Making an amateur translation of Kotor/Kotor 2?

[1Leonard]

Hey guys,

 

I've been playing both K1 and K2 since release. Lately my brother started playing them and I noticed that some parts of the games are pretty hard to understand for non-native English speakers (especially in K2). I was wondering if it would be possible for me to translate the subtitles of the English version into my native language (Dutch).

 

(I know this will be a huge project but I'm at least willing to give it a try if it's not impossible).

 

Would this be possible in theory? Is the scripting of the game tied to the language used in the dialog trees? Is there anything else I should really know?

 

Also would it be possible to make a K2 translation compatible with the TSLRCM (I'd need the blessings of the original creators of course.

 

Also, I have all the patience in the world for this project and am willing to learn, I'm just looking for another hobby, making a translation for these games which I love would be awesome.

 

Thanks in advance.

[JCarter426]

All the text in the game (and I believe for TSLRCM as well) is contained in the dialog.tlk file. Theoretically, you need only to edit the lines in this file... of which there are thousands. You can edit this file with TalkEd, which can be found on StarWarsKnights.com.

 

Other mods generally use .DLG files rather than edit the .TLK, but it's the same concept; you need only to edit the text; the editor for those is DLGEditor. And item descriptions are usually contained in the .UTI files; the editor for those is K-GFF. If you want to translate my toolbox, which contains various cheating and modding tools, you have my blessing.

 

I'm not familiar with the nuances of the Dutch language, so there might be other obstacles. I know the other language versions of the game have certain eccentricities which make them incompatible with most mods, but I believe a direct translation of the English version should avoid these problems.

[1Leonard]

All the text in the game (and I believe for TSLRCM as well) is contained in the dialog.tlk file. Theoretically, you need only to edit the lines in this file... of which there are thousands. You can edit this file with TalkEd, which can be found on StarWarsKnights.com.

 

Other mods generally use .DLG files rather than edit the .TLK, but it's the same concept; you need only to edit the text; the editor for those is DLGEditor. And item descriptions are usually contained in the .UTI files; the editor for those is K-GFF. If you want to translate my toolbox, which contains various cheating and modding tools, you have my blessing.

 

I'm not familiar with the nuances of the Dutch language, so there might be other obstacles. I know the other language versions of the game have certain eccentricities which make them incompatible with most mods, but I believe a direct translation of the English version should avoid these problems.

 

So if I understand correctly, if there are .dlg files in the override folder, I'd have to edit them as well?

 

Also, are the item descriptions contained in the .tlk file as well?

[JCarter426]

The DLG (dialogue) and UTI (item) files can either reference a line of the TLK or they can contain their own text. A clean installation of the game has everything reference the TLK, so that's the only thing you need to edit. TSLRCM may have UTI and DLG files, but that doesn't necessarily mean you'd have to edit them, as they might reference the TLK for all dialogue and item descriptions. in the dialogues it's easy to tell; if the line has a string reference (StrRef in DLGEditor) that's a positive number that means it references a line of the .TLK (e.g. in disciple.dlg, 119344 is the line "I have studied the holorecord of your trial. I am unsure what to make of it."). If the string reference is -1, on the other hand, that text is contained in that dialogue file alone. UTI files are similar, but there are different entries for the item name (LocalizedName) and description (DescIdentified). A similar concept applies for the UTC (character) files for the character names, but those are typically names rather than words in English apart from the usual "thug" or "soldier", so that's likely not as much of a priority.

 

Perhaps someone from the TSLRCM team can comment further, but I believe everything in it follows suit and references the TLK, rather than containing their own text. The entire point of this is to make translations easier, after all.

[1Leonard]

The DLG (dialogue) and UTI (item) files can either reference a line of the TLK or they can contain their own text. A clean installation of the game has everything reference the TLK, so that's the only thing you need to edit. TSLRCM may have UTI and DLG files, but that doesn't necessarily mean you'd have to edit them, as they might reference the TLK for all dialogue and item descriptions. in the dialogues it's easy to tell; if the line has a string reference (StrRef in DLGEditor) that's a positive number that means it references a line of the .TLK (e.g. in disciple.dlg, 119344 is the line "I have studied the holorecord of your trial. I am unsure what to make of it."). If the string reference is -1, on the other hand, that text is contained in that dialogue file alone. UTI files are similar, but there are different entries for the item name (LocalizedName) and description (DescIdentified). A similar concept applies for the UTC (character) files for the character names, but those are typically names rather than words in English apart from the usual "thug" or "soldier", so that's likely not as much of a priority.

 

Perhaps someone from the TSLRCM team can comment further, but I believe everything in it follows suit and references the TLK, rather than containing their own text. The entire point of this is to make translations easier, after all.

 

Thank you! This helps me a whole lot.

[Alexrd]

All the text in the game (and I believe for TSLRCM as well) is contained in the dialog.tlk file.

 

I assume that doesn't include the menus and UI, right?

[1Leonard]

I assume that doesn't include the menus and UI, right?

 

Actually, I already dug in, and it does!

[Alexrd]

Actually, I already dug in, and it does!

 

Nice.

[Fair Strides 2]

Thank you! This helps me a whole lot.

 

To help your burden a little bit, I made something once for a guy doing a Russian translation of KotOR 1:

 

TLK->Txt Converter

 

which will simply read the dialog.tlk file you select and extract everything to a .txt file, with some MANDATORY formatting added. There is also a utility to convert back to .tlk using the .txt, hence the mandatory formatting.

 

You will need three files as well (link below), in the same folder as the above link's files. Warning: If them in the same folder doesn't work, then follow the instructions in the link below:

 

http://deadlystream.com/forum/files/file/478-dll-files-for-fair-strides-tools/

 

WARNING: in the txt produced by the converter, it'll have some line about Language within the top 5 to 10 lines. It will most likely say English (whichever language KotOR was installed as). Since most mods that don't use the dialog.tlk file use an English local line, I'd keep the Language as "English" (minus quotes).