Thursday, June 2, 2011

Beta is finished!

At last the new game has reached beta status. This means I can begin collecting feedback to make some final changes. This was originally a four week project, but I invested an extra week into additional features: achievements, a leaderboard, and language localization.





I found a nifty way to get the game translated into a total of 16 languages (the screenshots show simplified Chinese and German) powered by Babelfish when possible and Google for the rest (Babelfish is more reliable). I write an html file that contains my text (written like an array in ActionScript with apostrophes and commas), upload it to the web as a webpage, get it translated, and then copy and paste. The rest is just programming where the subtitles go.

Thankfully I know a bit of Spanish so I was able to spot some problem cases. The text is simplified as much as possible. For example, rather than "Leaderboard" I wrote "The Winners", and rather than "Achievements" I wrote "Trophies". There are still some problem cases (like I used "mine" instead of "landmine" so it creates some hilarious sentences for the achievement), but it's good enough.

5 comments:

levelofdetail said...

Nice!

Keeping Pace said...

Brandon showed me the Beta last night with the changes you made over the weekend. I think you've got a really great game here, Elliot! I look forward to playing it once you launch it!

Casey said...

Forsaken Archer!?

Elliot said...

Thanks for the support Kendra.

Haha Casey. Don't get me started! I haven't played since February!

Casey said...

But is obviously on your mind! Haha. Game looks great Elliot. I'm super impressed.