Board Game Arena

First off, I am an American and a native English Speaker. I have however learned Japanese formally in a classroom setting in college. I decided I would try to help translate to earn some gift points, but I had not read the rules beforehand. I didn't realize that BGA only wanted native speakers translating into a particular language, but this was after translating 2 strings into Japanese for the board game "Dark Agent." These are the only two strings I have translated, but I thought I would tell an Admin and ask directly about this.

Am I in the wrong here? Should I have not translated any Japanese strings? I assume that I shouldn't have according to the posted rules, so if this is the case, could the strings I translated be left (they have yet to be authenticated), or should they get wiped somehow? Honestly I don't care what happens to the strings, but I would like the matter to get resolved, thank you!

BGA's native-speaker rule probably means that you must speak and/or write and/or read as well as a native speaker; as in, don't dare try to "translate" with google translator with you at all times.

Even though I'm not sure about this, one thing that I'm sure is that BGA has no actual way to catch that non-native-speakers, so it's more like an "agreement - please follow this for better experience to everyone" than "mandatory - if you are not native speaker, you are BANNED" thing.

If you're confident in translating non-native languages, go for it. That said though, don't over-do it also, and always think of leaving it blank for next person as an option.

Good luck in translating!

yooyou7 wrote: Even though I'm not sure about this, one thing that I'm sure is that BGA has no actual way to catch that non-native-speakers, so it's more like an "agreement - please follow this for better experience to everyone" than "mandatory - if you are not native speaker, you are BANNED" thing.

Yeah, that makes sense since there is no real way to really catch anyone except them translating poorly. Obviously the verification thing helps though. I can easily translate single strings even if I have to look up some vocab that I don't know. I suppose that would mean that I am not as good as a native speaker, but even Japanese people have to look up uncommon Kanji lol. I have talked with several Japanese speakers on BGA, and although I use google translate for kanji I don't know, or for vocab I am unfamiliar with, I know sentence structure rather well, and will only get better. It is pretty easy to drop a couple of new Vocab words into a sentence you already know how to form.

Anyway, thanks for the reply!

Just a bit of information.

No one is going through literally "verifying" your translations. They sit for 30 days and if no one else changes them, they automatically become verified. So it depends a bit on whether someone catches something, and then either comes here to say something, or already has the ability to do translating and can just change it. Some people can change verified ones as well.

If you ever do feel you want to "take back" a translation, all you need to do is put it back how it was, making sure it's exactly how it was originally or on a prior translation, and it'll revert back to that. i.e. you can't technically take yours away, but it can be reverted back. (They'll both show. The current one is always the green one.)

The rest is just my personal opinion... I think it somewhat depends on whether there's already others who are translating the Japanese and if they are able to keep up with it. If you do at least a pretty good job and it's helping because otherwise some things are not getting translated, I'd consider it useful, and then later if someone does find something wrong, it can still get corrected. If you already converse with native Japanese speakers, perhaps you could have them check some of what you've done and see if it seems appropriate. My only concern would be if there's maybe "less formal" things that would be more appropriate. With a more popular language, I feel a native speaker is the best person, but with a less popular one, it might be tough for them to keep up.

(Of course, so far we just have opinions and have not heard officially from someone who counts. )

Liallan wrote: The rest is just my personal opinion... I think it somewhat depends on whether there's already others who are translating the Japanese and if they are able to keep up with it. If you do at least a pretty good job and it's helping because otherwise some things are not getting translated, I'd consider it useful, and then later if someone does find something wrong, it can still get corrected. If you already converse with native Japanese speakers, perhaps you could have them check some of what you've done and see if it seems appropriate. My only concern would be if there's maybe "less formal" things that would be more appropriate. With a more popular language, I feel a native speaker is the best person, but with a less popular one, it might be tough for them to keep up.

Yeah, I am very familiar with the game Dark Agent. Your suggestion with checking with a native speaker is a good idea! That could be a good gauge as to the accuracy of my translations without having to wait for someone to verify it. Also the ability to correct a translation is nice. I only added two translated strings that were not translated at all yet, so I don't know if I can "revert" it back to a blank. Thanks for the advice!

Hi,
You cannot revert to blank, but you can copy/paste the original English string. Anyway if it's only two strings, it's not a big deal.

Overall, it's better if translation is done by native language speakers and by people who know the game and own it and can refer to the rules officially translated in their language.
But of course, it's not always possible, especially for a game like Dark Agent which has not been officially published.

So I rather agree with Liallan's personal opinion about this
If no native speaker has taken on the work, you can give it a try, then when/if a native speaker finds some wrong things, he can correct them. And yes, if you are in contact with a native speaker it's nice if he can review your work, to improve the translations and give you interesting feedback for yourself

Een wrote:Hi,
You cannot revert to blank, but you can copy/paste the original English string. Anyway if it's only two strings, it's not a big deal.

Overall, it's better if translation is done by native language speakers and by people who know the game and own it and can refer to the rules officially translated in their language.
But of course, it's not always possible, especially for a game like Dark Agent which has not been officially published.

So I rather agree with Liallan's personal opinion about this
If no native speaker has taken on the work, you can give it a try, then when/if a native speaker finds some wrong things, he can correct them. And yes, if you are in contact with a native speaker it's nice if he can review your work, to improve the translations and give you interesting feedback for yourself

Alright, thank you! I also have been playing Dark Agent with one of the Game Designers so interpreting the rules or understanding the game is not the issue, haha.