電玩遊戲中譯英策略分析—以《少女前線》為例

Abstract

自從電玩遊戲於1950年代問世至今，不僅硬體技術進步迅速，市面上的遊戲類型愈趨繁多的同時，遊戲產品也因為需進入全球不同國家的市場銷售，促成遊戲在地化產業的蓬勃發展，且近年來開發商為追求畫面品質與故事劇情，更是投入巨額資金進行開發，而在地化成也為開發商回收成本不可或缺的一環。此外，行動裝置的普及也使玩遊戲不再是家用主機及電腦的專利，然而卻鮮少有人對手機遊戲文本翻譯進行研究。因此，本研究將以筆者熱愛之手機遊戲《少女前線》中英文本為素材，套用功能學派及多位電玩翻譯研究學者的理論進行歸納，採用文本分析法探討其中譯英翻譯策略並分析背後原因。整體而言，分析發現《少女前線》為了能在螢幕尺寸較小的手機上呈現文本，譯入英文時常運用簡化策略，且影響了遊戲後期原文的撰寫策略，不僅如此，修正策略亦被廣泛應用來修正原文寫作失誤，避免英文版玩家遭遇理解困難，至於其他提及的翻譯決策及現象成因值得後續深入研究。Since the first video game was invented in the 1950s, both relevant hardware technologies and game genres have evolved considerably, leading directly to a boom in the localization industry due to the need to sell games on the global market. In recent years, enormous financial investments in pursuit of ultimate graphics quality and sophisticated narratives have become commonplace for game developers. The localization industry therefore plays an indispensable role in helping them recoup initial costs. In addition, thanks to the proliferation of mobile devices, gaming is no longer the domain of game consoles and personal computers. However, translation research regarding mobile game texts is very scarce. This thesis analyzes and categorizes the in-game English texts of Girls Frontline by applying both functional and video game translation theories. The analysis shows that a strategy of deduction is frequently used to display texts with limited sentence length on the mobile devices due to the relatively small screen size. In addition, to avoid difficult-to-understand English, a strategy of revision is widely used to correct errors in the source texts. Other findings mentioned in this analysis are considered potential topics for further research.