Technical Issue Translating MB2

[Sammy]

I've been trying to make a translation pack for MB2 (Dutch, Norwegian, Danish, Swedish, Icelandic) and I'm at a bit of a roadblock.

I've gone into the pack and seen the translation for the four languages which MB2 has translated, but since I'm a bit of a noob in editing the game, I'm unsure how to make my own PK3 that will offer new language choices -- I tried doing this and it resulted in my game breaking and needing a fresh install. I came here for this very reason, and I'd like to learn how to make the PK3 exist alongside the other languages, not overwrite it.

So, essentially, my question is how can I add new languages into the 'Language: Text' & 'Language: Voice' which are there with the French, German, Spanish, and English currently in there. Thank you in advance for your help.

 

[SneakDissing]

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you're going to go outside and rethink your life

 

[ent]

PK3s get loaded in alphabetical order and the last loaded content inside PK3s will override existing ones (exclusion .shader files).
So just make an extra PK3 named like zzzzzlanguages.pk3 and edit it however you want.

 

[Sammy]

PK3s get loaded in alphabetical order and the last loaded content inside PK3s will override existing ones (exclusion .shader files).
So just make an extra PK3 named like zzzzzlanguages.pk3 and edit it however you want.

How would I exactly get the files to overwrite though? I have no idea how to create new language packs nor get anything to start the process of overwriting in the first place. How would I get it to properly add new languages in the selection menu/ just get the files that will overwrite to be able to do so.

 

[ent]

Oh you want to add languages? Then you have to modify the engine and only people with that special engine will see that. Maybe engine is not enough.
So it's a hard work.
Or you want to add missing strings to the existing languages?

 

[hunGarry]

100% translation is not really achievable in the current state.
I tried translating and i got to a point where i translated every string in the language files but still many elements ingame would stay english.
You would have to edit some mod files which change with almost every update so you would have to translate them again and again...

 

[k4far]

@ent
How many hours of coding and looking through stuff would it take to simplify the process of translating? Making the translation a bit easier... to the point... we would just receive strings and send them back.

It would not be a problem to update this stuff regularly we have the eager people.

It is definitely not worth prioritizing over official releases stuff that is keeping this game alive (new maps, skins and fixes) tho. Introducing Movie Battles 2 to new languages would be just a nice surprise for many, but not something that would keep players in the game on it is own I think. Sounds like taunts will be in English anyway so myself I see no point of translating the interface to my native language.

 

[Puppytine]

Oh you want to add languages? Then you have to modify the engine and only people with that special engine will see that. Maybe engine is not enough.
So it's a hard work.

Yeah, but actually, I think replacing some of existing languages to a custom one should be enough, since I doubt there is a person who actually needs English, French, Spanish, German AND his additional language being available at same MBII installation.

How would I exactly get the files to overwrite though? I have no idea how to create new language packs nor get anything to start the process of overwriting in the first place. How would I get it to properly add new languages in the selection menu/ just get the files that will overwrite to be able to do so.

I guess you just need to grab all those *.str files from "Jedi Academy\GameData\MBII\MBAssets3.pk3\strings\Spanish" and translate everything that is in Spanish to a language you want, and then pack those modified files into "Jedi Academy\GameData\MBII\zzzzzMyCoolLanguage.pk3".
In fact, you don't even have to pack them into .pk3, placing them in directory "Jedi Academy\GameData\MBII\strings\Spanish" should work as well.

How many hours of coding and looking through stuff would it take to simplify the process of translating? Making the translation a bit easier, to the point we would receiv3 strings and send them back.

Translation of .str files is already simple enough, though I don't know how many strings are hardcoded into engine/MBII dlls, if any. Translating hardcoded sentences isn't easy at all, indeed.

But it seems that simplicity/complexity isn't the bigger problem anyway, cause I just took a look at all those files, the number of lines they have, and it's just too much work for anybody who spend his free time for a translation process. "That's no moon… it's a MBII lang strings".
Movie Battles is not commercial mod, people don't get any money for development, and amount of time and effort you need to spend to cover all translatable data seems overwhelming.

 

[Sammy]

I created the proper files, but whenever I try to save it doesn't save and goes back to the language it was before.. am I doing something wrong?

 

[Puppytine]

I try to save it doesn't save

Explain it.
Describe how you exactly saving it. Post screenshots.
Upload your pk3.

 

[ent]

@ent
How many hours of coding and looking through stuff would it take to simplify the process of translating? Making the translation a bit easier... to the point... we would just receive strings and send them back.

It would not be a problem to update this stuff regularly we have the eager people.

It is definitely not worth prioritizing over official releases stuff that is keeping this game alive (new maps, skins and fixes) tho. Introducing Movie Battles 2 to new languages would be just a nice surprise for many, but not something that would keep players in the game on it is own I think. Sounds like taunts will be in English anyway so myself I see no point of translating the interface to my native language.

Many hours.
Much effort - little gain.