Native Languages

[DavosSeaworth]

For immersions sake CA, please allow factions to speak in their own native languages, from cutscenes to the battlefield. I think the Civilization series has shown that audiences don't mind hearing the languages of non-English speaking factions. Hearing advisers and the like speak to me in Greek while I form up a the Makedonian phalanx for the final push in a battle would just be dreamy. Subtitles can be handled appropriately with the aid of a good UI. What say you community?

[Biggus Splenus]

Good job bringing this up, I agree.

I love listening to foreign languages. I hope it's an option to give units their native names too (if there wont be, I'm making a mod for it )

[DavosSeaworth]

Good job bringing this up, I agree.

I love listening to foreign languages. I hope it's an option to give units their native names too (if there wont be, I'm making a mod for it )

Assuming CA benevolently allows you to make that mod

[Wowwars]

As long as they add these "( and the unit name in english and subtitles i'll be fine

[IGdood]

For immersions sake CA, please allow factions to speak in their own native languages, from cutscenes to the battlefield. I think the Civilization series has shown that audiences don't mind hearing the languages of non-English speaking factions. Hearing advisers and the like speak to me in Greek while I form up a the Makedonian phalanx for the final push in a battle would just be dreamy. Subtitles can be handled appropriately with the aid of a good UI. What say you community?

I wholly agree with you, but there's a lot of people who are against us.

http://www.twcenter.net/forums/showthread.php?t=548249

The thread has already been made, but it got lost.

[Timefool]

Its going to be tough for them to find speakers of all the factions. I'm not sure anyone speaks the languages they spoke on the Steppes anymore, and if they do translating it from English will be tough.

[DavosSeaworth]

Its going to be tough for them to find speakers of all the factions. I'm not sure anyone speaks the languages they spoke on the Steppes anymore, and if they do translating it from English will be tough.

They have Dido of Carthage speaking Phoenician?



Attila



Even Boudicca



I gather they could use the same voice actors.

[rory o'kane]

They have Dido of Carthage speaking Phoenician?



Attila



Even Boudicca



I gather they could use the same voice actors.

Boudicca is speaking Welsh. I should know, I speak it fluently.
It's not quite Old Brythonic, but it's the closest extant relative.

[DavosSeaworth]

I presume a mod should delete this thread than?

[Biggus Splenus]

DAMN CA! Stop making your games harder to mod

[saxdude]

You realize of course that those languages are dead, and even greek has suffered great changes, right? That nobody speaks ancient germanic and gallic languages anymore right? That the languages spoken by the persians and Romans are long since dead, right?

[Biggus Splenus]

You realize of course that those languages are dead, and even greek has suffered great changes, right? That nobody speaks ancient germanic and gallic languages anymore right? That the languages spoken by the persians and Romans are long since dead, right?

I've course there are still people that speak these languages, and professionals that know what ancient greek literature was.

[IGdood]

They could always use some "Faux" Egyptian....like from Age of Mythology.

For some reason those words just stick in my head....I don't even know wh-ASSUMING DIRECT CONTROL

[Dan the Man]

They have Dido of Carthage speaking Phoenician?



Attila



Even Boudicca



I gather they could use the same voice actors.

Civ IV was pretty good with languages, but I've heard the Egyptian leader in Civ V apparently speaks modern Arabic. I haven't actually tried it yet myself, so I definitely could be wrong there. I wouldn't be surprised if Boudicca is just speaking modern Gaelic or Welsh and if Attila is speaking Mongolian. Really the thing about Civ is that its so long-reaching as far as time goes that it really does make sense to have people like the Celts speaking Celtic languages in their modern forms. This isn't the case for Rome.

They could always use some "Faux" Egyptian....like from Age of Mythology.

For some reason those words just stick in my head....I don't even know wh-ASSUMING DIRECT CONTROL

Wait, that was fake? I knew the Atlantean language had to be made up, but now I'm really disappointed. Oh well, the Egyptians in RTW times would probably be speaking Greek anyway. All the ones that matter to the game, that is.

All told, I think this wouldn't be quite as impossible as people are making it out to be. Ancient Greek is, afaik, still pretty well-documented. Latin would be pretty easy, as would Persian and Sanskrit if the map really goes as far as India. I think the only things you'd have some real trouble with would be Scythian, Gallic, Iberian, Old Germanic, all the other "barbarian" languages that weren't written down in contemporary times. Then again, didn't RS2 have settlement names written in Old Germanic? Even if not, I'm sure substitutions would be acceptable. Old Norse for Old Germanic (if they can do it for Age of Empires and Age of Mythology they can surely do it for Rome II), Gaelic/Welsh for Gallic, etc. The only idea here that I don't like is having advisers speak in native languages. Somebody who isn't a true history fan is going to get confused, absolutely hate it, then rave about it on some review site. CA is still a business and still has to pander to the lowest common denominator to stay afloat.

[Vaskill]

Civ IV was pretty good with languages, but I've heard the Egyptian leader in Civ V apparently speaks modern Arabic. I haven't actually tried it yet myself, so I definitely could be wrong there. I wouldn't be surprised if Boudicca is just speaking modern Gaelic or Welsh and if Attila is speaking Mongolian. Really the thing about Civ is that its so long-reaching as far as time goes that it really does make sense to have people like the Celts speaking Celtic languages in their modern forms. This isn't the case for Rome.

Wait, that was fake? I knew the Atlantean language had to be made up, but now I'm really disappointed. Oh well, the Egyptians in RTW times would probably be speaking Greek anyway. All the ones that matter to the game, that is.

All told, I think this wouldn't be quite as impossible as people are making it out to be. Ancient Greek is, afaik, still pretty well-documented. Latin would be pretty easy, as would Persian and Sanskrit if the map really goes as far as India. I think the only things you'd have some real trouble with would be Scythian, Gallic, Iberian, Old Germanic, all the other "barbarian" languages that weren't written down in contemporary times. Then again, didn't RS2 have settlement names written in Old Germanic? Even if not, I'm sure substitutions would be acceptable. Old Norse for Old Germanic (if they can do it for Age of Empires and Age of Mythology they can surely do it for Rome II), Gaelic/Welsh for Gallic, etc. The only idea here that I don't like is having advisers speak in native languages. Somebody who isn't a true history fan is going to get confused, absolutely hate it, then rave about it on some review site. CA is still a business and still has to pander to the lowest common denominator to stay afloat.

Old German is actually Old High German and people still speak it in areas around Germany so no substitutions from Old Norse, so save that for the Scandinavians which also spoke Old High German in certain areas "Northern Parts" As well as the Saxon language. Britons from Brittany still speak an ancient Celtic language so the Gauls could use that as well. I know nothing of what happened too Scythia or the Eastern European languages though. It like everything else evolved into modern Slavic Language? Possibility correct me if I'm wrong though as I am not sure.

[Dan the Man]

Old German is actually Old High German and people still speak it in areas around Germany so no substitutions from Old Norse, so save that for the Scandinavians which also spoke Old High German in certain areas "Northern Parts" As well as the Saxon language.

Perhaps I misspoke. What I actually meant is the Proto-Germanic language, the proposed reconstructed ancestor of all of the Germanic languages.

I know nothing of what happened too Scythia or the Eastern European languages though. It like everything else evolved into modern Slavic Language? Possibility correct me if I'm wrong though as I am not sure.

Scythian and Sarmatian are Iranian languages, so Slavic would be the wrong family. Scythians and Sarmatians are going to be a hard case. I'm sure there's probably some linguist out there who knows more about it than what I can gather from Wikipedia, but it'd probably be more than a little difficult for CA to find such a person.

[Vaskill]

Perhaps I misspoke. What I actually meant is the Proto-Germanic language, the proposed reconstructed ancestor of all of the Germanic languages.

Scythian and Sarmatian are Iranian languages, so Slavic would be the wrong family. Scythians and Sarmatians are going to be a hard case. I'm sure there's probably some linguist out there who knows more about it than what I can gather from Wikipedia, but it'd probably be more than a little difficult for CA to find such a person.

Ah, see you learn something new everyday, aye? Yes I agree, CA shouldn't worry about these things but it would be a nice addition for more "Realistic" commands but just looking for multiple linguists is an arduous task itself. But it can be done.

@ Dyeus Ah, okay, makes sense, looks like I'll need to head back too the history books.

[athanaric]

Scythian and Sarmatian are Iranian languages, so Slavic would be the wrong family. Scythians and Sarmatians are going to be a hard case. I'm sure there's probably some linguist out there who knows more about it than what I can gather from Wikipedia, but it'd probably be more than a little difficult for CA to find such a person.

Slavic is pretty close to the mark though, seeing as both groups are "Satem" IE languages. Scythian and Sarmatian languages are really hard to reconstruct though. Closest living relatives are Ossetic and Yaghnobi, and the former has changed a lot while the latter is only spoken by a handful of people.

Ossetic has its own presence on the internet, including Wikipedia, so I guess you could find some voice actors there. Still you shouldn't expect it to sound very much like its ancestors.

[Dyēus]

Old German is actually Old High German and people still speak it in areas around Germany so no substitutions from Old Norse, so save that for the Scandinavians which also spoke Old High German in certain areas "Northern Parts" As well as the Saxon language. Britons from Brittany still speak an ancient Celtic language so the Gauls could use that as well. I know nothing of what happened too Scythia or the Eastern European languages though. It like everything else evolved into modern Slavic Language? Possibility correct me if I'm wrong though as I am not sure.

No, Scandinavians never spoke Old High German. And Old High German is used for the period between 750 1050. And no one speaks it today, there are dialects which are more archaic or wholly other languages, like Frisian, but no one speaks Old High German.
Concerning the "real" Scythians and also Sarmartians, they spoke an Iranian language

Edit: Already beaten to it, maybe I should concentrate on one opened tab

[Delta146]

I'd be for this as long as CA doesn't put Italian in for the Romans or Modern Greek in the Greeks, or some other such thing. I know getting people to research and implement classical languages such as Classical Greek, Classical Latin, and the many, many other languages isn't something that's likely to happen, but still, if CA were to put in other languages, it would be disappointing for them to be a bunch of modern languages, even more so than just using English (or whatever language version you use.)

Edit: By the way, we actually do know a lot about Classical Latin and Greek, and a decent amount about some other languages of the time, so it's not impossible for such things to be done (EB managed to make a very good voicemod, after all.)