Ingame Languages the player can learn

[Doppelschwert]

I just remembered that there is a Final Fantasy game where a faction spoke a language which you don't understand (at first).

What those people are saying is normal english, but the text is decoded by a permutation of the alphabet (as opposed to a simple caesars cipher). The player was able to find some kind of stone slabs which would then give him the ability to "translate" the language (which effectively decoded a single character of the alphabet for the rest of the game).

In the end, if you hunted for those stone slabs, you were able to understand everything the people were saying - but you already were able to understand some of the words even without finding every character, which really felt like learning the language. The game featured also some kind of new game plus so that you were even able to understand everything in a second playthrough, discovering more information about the gameworld.

 

I think a similar concept for eternity would be awesome. Naturally, it should be a language which is not spoken anymore as to make sense in the game world, so a dead language which you can find scriptures from in dungeons or the like. Maybe couple some kind of lore skill to it and you have an easy way to give the player more lore and/or tips for certain areas if he wants to invest in the skill, making it a way cooler lore skill than the usual item identifying.

 

What do you guys think?

[rjshae]

It sounds like a type of mini-game. Not really high on my list of gaming interests.

[Ieo]

I'm not against the OP idea per se, but I'd have to question the amount of resources that can be invested in something like that alongside predicted levels of frustration for those players who aren't interested in that sort of thing. Given the KS, the target audiences have a very, very wide range.

 

So I would rather it be quest-based like in PS:T with the Dead Nations (though that was also heavily influenced by character stats, IIRC).

[AGX-17]

I just remembered that there is a Final Fantasy game where a faction spoke a language which you don't understand (at first).

What those people are saying is normal english, but the text is decoded by a permutation of the alphabet (as opposed to a simple caesars cipher). The player was able to find some kind of stone slabs which would then give him the ability to "translate" the language (which effectively decoded a single character of the alphabet for the rest of the game).

In the end, if you hunted for those stone slabs, you were able to understand everything the people were saying - but you already were able to understand some of the words even without finding every character, which really felt like learning the language. The game featured also some kind of new game plus so that you were even able to understand everything in a second playthrough, discovering more information about the gameworld.

 

I think a similar concept for eternity would be awesome. Naturally, it should be a language which is not spoken anymore as to make sense in the game world, so a dead language which you can find scriptures from in dungeons or the like. Maybe couple some kind of lore skill to it and you have an easy way to give the player more lore and/or tips for certain areas if he wants to invest in the skill, making it a way cooler lore skill than the usual item identifying.

 

What do you guys think?

 

Waste of time fetch quest. Planescape: Torment let you understand the Dabus rebuses if your Wisdom is high enough.

Edited January 4, 2013 by AGX-17

[Juneau]

What happens to all of the stuff you didn't understand first time around / forget about where it is and then miss something 'important' because getting this understanding is last on the list of things to do?

 

Personally I like the idea but can't see it being implemented as anything besides a nice little on the side thing. Perhaps if you we're collecting audio logs that microsoft sam read out to you and you could understand more as you unlocked stuff perhaps. But ingame. urghhh I can imagine it being something I wouldnt enjoy

[Nonek]

Anyone who's played all the Ultimas usually knows the Futhark half by heart, it added a nice little bit of depth there. That said I prefered the different levels of accuracy in translation that Torment offered, so that you could actually spy on your own companions while they translated for you, it was very "practical." One thing there is room for learning though is local slang and phrases, they always add so much depth to a culture at very little cost.

[PrimeJunta]

I just remembered that there is a Final Fantasy game where a faction spoke a language which you don't understand (at first).

What those people are saying is normal english, but the text is decoded by a permutation of the alphabet (as opposed to a simple caesars cipher). The player was able to find some kind of stone slabs which would then give him the ability to "translate" the language (which effectively decoded a single character of the alphabet for the rest of the game).

In the end, if you hunted for those stone slabs, you were able to understand everything the people were saying - but you already were able to understand some of the words even without finding every character, which really felt like learning the language. The game featured also some kind of new game plus so that you were even able to understand everything in a second playthrough, discovering more information about the gameworld.

 

I think a similar concept for eternity would be awesome. Naturally, it should be a language which is not spoken anymore as to make sense in the game world, so a dead language which you can find scriptures from in dungeons or the like. Maybe couple some kind of lore skill to it and you have an easy way to give the player more lore and/or tips for certain areas if he wants to invest in the skill, making it a way cooler lore skill than the usual item identifying.

 

What do you guys think?

 

Ev drao bid dra avvund du syga naym eh-kysa myhkiykac, E cruimt ruba ed'c y ped suna ehdanacdehk dryh y cesbma cipcdedideuh lebran. Nihel (un cesemyn) ymbrypadc fuimt pa luum druikr.

[LadyCrimson]

It would add some atmosphere to the gameworld I suppose, but while it's fine to have such an option, if it was in the game, there should still be another way to get all the backstory gameworld info for those who don't feel like feel like bothering with stone slabs or decryption mini-games or whatever. It sounds almost Myst/Riven-ish or something.

[Pipyui]

I like the idea. It would only be used for noncritical content, mind, and would require some amount of effort from the player to decypher, but I'm not sure that I'm afraid of such things. Information and lore to reward the explorer. Actually, I think mixing in a little Myst/Riven appeals to me.

[Hugo Rune]

I like the idea of different languages in the game world, I think it'd add great atmosphere but I'm not that keen on some far fetched quest to "decipher" it. Really, you don't hunt down "stone slabs" to decode single characters of a spoken language. You either find someone who can teach it to you or you make due with pantomime until you understand a few words and then go from there. I'd just like a speak language skill. In general, I'd like all kinds of knowledge skills and stuff like decipher script and so on. I was always disappointed that computer RPGs just never do that king of stuff.

 

Edit: sorry, should have read you post through to the end. Yes, for a dead language the rosetta stone approach makes much more sense and could be fun. Still, I'd like the whole thing to be skill based.

Edited January 4, 2013 by Hugo Rune

[Nonek]

Might be a very nice method of making certain characters more valuable as well, if they can translate or even (at higher influence levels) teach you a language.

[Ieo]

Might be a very nice method of making certain characters more valuable as well, if they can translate or even (at higher influence levels) teach you a language.

 

The PS:T approach can certainly be expanded. I think the trick such that it's not a frustrating minigame for many players is creative integration with general game content, so the emphasis must be placed less on the language puzzle particulars and more on the content related to it.

 

In the Dak'kon/Fell translation interaction (requiring also PC stats), the whole language barrier bit provided a layer of party intrigue and plot information. It was a brilliant piece of work, really. So rather than a Myst-exploration-puzzle approach that doesn't have any additional content value beyond the language puzzle itself, language as a hook to highlight content is a much richer path:

 

Party companion = Companions have their own backgrounds and experiences and may know bits of other languages. Maybe they interrupt ongoing PC/NPC dialogue; may serve as translator, perhaps requiring a level of relationship with the PC, or perhaps a preexisting relationship with the third party NPC. Maybe they can learn a language instead of the PC. Maybe if the PC has a particular relationship with a companion, the companion will offer to teach the language, as Nonek suggests. This approach places much more emphasis on character interaction than the language itself.

 

Faction, quest = Earning faction reputation indirectly may open a content door for the PC to learn a language by quest. This in turn can open up more opportunities for more quest content, not necessarily only for that faction proper. Perhaps enemy factions may recognize the speech and react to you accordingly; or in your wanderings, you're able to overhear rumors and such. Like TNO learning the extinct language of Uyo or the zombie language of the Dead Nations, quest-based language learning places much more emphasis on general content than the language itself.

 

The thing about PC stats, though--I'd say the biggest content imbalance in PS:T was the stat-based speech skills where the only way to get the most out of the game was to play a charismatic and wise mage. This was virtually impossible as a fighter/thief type without gimping TNO. Hopefully Obsidian will work the speech skill/WIS/INT/CHA stuff to be more class-friendly...

[Doppelschwert]

Maybe I should elaborate a little more on how I'd imagine this to work. I'd show you an screenshot of the mechanic in the final fantasy game, but I can't seem to find out which game that was, so I'll do an example instead.

 

Lets consider a simple caesars cipher for the example, so we would say an "a" in the ancient language is a "b" in our language, an "b" is an "c" and so on - finally an "y" is an "z" and "z" would be "a" (the characters are shifted by one).

 

Now lets say you'd find an ancient writing somewhere which said

 

"Advzqd ne sgd Mhfgs" which translates to "Beware of the Night"

 

Lets say that you have a translation skill of 6 which could mean that you're able to translate 6 characters of the ancient language - to make it easy lets say those are the first 6 characters a,b,c,d,e,f. So what you'd get is something like

"Bevzqe nf sge Mhggs"

where the orange characters describe what you understood and the message is also displayed this way in the game for you to read. With a translation skill of 12, you'd be able to understand

"Bevzqe nf she Mighs"

And with a translation skill of 18, you'd be able to understand

"Bevzre of she Nighs"

Obviously, this example isn't a good one as you need a pretty high skill to get anything from the message.

However, if we use the frequency of characters in the english language instead of the order of the alphabet to model the skill, beginning by the letters with most frequency, we get the order of learning to translate "dsznhm rgqckb tlvefx oaujiwpy".

With the values 6,12,18 in the translation skill, still meaning that you can translate the first few characters of the order above, you get

"Aevaqe oe tge Nifgt"

"Aevare oe the Nifht"

"Aevare of the Night"

Note that the above example is delusive as you're able to understand even more from context than what is translated when texts grow larger.

 

I agree that hunting for stone slabs or other kinds of minigame would not be fitting to the game, and I wouldn't expect the player to translate the message themselves manually. The skill would just replace the things you're able to decipher with color.

 

Alternatively, you could just give every message a a difficulty check and translate a percentage of characters according to skill / DC, although that loses much of its atmospheric factor. You can give a short summary of what your characters get out of the text as well at the end (like the traditional deciphing checks in varios DnD games) - the concepts aren't mutal exclusive - I just think its a satisfying and fun process to see how you're advancing in the language at the same time, getting a feel for how your characters are struggling with the texts by reading the partial translations yourself. This way it shouldn't need a lot of work to implement while imho adding a nice bonus to atmosphere.

 

Also, the messages should make out only an optional part of the lore as not to spoil the game for players without the skill, but still rewarding the players investing in it (additional hints about difficult areas ahead or something like that for example, and cultural things which are not necessary but nice to know).

Edited January 5, 2013 by Doppelschwert

[Ieo]

"Advzqd ne sgd Mhfgs" which translates to "Beware of the Night"

 

Lets say that you have a translation skill of 6 which could mean that you're able to translate 6 characters of the ancient language - to make it easy lets say those are the first 6 characters a,b,c,d,e,f. So what you'd get is something like

"Bevzqe nf sge Mhggs"

where the orange characters describe what you understood and the message is also displayed this way in the game for you to read. With a translation skill of 12, you'd be able to understand

"Bevzqe nf she Mighs"

And with a translation skill of 18, you'd be able to understand

"Bevzre of she Nighs"

 

It's an interesting idea, but there'd be extra work and may be quite awkward to implement given that Project Eternity will be translated into several other (real) languages. So the question there is return on investment for a detailed in-game language barrier, including effort in real PE translation, as opposed to a more general approach tied to content like in PS:T. Hm.

[Doppelschwert]

I don't know if it would be that hard to implement, although I haven't considered any translations to other real languages until now.

Obviously, this is difficult for languages using another alphabet, but for languages using the latin alphabet, this shouldn't be too much trouble:

All you'd really need to do is make a function which ciphers/deciphers a given text with a given cipher by substituting symbols. Translations could then just translate the texts that are ciphered normally, and all they had to do was to exchange the cipher, which is an easy task if you just use the character distribution over the words of the corresponding language. Given that I'd be able to code this without working in the programming industry, I don't imagine this to be a problem or overly ressource heavy.

 

For other alphabets than the latin one, this could theoretically be doable as well, you only need a way to adapt how many symbols the cipher skill is able to translate - but you still have a valid point there.

Edited January 5, 2013 by Doppelschwert

[Archmage Silver]

Personally I'd only accept this idea if we're talking about something like this:

 

Elf Commoner: [Elvish] Do you speak Elvish?

CHARNAME: [Elvish] Yes. I learned it through years of training.

 

And if the player doesn't speak Elvish, the dialog would simply show the elf commoner saying something the devs came up with, followed by the player asking something in Common. Like so:

 

Elf Commoner: Ara'd elhven adar na el?

CHARNAME: Sorry, could you repeat that in Common?

 

This way doesn't take that much work, but would add flavor to the game if so desired.

[AGX-17]

Maybe I should elaborate a little more on how I'd imagine this to work. I'd show you an screenshot of the mechanic in the final fantasy game, but I can't seem to find out which game that was, so I'll do an example instead.

 

Lets consider a simple caesars cipher for the example, so we would say an "a" in the ancient language is a "b" in our language, an "b" is an "c" and so on - finally an "y" is an "z" and "z" would be "a" (the characters are shifted by one).

 

But an encryption isn't a language. If it's just an encrypted form of the base language, it's an encrypted form of the language, not a different language. Learning a language and en/decoding an encryption are two different cognitive feats.

 

Language is more than just shuffling and replacing letters, there's grammar, syntax, semantics, tone, etc.

Edited January 5, 2013 by AGX-17

[PrimeJunta]

How about using real-life languages? That would save time and would certainly be no less realistic than having English as the main language. Tolkien did this to an extent in his books; for example Hobbit names and the language of the Rohirrim were Anglo-Saxon although he had actually made up entirely artificial languages for both. The rationale was that Rohirric is to Westron (the Middle Earth common tongue) what Anglo-Saxon is to modern English. So Meriadoc Brandybuck's name was really Kalimac Brandagamba. Plenty of cool RL languages to draw from, both contemporary and ancient!

 

Edit: BTW Bilbo Baggins's real name is Bilba Labingi. Heh.

Edited January 5, 2013 by PrimeJunta

[Doppelschwert]

Maybe I should elaborate a little more on how I'd imagine this to work. I'd show you an screenshot of the mechanic in the final fantasy game, but I can't seem to find out which game that was, so I'll do an example instead.

 

Lets consider a simple caesars cipher for the example, so we would say an "a" in the ancient language is a "b" in our language, an "b" is an "c" and so on - finally an "y" is an "z" and "z" would be "a" (the characters are shifted by one).

 

But an encryption isn't a language. If it's just an encrypted form of the base language, it's an encrypted form of the language, not a different language. Learning a language and en/decoding an encryption are two different cognitive feats.

 

Language is more than just shuffling and replacing letters, there's grammar, syntax, semantics, tone, etc.

 

I get your point, but I don't agree. An arbitrary encryption may not produce reasonable phonetics and thus disqualifies as a natural language, but it defines a language nonetheless as grammar, syntax and semantics are just inherited by the base language. The phonetics part can be adjusted by only allowing seperate permutations among vowels and consonants. That may not make it an original language, but it still qualifies as a language.

 

However, the point of this is not to introduce a new language (as developing a new language surely goes beyond of the scope of project), but to visualise the progress of learning a language. I think this is is better than having a simple lore-check which means either comprehending all or nothing, as in reality, you seldom comprehend a sentence completely or not at all but most of the time partial instead.

[Ieo]

I get your point, but I don't agree. An arbitrary encryption may not produce reasonable phonetics and thus disqualifies as a natural language, but it defines a language nonetheless as grammar, syntax and semantics are just inherited by the base language. The phonetics part can be adjusted by only allowing seperate permutations among vowels and consonants. That may not make it an original language, but it still qualifies as a language.

 

However, the point of this is not to introduce a new language (as developing a new language surely goes beyond of the scope of project), but to visualise the progress of learning a language. I think this is is better than having a simple lore-check which means either comprehending all or nothing, as in reality, you seldom comprehend a sentence completely or not at all but most of the time partial instead.

 

It's basically a shorthand method of game implementation, to be sure. As side (corner, optional) content, this approach would certainly add flavor. In terms of lore, factions and cultures that interact presently in PE are going to have some common language anyway, so it makes more sense that an obscured language is "dead." For example, the mega dungeon appears to be a big abandoned thing and is already optional; perhaps an ongoing side story/quest/thing paralleling the dungeon levels would allow one to decipher the code of the temple's dead god enshrined within (heh). This could lead to a single encounter or treasure chest or whatever, possibly even elucidate details of the dungeon lore. But for the type of implementation you're proposing, probably not anywhere near the main campaign or major factions because the focus isn't really on the content the code arbitrarily obfuscates.

 

On the other hand, a general language hook approach I described earlier like how PS:T handled it could be implemented much closer to the main campaign and characters. I think the more granular the puzzle, the further from the main campaign it should be, basically (but there should definitely be puzzles and riddles in general). Then it's up to Obsidian to decide whether the development effort is worthwhile or not for side content. Could be; I can see such an optional thing in the mega dungeon.

[Umberlin]

I feel like languages need to be implemented well, and have real implications for one person not understanding another. Missing out or misunderstanding and so play a big part in multicultural interactions, and it's important to make it feel and work right to achieve the various nuances. I'm not talking about implementing a language here either, that's another beast entirely, I'm talking straight consequence your 'replacement for a simple lore check' passing or failing, and the consequences need to be there, solidly, in my mind, if such a system where language (even if the languages aren't developed, only implied to exist) matters and exists in the world - especially if it exists in a mechanic sense. It can't 'just' be a system, the system has to work with the whole package of game systems; dialogue, missions and the rest.

 

In terms of your actual suggested mechanic, I see a certain portion, however large or small, of people potentially getting annoyed with it. Not to say there are not people with grievances against the lore check route to language. I simply see the lore check route as the one less likely to cause annoyance on the larger scale. I'm not sure you need to turn checks into a mini game, I'm not even particularly fond of games that turn lock picking/hacking skill checks into a mini game. Such mechanics, for me, often just bring the game to a grinding halt, and offer nothing I enjoy while doing it - as most said mini games are as mind numbingly boring as they come.

 

I'm not saying your suggesting one of 'those' mini games, but, the little scavanger hunt for slabs could all too easily become annoying busy work in the eyes of some, especially if they wanted to partake in said content. I'm not sure it being decoded in a new game plus would help either, as some players might not be willing to play again in a newgame plus mode, especially if annoyed by such a system.

 

Still, I think your heart is in the right place, and I'm not saying it's a terrible idea. I'm just not sure it would go over well with a larger audience, or even myself after prolonged exposure.

 

-

 

For the record I despised the language hunt in FFX, and despised the game as a whole, save for its combat system, which, as far as turn based systems go, I was quite fond of.

Edited January 5, 2013 by Umberlin

[SunBroSolaire]

Ico did something similar, where the language was translated in NG+. I like this idea. It would be a great way to add hidden themes and plot elements to the world. From what Josh has said about the importance of language in P:E, I'm guessing they're already planning something sort of like this.

[Doppelschwert]

I can relate to most of the things you say umberlin, especially not being interested in playing a new game plus only in order to see the text. I also understand that the original approach outlined in the first post is propably too much minigame for most of the backers (while I still think that this can be intriguing for its own reasons), but I think the following would work reasonably well and add a lot of atmosphere to the game:

 

- There is one special dead language in the game which you can find in ruins all over the place and this relates to

- Additional to the traditional lore skill, you get a short sight of the decrypted text at the beginning.

 

So its not like

 

"You find an old craving on the wall hidden under some dust.

[if Lore > 6]

It seems to be a warning of some sort about going further after sunset, although you don't know why.

[if Lore <= 6]

Sadly, you can't really make out its meaning."

 

but instead

 

"You find an old craving on the wall hidden under some dust. It reads

[if Lore > 6]

[show decryption according to Lore skill, for Example: Lore=12]

>> "Aevare oe the Nifht" <<

It seems to be a warning of some sort about going further after sunset, although you don't know why.

[if Lore <= 6]

[show decryption according to Lore skill, for Example: Lore=6]

>> "Aevaqe oe tge Nifgt" <<

Sadly, you can't really make out its meaning."

 

This doesn't exclude the lore skill to be traditional at every other instance of using it, neither does it involve a treasure hunt for stone slabs or anything. Its still stat based, but its a whole different experience - without having to invest too much ressources on development.

 

I also want to stress that this way this is not a minigame you're forced to do. You could still decipher the text as the player even if your skill is too low, but the game doesn't expect it from you, thus it is not a minigame but only a nice visual clue indicating why the character didn't succeed.

Edited January 6, 2013 by Doppelschwert

[JOG]

How about a real translation in a rare real life language (any Irish reading this, feel free to correct me).

 

"seachain an oiche"

 

seachain = avoid / beware of

an = the

oiche = night

 

The text would have several translations of different qualities, and the skill would decide which is displayed along with the original text.

Since different languages don't just exchange words, the worst translation would be completely misleading (like "yes, tax now together" - 'sea chain anois cheile)

 

So the player would be able to learn the language and act accordingly ignoring character skill and learning something for real-life as well.

[PrimeJunta]

I'd be tickled if it turned out the boreal dwarves spoke suomi.