Polish localization with voice acting

[Marang]

Hi Obsidian,

 

The Polish community of gamers is huge. There are great numbers who have been playing - till this day - games like Baldur's Gate Saga, Icewind Dale Saga, Temple of Elemental Evil, Neverwinter Nights 1&2, Planescape Torment, Tides of Numenera and of course Pillars of Eternity. All of those titles named before where fully localized in Polish (text+voice acting), only Pillars 1 has no Polish voice acting implemented. 

Native English speakers don't realise, but localization without voice acting can easily break the immersion. Imagine that you read text in your language, while your character speaks different words that you can't understand. You can't get a complete joy while gaming this way. Sure, some of Polish gamers preferences are to stick to English version and never try their native localization. But those are less in numbers I believe. Personally, I don't like English language and would love to hear my characters shouting ''Do boju'' instead of '' To battle'' ;d

There were great numbers of Polish backers as well. In my humble opinion - it would be great to be given a small dose of appreciation by introducing Polish community to Pillars 2 as a fully localized  game in Polish. I understand that it will  involve great amount of additional work to be done, but trust me it is worth to keep your fans satisfied. 

 

As for me, even though I was unsatisfied with Pillars 1 (mainly because of the writing and the main story - it felt flat and uninteresting) yet I'm still waiting for Pillars 2 with high hopes, that not only the writing will be much more adult and spot on, but it will bring a complete Polish localisation - that I will be able to play the game without breaking the immersion.

 

 

Thank you for your time reading my post.

 

[Wormerine]

I understand your request (polish VO for Baldurs Gate was magnificent) but that won't happen. Essentially they would need to double their VO cost for every language they decide to add. As they look to expand the amount of VO that is in the English version it would get really expensive to record them in other languages. If Obsidian will selfpublish it, it would be tricky to organize casting and recording in Europe.

 

That's to bad. I can't play the mixed polish/English localisations anymore. At least I can explain to myself spending way to much time playing games as working on my language skills.

[Wormerine]

As for me, even though I was unsatisfied with Pillars 1 (mainly because of the writing and the main story - it felt flat and uninteresting) yet I'm still waiting for Pillars 2 with high hopes, that not only the writing will be much more adult and spot on, but it will bring a complete Polish localisation - that I will be able to play the game without breaking the immersion.

 

Wait what? Your English seems really good, so if you played it with polish localisation I recommended giving a shot to English version. Keeping dictionary near might be helpful as Obsidians doesn't shy from flowery discriptions but it might be worth it. PoE1 had some pacing problems but it certainly wasn't flat and it's approach to world and characters was very mature. Maybe the translator did a poor job. Unless by "adult" you literally mean more "adult language" (f***, c*** etc.) in which case, please no.

[smjjames]

Wasn't one of the stretch goals Polish localization or voiceover? *goes and looks* Edit: I think it was just the localization, not voiceover.

Edited August 13, 2017 by smjjames

[MortyTheGobbo]

It's not just extra work, it's a lot of extra money. Voice actors don't come for free. Nor do translators, and someone will have to translate all those voiced lines. Which, speaking as an audiovisual translator myself, is more difficult than translating on-screen text. So, yes, it would be great to get a fully voiced Polish version... not that I would play it, since I never play games in Polish if I can help it - unless someone forces me to, like Origin insists on doing. But the reasons why there might not be one are very harsh and financial. Unless they've reached that Polish localization stretch goal.

Edited August 13, 2017 by MortyTheGobbo

[smjjames]

It's not just extra work, it's a lot of extra money. Voice actors don't come for free. Nor do translators, and someone will have to translate all those voiced lines. Which, speaking as an audiovisual translator myself, is more difficult than translating on-screen text. So, yes, it would be great to get a fully voiced Polish version... not that I would play it, since I never play games in Polish if I can help it - unless someone forces me to, like Origin insists on doing. But the reasons why there might not be one are very harsh and financial. Unless they've reached that Polish localization stretch goal.

 

Exactly, and with twice the voiceover, that means twice the work.

 

As for the Polish localization stretch goal, that was one of their early stretch goals.

[Wormerine]

It's not just extra work, it's a lot of extra money. Voice actors don't come for free. Nor do translators, and someone will have to translate all those voiced lines. Which, speaking as an audiovisual translator myself, is more difficult than translating on-screen text. So, yes, it would be great to get a fully voiced Polish version... not that I would play it, since I never play games in Polish if I can help it - unless someone forces me to, like Origin insists on doing. But the reasons why there might not be one are very harsh and financial. Unless they've reached that Polish localization stretch goal.

Polish localisation was reached but I imagine that none of the localisations include VO, right? Torment had indeed polish VO but they had little VO overall.

[Sedrefilos]

Does OP want voice localization out of pure nationalism? English language with Polish text breaks immersion? Like when watching an American movie with subtitles? Does it breaks immersion too?

Don't like English language? WTF? And prefer characters of an original American game sounded Polish? Ok whatever.

Polish community is large... ok, is it larger than Russian or German or French? 'cause they are not getting local voice-over either.

Edited August 13, 2017 by Sedrefilos

[White Phoenix]

I think it is a matter of nostalgia than immersion breaking. I usually don't play with Polish VO if there is one (with few exepctions) as I like more reading than listening. 

 

Numenera has Polish sounds because of very very little VO. If it had been like Pillars of Eternity or even White March it wouldn't have had any Polish sounds, I am sure. Pillars and other neoclassics are too niche for Polish market as they cannot sell in AAA numbers. Mass Effect 3 had no Polish voices unlike ME1 and ME2 despite huge fanbase. Similar things happened to Risen series, first game with no VO, Risen 2 with VO and Risen 3 same as Risen 1. It really shows that publishers see only money and profit, nothing more.

Edited August 13, 2017 by White Phoenix

[Wormerine]

Does OP want voice localization out of pure nationalism? English language with Polish text breaks immersion? Like when watching an American movie with subtitles? Does it breaks immersion too?

Don't like English language? WTF? And prefer characters of an original American game sounded Polish? Ok whatever.

Polish community is large... ok, is it larger than Russian or German or French? 'cause they are not getting local voice-over either.

I can't speak for him, but it doesn't seem to me as absurd as it might to you. I can't deal with both Polish/English language at the same time either. I can understand English just fine and that is kinda the problem. I can watch Japanese films without issue as I know no Japanese. But when I read and hear at the same time and two things don't overlap it is distracting and weird. When I am watching a movie with subtitles I have to ignore them otherwise my brain gets confused whenever translation is not literal, uses different structure that original or joke/play on words is messed up (and that happens a lot). I turned PoE for a bit into PL as I didn't know couple words but I ended up just keeping dictionary at hand. It is really weird to hear Eder speak, and read something similar but not really the same.

 

Full VO is a common thing to do, so it can is not insane request, but at this time it just won't happen.

[Wormerine]

I think it is a matter of nostalgia than immersion breaking. I usually don't play with Polish VO if there is one (with few exepctions) as I like more reading than listening. 

 

Numenera has Polish sounds because of very very little VO. If it had been like Pillars of Eternity or even White March it wouldn't have had any Polish sounds, I am sure. Pillars and other neoclassics are too niche for Polish market as they cannot sell in AAA numbers. Mass Effect 3 had no Polish voices unlike ME1 and ME2 despite huge fanbase. Similar things happened to Risen series, first game with no VO, Risen 2 with VO and Risen 3 same as Risen 1. It really shows that publishers see only money and profit, nothing more.

Haha as if doing full VO had something to do with artistic integrity. It is done to widen the market. If the sales aren't worth the extra investment then they don't do it. With Mass Effect 3 I am willing to bet that they just rushed it out too quickly to put together full foreign VO. The whole game felt like a first draft with an ending copy pasted from a different project.

[Sedrefilos]

Full VO is a common thing to do, so it can is not insane request, but at this time it just won't happen.

 

It is common but the game won't come in other voiced language than English and French, Russian and German are in line before Polish as one can tell from the main Fig page; so asking for a Polish VO sounds kinda "weird" (as in nationalistic) to me. This in conjuction with "Native English speakers don't realise, but localization without voice acting can easily break the immersion" and "I don't like English language and would love to hear my characters shouting ''Do boju'' instead of '' To battle'".

There are other Polish people in here (such as you ) but they don't ask things suspiciously

[smjjames]

I thought Spanish would be in as a voiced language, given it's audience in the US, also a heck of a lot easier and cheaper to find a Spanish speaker.

[Wormerine]

 

 

 

Full VO is a common thing to do, so it can is not insane request, but at this time it just won't happen.

It is common but the game won't come in other voiced language than English and French, Russian and German are in line before Polish as one can tell from the main Fig page; so asking for a Polish VO sounds kinda "weird" (as in nationalistic) to me. This in conjuction with "Native English speakers don't realise, but localization without voice acting can easily break the immersion" and "I don't like English language and would love to hear my characters shouting ''Do boju'' instead of '' To battle'".

There are other Polish people in here (such as you ) but they don't ask things suspiciously

I like giving people benefit of the doubt;-P. While wording of the request was odd, and the requested feature is too expensive thing to make it happen it is not a wrong thing to ask for.

 

It is proven that people respond the best to their naive tongue. Ideally, no matter what you create, you want to reach out to people in language they respond emotionally to. Having desire to experience a game in language you are most comfortable with is fully understandable, especially as other titles offer such option. I believe his request is more personal (selfish?) than nationalistic (promoting interests of polish players over Germans or french). Though these days you never know... because why wouldn't you want to have Matt Mercer in your VO?

[DexGames]

Hi Obsidian,

 

The Polish community of gamers is huge. There are great numbers who have been playing - till this day - games like Baldur's Gate Saga, Icewind Dale Saga, Temple of Elemental Evil, Neverwinter Nights 1&2, Planescape Torment, Tides of Numenera and of course Pillars of Eternity. All of those titles named before where fully localized in Polish (text+voice acting), only Pillars 1 has no Polish voice acting implemented. 

 

Not my intention to seem mean but... Maybe it's because Pillars I is one of the only title in your list that was "Crowdfunded".

Ok, I understand your request aswell, I'd love the Game to be Voiced in my language too, but come on :

 

Be realistic, if you've been following the Video Game industry for that long (Since Planescape, Temple, etc), & its evolution, you KNOW localization cost a tremendous amount of money !

Especially for a Game as"wordy" as those ones are, the amount of dialogue lines that should be voiced would cost "close to a third" (just my guess, but it cost A LOT) of Obsidian's budget.

 

It's not fare, in my opnion, to think & ask OBS to put so much money into "Voice Acting". (which would imply to cut off many things from the main game by the way)

 

Again, I understand the request but, it'll already be localized in sooo many languages, thanks to all the Korean, Portuguese, Italian Fans & all the community who've been VERY LOUD during the Campaign, asking for their languages to be added. Even Chinese people have asked for "Simplified Chinese" to be added.

 

It's not a Triple A Production. With all dued respect, I think you're asking for too much.

Just my opinion though.

Edited August 13, 2017 by DexGames

[Wormerine]

 

Hi Obsidian,

 

The Polish community of gamers is huge. There are great numbers who have been playing - till this day - games like Baldur's Gate Saga, Icewind Dale Saga, Temple of Elemental Evil, Neverwinter Nights 1&2, Planescape Torment, Tides of Numenera and of course Pillars of Eternity. All of those titles named before where fully localized in Polish (text+voice acting), only Pillars 1 has no Polish voice acting implemented.

 

 

Not my intention to seem mean but... Maybe it's because Pillars I is one of the only title in your list that was "Crowdfunded".

Ok, I understand your request aswell, I'd love the Game to be Voiced in my language too, but come on :

 

Be realistic, if you've been following the Video Game industry for that long (Since Planescape, Temple, etc), & its evolution, you KNOW localization cost a tremendous amount of money !

Especially for a Game as"wordy" as those ones are, the amount of dialogue lines that should be voiced would cost "close to a third" (just my guess, but it cost A LOT) of Obsidian's budget.

 

It's not fare, in my opnion, to think & ask OBS to put so much money into "Voice Acting". (which would imply to cut off many things from the main game by the way)

 

Again, I understand the request but, it'll already be localized in sooo many languages, thanks to all the Korean, Portuguese, Italian Fans & all the community who've been VERY LOUD during the Campaign, asking for their languages to be added. Even Chinese people have asked for "Simplified Chinese" to be added.

 

It's not a Triple A Production. With all dued respect, I think you're asking for too much.

Just my opinion though.

Just a small correction. Tides of Anime era (autocorrect from Numenera - had to leave it in) was crowefunded as well, but as pointed out before it's amount of VO was minimal.

[Kirk]

Oh please, no polish VO, I love the original voices. 

 

But, if I rememeber correctly, there was a way to use polish BG1's VO "Przed wyruszeniem w drogę należy zebrać drużynę" instead of "You must gather your party before venturing forth" in PoE just for the sake of pure nostalgia

 

EDIT --> http://www.kawerna.pl/aktualnosci/gry-i-zabawy/item/8702-przed-wyruszeniem-w-droge-nalezy-zebrac-druzyne-usprawnij-pillars-of-eternity.html here

Edited August 15, 2017 by Kirk