Players and translators verbalize their anger when they learn that the successful Supergiant title opted for non-professional work on localization.
The localization of Hades to languages such as Spanish was carried out through a collaborative work between translation professionals and the community. Supergiant Games has confirmed the working methodology of this department during the development of the title, one of the best video games of 2020, and has apologized for the numerous errors reported by users.
What happened to the Hades translation
The controversy began on Tuesday, when professional translators such as KWolframio expressed their anger on the social network Twitter when they encountered massive translation errors in Hades as a result of apparently having used an artificial intelligence transcription system.
#NintendoSwitch #HadesGame
Stop ruining your games with machine or non-professional translation 🙁
Ths is FFVII level bad. pic.twitter.com/gUqeXeZyOV– Keru 👾🌿🎮 (@KWolframio) January 12, 2021
Given the impact of the message, Supergiant Games responded to the thread derived from that message with an official statement where, initially, the complaint was contradicted: “What you are saying is not accurate,” begins by saying the North American study, which made the news months ago for having congenialized development without incurring in practices such as crunching for its workers. “We have worked with both a professional localization team and the support of the translator community during production, in a convergent way”, they add.
ATRAE condemns the practice of Supergiant Games; its director responds
From there, both the community and other members and professional translation organizations, such as the Spanish Association for Audiovisual Translation and Adaptation (ATRAE), participated in the complaint with a message of disgust that seeks to condemn this criticized practice, already used by other video games in the past such as Disco Elysium together with Clan DLAN (which was finally paid), because they consider it to be “a lack of respect for the union” of professional translators.
Using the fan community to translate a game is disrespectful not only to the guild, but also to consumers, who pay for a product and get a mediocre result at best. From ATRAE we condemn the practices of @SupergiantGames. https://t.co/UfSoZ4ORqC
– ATRAE (@ATRAE_ORG) January 14, 2021
“Using the fan community to translate a game is not only disrespectful for the guild, but also for consumers, who pay for a product and get a mediocre result at best. From ATRAE we condemn the practices of Supergiant Games ”, reads the association’s message in its message, published on Twitter at noon this Thursday.
“We are actively engaged in improving our translations at Hades”
Hey, this is @kasavin (I’m the one tweeting). I’m sorry for how I replied to you. I love our community but should not have been defensive. We learned a lot working on Hades, and clearly have a lot to learn still. We sincerely appreciate the feedback and are reading all of it. 1/2
– Supergiant Games (@SupergiantGames) January 14, 2021
After the commotion, this Thursday night came the last response – and I’m sorry, this time – from Supergiant Games; With the exception that this time it was Greg Kasavin, creative director of Hades, who gave voice to the statement. “I apologize for how I responded,” he begins by telling Jenn O’Donnell, whom he initially replied with a currently deleted message. “I love our community, but he shouldn’t have been defensive. We have learned a lot working with Hades, and clearly we still have a lot to learn, “he argues, adding:” We are actively engaged in improving our translations in Hades, as well as improving our processes from now on, “he adds to finish.
It is expected that a patch for the video game will be applied soon, available on Nintendo Switch and PC, which can correct these translation errors. It is not known, however, if this time the support of the non-professional translator community will be chosen again.
References | KWolfram; ATTRACT; Greg kasavin
