Clarification on Foreign Languages

[Emandir]

Dipsy a écrit :

excuse moi

Ne t'excuse pas !
In fact, I find it's kinda funny!
Well, I actually said it's hell, but I meant in the game (like it would be in real life), the only difference is that it's a bit hard to show what you mean with signs


Wouter_Broekhuizen a écrit :

I had a long time ago a dutch character already in the French area but they where very hostile to me. I get killed in 2 days and didn't no the reason!

My first French character has also been attact without reason as soon as he tried to speak to the man in his twenties that already were in the location in which he appeared!
I knew Frenchmen were racists, but not that much !

Jean-Luc

[Kiddycat]

in the german area we meet with spanish speaking people all the time and some of them really don't understand a word english, and even though i don't speek spanish (except for hello and how are you...)
we kind of got along because there were other people around who could speak both languages, so we helped each other...

[The Hunter]

Ummm... Yeah, right. And how about Fernando Draco fellow in Kish? Started talking in Spanish abt how he'd subjugate all german speakers and conquer the german part of the island? Ingame none of us understoood the guy, so we didn't attack him untill he attacked us. I don't really speak spanish (Much), but enough to understand what he said.

Oh, was he de F. Draco who's name appears on many of the maps lying around?

[Revanael]

There was a french character who appeared in one of the english areas a day or two ago (I cant remember where). My character didn't understand what he was saying (Im no french expert, but it sounded like asking us for help with the game! very odd...). Another character there did, apparently. Didnt like that much.

[Pirog]

If you meet a non-English speaking Cantrian, is it allowed to write the hand gestures, emotions and such things in English?

(The things you put in between * and * )

[Jos Elkink]

Well, yes, if you know the other can read it ...

There are no really fixed rules - it is just that it will never work if people start mixing up all languages. And you should always keep in mind that those language areas are there so that people who do not know English, can still play. So you might scare away people.

I did it, for example, when my Dutch character met an English guy. I refused to understand him and replied in Dutch, but I did make gestures in English. But of course, I knew he spoke English ...

[Jos Elkink]

Well, I say 'no fixed rules', but start a character in one language area and just simply play in English is definitely not allowed, of course ... The Russian area is abused in that way, and I don't like it. If you start a character in a certain language group, you *have to* speak that language, and use it in notes, and building names, etc. etc. But if you meet someone of another language group, there are not really fixed rules.

From a roleplaying perspective, it is of course much more fun to use gestures, translators, etc

[rklenseth]

That is why I think emotes would be a good idea.

Perhaps allow everything to have the ability to be pointed at. So someone can say "carrot" and point to a carrot and the other language person would be seeing carrot being pointed and should be able to pick up what is being done.

Also, allow for simple emotes like nod head, shake head, jump, laugh, etc...

And the freestyle emotes could also attach a translator to it so it translates into other languages for other different language people. Something might be able to be programmed someday for Cantr 2.0.

[viktor]

i just thought it would be useful to point out what is on the first page of cantr before you even get to the login page, i copied and pasted this directly from there

" Although some experience in a language is needed before one can play in that language group, the game can be used very well to practice your language skills in a second language. Just play one or two characters in a non-native language and you`ll be surrounded by people talking the language you are learning. Or you can play a character and so once in a while take a step back and observe what kind of societies you see forming, which can be very educational.

Note that we are in the process of translating the website in different languages. If you use the website in a language other than English, you will still most likely encounter a lot of English."

one of my english characters encountered a frenchman who spoke only in french so i responded to him, other characters asked me in "OOC" how my character knew french so i said in "OOC" that since we do not have formal education teaching us english then there's no reason for us not to know other languages from "birth"
besides if nobody around can speak french to the french guy, how is he to learn english?

so in essence i think it's to regularily speak the area language for what area you are in but for the sake of communication to other people it isn't a restriction, especially if they sailed in or created a character to learn english but don't know it.

[rklenseth]

Ever see 'Dances with Wolves'? It has been told that if you speak another language and suddenly go into another society that doesn't speak it. Eventually you learn it without learning it. You just realize you suddenly understand what the people around you are saying.

[viktor]

it's different though if it's a bunch of typed words on a screen, you cannot hear people's tone of voice, see thier expression and hand gestures as well as other body language, which are all very important when larning another language if ur just tossed into a group of people speaking a language you don't know a word of.

[rklenseth]

That is why I am trying to get emotes added in.

[Revanael]

I take it, Viktor, you were the person who answered the frenchman in my post above?

[viktor]

I take it, Viktor, you were the person who answered the frenchman in my post above?

alas you now know one of my characters and i know one of yours, i can't remember if i actually had gotten your name though to recognize you lol

i was going to do an OCC to the french guy to talk to him but he had left (as you told me after i started rambling in french)

another thing i thought of today to consider.... in any society at any time in any language group, a person or group of people can "create" thier own language/code by which no other person can understand them. as with secret societies or millitary or anyone else for that matter hence making me feel secure that i can speak any language if it is at least for the sake of communication with someone who stumbled into the wrong server.
if different languages exist on the same world but different islands then it is inevitable that all language groups will eventually meet and intermingle and we will have for the most part a bit of every language show up on every continent through people moving from one island to another. the part about speaking predominantly english on the english spawning grounds is simply to have a mutual language by which to communicate with everyone else there, not to restrict us to english. as is with the real world. be it that my characters were just born with no education, they are just as likely to know any other language as they know english since english was never taught to them either.
blah blah, can i yammer on saying the same things for another paragraph

oh i should also note that i am from canada so it can be expected i'd know both english and french, i know a little bit of german too.

pps. i just thought of the players being the "god/godess" of thier own set of characters means that thier language skills are derived from us , thier "gods/godesses"

[rklenseth]

I take it, Viktor, you were the person who answered the frenchman in my post above?

alas you now know one of my characters and i know one of yours, i can't remember if i actually had gotten your name though to recognize you lol

i was going to do an OCC to the french guy to talk to him but he had left (as you told me after i started rambling in french)

another thing i thought of today to consider.... in any society at any time in any language group, a person or group of people can "create" thier own language/code by which no other person can understand them. as with secret societies or millitary or anyone else for that matter hence making me feel secure that i can speak any language if it is at least for the sake of communication with someone who stumbled into the wrong server.
if different languages exist on the same world but different islands then it is inevitable that all language groups will eventually meet and intermingle and we will have for the most part a bit of every language show up on every continent through people moving from one island to another. the part about speaking predominantly english on the english spawning grounds is simply to have a mutual language by which to communicate with everyone else there, not to restrict us to english. as is with the real world. be it that my characters were just born with no education, they are just as likely to know any other language as they know english since english was never taught to them either.
blah blah, can i yammer on saying the same things for another paragraph

oh i should also note that i am from canada so it can be expected i'd know both english and french, i know a little bit of german too.

pps. i just thought of the players being the "god/godess" of thier own set of characters means that thier language skills are derived from us , thier "gods/godesses"

First off, all languages are on the same server and are suppose to meet.

Second off, your character shouldn't really suddenly understand another language even if you as a player understand it. Try role playing learning the language. At least don't suddenly pick it up. The point is to simulate encounters between groups of people that do not understand each other like what must have happened in ancient times. So if a group of French speaking people happen upon English speaking people they shouldn't suddenly understand each other and instead try to role play it out by teaching each other or their are many other ways for this to work out.
This could someday lead to actual translators between different language societies in game.

Third off, creating another language in game is fine. Using a secret language for a group of people is okay and has been done before in many places. Just be careful not use an language that has its own area like French, Dutch etc... and use a language that hasn't been used somewhere else in Cantr already like Drow or Tolkein's Elven and I believe another area has already used Klingon as well. I would like to see an actual language created froms scratch in Cantr. I imagine that would be fun and interesting to see how it evolves throughout its history.

And fourth off, from my knowledge there has actually been very little real contact between different langauge groups espcially among the English areas (if any) so since English is the only known language other than made up ones then your character currently spawned in an English area should know only English and must learn to understand and speak another language either from another English speaking person that has been taught or an actual foreign speaking person. Then and only then should they know the language. It will be hard to role play but it would be possible.

In time, as more and more contact between different languages occur then the languages might become more well known and intermingled and common forms of communication are set up like how French was the international language for Europe and any part of the world that Europe touched during the Middle Ages and how English is the international language used to today. But that is many, many years down the road.