Some translation clarifications

[NELOK]

Hi everyone. I've played Andor's Trail in the past and loved it. Recently decided to check on anything new as I run across it again on F-Droid and I was happy to see that there's been a major update

So, I thought I would help translate Andor's Trail in Greek seeing it was at under 1% complete. I've done translations before so it's not a big deal for me and Weblate makes things really easy. But I do want some clarifications as I'm progressing and I thought using the official forum could probably get me an official reply. As I am translating I realize a LOT of the dialog will be poorly communicated (seem very unreal and distracting) if I translate it directly as is. Is it allowed/encouraged to do the translation and vary things enough to make it read like true human dialog while keeping the meaning intact? It's difficult to give you an exact example of what I mean without using two languages but other translators can probably understand

Another thing I wanted to ask is whether I can compile the game myself afterwards and include my translation to see my changes. This is important to do a final check on whether I've missed something or have deviated from the meaning the original dialog intended to convey. I don't mind waiting for a rebuild if and when it comes out, but it would sure make my life easier.

Thank you

[Gonk]

Thank you for helping to translate. See this post for how to setup the build environment. I can try to assist you if you have questions:
https://andorstrail.com/viewtopic.php?f=6&t=4560#p46641

About changing the translations I am unsure without having examples. I am doing translations, too and I don't do them word by word, but I don't change the meaning of sentences even if I feel it could have been done differently in english.

[rijackson741]

Be sure to at least install ATCS: https://andorstrail.com/viewtopic.php?f=6&t=4560. It allows you to view the dialog strings in the context of the conversation. Try to keep the conversation true to what was originally meant, rather than just a word by word translation.

[NELOK]

UI translation is 100% done with no errors, now to test it in action I'm not sure how Andor's Trail can handle larger strings in its UI (and some Greek expressions tend to be quite larger than their English counterparts). I'll have to build the game and go through all screens to see what fits and what doesn't. I tried to keep the UI expressions as clean and professional as I could. Very very few terms in strings have been purposefully left in English (eg Bonemeal)

But in the meantime let's get back to translating the actual content <3

[Nut]

Hey, cool! You are right, some things can't be translated, especially names or play on words might be difficult.
The UI can handle longer strings - you could check e.g. French which also have some long words.

[NELOK]

Hey, cool! You are right, some things can't be translated, especially names or play on words might be difficult.
The UI can handle longer strings - you could check e.g. French which also have some long words.

I hope so, English can be so elegant with simplifying some expressions but in Greek you have to describe it way too much sometimes or go out of your way to use some existing but obscure word that people won't understand, a no go in a game.

I know stories can handle longer text, not sure about the UI (especially the stats screen). I'll try to pull the code, build it and see. I'll go over it again with a fresh perspective next week to see what I can shorten and/or change.

[Nut]

Of course you can try. Hint: Fir translations it's not just compiling - the texts are still in weblate and must be imported first.
And if you get to translate the content, the .mo files has to be generated before compile too.
Maybe I could help you how to do it, but don't know when I find the time