CONFERENCE
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LOCALIZATION
Game localization is a vital function of the ever-expanding global game industry as it's responsible for half of the industry's total revenue stream. Successful game publishers and developers realize that localized versions of their games can drive revenues and increase international appeal. Beyond existing gaming markets, the demand is quickly increasing from a growing number of countries and emerging markets around the world, which is prompting publishers to localize and even culturalize more titles into more languages to maximize their ROI. The Localization Summit at GDC is supported and organized by the IGDA Game Localization SIG, and it is aimed at helping localization professionals as well as the entire community of game developers and publishers understand how to plan and execute game localization and culturalization as a part of the development cycle. Professionals from all departments and all areas of expertise are welcome to attend this full day of lectures, panels and game postmortems.
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2013 HIGHLIGHTED SESSIONS
English is a Localized Language: Translating Diablo III
Andrew Vestal (Blizzard Entertainment)
Items in Diablo III can have one of 400,000 possible names. How do you translate and test this huge pool of randomized content? By developing flexible systems up front that work for every language - including English. This presentation outlines the development pipelines that allow localization to support Diablo III's high level of replay value and randomization. Special focus is given to conversation implementation, and the randomly constructed item and monster names. Blizzard's internally developed localization tool will also be shown. Stop translating whatever the developers hand you, and start thinking of English as another localized language!
LOCALIZATION SUMMIT ADVISORY COMMITTEE
Miguel Á. Bernal-Merino
University of Roehampton, London
Miguel Á. Bernal-Merino is a lecturer and researcher in multimedia interactive localization. He has worked none-stop for the past few years to raise awareness about the issues involved in the localization of video games within both the industry and academia by leading several events in Europe and the US. He believes passionately in localized versions that play as wonderfully as original ones, and looks at the challenging road ahead with a positive determination and excitement. He remains committed to building the bridges that will allow developers, publishers, localizers, and academics understand each other's work better, and ultimately improve overall quality, player satisfaction, and ROI.
His expertise lies in the translation of rich-media texts (such as video games, films, etc.) He has several publications on audiovisual translation and game localization, and although permanently based at the University of Roehampton in London, he is invited as a guest lecturer in many universities around Europe. He is also working towards a full integration of game-like applications to enhance literacy and language learning complementing formal education.
His expertise lies in the translation of rich-media texts (such as video games, films, etc.) He has several publications on audiovisual translation and game localization, and although permanently based at the University of Roehampton in London, he is invited as a guest lecturer in many universities around Europe. He is also working towards a full integration of game-like applications to enhance literacy and language learning complementing formal education.
Kate Edwards
Englobe
As the founder and principal consultant of Englobe Inc., a Seattle-based niche consultancy for content culturalization, Kate is a gamer who became a unique hybrid of an academic geographer, writer, and geocultural content strategist, all coexisting with a passion for cultures, technology and games. Formerly as Microsoft's geopolitical strategist in the Geopolitical Strategy team (a position and team she created and managed), Kate was responsible for protecting against political and cultural content errors across all MS products and locales. She implemented a "geopolitical quality" review process in the Microsoft Game Studios and was personally responsible for reviewing potential sensitivities in all 1st party games. Since leaving Microsoft, she has worked on numerous titles, including Dragon Age 1 & 2, Star Wars: The Old Republic, Ninja Gaiden II and Dance Central 1 & 2. Kate is also the founder/chair of the IGDA Game Localization SIG and a regular columnist for MultiLingual Computing.
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