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Russian localization and regional prices.
Celtaidd Rwsiaidd
Member
Just in case, I would like to remind to all that the Russian language is one of the 5 most spoken languages on the planet. Many developers have already made the mistake of ignoring this fact. True, many do not even know this. But it is enough to look at Warcraft and TECO, and compare them with other games without the Russian language.
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"Ashes of Creation will be initially available in English, French, German, and Russian.[2][3]
Italian, Polish and Spanish localization will then be added.[3]
Spanish will be added in the near future.[4]
Other languages are being considered.[2]"
https://ashesofcreation.wiki/Languages
https://www.statista.com/statistics/266808/the-most-spoken-languages-worldwide/
I'm not saying that Russian isn't one of the fifth most spoken languages, but I am reasonably sure it isn't in the top four and there may be contention between several languages claiming that they are in fifth place.
I am happy to see that Russian will be supported in the initial release so that we don't have to investigate further.
Cue complaints from a billion Chinese and Hindi speakers...
Chinese support is probably something they shouldn't worry about until much, much, much later.
The language is rarely ever the problem. It's usually the politics, regulation, culture, and a gigantomajestic nuclear mindfield so huge, dense & deadly that you have to navigate with extreme caution.
The subtlest mention (or lack thereof) of anything remotely related to China or its ppl / culture in anyway they dislike could instantly land you an infamous deadly conviction known as "Insult on China". And any hope of succeeding in the (mainland) Chinese market vanishes with it.
I am pretty sure you have no worries. I would have picked Spanish over Russian. Not out of bias, but just trying to cast a larger net.
If I had more time, I would write a shorter post.
Steven has addressed their plans for the Chinese market in the past. They will allow them to VPN into the game if they so choose, thus eliminating the whole "appease Pooh or your game gets blacklisted!" argument.
My feeling on the Russian thing was that it was a requirement of them publishing in EU and Russia with the My.Games deal. Now that is dead and long buried they are still stuck with that customer base. I wouldn't be surprised that after they run into the mafia mentality that plagues publishing in that region that the Russian and connected region players get shuffled into the EU publishing.
Chairman Pooh. Titles are important. Oh, and don't think 'Pooh' is actually the correct name either.
I dunno. I've found that unknownsystemerror is generally right about things on this forum. You might want to just take their word for it.
Keep in mind, events that have transpired since this thread started may have changed Intrepids plans for a Russian version.
In fact, I would be shocked if they haven't at least reconsidered.
The problem with this is that a Russian server would have to have a Russian based server time (for events and such).
I really don't see Intrepid setting up a Russian language server with a US time zone.
Acknowledging the linguistic diversity of the global population is a crucial aspect of creating inclusive and user-friendly experiences, and it is always beneficial for developers to consider providing localization options for widely spoken languages such as Russian.
Uh nope
English – 1,121 million speakers. ...
Mandarin Chinese – 1,107 million speakers. ...
Hindi – 698 million speakers. ...
Spanish – 512 million speakers. ...
French – 284 million speakers. ...
Arabic – 273 million speakers. ...
Bengali – 265 million inhabitants. ...
Russian – 258 million speakers.
1. Chinese — 1.3 Billion Native Speakers
2. Spanish — 485 Million Native Speakers
3. English — 373 Million Native Speakers
4. Arabic — 362 Million Native Speakers
8. Russian — 154 Million Native Speakers
Lol numbers are all over the place anyway. Prolly Intrepid will look into monetization value, not most spoken language stats anyway. I know I would. ))
First, I would be wary of anything at all to do with languages that lists "Chinese" as a language.
Are we talking Mandarin, Cantonese, Hunanese, Wu? (there are more, I just can't remember the less common ones off the top of my head). If it is Standard Chinese (note that Standard Chinese is Standard Chinese, it is not just Chinese), the number is just wrong.
Second, the OP is talking about most spoken languages, not languages with the most native speakers. These are different things.
Lol good point on Chinese dialects. So AoC should be written in Chinese (all variants) and translated to Engrish before release.
he means people who natively speak the language and people who speak the language as a 2nd+ language
There's a difference in "Chinese text" (written) and "Chinese dialects" (spoken).
There're only 2 types of Chinese text that are actively being used:
Traditional Chinese - used in Taiwan & Hong Kong.
Simplified Chinese - used in Mainland China & Singapore.
And unless you want to do localized voice acting, those two are all you'll ever need to care about. Although be warned, for historical, political, and emotional reasons, both the Traditional & Simplified Chinese community will feel offended if you only do the other Chinese version but not theirs.
Spoken Chinese, meanwhile, is a much more complicated thing:
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Varieties_of_Chinese
- There are hundreds of localized varieties
- Phonology's completely different, vocabs differ to a lesser extent, while the underlying character set is more or less the same (just the traditional vs simplified difference). e.g. Cantonese & Mandarin speakers usually cannot understand each other if they just talk, but if you let them text each other, they can communicate just fine. This is why when you put Mainland Chinese, Taiwanese, and Hong Kong players in the same game you can often see them engage in heated political arguments in public channels
- Mandarin is the most widely-used version, coz ccp basically forces it upon all of the mainland chinese population. If a mainland chinese person is educated enough to know how to play mmorpg on a PC, he knows mandarin anyway. (i.e. you can safely ignore the "hundreds of varieties" ...)
- Cantonese/Yue is only used in Hong Kong & China's Guangdong province. But nobody here would ever expect an English-based, international game to have a localized version with Cantonese voice acting (sure some of us may *appreciate* it, but none of us would *expect* it). Many of us grew up playing English/Japanese based games, and will gladly just play the English version.
In short, if you want to localize the text for Chinese, do both Simplified & Traditional. If you have money to throw away and want to add localized voice-acting, do Mandarin.
Anyway, back to Russian.
I think this is the major point in this thread, right now.