGO: So I wanted to be that, I wanted to speak strange languages and be in foreign lands. And as I was teaching English, during my breaks, I would flip through the newspaper looking for opportunities. And one time I saw this scholarship offer by the Taiwanese government. And I thought that was for me. I applied for it. Out of 70, there were 12 selected. I had a number of reasons to, you know, follow that pursuit. And one might not be that obvious, but I am 1/8 Chinese. I don’t look like it too much anymore.

ALEX: You look like more of a 1/16.

HUGO: Oh, okay. You’re close. During high school, I read a lot of Confucianism and Confucius. I was really curious on the culture. So that took me to Taiwan, where I stayed for about five years. I did three years of language training, and two years of geography in Mandarin. After I finished that chapter, I came back to the U.S. and started in the gaming industry.

FLOR: Which leads us to the next question, because I definitely want to know how you got into the gaming industry. Why games? What do video games represent you?

HUGO: You know, career wise, I started in 2006, but I think it goes way back when my father bought the first console for me, an Atari 5200. It was an upgrade from the 2600, so I was kind of popular in the neighborhood because we had that.

FLOR: Everyone wanted to play with you, right? After school.

HUGO: Yes, I was one of the few…

ALEX: That was in Costa Rica, right?

HUGO: That was in Costa Rica, correct.

ALEX: Okay.

HUGO: And there was a problem, though, not many people to exchange game cartridges with, you know? So I would say, after that, I got to the Nintendos and all the games that came with Nintendo as well. I skipped the Sega, but the Nintendos and the Ataris have a very special place in my heart. And I would say that’s when it all started, understanding, you know, analyzing a game, how to break through different levels and whatnot. So going back to after I came to the U.S., I found this small company that was looking for a Spanish translator. And we don’t have that industry anymore, but they were called Betting Games. And the way they worked, there were games like Tetris or Zuma, if you remember Zuma, or Bejeweled.

FLOR: Yes.

HUGO: And they had, you know, they have kind of hacked the games that were online and you could play for money. If you were good, you could earn money. It was like an online casino for gamers, something like that. So I did that and the company did not last too long. And at the time, I remember my boss telling me, “Hey, you know, there’s this job opportunity for this company out in Orange County.” And said, “Oh, forget it. I don’t even have a car. That’s too far for me, so I think I’m going to skip.” That company was, you know, sold out. And I did a couple of odd jobs in the meantime, like, I worked for a bank and I managed their Chinese site, their Spanish site. And, you know, fate had me where I moved, I had to move to Orange County. So during the 2008 downturn, you know, the economic downturn in the U.S.

ALEX: Yeah, I remember.

FLOR: Yes.

HUGO: I decided to go back to school and finish my degree. And linguistics was by far the easiest thing I could find because I had the languages there already. And so it was actually the minimum number of classes I would take. At the beginning, I didn’t really know much what it was all about, but I fell in love with it right after I did my first class and was like, “Oh, my God, where has this been all my life?” Nobody’s ever told me that linguistics, I mean, with such an unsexy name or sexy name, I don’t know, that was the thing for me. So that was a breeze. I did that for about two years, and before graduation, I started looking for jobs. And a neighbor company was Blizzard Entertainment, and they were looking for a Language QA. And then I remember recalling my old boss saying, oh, my God, this was the company he had told me back in 2006. I couldn’t believe it. I could have been working there since 2006.

FLOR: You belonged there. I mean, it was meant for you.

HUGO: And of course, the rest is history. I went through the ranks, I did QA for about a year, and it taught me a lot about maneuvering inside the games, which is not an easy thing. For example, for World of Warcraft and then StarCraft, that was very different. And Diablo III that, at the time [indistinct 15:10] and it was not out, we were doing QA for D3.

FLOR: Wow. And you were one of the first people to ever play it. Right?

HUGO: Yes. Yes, you’re right.

FLOR: Incredible.

ALEX: You know what? I’ve told you this in some of our previous talks, but I love Diablo III. I love it. And it is till this day that every time that I find any locked doors, I go like the Witch Doctor in Spanish, “Está cerrado (It’s locked).” It’s like in my brain, that’s the sound for a locked door. “Está cerrado.” And for my wife, too, because I say it out loud.

HUGO: That’s so nice to hear. That’s so nice to hear. I don’t hear those stories enough because we make a great effort or I make a great effort to put in the diversity in dialects and accents into the game, because I know that they’re being ingrained in the players, in the gamers’ memory for a lifetime. So it’s so heartwarming to hear stories like that. Thank you, Alexis.

FLOR: Well, it would be great if someone watching this show and as a big fan of any of Blizzard’s franchises, please leave a comment below. If you’ve experienced these games in Spanish for Latin America, in particular, this is the person you want to thank for that. So please leave your love for Hugo in the comment section.

ALEX: Yeah. No, thank you, Hugo, for making such a great job because it leaves a mark. It leaves a mark. I don’t want to stay too much in this because I’m gonna cry, but… I’d like to know, how do you manage nowadays…? Because we’re all busy, but I can imagine that what you do, your position, must book your time pretty, pretty heavily. So how do you manage your time and balance work with your everyday life? Do you still have time to play video games? Do you play video games still? And I’m going to leave another small question for that, because it’s a long one.

HUGO: Okay. So the short answer is yes, I still find time to play games. They are very significant for me. It’s a way to relax. And some people, you know, they read the news. Some people watch movies. Some people play with their pets. Or some people play video games. And it’s a way to find refuge from the day-to-day life to recharge your batteries. So it is very important for me. And of course, it benefits my job and it pays off when you show that knowledge. And it benefits others, too, in your job. Going back to what I do for Blizzard, so I left you at QA, I did that for about a year. I later moved on to Content Editor, which was basically synchronizing with the translators that we have as outsource partners, right? And then because of needs in that department, I moved to Project Management. That was more of a language agnostic position, but still keeping, you know, final decisions language-wise. And now the latest of the evolution is Language Specialist. In my view, I’ve always been doing the same thing. But I just provide people with different services, if you know what I mean. And in terms of how do I manage my time? So there are some things that I have to do for work in video games. I am doing one right now, but I cannot share any details. Haw-haw! And I am…

ALEX: You’re so mean!

HUGO: I am collecting information. I am researching this product for the benefit of the translators that are going to get this product later on to localize. So some of that can be done, you know, as part of my job. And others I do here and there. I would say I play more mobile lately.

FLOR: Interesting.

HUGO: Because it takes a little more time to turn on the console, sit in front of the TV, you know, find the time and the space.

ALEX: Yes, I can relate to that. I have a two-year-old in a small apartment that we live. So mobile gaming is very, very, very comfortable.

HUGO: Yeah.

FLOR: Maybe you should turn to mobile as Hugo.

ALEX: Yeah.

HUGO: That’s a very interesting stage and it has its advantages. I remember when we had newborns, it was kind of fun because you had to stay up through the night sometimes or wake up at odd times, or sometimes you don’t fall asleep again. So guess what? Come on, console.

ALEX: I’m gonna play. Yep.

HUGO: So you just find your time and you adjust to it.

FLOR: Yeah, absolutely.

ALEX: That’s how it works.

FLOR: And you mentioned some of the things where some of the people you interact with as a Language Specialist, but I wanted to know, how does a day in the life of a Language Specialist look like? What are the challenges that you’re facing or that you faced through the years? Because probably they have changed.

HUGO: Yes. There has been an evolution for sure. But when I started, I was not so mature in the position and the team was not either. And so I remember… it’s actually a very endearing memory for me when we would have the… I call them the tomato-tomato discussions. Because for Latin American Spanish, it’s something that is very dear to us in every country, we all have our own nuances, because we grew up in a linguistic bubble, you know? We had marketing, we had TV, we had friends, we had school, we had the university. And someone that comes around from a place that is not from where I am and tells me that I’m not speaking the correct Spanish, it’s definitely an insult because, “Hey, my grandmother spoke like that, my grandfather, my parents, my classmates. They all spoke like that. Who are you to tell me I’m wrong? I think I’m right.”

FLOR: Kind of your identity. It’s what makes you you, right?

HUGO: Right, right. So when you bring on different Spanish speakers from different countries, and they’re just finding out about what others sound like, what others experience is like, you know, it’s a little bit challenging, and it was at the time, to explore our differences. Luckily, I am a descriptivist linguist. I think… Descriptivist? What is the other opposite of descriptivist?

FLOR: Hmm…

HUGO: Prescriptive. So a prescriptive linguist is the one that kind of follows the rules, kind of like the grammar, the language police, and a descriptive linguist is the one that’s just like a scientist, observes the behavior of a certain language, understands why they speak like that, where they come from, and then kind of tries to marry the differences. And that is kind of what I did at the very beginning in our department.

ALEX: More artistic, sort of speak, right?

HUGO: Right. Right.

ALEX: You mentioned scientific, but I imagine like someone that works their art with languages.

HUGO: Mm-hmm. Well, linguistics is a science, a social science. So that’s why I slipped that in there. So it happened when, say, we would decide a name for a unit or an important name for an expansion, and then people would have all these feelings about a certain word. So then I had to explore, you know, where they were coming from, what sounded natural to them, and then do the same thing for the other part and then try to explain, “Yeah, this sounds natural to him or her because of this and that.” And the best thing to do for the game would be based on the trends that we see in all of Latin America, kind of like that. So those are kind of like… I’m kind of deviating from the question, am I?

FLOR: No, but it’s fascinating. I mean, you can keep going for hours. It’s all right. Like I would listen for what you have to say for hours. I mean, it’s super interesting how it can be as simple as, yeah, there’s not one single variant, and that’s it. So you may choose, for example, Latin American neutral Spanish or Mexican Spanish and put it under an umbrella. Or if you dig and you go deeper and you realize that there’s more than just a variant, it’s just the culture behind those variants and the people behind them that speak that specific variant. Right?

HUGO: Right. So the different tasks I get for work, when they are linguistically related, we just geek out so much on them and we could talk on forever about those. I remember one. I’ll give you an example of where we had a bug in an audio in a game and… I don’t want to say that word right now. It’s a Spanish word. And there’s these little creatures in the game World of Warcraft, they’re kind of short, but they’re not the goblins. What are they?

FLOR: We might need Lara’s help here.

HUGO: So, in English, they’re called “gnomes,” okay? They’re called “gnomes.”

FLOR: Oh. It’s “gnomos” in Spanish.

HUGO: Oh, there you go. You said it. I did not say it. Just the way you pronounced it. In a game. And then we got it in Blizzard at HQ, and we all looked at each other and were like, “What are they saying?” Because nobody knew it by “gnomos.” We all said it as “nomos.” So that took me back into a historical [cut-off audio]. And you wonder why some people would say “gnomo” and other people would say “nomo.” And maybe we could talk about this offline.

FLOR: Yeah. For the people that are tuning in, “gnomo,” as I pronounce it in my Argentinian Spanish, is written as g-n-o-m-o, right?

ALEX: Right. Gnomo.

FLOR: So I pronounce it “ñomo” and Hugo, you pronounce it “nomo.” Correct?

HUGO: Nomo.Yes. Yes.

FLOR: And we speak the same language. It’s fascinating.

ALEX: Yeah, but that’s the beauty of it. Hugo, by now, I mean, we know, but our audience must see that you have a beautiful way of seeing life and to see language and to talk about it as well. Right? And I know that you see life as a video game, right? Where you can be either Indiana Jones or someone with special abilities. And you’re an advocate for bilingualism for future generations. What are your thoughts on what’s the potential of future generations for people in the industry, in language and gaming? Take it wherever you think.

HUGO: So, that… My endeavor of talking to elementary school age kids about what I do at work came about because I was once invited at my son’s elementary school to read to the kids. And I was like, “No, but to go there and read a book in English? That not me. Why don’t we go like, you know…” I used to watch in the movies where parents would go and talk about their professions. And why don’t I prepare a presentation, and talk to the kids about what I do at work? And at the same time, I bring the exposure of the idea that speaking languages is okay, it’s natural, because that’s something that here in the U.S. is not so common as you would see it in other areas of the world where multilingualism is more common. Here, there is bilingualism and multilingualism, but it’s kind of like in the shadows still. You know, you keep it at home in a corner or with your friends, and if you’re in public, you whisper it. Or if you go order McDonald’s, and I turn around to my son in Spanish to ask him what he wants, you get all this, you know, it’s kind of like in a movie, all the bright eyes in the darkness staring at you. So I saw that as an opportunity to also show my son that it was okay to talk about that. And of course, I put in comparisons. You know, I pulled one of those Hearthstone cinematics that you could see on YouTube. I couldn’t pull out an Overwatch one, although I really wanted to, but it might have been a little bit too violent for eight-year-olds.

FLOR: Yeah, probably.

HUGO: But I’m sure they see it at home. So I saw that opportunity to talk with them on those topics. And then it just evolved from there. The teacher had a son in a bilingual program at a different school, and he said, “Well, would you do the same thing at this other school for my son’s class?” And then he moved from there to a local library. “Hey, why don’t you do that for that community?” And then somebody else called me, you know, someone that I had met ages before that worked at an elementary school. And then I did it again. So I’m like, you know, happy to offer that. And I sell it as a way to, you know, discover your abilities, like in a video game, like a language is another ability that you could use for a job to, like, work at Blizzard or anywhere you want. Right? And also to give them the idea that playing video games is a way of getting to know yourself, getting to know what you’re good at, what you’re bad at, what you like, what you don’t like. And those are skills that you should know by the time you get out of high school, you should not go into university, you know, listening to others tell you what you should study. You should know by then. So games are a way to let you find out what you like and what you don’t. So I think it’s all connected. I think it’s all beneficial. But of course, you know, some people abuse screen time, right?

ALEX: Yeah. No, but what a wonderful story, Hugo. To think that you thought it just for your kids’ class, right? And it evolved. No, it’s amazing. I’m kind of speechless right now, but just because I enjoyed it so much.

FLOR: Yeah, it’s so nice that you get the chance to give back to the community, right? Through language, which is your passion. So it’s a beautiful story. And talking about passions, and I know you pretty much have the dream job, because Blizzard Entertainment is an amazing company, has incredible games. And we wanted to know if you have any recommendations to translators or linguists that are trying to get out there in the industry and are dreaming of maybe someday working at Blizzard or a company similar to Blizzard, though I’m not sure if there’s any. I mean, what would you recommend to them?

HUGO: Hmm. That’s a really good question. It depends. It varies depending on where you are and what you like to do, right? I think it’s your passion that kind of drives you to a destination, right? And then how do you break into it? Like breaking into the industry at first. There’s so much competition, but then there’s also so much opportunities. We live in a day and age where video games is taking over Hollywood in terms of entertainment. So it’s huge. It’s huge. And guess what? Languages as an industry is also exploding. Is there a lot of content right now, do you think? Well, there’s gonna be a lot more, and a lot more content to translate.

FLOR: Yes. This is not stopping.

HUGO: Right. So if you are a translator, say, and you’re interested in video games, well, if you were to solve it like in a video game, you would try to find the easiest way in, right? If it’s a big wall that you have in front of you, try to find the easiest way in. Find the door, the broken door that no one is looking for. Find the easy way in. For me, the easiest way in was using my languages, using my interest in video games, and that I lived nearby. So if you kinda summarize, putting it on a list, making a list of what would be easy for you. What skills do you have? Some people might have marketing in there. And guess what? We also need marketing people. Lawyers. We also have lawyers, right? Right. They are necessary in our society. So it just depends. And, say, if it’s a specific company that you’re looking into, it might be… it might look like a fortress at first, so find the easiest way into the industry first. Work on a smaller project first. That will build up on your experience. When you go on to the next opportunity, you can say, “Well, I did this and this and this at this other company, and I thought there were better ways of doing it. What are you guys doing?” And that gives you power, right? Just like when you analyze one video game, and I could just drop one here like Mario, right? And when you compare it to Donkey Kong, and you play Mario, we can have a conversation, we can compare it. How is it different? Who made the game? What years they were published? What consoles? And that is all knowledge that you would gain from having that experience, right? So I would say anywhere that you can find, put your foot in the industry would already give you more power to go into the next level, and the next level and the next level. Kind of like World of Warcraft.

FLOR: I love that you’re bringing the fact that you don’t need to have like a specific skill or area of expertise because as you said, we need lawyers, marketing managers, localization specialist and account managers, producers, game developers. You don’t even need to be just a developer to be in the gaming industry, right?

HUGO: We have librarians, we have historians, we have business intelligence people that analyze huge batches of data.

FLOR: Geologists. We had… One of our guests, one of our special guests was Kate Edwards as well, and she has so much background in geography and history, and still she’s collaborating and adding so much value with her background. So everyone has something that can add value to the story, right?

HUGO: Definitely so, definitely so. One example that I always like to bring up is when we worked on Overwatch. And, you know, one thing that I always wanted to do was to use my Chinese expertise in the games where I work, and the opportunity never really came about, you know? I would see it on everyday tasks where I would try to understand the English, to understand the source, and I would look at different languages. And because of Chinese and the way they look at things, the way they describe things in their language, I would understand right away what they’re talking about, okay, this is what it is in Spanish, or this is what it should be for other languages. But never really as impactful as when the Overwatch project came about. And when we were deciding who was gonna be the talent for it, and we definitely wanted someone who spoke the language, and we were just very lucky to find the talent that we found for Mei, who has studied Chinese in Mexico. And she was not a voice actress as a profession, she’s more of a drama professional and a writer.

FLOR: Interesting. And how long did it take you to find her?

HUGO: Well, we had to do it very efficiently, maybe two or three weeks.

FLOR: Well, that’s very efficient for such a special profile, right?

HUGO: We had to we had to move very fast because we didn’t have time. So we found her. And since she had never recorded in Mandarin Chinese before, she looked at the script and she said, “Well, yeah, I can do it, But there’s some words here that I don’t understand.” And when I heard that, I was like, “Wait, wait, I can help!”

FLOR: Your opportunity to shine, right?

HUGO: Yes. So what happened was that I joined the recording sessions remotely, and then I helped her with the pronunciation of certain words, the pronunciation of sentences, and also just, of course, because she is very good at it, just to give her that emotional support.

FLOR: Well, I think it’s about time to go to our meme round. What do you think, guys? Should we do it?

ALEX: I’m down for some memes.

FLOR: All right. Well, this is the first meme. And here I think we’re gonna need a little help from you.

HUGO: Here it is. Yes. This is a… this is not by far a popular meme that you see out there that people share about, because this was an internal discussion and happened about by the time Heroes of the Storm was coming out, because this is the character in Heroes of the Storm.

ALEX: Yes.

HUGO: At the time, we had this discussion of what we would name our demon hunter. And in English we had the name Valla, right? And then there was an issue with that, because if we published it as the way it is in English, people would read “valla,” and that means like “fence” or something. And so something like very uncool. I mean, people are gonna be saying, “Valla, Valla, Valla,” and it’s gonna sound like, “Go, go, go,” or like a fence.

FLOR: Yeah, [it sounds 40:58] forced, right?

HUGO: So, yeah. So what do we do? What do we do? And there was this heated discussion about, what do we name them? And then we reached out to the dev team and they said, “Well, there’s also this other demon hunter in the lore,” and this is public, actually, “and her name is Tyla. Tyla is another demon hunter that is mentioned in the lore. Well, would you guys be okay with that?” So then that was brought on the table and then we started discussing. Anyway, it went on for hours. It was so long, it was so heated and people were fighting over this, that our current director in localization made this meme. They mirrored the image and put Tyla and put Valla and then, go, fight, who’s gonna win?

ALEX: The PvP.

FLOR: Now it makes sense. Yeah, who would win in that story?

HUGO: We were like literally bringing out the popcorn and, “Yeah, you guys keep discussing, keep discussing. I wanna see how this ends.”

ALEX: I love Valla, but I wasn’t aware of the Tyla one.

HUGO: Yes, yes. You know, just to tie the knot at the end… Oh, and there was another issue with Valla because, in Argentinian Spanish, you will pronounce “bala,” not “Vala,” and “bala” sounds like “bullet” in Spanish, but in Argentinian Spanish, “bala” is something of a bad word that we did not want in the game. So yeah, we didn’t want that. We didn’t want “bala.“

FLOR: Yeah. We can also pronounce it as “vaya” as well. I mean, it can mean like a barrier or something and you don’t want that either.

HUGO: Right. Right. Yeah. In the end, we took out one of the “l’s” and it stayed as “Vala,” and there were no issues with the other meaning of the word. It was my guess that, you know, taken out of context, if it’s in the context of the game, you’re not gonna think about it in any other context. Why would you? Why would you, right? And we haven’t heard anything so far, so please don’t go bug it now, I think it’s fine.

FLOR: Thanks for sharing this inside meme, and I love that story. Thank you. This is for all Spanish speakers out there.

ALEX: It depends on who you call, right?

HUGO: Yeah. You’ve got A, B, C, and D, and, you know, the first time I saw this meme, I was like, you know, I’m a Spanish speaker, I should be able to answer this. You know, some monolingual person sent me this and, “Okay, so what is it? What is the answer? I wanna know.” You know, “I probably have the answer.” And then I looked at them, and it was like, “I don’t know.”

ALEX: All of the above.

HUGO: I don’t know what “ahorita” means. I don’t know because it depends on how you use it in your context, in your country, in your atmosphere, in your family.

FLOR: Oh, I love this one. Yeah. And we can probably find even more if we Google, because there’s so many different ways to say “popcorn” in Spanish. You have no idea.

HUGO: Yes. This is one of my favorite ones. I use it at work often, and particularly when I do presentations to my teammates, you know? I do presentations on the Chinese language to explain the difference between traditional and simplified, and why if it’s, you know, if one is simplified, why is not the other one complex? You know, I don’t understand that dichotomy. So I use this one to explain why Latin-American Spanish is so difficult. Why? Because when they, you know, when developers or production sends a query and they ask, “Okay, we want to know what this would be, what the translation would be for your language, because the developers want to implement this in the game.” Okay? And then you see all the languages answering and there’s like German, boom, Spanish, boom, I mean, European Spanish, boom, French, boom, Russian boom, Chinese, done, Brazilian Portuguese, done. And they’re like, “Where’s Latin American Spanish?”

FLOR: All over the place.

ALEX: Working on it.

HUGO: “I’m still discussing with the people, I’m doing my best. I’m still discussing to, you know, marry all the opinions and getting the best answer to you.” And that is because you have to go through all the countries that you have, you know, you can reach out to. Well, this meme is kind of old, at least the picture, right? At the time, I don’t know, I must have made it like six, seven years ago when we started discussing this topic. And for Spanish speakers, it’s a very sensitive topic because it talks about the core of who you are and how you speak. And so, when you hear the first comments of neutral Spanish and, you know, nobody likes it because they all defend who they are. And yes, I see that, I respect who they are. I mean, I am the number one person that, when I visited Buenos Aires, I started speaking like the locals like right away because I wanted to pick it up. And, you know, and then I came… you come back and then you start finding a love for the way things are pronounced a little bit differently. And then it just sounds like music, so beautiful. So I am the first one to appreciate the diversity in accents. And the issue of neutrality comes when you have to publish one product to a huge market. Right? So what do you choose?

ALEX: That’s what I was saying, right? Like teach your kids the ways of video games, then they’ll never have money to buy drugs or something like that.

FLOR: Yeah, it’s a healthy hobby.

ALEX: Yeah.

HUGO: I think so. Yeah, I agree. And World of Warcraft is not an easy game. I mean, I’ve played it and I don’t do… I don’t do like 10% of what you can do inside World of Warcraft.

FLOR: Really?

HUGO: I mean, I’m like questing and sometimes I fish, like, the most boring things. And I don’t do raiding or even battles. Oh, my God.

ALEX: I’ve felt like John Wick every once in a while in this picture, especially because of all the bruises and all the low health.

HUGO: Yes, it happened to me on World of Warcraft, because you have to go pick up your body, right? And sometimes he’s right there. There’s not enough time for you to leave.

ALEX: Yeah.

HUGO: So, yeah, it’s kind of funny.

FLOR: I had so much fun. Thank you, Hugo, for sharing your memes. We like to think of it as a way of getting more personal with our guests, because we like to know what makes them laugh. Thank you for sharing what makes you laugh. It was an absolute pleasure to have you here with us today, Hugo, and to learn more about your incredible journey in Blizzard and in the localization industry. Thank you, Alexis, also. It was lovely having you, everyone. Thanks for tuning in, and we’ll see you in another Open World. Take care.

HUGO: Bye, guys.

Episode Transcription

FLOR: Hi, welcome to another Open World LocFact!

ALEX: Hi, everyone. Well, I’m Alexis and today Flor and I will be discussing one of my personal favorite games: The Witcher 3, which was localized into a staggering 13 languages.

FLOR: For those unfamiliar with the game’s cultural background, most elements come from Slavic folklore. It’s a rarely seen world to most players, but for localizers, it becomes a hardcore level challenge. Monsters, characters, and locations often have expressive names, so localization plays a big role in portraying culturally accurate descriptions that are heavily influenced by that specific folklore.

ALEX: Now, let’s start with Geralt’s trusty steed: Roach. But don’t let that name bug you! It actually comes from the fish, not the insect. Plotka, the name in the original language, that I’m probably butchering now, it comes from Polish, for those who didn’t know, and is a female gendered word for the roach fish, which derives from the Polish “Płoć.”

FLOR: Funny thing about this horse is that in Czech, “Roach” was localized into “Klepna,” which actually means “gossip.” You may be asking why this happened, right? I mean, we sure did! We have a theory here for this. We think that what might have happened here is that the Czech translator probably used just “Plotka,” as you can see on the screen, without the special symbol right there. And that means “gossip” or “rumor” in Polish. Interestingly enough, regardless of the possible mistranslation here, the word “Klepna” in Czech also refers to the sounds of hooves.

ALEX: There’s a lot going on behind the horse’s name, but Roach clearly deserves it. Such a good steed. Now, something else worth sharing about this game are some of the enemies, and here we should mention the Leshens. These are tough, forest-dwelling creatures with the frightening features of several animals from our world all combined. These creatures’ name comes from the Slavic term for “forest,” which is “les,” and it’s totally fitting for the Leshen’s bark and moss-covered arms, root-like legs, and deer skull for a head. Certainly a forest creature and more than a little badass for a creature, too.

FLOR: They were pretty badass to me. And now, we want to talk about Bies. That’s the Polish word for “devil” or “fiend,” and they’re another creature we often encounter in The Witcher 3: Wild Hunt. Bies are widely considered to be a synonym of “chort,” which is a demon from the Slavic mythology, who is often associated with the devil since the Christianization of the Slavic nations.

ALEX: Now, the Witcher’s localization and culturalization work is just uncanny, and we love to see so much time and energy being dedicated to doing justice to the original books. I mean, there’s so much more to unpack here, but for now we’re gonna wrap it up and thank you for joining us in today’s LocFact!

FLOR: Hi, everyone! Welcome to a new episode of Open World. How’s everyone doing today?

ULISES: Hi.

FLOR: Hey. So today we have a very interesting guest that we’ve been wanting to interview for quite a long time now. Today we have Ulises. Hi, Ulises, how are you?

ULISES: Hi, everyone.

FLOR: Ulises Uno is a content and localization manager at Etermax. Etermax is a very popular company here in Argentina where we are all based, and he’s leading a strategic area for the company’s gaming division, which is focused on developing and publishing worldwide social games that entertain, connect and foster knowledge in up to 34 languages. Can you believe that? And he has an educational background in social sciences and translation, and he joined the gaming industry as a translator and a copywriter. Ulises currently leads a team of language specialists, user experience writers and content producers, guiding them towards a product-centric mindset. Hi, Ulises, welcome to Open World! How are you today?

ULISES: Hi, I’m doing great. It’s an honor to be here. And thank you for inviting me.

FLOR: Oh, please.

ALEX: The honor is all ours, man.

FLOR: Yeah. So, well, we have a couple of questions for you because we’re super curious to know how you got into this industry, your background and your experience as a localization producer. Well, from what I see, you’ve been wearing a lot of hats, and that’s super interesting. And of course, we want to learn from your story. So first of all, what aspects do you take into account when trying to reach a specific market? Are there any specific strategies when it comes to mobile apps and games?

ULISES: Well, I would say in just a few words that we go for the low hanging fruit first and for the long shots later. So we try to see the return on investment and try to figure out whether the lifetime value of a user is bigger than the cost of acquiring a user. And then in terms of the cost of acquisition, localization plays a part. So sometimes, you know that localizing a game that was first devised or first developed in English, translating it into Chinese will be more costly than translate into Spanish, for example. And that’s just taking the cultural aspects into account. I’m not talking about possible dealing with censorship or dealing with local publishers, in the case of China. And… Yeah. It’s usually easier to localize for the markets that are culturally closer to what you already know or kind of know.

FLOR: So yeah, we wanted to know what are the main challenges, or better yet, the most fun aspects of your job in a company so well known for making worldwide social games.

ULISES: All right. So I joined the company when Trivia Crack was a sensation in Latin America. And I remember those first days as being really hectic and having camera crews all the time in the office because, you know, the media wanted to know what was it about, this little Argentine company that was playing in the same league as giants like Zynga or King.

ALEX: Making those first big waves.

ULISES: Yeah, exactly. And it was quite rewarding because one of my first tasks was to see how to expand that initial success in Latin America over to other markets. And so we started translating the user interface, localizing the content into, well, quite a few languages. And I remember when it hit number one in the US, that was… That felt so good.

FLOR: Wow, I bet!

ULISES: Yeah.

FLOR: How did you celebrate? Was there anything in particular that you did? I mean, that was a huge milestone.

ULISES: Yeah, we had a party, I remember, to celebrate it.

FLOR: Good times.

ULISES: Yeah. Yeah, it was crazy. We would see people uploading videos on YouTube playing the game. BuzzFeed was making, like, quizzes on the game. And then more… Well, it was a bit unexpected. It was a huge success also in Turkey. So seeing people who don’t speak a language you understand talking about the game on TV was completely…

ALEX: Mind blowing.

ULISES: It was mind blowing. And I would say that the most fun and most fulfilling part of my job is knowing that I can do what I like doing and I can apply the knowledge that I enjoy, you know, harvesting and put it into this collaborative effort to make a game be a success.

FLOR: Yeah. And I bet, like, I mean, I wish I experienced that once in my life. Like, feeling your own product kind of doesn’t belong to you anymore, it’s part of the community. And it’s surreal to see other people like playing with your product, a product that you put so much time and effort, and you get to know every single person who intervened in that process. I bet it’s a really amazing feeling.

ULISES: Yeah. At some point we had two million people playing each day and…

FLOR: Wow! That’s crazy.

ULISES: Yeah. Thinking just that some people were… two million people were probably reading my translations was mind blowing. And at the same time, I saw how the company grew. So we were a startup at the time, and because of the success of the game, we started building like an international company. And at that time I knew everyone. We were only 60 people and now we’re like 500 people.

FLOR: Wow!

ULISES: It’s really… Yeah. It’s gratifying that some of that has to do with localization. Of course, I cannot take credit for all of that.

FLOR: It’s a team effort, right? It takes a village to raise a popular IP and such a successful brand like the one that you got there. And how does it feel like to work in such a large team? I mean, the culture… I know that you have a very strong culture, and I really appreciate that. And I’m really curious on how you build relationships once you’re in that stage, right?

ULISES: Yeah. At some point, we had to, you know, get together and figure out what our values are and how we want to work with each other. Before that, it was just anything goes or whatever makes everyone feel more comfortable. But now, when you’re so many people, you just have to have some rules and some expectations and there are certain rituals. It’s like a Chinese society.

ALEX: Yeah, you go from a household, right? To an entire community. But let’s jump back to the now, right? So now you guys at Etermax localized your products in up to 34 different languages?

ULISES: Yes, that’s correct.

ALEX: We know that it may not always have been like that. From which languages did you start at the beginning? And can you please elaborate a little bit more about this growth and the growing pains, if there were any, in the process?

ULISES: Yes, of course. So the very beginning for us was a game called Word Crack o Apalabrados, that was the first game we made. And it was like a Scrabble for mobile. And, of course, we didn’t invent the genre, but what we did see was that there wasn’t a Spanish version of that game available for iPhone users at that time. And when we released it in Spanish, it was a huge success in Spain, and soon enough people from different autonomous communities in Spain started asking for a Galician version, a Basque version, a Catalan version, and so on and so forth. So, well, soon enough we figured out that we could offer a localized version for users and that it would make sense. And then when Trivia Crack came along, and it fared so well in a variety of countries, I think we became more aggressive in a way, like we started adding languages and they would usually have at least a moderate success. And then I think we became a bit more cost-conscious, because having that many languages in a game can also harm your focus, right? So I would say, generally speaking, we start with the EFIGS and Portuguese, so English, French, Italian, German, Spanish and Portuguese, and then we build it up from there. Usually we start with other European languages. Depending on the game and depending on the goals of the company at the time, you could be adding Dutch first or Catalan first. Other times it means trying to localize it for the East Asian market. Sometimes it’s Russian. Other times might be Southeast Asian countries. It all depends.

ALEX: It’s a bit of a people’s choice too, right? And market research, for that matter, right?

FLOR: Yeah, it’s a mix of listening to your community and getting your numbers right, and doing a lot of research.

ULISES: Exactly. And being mindful also of the genre of the game. Because for trivia games, it’s not difficult to provide an experience in Chinese, for example, or Korean. But Scrabble, which is, you play with tiles with different letters. No, it’s just impossible.

ALEX: Yeah, that can be quite a challenge.

FLOR: Yeah. And was there any particular language or languages that were more challenging than others?

ULISES: Well, I suppose the further away you go from the Indo-European languages, the harder it gets for different reasons. So in some cases, like in Turkish, you have two “i” letters. And that’s a problem because we don’t have them mapped out in our database. But then East Asian languages come along, you have so many languages. And then you go to Southeast Asia and you have probably Vietnamese that doesn’t look too hard because it’s Latin based, but you have so many diacritics. And then you have Russian, which is, well, they don’t have that many characters, different letters, but they do have more than two plurals. So… yeah.

ALEX: Different challenges.

ULISES: Yeah.

FLOR: Yeah, right? It’s so interesting that you learn so much because you start to find these similarities, even though some languages are so distant from one another, right?

ULISES: Yeah, exactly.

FLOR: So we also wanted to know what games you’re playing because, yeah, we’re all into localization, but what brings us here are games as well. So is there any game that you would like to recommend us?

ULISES: Huh. Well, I’m not the best of gamers.

FLOR: Oh, me neither!

ALEX: Yeah. We are not pros. We are not on E-Sports. We like to play games.

ULISES: All right, fair enough.

FLOR: We’re very busy people, and we don’t have enough time.

ULISES: Fair enough. I tend to play games that came out a couple of years ago. So right now I’m playing Final Fantasy VII, the Remake version. It’s really good. And I recently finished the entire Uncharted series. That was really good. But what happens to me is that I see video games as a social activity, and of course, I play your occasional FIFA or Fall Guys online. But I prefer getting together and playing Mario Kart or, you know, Smash Brothers and stuff. So, yeah, in this pandemic, it’s really hard, you know?

ALEX: It’s really hard.

ULISES: Yeah.

FLOR: Well, for the people that are not aware what was going on before we started this session, there was a box lying there because I just got my TV delivered this week. And one of the things that I’m looking forward to is to playing games with my friends in my couch like co-op. And those are one of my favorite games, actually. Last year I played a lot of Overcooked.

ULISES: Oh, yeah.

FLOR: It has this cool factor, you know? It helped me go through lockdown and stay in touch with my friends. And I mean, it became a social space, like you said.

ULISES: Yeah, totally.

ALEX: Yeah. I have this same spirit to play co-op, but with different games. I’m a big Souls fan and Bloodborne fan. But to play co-op on those difficult games, it’s like to have people that help you and that have fun with you, right? Or suffer with you!

FLOR: We’re in this together.

ALEX: We’re together, right?

ULISES: Yeah.

ALEX: So now moving forward to your experience, Ulises, what are the most challenging features that the localization process have in video games? Is there anything in particular that keeps you up at night? Or do you have a good night’s sleep every day?

FLOR: I do hope so, though.

ULISES: Yeah. I would say I do sleep well nowadays, but I didn’t before. So, well, first of all, I think localizing games is a complex endeavor. We mentioned a few things that get in the way of a perfect localization for internationalization. And after some time working in the industry, I think I’ve come to realize and accept that there’s no such thing as a perfect internationalization or localization in the real world. And yeah, I used to lose sleep over it, worrying about, what are we gonna do about the Arabic speaking users that won’t be able to see all the plurals that they have and whatnot? But I guess it’s just not reasonable to be a stickler of localization. And you have to try to come to terms with that. And yeah, and after that, you learn to compromise and prioritize. And I think the most challenging thing is to have a clear vision of where you want to go with a game or a product, and think in terms of incremental steps and finding ways to test your hypothesis and validate what you thought was right, and finding ways to collaborate with the myriad of different disciplines that work together in building a game.

ALEX: That’s amazing advice for everyone…

FLOR: Yeah, everyone should be taking notes right now.

ALEX: I know that I am at least taking mental notes.

FLOR: Yeah. And I wanted to go back to… Well, I know that you’re a super large company right now. You mentioned that you are almost 500 people, over 500 people, and I know that you have presence in a lot of parts of the globe. And I wanted to know, how is that experience? Was there any opportunity where you encountered any cultural barriers with your colleagues or even with your partners as well? Because I know that you collaborate with people from all over the world.

ULISES: Yes. It’s a funny question, really. And I think I’ve encountered what many may have encountered, too, when working with international colleagues. You get the, you know, the common share of stereotypes, I would say, like some nationalities tend to be more structured or others tend to be more laid back and whatnot. But the funny thing is, well, I’m from Argentina and I work in Uruguay, have been working here for three years now. And when I came to Uruguay and started leading the team here, I was soon… I soon encountered that we Argentinians don’t know much about Uruguayans, like we take for granted a lot of things. Of course, we’re really similar, you know? From the outside you probably cannot tell many differences. And Uruguayans know a lot more about Argentinians that we know about them. And also they tend to… they know that, and they try to make us feel at ease. So we always…

FLOR: Oh, that’s so sweet of them.

ULISES: Yes, but we underestimate the subtle differences. That was one problem moving. And I’m usually, you know, really calm. I have a calm demeanor, but I’m really direct and straightforward and like, yeah, upfront. And those qualities here are a bit frowned upon. Like, you can come off as blunt or even impolite. So things that have been working for me in Argentina didn’t work here. I had to relearn some social norms to make things work. And I’m talking about two really similar countries.

FLOR: For those that may not be familiar with how the map is looking over here, well, we’re pretty close to Uruguay, we’re pretty much neighbors.

ALEX: One hour away by boat.

FLOR: Yeah, well, and you can also go by car and it’s like a five hour ride or something like that. But yeah, it’s pretty close to Argentina, Buenos Aires in particular. And we even share the same language. And it’s so easy, as you said, to fall into those assumptions and to think that we’re so close that we’re the same, but we’re not.

ULISES: Exactly. And, well, what I did learn was that it’s not good to assume that what is normal to you is normal for everyone. But at the same time, you know, working in video games, you come to learn that cultural differences are not a barrier, but an asset or an opportunity. We need more diversity in video games now. And if you want to reach a global audience, then having different nationalities on your team could be really valuable.

FLOR: Yeah, I totally agree with that. It makes the final product so much diverse, and it helps you reach a broader audience and to connect in a more deep way to your audience, right?

ULISES: Yeah, exactly.

ALEX: Okay. So going back a little bit to Etermax now, given that you guys are working on very popular mobile franchises that include many cultural and sometimes even very specific local references, how often do you receive feedback from your players? And do you have a system nowadays in place to process and implement that feedback?

ULISES: All right. Yes, we receive a ton of feedback. So people are very vocal, and we appreciate that. We appreciate that a lot, actually. But most importantly for our Trivia Crack family of quiz games, we have something called the Question Factory, which is a feature that not only allows them to give feedback, but also participate in the localization, continuous localization and content generation for our games. So what we do is we created this space right from the beginning almost. Users send their questions, and then we process them a little bit and send them back to the users who then rate them. And then we do this language by language and country by country, so we make sure that your country of origin is one of the key factors that determines the questions that you’re gonna get and, henceforth, the experience that you’re gonna have with the game. And I think that has been a really popular feature, because right now I would say that almost 95% of the content that you see in the game was created by users. Especially Americans and Brazilians and then Argentinians, in that order, are the top contributors to the content.

FLOR: In order of passion, right?

ALEX: But that’s so cool, that the user experience, I mean, it’s generated by the users. I mean, that speaks highly of Etermax as well.

FLOR: Mm-hmm.

ULISES: Yes. I suppose… Well, it was one of the things that we saw at the very beginning. We didn’t invent trivia games, of course, but we did see that whenever you wanted to play a trivia game in Spanish, two things happened. On the one hand, there were a certain fixed amount of questions. So after a while, they would start repeating themselves. And the other thing was, you get questions that were only relevant for people in Spain. So you get questions like, which of the following towns is in Extremadura? And I don’t know the answer to that, and I really don’t care.

ALEX: Yeah, me either.

ULISES: Yeah. It’s not relevant.

ALEX: It’s not relevant, right?

ULISES: Exactly.

FLOR: Yeah. You’re doing a master’s in Spanish, [indistinct 31:00] your geography, and you’re based in Argentina, right?

ULISES: Exactly. So we gave the users the chance to create content and also rate it. And also, we started serving it based on their country of origin. And that has become a really scalable model too, because we couldn’t possibly make that many… well, a couple million… or more than a couple million, like 50 million questions nowadays. There’s no way.

FLOR: More than a couple million!

ALEX: More than a couple million. Just one million is a lot. “More than a couple of million.”

ULISES: Yeah, there’s just too many. There’s no content or localization team in the world that can make that many. So our focus is more on, well, how to process this, how to make the most out of it, and how to provide users with the most meaningful and pleasant gaming experience.

FLOR: That’s incredible. I love that you came up with that system and that it’s working so well. And I also want to know if there’s any specific tool that you used through this specific process or through the localization process in general. Because I know, like you said, you have millions of questions, and I bet it was also interesting to streamline this process through some sort of technology, right?

ULISES: Yes. Well, when it comes to the questions themselves, we used tools that we built ourselves in-house. It’s quite specific. There was no one that provided it. But when it comes to the localization of the interface, we started with our own tool as well and it quickly became, you know, not worthy. It was really costly to maintain it. It was really a hassle. And soon enough we started looking for a tool that could do that for us. And…

FLOR: Yeah, probably there was a need to reinvent the wheel, right?

ULISES: Exactly. Exactly. And well, in that respect, I don’t know if I can mention the tool itself that we…

FLOR: Oh, it’s okay. We don’t want to break any NDAs or put you in a spot, but there are many tools in the market that generally cover the main features. Some may cover some different aspects, but generally what they do is process tons of words simultaneously and have some sort of translation memory or a glossary that you can access to and keep consistency throughout the languages, right?

ULISES: Yes. Yes, exactly. But I can tell you about the requirements on our side.

FLOR: Oh, please.

ULISES: What we needed it was… Well, we have our team of freelancers, so we had we have something in place that would work for them. So we had to have a translation memory and the CAT tool as well. And from our side, we had to add a translation management system as well. And it had to be decentralized because we have many games and not all of the games have a translation manager. So we had to find something that could work for that workflow. And at the same time, we needed a continuous translation so translation task should flow like really fluently. And, yeah, I think those are the main requirements. And, of course, we appreciate our QA, as anyone does in the business.

FLOR: Oh, yeah, quality is everything right?

ULISES: Yeah.

FLOR: So we want to go to the meme section now, if that’s okay with you. I know that you have a pretty interesting story to share about memes, because I know that you’ve created some sort of museum around memes with some of your colleagues and friends.

ALEX: I want to hear about that, too.

FLOR: Yeah. Do you want to share more details on how that was born?

ULISES: Of course. Um, well, first of all, I love memes. I think everyone here loves memes.

FLOR: Yeah. You’re in the right space here.

ALEX: Yes, my friend.

ULISES: Yeah, I think it’s a really generational phenomenon as well. So we’re all millennials, and that has hit us harder than all other generations, maybe. And we take memes so seriously, they’re such a big part of our life, that we started thinking, isn’t it almost like an art form? Isn’t it the way that we’re communicating now with other adults, too? Isn’t it the way we socialize? And we also learned a lot more about the other person, like the memes that the other person likes probably just tells you a lot about them. And we thought that it would be funny to make this memes museum, so a place where we could discuss memes and to preserve the memes that are worth preserving. Like, you know, a good old painting. And, yeah, I think it’s also interesting because localization and memes, there’s a connection there.

FLOR: Yeah, well, we were just discussing this the other day. Yes. One of my question is, when are we going to start thinking about meme localization? Because I know there are many dev teams, even publishers, that are trying to reach their communities, and they found that memes generate this engagement that we’re looking for. So sometimes you need to translate them and even localize them and go like full culturalization with the meme, you know.

ALEX: Culturalizing memes.

FLOR: Yeah, for the other person to get it. I have a lot of English speaking friends that I sometimes share memes with, and some are very… super, super specific to the Argentinian culture, and I need to give them like a full explanation of when I was born, in what culture I was immersed, what programs or TV shows I used to watch to get to the conclusion. Of course, the fun aspect is lost in between because of that whole explanation. But they have such a huge cultural baggage sometimes that it’s hard to portray the message.

ULISES: Yeah, exactly. I think… well, probably you’ve heard the mantra that goes like “To go global, you need to think local,” or something along those lines, when it comes to localization. And I think memes are probably the epitome of that mantra, because it’s a global phenomenon, but at the same time, the ones that, you know, get to you really to the deepest part of your heart are the ones that are hyper localized, the ones that you understand them because you were born and you grew up in a certain place at a certain time. And that’s, well, that’s a challenge to translate and transculturalize them.

FLOR: Hell yeah. I mean, we take memes seriously here.

ALEX: We take memes seriously.

ULISES: Yeah. But I also think they’re… I’m sorry.

FLOR: No, it’s okay.

ULISES: I think… It’s like… I take it so seriously. But I think memes can…

FLOR: We do as well, trust me.

ULISES: Memes can bring humanity together, I think, much like localization, because we’re seeing that we can laugh at the same things. And, you know, being able to be in this generation and seeing how we are laughing at the same topics or the same entities. I don’t know. If that doesn’t bring us together, then I don’t know what will.

FLOR: Oh, yeah. I mean, yesterday, I was talking to one of my best friends and I was so tired that we were just talking through stickers and memes and gifs. That’s my language when my brain is dead.

ALEX: It’s a sociological subject on its own.

FLOR: Yeah. Yeah, and it can portray a whole mood or a whole vibe or a whole even political stance, you know, it can get as personal as you want them to.

ULISES: Yes.

FLOR: So we’re gonna get personal. I’m gonna go ahead…

ULISES: All right.

FLOR: I’m gonna share…

ALEX: This is too real. This hits too close to home.

ULISES: Yeah. I don’t know why, but it does happen.

FLOR: Yeah, especially… Well, sometimes lately, I’ve had some of those days when I’ve been like for hours in a call, jumping from one call to the next, and I start to, of course, I start to lose concentration, lose focus. And then whenever that happens, I just stand up, just go to… or maybe take a walk around or something because, yeah, I’ve been there so many times. The next one.

ALEX: The same thing can apply to Resident Evil 4, right? How many consoles do a single game need?

ULISES: Well, my sense on that is that, if the game is good enough, then it should survive and come to the next generation’s console.

FLOR: Yeah.

ALEX: And it certainly does. My concern is that not enough… not enough good games are going out or being released, right? That we continue to play that amazingly good game, but it’s ten years old.

FLOR: Well, but it takes years to build a game that is actually good and that can stand for decades and have communities of followers for decades. So maybe that’s why. There are many other reasons probably there, but yeah, for sure.

ULISES: I can totally relate to this.

ALEX: Yes. Yes, totally.

ULISES: So my favorite game of all time is Super Mario World, and I play it every year, and I play it through and through every year.

FLOR: And with whom do you play?

ULISES: I’m sorry?

FLOR: With whom do you play generally? Friends, family?

ULISES: Oh, no, that one I play alone.

FLOR: Really?

ULISES: Yeah. Super Mario World is, you know, I can beat it with my eyes closed at this time.

FLOR: Oh, you’re that good?

ULISES: No, I just like it that much. And I’ve play that many times.

ALEX: It’s an amazing game. I had it back in the mid-nineties, and when I bought my Super Nintendo Mini, I started it over again. And it was like, I felt like a little kid again.

ULISES: Yeah. Yeah, I think that’s what makes me feel.

FLOR: Exactly. That’s what’s great about it, that it gets you back to that space, like a child again. Right?

ULISES: Yeah.

FLOR: There’s… Yeah, yeah. I could be talking for hours and debate about video games making people violent. Like, no. I mean, look at us. Right?

ULISES: Yeah, exactly. And the media portrayal of video games, I suppose it’s gonna change at some point. Like so many people are playing games now that we have smartphones and there’s casual games for literally everyone. I don’t know. It should change that perception. It’s so old.

FLOR: I mean, I like to believe that it’s already changing. Like we talked just a couple of minutes ago, it’s becoming a social space, and everyone is pretty aware of that already. So I think that this idea will get old soon. Hopefully.

ULISES: Hopefully.

ALEX: Now I have something that I want to ask. Who was that that just did a cameo on screen?

FLOR: Where?

ALEX: I need to know the name of that beauty.

ULISES: Oh, are you talking about my cat?

FLOR: What am I missing?

ALEX: You are missing something, Flor. We had a cat cameo. We love cat cameos here. I’m sorry to expose you, but… Oh!

FLOR: Oh! Yeah, we need proper introductions.

ULISES: She is Arabella, one of the… Yeah, the two cats that live here, but she’s the more extroverted one. And she likes to say hi.

FLOR: Hi, sweet girl! Oh, so cute.

ALEX: Sorry. I had to meet her. Sorry, Ulises.

FLOR: Yes. Thank you, that was absolutely necessary. Alexis, thank you.

ALEX: Oh, please. [I deserve it. 46:53]

FLOR: So going back to this. Every single time.

ALEX: Who hasn’t tried to drive normal on a GTA game or something? It’s impossible.

FLOR: I just can’t.

ULISES: It’s impossible.

ALEX: It’s impossible.

ULISES: Yeah, totally.

FLOR: It reminds me also, well, to every single car game. Whenever there is a car involved, I just can’t drive.

ULISES: I’m a really bad driver in the real world, so imagine in games when there are no consequences.

FLOR: Well, in the real world, I’ve been told that I’m fearless. So that can be a problem.

ALEX: That’s something I should take into consideration, Flor, when we meet.

FLOR: Yeah, you’ve never been in a car with me. I still have to get my driver’s license. Yeah, I’m 33 years old, I’m an adult, and I don’t have a driver’s license. I don’t know how that happened.

ALEX: It can happen.

FLOR: Yeah, I mean, I’m here. So, yeah, this meme also reminds me whenever I try to play Rocket League. I’m flying in the air.

ALEX: I suck so bad at Rocket League.

ULISES: I’m all over the place when I play Rocket League.

FLOR: It’s like, “Hey, look at the ball!” and I’m like over there flying. Something like that.

ULISES: But then again, I’m bad at driving and I’m bad at playing football, so it’s only normal that I suck at Rocket League.

FLOR: Well, you probably have a lot of other skills. And we are… We’re convinced about that. Did you know that there’s…?

ALEX: This is very funny.

FLOR: Yeah. There’s a Twitter where you can see like different scenes in games where you can pet the animals that appear on the screen.

ULISES: Oh, really?

FLOR: Yeah. I have to share it with you because it’s super cute.

ULISES: Yeah. I can relate to this. I prefer animals to humans too, in real life, so.

FLOR: Yeah. That’s why my roommates are cats. That’s how she died, old and alone with a ton of cats.

ALEX: But you’re still young, Flor, you have time to get more cats.

FLOR: Yeah, always. Cats and plants. So that was the end of our meme round.

ALEX: Thanks so much for taking time out of your busy, busy schedule to meet with us, man. Thank you very much.

FLOR: Yeah, I had so much fun, and I really enjoyed getting to know more of you and your start in this industry, which is super interesting. Thank you for joining us today.

ULISES: Thank you for inviting me. It’s been a pleasure. It was really fun, and I look forward to seeing you guys in Buenos Aires when I can travel.

FLOR: Yeah, well, I look forward to traveling either to Uruguay or to wherever.

ALEX: I’d love to go see you in Uruguay, too. I mean, I miss that country so much.

FLOR: It would be great to get together for drinks or for a game session or something.

ULISES: Yeah, that sounds good.

FLOR: To get to see you in person. We’re definitely going to leave the meme museum link over there in YouTube because people should see this. I mean, I really appreciate it. And it’s a gem, a hidden gem that everyone should be aware of. Thank you so much, Ulises. Thank you so much, Alexis. So nice to be here with you today. Thanks, everyone, for joining, and see you on our next episode. Take care.

ULISES: Bye.

ALEX: Bye, guys.

Episode Transcription

JETT: [In Korean] Aww, sorry!

WRAITH: Tell Death I said hello.

ALE: Hi, guys! Today we will be talking about culturalization in some of the most successful first-person shooters out there.

FLOR: Yes, that’s right! Specifically, we’re going to talk about Valorant and Apex. Each of these games has a very distinct lineup of characters from different nationalities.

ALE: Now, let’s start with Apex Legends. For this LocFact, we have some interesting insight from one of our previous guests, Yuhei Nasu. This game celebrates cultural diversity and even in some cases, characters have a catchphrase in their native language that is intentionally left as is in the Japanese version as well.

FLOR: Yeah. For example, Octane will say “No hay problema,” Wattson will say “Merci,” and Crypto will say “Josimhae.” Also, characters will sometimes mention foods or even items that are specific to their cultures.

ALE: Exactly! It is beautifully done. Like when Horizon says…

HORIZON: Air strike! Keep moving or we’re haggis.

ALE: Most users will not know what “haggis” is, and it would have been easy to just say “Air strike! Move if you don’t want to turn into minced meat,” but this would have taken away from the character’s heritage. Leaving the word “haggis” leads to users asking, “What is haggis?”, right? So this creates a curiosity for a culture that they may not have even known if it were not for Apex.

FLOR: Yeah, I definitely had to Google that one, and now I want to try haggis.

ALE: Yep. Same.

FLOR: So yeah, thank you, Yuhei, for that insight. So now we want to talk about Valorant. Do you want to share more details about that, Ale?

ALE: Yeah. Let’s take a look at the character Skye to start. This character is all about Australia. Her animal skill Guiding Light is designed after a brown goshawk, a bird native from Australia, and several other Pacific Islands. For hunting down her enemies, she can also summon a Tasmanian tiger, which is an animal that inhabited the same region and is now believed to be extinct.

FLOR: Her accent does not go unnoticed, that’s for sure. She’s as lively and expressive as any other Valorant character. And also, another character worth mentioning here is the robotics genius Killjoy.

ALE: Yeah. This character certainly brought a lot of debate among German players in terms of cultural representation, since Killjoy does not drink beer, nor does she go around the maps eating Bockwurst or Weißwurst. After all, it is clear that she was not designed after your typical German stereotype.

FLOR: And… Yeah, absolutely. Here we all agree that cultural representation is not something that is easy to achieve. But we would definitely love to hear your comments on this and learn from your favorite characters in Apex and Valorant, and maybe share more details on some cultural aspects that you may have considered that were spot on.

ALE: Thank you very much, guys! See you on the next LocFact.

FLOR: Hi, everyone! Welcome to a new episode of Open World. Today, here we have with us Ivan Lopes. Ivan has been working as a professional translator since 2009 in several fields such as literature, video games and audiovisual translation. He graduated in Japanese language and literature from the University of São Paulo, where he’s based. And he has also studied the Japanese language in Japan, where his appreciation for the ancient culture grew even more, of course. In his free time he enjoys riding his motorcycle across Brazil. That sounds really exciting. Hi, Ivan. How are you?

IVAN: Hello. Thank you. Thank you for the invitation. It’s an honor to be here with you all.

LORE: Good to have you.

FLOR: We’re super excited to have you here. So we want to start with your background, because we know that you studied translation and interpreting, but people from outside the industry might not see a big difference between translation and interpreting. But we know that there are actually very different skill sets for each task, right? So do you think that having experience in both translation and interpreting helps you in game localization in any way? Because you know that you’re often translating written text with the end goal of it being spoken aloud, right? So from your experience, did any of those fields ever connect or make you improve your work somehow?

IVAN: Absolutely. Completely connected to each other. They are distinct and very different, but also very similar, right? When you are translating something, you have time to go on a dictionary to search for a certain word, and to read and read again and read a third time and read a fourth time the same sentence.

ALEX: A more paced kind of work.

IVAN: Yeah, like, you read it until you have it by heart, you know? But you can improve. Whatever you are saying, you can improve. This improvement will, in my opinion, in my experience, will be mostly guided by readability, you know? If it’s easy to understand, if it’s not that easy to understand… if it’s natural, you know? People, in my case, the people from Brazil will read that sentence and relate to that, and they will feel like someone is actually talking to them, because that’s pretty much what video games are, right? You have either a machine talking to you, teaching you how to play the game, or characters behaving like in a movie. So it must sound natural in any circumstance. Well, interpreting is the same as translation, but you don’t have the time to do anything, you know? You’re gonna hear and you’re gonna speak.

FLOR: It’s like, go, go, go, go, every single time, right?

ALEX: Your first try has to be the best one, the very first time. And you don’t have a second one.

IVAN: Well, sometimes, because there are mainly two types of interpreting, right? You can be a consecutive interpreter or a simultaneous interpreter. When you are a simultaneous one, like the people on the Oscars, you know? They are talking and you are talking at the same time. This is harder, way harder. But when you are working consecutively, you still can talk to the person who is talking, who is speaking, and ask something or add something. I remember this time I forgot… It was a course, right? It was a technical school and I was interpreting a discourse. I completely forgot how to say “sandpaper.” And…

FLOR: What did you do?

IVAN: That’s the thing. He spoke in Japanese. I understood what he was saying, what he wanted, but it didn’t come to my mind, and I was like, “Oh, come on, I know what this is.” And then, you know, you become human. You may mimic, speak to people like, “Hey, that thing you use to do this. You know. You use it like this.” Yeah. My interpreting teacher told us… He was a great, great interpreter, and he said, “Well, there’s this… There was this time I was in a conference, and the person who was speaking made a joke, like Americans usually do, right? At the beginning of the speaking, they make a joke. And it was a very American joke. And he told us, “Well, you have two choices. Either you always have one joke ready to tell them, or more than one, because the joke can be longer or shorter. So you have a set of jokes. Or you do what he did, which was, at the end of the joke, you just tell the audience, “Well, he just made a joke. It’s very hard to translate. Please laugh here.”

LORE: I love that option.

IVAN: Yes. I think at the heart, that’s what I do. That’s all it is. When translating…

FLOR: I think that’s a great way to build rapport with the audience and for them to be empathetic of the work of an interpreter, because it’s really hard, especially when it comes to jokes, right?

IVAN: Yeah. Exactly. Well, it turned out very nicely in this course, because there was a lot of very specific materials for that. And after that first one, “sandpaper,” I felt free to start doing that whenever I didn’t know what something was. And after that, I was called by the same company, the same people, to work for them several times, so they enjoyed it. It worked, somehow.

LORE: It worked out.

ALEX: It worked out.

LORE: And as an American, I will say, if any of you are interpreting for me, I give you blanket permission to just go ahead and use that option B. As long as I come across as funny, I don’t really care about how it happens.

IVAN: Excellent.

LORE: I have another one for you here. We were a big fan of some of the text that we were reading on the BrazLoct website, so much so that we thought it was important to quote this one word for word. “People shouldn’t be deprived of culture because of their status, social position, or educational level. And as humans, we fight where we can to help people the best we can.” Could you tell us a little bit more about fighting the good fight?

IVAN: Well, I wouldn’t call that the good fight. I actually call that the human fight, you know? And that’s because when we came up, when we were writing this, we were thinking about ourselves. In Brazil, less than 5% of the population, of the total population, can speak English. And less than 1% can actually speak English. Because there’s a difference there. You can understand, you can say something, and you can actually read a book or read something that is heavy, that is very big. There’s a difference there. There’s a very low amount of population that can actually [direct access for their cultures 11:49]. And we are speaking of English, right? It’s not even Japanese or Spanish. Surprisingly enough, there’s even less people talking Spanish in Brazil, although we are very close and the languages are very similar. And, well, not being able to speak or understand another culture makes you separated from that culture. Even though you have access to a lot of series, a lot of movies and games, but if you can actually understand what’s happening, if you can actually get a grasp of what they are saying and what’s behind that, you know? Because the language is… there’s several layers for a language, right? So, when we are speaking, we are expressing our culture there as well. And it’s very sad that people can’t reach that. And us at BrazLoct, we all came from… All of us came from a very humble social layer back there from the beginning. And we either struggled through or had contact with a lot of struggles to learn to be better, to learn new skills, to learn about the world, to understand that the world is bigger than it seems. And, well, personally speaking, I first became a translator because of one book I read. It was a Japanese book translated to Portuguese. And it was so beautifully translated. And in the preface of it, there was a very nice description of the translation work done in that book.

ALEX: Nice.

IVAN: And that was the moment I looked at that and said, “Okay, this is what I want to do in my life.” And, you know, but I am where I am right now because of that moment, and that moment would not happen if that book wasn’t translated. We never know what will touch people. Sometimes we say, even with friends, we can say something that is very natural, very normal for us, but for that person, it’s life changing. I bet everyone here has a moment like that, when someone come to you and say, “Hey, what you told me this day was life-changing.” And it’s amazing. So what we are trying to achieve at BrazLoct is to bring this experience, the best way we can, to people in Brazil. Of course, we are a very small studio and we are starting right now. But this is our main goal, to bring a great story to people so people can enjoy them, learn with them, and maybe, who knows? Be saved by that.

ALEX: Nice, nice. Well, for those of you who don’t know, Ivan here and his studio has worked on the localization of Disco Elysium, that we have the director’s cut now on Steam, I saw earlier this week. But I love what you just said about saving someone or getting to them, right? But what can you tell us about your experience translating this game that has won so many awards? And also, how did it feel from your side, right, from your perspective of localizing it when the game started to gain all the recognition that it has today?

IVAN: Well, Disco Elysium is a very unique game, and I think everyone will agree with that. It’s so deep in so many senses. Well, when I started working with it, I had already played the game as a gamer, you know? I love RPGs, and Disco Elysium promised to be like the experience, the tabletop experience. So yes, I was very, very curious because something that was very frustrating for me from the beginning, from the first time I played Chrono Trigger, I was like, “Well, okay, this is nice, but this isn’t RPG.” Because I was used to D&D and to Vampire in order to go together with my friends and throw the dice, you know? And be free to do anything. Then I remember, it was by chance I saw an ad, it was a rather long video talking about Disco Elysium when it went into its first launch, because it was translated after, you know? It was launched in 2019 and it was translated in 2020.

ALEX: Right.

IVAN: So I got the game and that was… like my mind was blown, you know? Because that was a tabletop experience, a genuine tabletop experience right there. So I was very happy with the game, I played it. And then, at the middle of 2020, I was called to translate it, to help translate it. It became very quickly one of those, “Oh, this is a dream gig.” And it became very, very, very quickly a dream gig. But I didn’t think it would happen, actually, because it’s too big, you know? Disco Elysium is like “The Lord of the Rings,” all three books of “Lord of the Rings,” plus “The Hobbit” times two.

LORE: Wow!

FLOR: That’s a lot of content. A lot of stories.

ALEX: That’s a lot of words.

FLOR: A lot of worlds also.

ALEX: Worlds. Yeah.

LORE: Words and worlds.

IVAN: I like saying it like this, because when you say, “Well, it’s more than one million words,” you say, “Wow, that’s a lot.” But still, no, it’s a number. But when you say it’s “Lord of the Rings” plus “The Hobbit” times two, you get the idea, you know? You get, “Oh, wow.”

ALEX: You get the whole spectrum of it.

IVAN: Exactly. And so it was a huge task. Talking about the operative side of the thing, it was a huge task. Because I don’t know if you’ve played the game, but when you’re playing, the thing is, it’s a tabletop RPG, right? Whatever NPC you meet, you have like four to six different options of answering them. And it can go anywhere. Like, you he says to a lady on a wheelchair if he can ride with her to fight crime, you know? Like Batman and Robin. So yeah, it’s like this, you have a lot of a lot of different options. And whatever you choose will affect not only your relations with the NPC, but also the relations between the NPC and other NPCs.

ALEX: Right.

IVAN: So when you are working with something like that, consistency is a huge concern. It’s very hard.

ALEX: The importance of those processes to be consistent all throughout the game. Such a big game.

IVAN: Yes.

FLOR: And how do you handle that? I mean… I probably don’t want to break any NDAs, but probably there’s a style guide. Is there a huge term base that you connect to? Yeah. How do you keep consistency in such a huge project?

IVAN: Well, the studio ZA/UM was very helpful. They gave us tons of reference materials, and that from the beginning was very helpful because the world in Disco Elysium is a world very similar to ours, but still slightly different, different and not to make you think, “Wait a second. There’s something strange going on here.” You know? But it’s still very similar. Yeah, but still very similar so you don’t think you are in another world. So it feels like you are here. It’s not Earth, there are no continents, it’s another world. But it’s very similar and it’s very political. It discusses feminists, it discusses politics in a huge specter. It discusses alcoholism, it discusses drug addiction, it discusses a lot of very deep, very serious… Depression. It discusses a lot of very deep, very serious things. And having reference material for that was crucial for work. And then as a team, BrazLoct was born during this collision process because we created a bond… Because, you see, if any of you go… There was no term base because the game wasn’t translated, right? So we created the whole glossary, we created pretty much everything. We had to create new words because they did that in the original one. And we had to understand the game like three, four layers below the surface so we can come with the translation. And in some parts of the game, we were given a lot of freedom to create as well, as long as the team was not changing the game, right? So when coming up with terms like names, character names, we got a lot of freedom. But we wanted to make… As I said, you know, since our purpose, our goal is to deliver the cultural material, the culture to the people here in Brazil, we must be very loyal to the source. We are completely against putting a lot of slang in the game when not necessary, or cursing words were not necessary. Of course, there’s a lot of them, of both of them, but we were not like forcing that. Sometimes we see in some games that people force this to make people laugh or to gain, you know, a younger audience, like, “Well, let’s put a meme right here. Let’s insert this something, you know, because it’s so cool, it’s so nice.” And we had some arguments in our team. “Hey, what do you think if we put this one right here?” and then the answer was always, “Okay, let’s check the game.” “But the game doesn’t bring this funny stuff right here, so I won’t use it.” “Oh, but it’s funny.” “No, we won’t use it.” And then. So it was very discussed. And everything that we took a leap forward in order to translate… “Okay, let’s make this… Let’s adapt this so people will understand it better, so people will get the meaning, the real meaning of that,” we were always in close contact with the studio and asking them, “Hey, can we do this? Is it okay if we do this? It’s what the game wanted to say.” And then we would only proceed if they said, “Yes, go ahead.” If not, then we would go back to the project table, you know, and think again. Think something else and go with that. So there was a lot of talk. Answering your question about how we did it, it was a lot of talking between ourselves and with the studio so we could get things done. And afterwards it was only, you know, the usual process of having a glossary and of being their glossary. For me personally, it was, well, it was a dream come true. My name is in there, so to have my name in a game that was so… that became so famous is an honor. I feel really proud, and I feel very good in this place of my career right now. And everyone in our team, everyone in BrazLoct team shares the same feeling. We feel proud because, you know, there was a lot of compliments in Twitter about the translation of Disco Elysium. And when it was launched, we were like… everyone had diarrhea, you know? Everyone was…

FLOR: I bet! I mean, did you sleep? No. How did you…?

ALEX: How did you manage the nerves?

IVAN: I did translate some big franchise before, but under NDA. No one knows I did. I can’t tell anyone I did. So it’s, again, I still go and check, you know, what people are saying about the translation, but I’m not expecting anyone to come to my door with stones on their hands and say…

ALEX: “It’s your fault that the game is so crappy translated!”

IVAN: “[indistinct 26:24] it’s ruined because of you!” But in Disco Elysium, everyone knew who we were, and there’s already this huge fanbase and they are very passionate about it. And now that it went to PS5 and PS4, people are actually fighting on Twitter, you know, because some people didn’t like the game because, “Oh, too many words, I don’t want to read. If I want to read, I go read a book.” And the people that like the game are like, “Oh, you’re stupid. You don’t like to read. You don’t know how to read.” You know, they’re actually fighting over it.

FLOR: Big debate.

IVAN: Big debate. It was a huge thing. And then we spent the next week after the launching both for the base game and for the final cuts, we spent the whole week watching Twitter.

LORE: Not overthinking it at all.

ALEX: Chilling.

IVAN: Not at all. Chilling. Relaxed, thank you.

FLOR: The stakes are really high. Your name is in there. Your friends know that you did that, right? Like it’s not…

LORE: You care about the game personally.

FLOR: Because if you sign an NDA, all you can tell is your mom, like, “Hey, I translated this amazing thing that you don’t care about, but hey, here it is!”

IVAN: Yeah, exactly. And then, you know, we were actually, especially on the first game or the first base game… Because it was a year-long project. A lot happened during that one year, right? So there was a lot of problems. And we were waiting for people to notice those problems in the translation and, you know, come back to us because of that. But no, but no one came. And we also, in our Twitter, we put a form for people to fill out whenever they saw a bug or a problem in the translation, so we would know about it and correct it.

ALEX: That’s smart.

IVAN: Well, people were, well, are still being very, very helpful. I keep receiving, you know, feedback from people. There’s this person who keeps… He told me, “Okay, I’m not playing this game as a gamer. I’m playing like a reviewer,” because he works…

FLOR: That’s the best thing that can ever happen, right? Like…

IVAN: And pretty much every day he comes, “Hey, this part right here does this thing you may want to look upon.” And of course, sometimes he’s right. Most of the time he’s right. Sometimes it was [indistinct 29:18] because the word of this [indistinct 29:19] is a little bit weird. There are things that people look at and, “Oh, this is wrong.” But no, it’s right. This is actually…

LORE: Promise.

ALEX: No, no, no, he’s right.

FLOR: I checked.

ALEX: Trust me, he’s right.

IVAN: No, no, no. There’s one line. We received a lot of feedback on this one line because this character says something completely strange. As you told me I can curse, I’m gonna curse here, but I’m quoting the character. He says something like, “Can I have a fuck with you?”

ALEX: Okay.

FLOR: Okay.

IVAN: It’s very strange, right?

LORE: Interesting.

ALEX: That’s an interesting proposal. Interesting question. Can I?

IVAN: He actually comes to a lady [indistinct 30:05] and then… No, you can have… She says something, and then you have to answer, right? And depending on your answer, you can go straight and forget that’s ever happened and just go on with your life. But there’s one option when she will actually laugh at you because she asks you to say that again. Yes, she asks you to say that again. And then you can just say “No” and go ahead or change the subject, or goes something like, “Say what?” And then she tells him, well, “Say again what you just said.” And then he says the same phrase, but in the correct way. And then she goes like, “No, you didn’t say that. You said this one.” Right? “This thing right here?”

FLOR: Oh!

IVAN: “That’s not how people talk,” you know?

LORE: That’s interesting.

IVAN: If you watch only the strangeline over there,you think it was a mistake, you know?

ALEX: Yes. Context is everything.

IVAN: Exactly. And in the game, you only know that was really meant to be that way if you choose this one option.

LORE: Have faith in your translators.

ALEX: They know what they’re doing.

FLOR: But that fanbase? Yeah, but also like having passionate fans that know the story as much as you do and can help you improve it, that’s amazing. That’s priceless.

IVAN: It has also been great to be in close contact with people that are actually consuming our translation, right? So we can know what they want, what they think, what they feel like, you know? One of the best things I ever heard was, “Thanks to you, guys, I could play this game.”

LORE: Aww!

IVAN: That’s really heartwarming.

ALEX: Yeah. That’s why you do it.

IVAN: Yeah, exactly.

FLOR: Ivan, now that we’re getting more and more into gaming things, and I know that you gave us a couple of hints here and there of what your favorite genre is, but I wanted to know what you’re playing. Are you playing any games, or are you just focused on work? Because I know that can happen also.

ALEX: That can happen.

IVAN: Now it’s funny because I can be with a controller in my hands and tell my brother, “Hey, I’m working.”

FLOR: Yeah, right?

IVAN: But yeah, I’m playing something. Don’t judge me here because I never learned how to say this game’s name correctly. But I’m playing NieR:Automata. “Near Automata,” “Naier Automata.”

ALEX: I think it’s “nier,” like N-I-E-R, right? Automata. Yeah.

IVAN: Yeah. N-I-E-R Automata.

ALEX: A Square Enix game.

IVAN: Yeah. Great game, but very difficult. It’s very hard.

FLOR: Oh, is it?

IVAN: Yeah, well, it’s an RPG. But the thing about Nier which got me really surprised was that the very first section, let’s say the introduction of the game, the prolog of the game, you have to play it whole. You don’t have any save points. The game doesn’t save automatically. You have to play like one hour without dying… A very difficult game. Fighting one boss, and then you can save. No, you must fight one boss and then you can save. And it’s not an easy boss as well. So this came as a surprise. I don’t know why Square Enix did that, you know? Anyway, so… Yeah, I’m having fun with that. Great graphics. Extremely nice story. And in a more relaxed vibe, I’m playing also Hollow Knight, which is…

ALEX: Is it really relaxing to play Hollow Knight?

IVAN: It is for me, yeah.

ALEX: It’s a very hard game too, man.

LORE: Listening to my husband play it, I’m gonna say it’s not super relaxing.

FLOR: Oh, no, it’s not. It can be very frustrating at times.

IVAN: Yeah, well, comparing with Nier, I think it’s a little… it’s considered more relaxed than Nier.

LORE: So relatively. Okay.

IVAN: Also, I was playing Cuphead.

ALEX: Again, not very relaxing. Again, not very relaxing.

IVAN: Not at all. No, Cuphead is not relaxing at all. But if you compare Hollow Knight with Cuphead and Nier, then yeah, you have like… It’s pretty much, you know, one of those animal crossing or something like that.

ALEX: Yeah, well compared to that.

IVAN: Yes. So I’m playing those. And I’m also watching the gameplay… I don’t have a PlayStation right now, so I’m watching the gameplay of Final Fantasy VII Remake.

FLOR: Oh, yeah, that’s a good one.

IVAN: Yeah. I kind of have mixed feelings about the remake at the moment because I’m a big, huge fan, hardcore fan of the original one. But we’ve got to understand that the time has passed, right?

ALEX: Yeah.

FLOR: So we want to go now to our meme section, because we always like to end our show with a meme round. And we asked you, of course, to share with us your favorite memes. I’m going to share my screen now.

LORE: That gives me anxiety.

ALEX: That can look like any MMORPG ever, right?

IVAN: Yes. You know, I felt like… I actually translated, I started my career translating an MMORPG. And when I went on to look at the translation, the implemented translation, this is what I saw. This is pretty much what I saw. I was the one translating it and I couldn’t find myself in there. And then I would, you know, I would think, “Well, I’m getting old indeed.”

FLOR: Oh, yeah. Same happening here. Like, where do I start? What do I have to pay attention to?

IVAN: A lot of things happening. And, you know, sometimes if you have like three or four things on the screen, it’s already difficult. And then you look at those games that got a lot of menus. And then there’s this small chat. If it was not enough all the menus, all the messages and all the buttons, there’s this small chat window over there.

ALEX: Another chat.

LORE: Oh, boy.

IVAN: Come on.

FLOR: Oh, my. That’s a lot for my short span attention.

ALEX: Yeah.

FLOR: Short attention span. Oh, this one.

LORE: Painfully accurate.

IVAN: Yeah.

ALEX: This happens quite often. So this is pretty accurate.

IVAN: Yeah, I couldn’t resist this one. I couldn’t resist it, as well, because it’s pretty much the same. Any game you play. Any game. Well, I play RPGs, there’s always a desert.

ALEX: Always a desert.

IVAN: There’s always a desert. And there’s always this kind of song playing on the desert, you know?

LORE: Sepia filter to let you know that you’re in Latin America in any TV show or movie.

IVAN: Exactly. Sepia filter. Exactly.

ALEX: It’s painfully accurate.

FLOR: Yeah.

ALL: Oh!

ALEX: I believe we all have this type of moment.

LORE: Yeah. That one hurt a little.

IVAN: This was me,this was my face playing The Witcher 3. This was me playing The Witcher 3.

ALEX: Don’t spoil it for me because I’m currently playing it right now. I’m currently playing it right now.

IVAN: Oh, I would never. But play as much side quests as you can.

ALEX: They are so fulfilling. They are so fulfilling the side quests.

IVAN: Exactly. For me, they are better than the main quest, you know? For me. But you know what? This is a polemic opinion. I think that the side quests from The Witcher 2 are actually better than The Witcher 3. The Witcher 3’s side quests are more complex, I’d say. You have to go to several places and talk to a lot of people. There are longer and more complex. But nothing beats the troll side quest in the beginning of The Witcher 2. Nothing beats that. Nothing.

FLOR: Hmm, interesting topic. We would love to hear what everyone thinks about that also.

ALEX: Yeah.

FLOR: So this one.

ALEX: I played Dark Souls on Bloodborne, and this is real.

FLOR: Oh, yeah?

IVAN: Come on, man, you hear it in Latin. Come on. It’s the end of the world, you know? Like…

ALEX: You’re gonna die.

IVAN: The angels are coming announcing the apocalypse and that’s what happens. That’s it.

FLOR: All the drama.

LORE: Immediate spookiness.

IVAN: Come on. Music starts playing, and the music has lyrics. It’s already frightening enough. If it’s in Latin…

LORE: It’s going down.

ALEX: It’s going down. Yeah.

FLOR: I know. Yeah. Armageddon.

LORE: Save button. Save button.

IVAN: You see the save icon showing up there and it starts playing in Latin. It’s over. Oh, this one! I saw a very nice tweet about this one recently. They are saying that it’s very important to have a Busy Adult Mode for every game.

ALEX: I saw that one.

LORE: Yes, please.

FLOR: Great advice!

IVAN: Because you go back to the game months after, weeks after, you don’t remember anything anymore, and you need a mode that will tell you where to go, what you did, because you forgot about the whole history. And if the game doesn’t have some kind of journal, you are lost. And what you must do and anything else.

LORE: Game devs, listen up. Busy Adult Mode suggestion.

ALEX: BusyAdult Mode log, please. “You were in this quest. You need to go here. Remember.”

LORE: Help us out.

IVAN: “This is what happened.” A very short story of what happened.

FLOR: Exactly.Like when you go back to a new episode of a show that you were binge watching and then you suddenly stopped for some reason. And you go back to where you were, and you have a preview or something.

ALEX: We need that in games.

IVAN: It’s like waiting for… It’s like, you know, Game of Thrones. If there wasn’t the series, if you were waiting for the next book… Come on, that’s already ten years.

FLOR: I know.

LORE: I already can’t tell what happened in the books and what happened in the show. I’m gonna need somebody to go through my brain and, like, separate what happened and what didn’t happen in the books.

IVAN: Exactly.I was thinking, well, when it’s close to be launched, I may read everything again. And now it’s like, man, I don’t have time to read things. I have to read.

FLOR: I know.

LORE: It’s a lot of reading!

FLOR: You can always blame the Mandela effect, right? Just your imagination inventing memories of Game of Thrones.

LORE: And blocking out memories of Game of Thrones.

FLOR: Yeah.

ALEX: Yeah, yeah. Especially from the TV series.

LORE: Little bit of both there.

ALEX: It’s on selective mode. Selective memory.

IVAN: That happened. That didn’t happen. So if I don’t remember, it didn’t happen.

FLOR: Exactly.

IVAN: This one…Have you ever played The Messenger? It’s a platformer, just like Ninja Gaiden.

FLOR: Oh, no, I haven’t.

IVAN: The Messenger is a very cool game. If you like Ninja Gaiden, The Messenger is the right choice. And whenever you die, comes this demon-like figure and start insulting you. Things like, “Are you playing with your feet? Or…

ALEX: That’s not very nice.

IVAN: You can always say you are testing something, you know? I used to do that with my brother when he comes insulting me. That’s how I felt. This meme is how I felt whenever I died in The Messenger.

FLOR: Oh, the feels.

IVAN: Yeah. I never switched [indistinct 43:57].

FLOR: I can tell that you like challenges. Well, that was the end. Ivan, it was a pleasure having you. I cannot believe our time is up already.

IVAN: That felt really fast.

LORE: It really did.

IVAN: I talk a lot, I’m sorry. I told Alex I talk a lot.

FLOR: Oh, but we love to hear you talk.

LORE: That’s why we want you here. We want to hear all your thoughts.

IVAN: Thank you. Thank you for the invitation. It was really a pleasure talking to you.

FLOR: Oh, please. Thank you for your time and for sharing your wisdom on video game localization. I hope to see you soon. Everyone, stay safe, and see you in our next episode. Bye!

ALEX: Bye, everyone!

LORE: Bye!