Translation of Realia and Irrealia in Game Localization

<p>This book explores the impact of a video game’s degree of realism or fictionality on its linguistic dimensions investigating the challenges and strategies for translating <i>realia </i>and <i>irrealia</i> the interface of the real world and the game world where culture-specificity manifests itself. </p><p>The volume outlines the key elements in the translation of video games such as textual non-linearity multitextuality and playability and introduces the theoretical framework used to determine a game’s respective degree of realism or fictionality. Pettini applies an interdisciplinary approach drawing on video game research and Descriptive Translation Studies to the linguistic and translational analysis of in-game dialogs in English-Italian and English-Spanish language pairs from a corpus of three war video games. This approach allows for an in-depth look at the localization challenges posed by the varying degree of realism and fictionality across video games and the different strategies translators employ in response to these challenges. A final chapter offers a comparative analysis of the three games and subsequently avenues for further research on the role of culture-specificity in game localization.</p><p>This book is key reading for students and scholars interested in game localization audiovisual translation studies and video game research.</p>