True_Spike

I do believe having the game localized will make the game more accessible to a wider audience and greatly enhance the playing experience of many people accross the globe. Most non-native speakers who are able to communicate in English will be able to play the game, sure, but they won't be able to fully grasp the narrative's nuances, they won't be able to fully appreciate its diversity and their experience will suffer because of that. Playing a game like this is all about immersing yourself, much like when reading a good book - you're not playing a game, you are a part of it. Indulge yourself, dive in as deep as you can and the satisfaction you'll get in the process of doing so will be orders of magnitude bigger than that of a simple completionist playthrough. That is impossible to do when your understing of the narrative is hindered. Translating a (mostly) text based game is not an expensive matter and is done by a 3rd party, so it doesn't take away from development time. I work as a translator and I have come to loath most localizations I have come accross, but the games of old, at least in Polish, were translated beautifully. Ever for a rather fluent English speaker like myself, it made the game much more believable and way easier for me to lose myself in. Plus, like I mentioned in my thread, the Polish translation could end up costing nothing if a good deal with GOG.com would be made (resulting in the game being both translated and available on GOG.com (and a lot of people want that to happen anyway). Wider audience = more copies sold, it's as easy as that and since this is mostly a text-based game (and localization - a good one, at that - is relatively cheap) I really cannot imagine the costs outweighing the profits coming from bigger sales. Basically, I'm all for having the game localized to a few languages (professionally!), because this is a valid business decission that will end up earning Obsidian money rather than costing anything. A win-win situation, both the developer and the players are happy.

I think a Baldur's Gate-like x2 progression would be nice, but it's really hard to tell without knowing the game better (its scope and design).

Then don't make it so that the easiest monsters spawn at the start locations. Gothic 2 did a fine ass job of making the entire world feel dangerous - from start to finish. There were locations that were medium hard, there were locations that were hard and then there were locations that were bloody hard - all of them were placed, sort of, randomly (you *could* see some form of progression, but you'd really have to look for it to notice). And to be honest, with level scaling, every location feels artificial. There's no challange at the beginning and there's no challenge at the apex of the game. Just a steady pace.

Dear God, no. I am yet to see a game that uses level scaling to its advantage. Most of the time it's a game breaking mechanic, in one way or the other (gameplay or immersion).

That's kind of the reason why I really liked the Underdark part of the BG2 campaign.

I'm saying that the text-based localizations they do are of top quality (most of the time) and player's often cringe at the voice-overs in modern games. In the case of Project Eternity, dubbing is hardly an issue. Fan-made translations are almost *always* inferior to their official counterparts (I am yet to see a proper fan-made translation), because most of the time they are done by amateurs, for free. This means less time invested in the product, no proper quality assessment process, lack of coordination between multitple translators and, quite often, it's just a straight-up translation rather than localization. Also, the game *will* feature little snippets of voice, akin to Infinity Engine games - and these will remain untranslated by fans. A partial translation just doesn't look good. Polish localizations are done for most of modern titles and the costs of doing these far outweigh the costs of localizing a game like Project: Eternity. Doing so professionally assures the game will become available to a wider audience. Yes, most people are capable of playing a game in English, but at the same time most of them are incapable of understanding everything. Immersion is a huge factor in RPGs and it suffers greatly when a player simply doesn't have the means to fully grasp the narrative with all of its little quirks and nuances. As for the GOG deal and the localization - it all depends on the angle at which negotiations will be approached.

I'd rather they concentrated on single player only.

For example, Planescape: Tormet is said to have had 800,000 words. With an average of 5 characters per word, it gives us about 4kk characters. This equals, roughly, 1111 standardized pages. The average rate, per page, E -> P, in Poland, is 25 pln. This means that the entire Planescape: Torment could, in theory, be translated for 27775 PLN, which is a tad shy of 9k USD. Of course, real costs would have been higher, since additional staff is required: coordinator(s), proof reader(s) for the quality assessment, and then there's software costs etc. Still, without the voice-over it wouldn't take more than 20-25k for a top quality localization and I'm sure a deal could be made where CD Projekt would cover a portion / all of the costs of localizing the game (to Polish) for the rights to distribute the title through their digital distribution network, which is GOG.com (since with each copy sold they get a cut and they wouldn't need to sell a ton to get a positive ROI - and the game is destined to sell a lot of copies anyway). People want the game to be available there anyway. Everyone's happy.

I work as a translator and text-based translations shouldn't be that much of a problem. It's the voice-over that is the biggest issue budget-wise.

I doubt it would cost more than on Steam, to be honest.

Fan-made translations are *always* terrible, something English-only speakers might not be aware of. Look at all the user-made content our there. CD Projekt has been doing localizations for the past 15 years and has been doing a decent job, but they showed the most strength in localizing Infinity engine games. Plus, there's this GOG aspect that needs to be considered.

I won't lie and say I'm familiar with the names of people in the industry, but I just want to say the music in Baldur's Gate (2, in particular) was just fenomenal. I can only hope that whoever will end up in charge of composing music for the game will be able to retain it's magical, epic feel.

If the game is meant to be mature and to be taken seriously "sexy" battlewear simply does not make sense. It just doesn't fit, n my opinion.

Given the huge backing the project has already received (and I hope the money stream will only grow bigger with each passing day) it's natural to expect the game to be localized, because even though many people do prefer the original language rather than their native one, a skillfully done localization greatly increases the game's reach - and the costs of such, in a game similar to the old infinity-based legends of the cRPG world, are quite low when compared to those of localizing a fully voiced "modern" RPG. Most localizations are known to be inferior to the original - which is to be expected - but there is an exception to every rule. I can't see anyone living outside of Poland or unfamiliar with our gaming culture would know that, but the Polish localization of Baldur's Gate (of all titles, but BG2 in particular) is widely accepted to be quite a bit *better* than the original. The feel has been maintained, the voice actors were superb and to this day the game is regarded as the best (Polish) localization in the long history of gaming. Bar none. It would only be natural to expect the people behind Project Eternity to want to repeat that massive success and it just so happens that the company behind BG's localization was CD Projekt - that of CD Projekt RED, the studio behind the Witcher and the Witcher 2, known as one of the few remaining studios to actually treat the players with respect and cater to their every need, promote DRM-free content (for the sake of buyers), listen to the community and adhere to the same business principles I have come to associate with the people behind this glorious project. It also happens to own GOG.com - a steadily growing digital distribution platform known for being DRM-free and dishing out loads of additional content to the buyers. People want the game to be available on GOG, because it offers a very reasonable alternative to steam, whilst retaining the digital distribution aspect, which is so imporant to this project. Infinity-based games (and Obsidian titles like Kotor 2) are one of the most successful ones in terms of sales in Polish history. Do not miss out on the opportunity to penetrate this promising market, I beg of you. Striking a deal with CD Projekt RED concerning the Polish localization and digital distribution of the most promising RPG game we've seen in years can only bode well for both the game and the people wanting to enjoy it as much as they possible can. Thank you for reading this, I hope it will get to the people responsible for the fate of this project. I keep my fingers crossed and my wallet open and can't wait to hear more about it