Vapourware ZTranslate - a universal game translation tool

[rusty_shackleford]

https://ztranslate.net/

How it works
ZTranslate translates games based on screen grabs on the user's machine, in either package mode, or automatic mode. In automatic mode, when the user presses the tilde key (~) the client grabs a screenshot of the current window in focus, sends the image to the ZTranslate server, and then waits to recieve the translated image back to display in ZTranslate window. The server does this by doing a generalized OCR algorithm, and then using machine translation to translate the OCRed text to the target language (both via google apis).

These two actions can be slow and inaccurate, so the image sent to the server is saved, where the user can modify and improve the translation, and eventually release a packaged translation. In package mode, a user loads a pre-made package, and then the client will continuously grab the window in focus and translate the image based on the package. This mode runs much faster than automatic mode (allowing continous grabbing), doesn't require making calls to the server, and uses a currated human translation instead of a machine one. Packages themselves can be made public for other users to download from the downloads page on this site, or they can just distribute it themselves whichever way they want.

Creating a package for a game yourself first starts with the sourcing step, where you grab images from the game while in automatic mode in the ZTranslate client. After that, you create a game page for the game, move the images you sourced from the (uncategorized) game to the new game page, create the index definitions, and fix the translations. When you're done, set the game to be public on the edit game page, or download the package to distribute it yourself.

Has anyone used this? Experiences?

 

[flyingjohn]

Machine translation problems:
-Story/dialogue will not make sense
-Menus should be learned because you can apply it universally to other games.
-Will cost you money in the long run

If you want to try a game in a different language i guess they can be worth a try.

 

[deuxhero]

Wonderbar already solves the issue of trying to reimplement translated text, so I'm not sure what the point of this is.

 

[deama]

Ross used it in his the cave world game dungeon:

 

[Rincewind]

It would be quite useful if it works. There's a few text adventures in non-English languages that I would like to play someday, e.g. Die Drachen von Laas, an RPG/text-adventure hybrid from the authors of the Realms of Arkania series. My German is a bit rusty so this would definitely help -- easier than typing in the text or words into Google translate.

 

[Morpheus Kitami]

It would be quite useful if it works. There's a few text adventures in non-English languages that I would like to play someday, e.g. Die Drachen von Laas, an RPG/text-adventure hybrid from the authors of the Realms of Arkania series. My German is a bit rusty so this would definitely help -- easier than typing in the text or words into Google translate.

It does as long as you have it on a SSD, since it works too slowly on a regular HD. I would say its not wise to play a text adventure, but it does run in two windows, the game itself and a window with the translated text. You'd still need to learn the verbs yourself. Might also be tricky with nouns if its one of those games that hides them. It does happen, and in games you don't fully understand, its gamestopping.

 

[Rincewind]

It would be quite useful if it works. There's a few text adventures in non-English languages that I would like to play someday, e.g. Die Drachen von Laas, an RPG/text-adventure hybrid from the authors of the Realms of Arkania series. My German is a bit rusty so this would definitely help -- easier than typing in the text or words into Google translate.

It does as long as you have it on a SSD, since it works too slowly on a regular HD. I would say its not wise to play a text adventure, but it does run in two windows, the game itself and a window with the translated text. You'd still need to learn the verbs yourself. Might also be tricky with nouns if its one of those games that hides them. It does happen, and in games you don't fully understand, its gamestopping.

Yeah, I'd really like to play some of those German-only text adventures, but I don't feel like brushing up on my German... This is the basic conflict I am facing.