Localization Project

This page aims to collect translations of common roguelike messages to other languages. Using this information author can (crudely) enable localization support for his/her game. It will not be perfect but probably sufficient for a good start.

Translation notes

French: Change “le” in the French messages below to “la” when referring to a grammatically feminine monster. French grammatical gender when referring to nonhumans varies by species rather than by individual gender. Either article shortens to l’ when used before a monster whose species name starts with a vowel. Note that if you’re building more complex messages using adjectives, the adjectives will also have to agree in the masculine or feminine form with the modified noun.

Also, if you have to guess the grammatical gender of a species, and you guess feminine when the species name ends in -a or -e and masculine otherwise, you’ll be right most of the time (but not always, alas) in French.

Polish: Nouns are modified by appropriate declension rules. Thus a “standard” message would be most likely wrong for randomly chosen game name.

Spanish: Verb conjugation, division into masculine and feminine sexes. Nouns have only one form for singular and one for plural, but there are articles for each person and number, both definite and indefinite:

Sg. M.	Sg. F.	Pl. M.	Pl. F.
un	una	unos	unas
el	la	los	las

German: Declension rules modify articles and verbs to determine case and many other things in a sentence. While the German is more complex than English in this regard, translating simple sentences is relatively straight-forward, with a little effort. I will give some of the rules here, and if you get these, then you should be able to translate simple sentences on your own. Granted, you could always use an online translator, but if you know the rules yourself, you can double check the results.

Articles (German has four forms of ‘the’) Nominative case | Accusative case | Dative case | Genitive case ——–|——–|——–|——– der (masculine) |den |dem |des die (feminine) |die |der |der das (neuter) |das |dem |des die (plural) |die |den |der

Every German word has a ‘the-word’ (one of four, including plural, indicated above under Nominative case) attached to it. The is important because whenever you have a noun (car, for example) there is always a ‘the-word’ (article) and the article is always spoken (unlike in English). There is little rhyme or reason which article goes with which noun and Germans just simply memorize them.

A quick word about cases. I listed the four cases (Nominative, Accusative, Dative, and Genitive) above. Nominative is used for the subject (I gave, for example I is the subject of the sentence). Accusative is used for the direct object (I gave the book, book being the direct object). Dative is used for a number of things (might be useful to look up Dative case in wikipedia for more information on its uses) but, for now, it simply indicates the indirect object (I gave the book to the editor, editor being the indirect object). Most simple sentences you construct will have one or all three of these cases in them. I will leave Genitive case for your own further study.

So, hopefully you understand articles. The next thing to learn is conjugation. Conjugation is simply learning how to modify verbs (verbs = action words) based on the preceding participant (I, you, he, she, it, we, you guys, they). Given a participant, you add the ending onto the verb. The endings are show below:

One last thing to learn before we can put all this together. Whenever you look up a word in a German dictionary, you are given the full word (infinitive). Hidden inside the infinitive is a stem (this is not a technical term), and we need to know how to get the stem so we can construct sentences. If you look up the word ‘to say’ in a German dictionary, you find ‘sagen’. German words, many times (every time? I can’t recall) have an ‘en’ ending on the verb. To find the stem, we remove the ‘en’ ending. So, the stem of ‘sagen’ is ‘sag’. Now, we simply put the ending on the stem. If I want to say ‘I say’ we construct it like this (participant stem+ending) to get (‘Ich sag+e ‘ or ‘Ich sage ‘). To say ‘you say’ we get ‘du sagst ‘. Do you see how the participant modifies the verb, now?

Now that’s all we need. Let’s start constructing some sentences!

So, we want to say ‘I hit the goblin’. The subject is I (German: ich). Hit is ‘schlagen’ and goblin is ‘der Kobold’ in German (remember the article? Just remember to always include the article for nouns). So, we have the subject and that’s the beginning part of the sentence ‘Ich’. Now, we add the verb and it’s ending (based on the participant) ‘Ich schlage’. Lastly, the goblin (der Kobold) is the direct object of the sentence. So, we change the ‘der’ to the accusative form (which is ‘den’, based on the first table above) and we add that to the sentence to get ‘Ich schlage den Kobold’. You just constructed your first sentence!

Also, a last word. All nouns in German are capitalized. Ich (I) is only capitalized at the beginning of the sentence (unlike I in English). Remember, when you check your translation with a translator, you will find exceptions. Don’t worry about them too much since they are probably aspects of the German language that are remote or old (for example, ‘you hit’ doesn’t translate to ‘du schlagst’ but ‘du schlägst’). As long as the basic form is right, then don’t worry about it. It’s good.

Messages

En: “Welcome to Neohack.”
Fr: “Bienvenue sur Neohack.”
Pl: “Witaj w Neohack.”
De: “Willkommen zu NeoHack.”
Es: “Bienvenido a Neohack.”(M), “Bienvenida a Neohack.”(F), “Bienvenid@ a Neohack.”(M+F)

En: “You hit the goblin.”
Fr: “Vous avez frappé le gobelin.”
Pl: “Trafiasz goblina.” [goblin: Acc.]
De: “Du schlägst den Goblin.”
Es: “Golpeas al duende.”

En: “You killed the goblin.”
Fr: “Vous avez tué le gobelin.”
Pl: “Zabiłeś goblina.” [goblin: Acc.]
De: “Du hast den Goblin getötet.”
Es: “Has matado al duende.”

En: “You cut the goblin’s head off!”
Fr: “Vous avez décapité le gobelin!”
Pl: “Odcinasz goblinowi głowę!” [goblin: Dat., głowa: Acc.]
De: “Du köpfst den Goblin!”
Es: “Decapitas al duende.”

En: “The goblin is slightly damaged.”
Fr: “Le gobelin est légèrement blessé.”
Pl: “Goblin jest lekko uszkodzony.” [goblin: Nom.]
De: “Der Goblin ist leicht verwundet.”
Es: “El duende está ligeramente dañado.”

En: “The goblin is badly damaged.”
Fr: “Le gobelin est gravement blessé.”
Pl: “Goblin jest ciężko uszkodzony.” [goblin: Nom.]
De: “Der Goblin ist schwer verwundet.”
Es: “El duende está gravemente dañado.”

En: “The goblin is wounded.”
Fr: “Le gobelin est blessé.”
Pl: “Goblin jest ranny.” [goblin: Nom.]
De: “Der Goblin ist verwundet.”
Es: “El duende está herido.”

En: “The goblin hits you.”
Fr: “Le gobelin vous frappe.”
Pl: “Goblin trafia cię.” [goblin: Nom.]
De: “Der Goblin schlägt dich.”
Es: “El duende te golpea.”

Table of monster names and grammatical genders

En:	Fr:	Pl:	De:	Es:
beholder	spectateur(M)	obserwator(M)	der Beobachter	el espectador
cyclops	cyclope(M)	cyklop(M)	der Zyklop	el cíclope
demon	demon(M)	demon(M)	der Dämon	el demonio
devil	diable(M)	diabeł(M)	der Teufel	el diablo
djinni	djinn(M)	dżinn(M)	der Dschinn	el genio
dopplegänger	double(M)	sobowtór(M)	der Doppelgänger	el dopplegänger
dragon	dragon(M)	smok(M)	der Drache	el dragón
efreet	éfrit(M)	ifryt(M)	der Ifrit	el ifrit
elemental	esprit élémentaire(M)	żywiołak(M)	das Elementar	el elemental
evil eye	oeil maléfique(M)	złe oko(N) [a bit ridiculous…]	?	el ojo maléfico
familiar	familier(M)	chowaniec(M)	der Vertraute	el familiar
gargoyle	gargouille(F)	gargulec(M), rzygacz(M)	die Gargoyle	la gárgola
gelatinous cube	cube gélatineux(M)	galaretowaty sześcian(M)	der Gelatinewürfel	el cubo gelatinoso
ghost	fantôme	duch(M)	der Geist	el fantasma
ghoul	goule(F)	ghul(M)	der Ghul	el ghul
giant	géant(M)	olbrzym(M), gigant(M)	der Gigant, der Riese	el gigante
goblin	gobelin(M)	goblin(M)	der Goblin	el duende
golem	golem(M)	golem(M)	der Golem	el golem
gorgon	gorgone(F)	gorgona(F)	die Gorgo	la gorgona
griffin or gryphon	griffon(M)	gryf(M)	der Greif	el grifo
hippogriff	hippogriffe(M)	hipogryf(M)	der Hippogryph	el hipogrifo
homunculus	homoncule(M)	homunkulus(M)	der Homunculus	el homúnculo
imp	lutin(M)	chochlik(M)	das Teufelchen	el diablillo
kobold	kobold(M)	kobold(M)	der Kobold	el kobold
lich	liche(F)	lisz(M)	der Lich	el liche
mummy	momie(F)	mumia(F)	die Mumie	la momia
ogre	ogre(M)	ogr(M)	der Oger	el ogro
orc	orque(M)	ork(M)	der Ork	el orco
quasit	?	?	der Quasit	?
shapeshifter	métamorphe(M)	zmiennokształtny(M)	der Formwandler	el cambiante
skeleton	squelette(M)	szkielet(M)	das Skelett	el esqueleto
spectre	spectre(M)	zjawa(F), widmo(N)	das Gespenst	el espectro
troll	troll(M)	trol(M)	der Troll	el trol
unicorn	licorne(F)	jednorożec(M)	das Einhorn	el unicornio
vampire	vampire(M)	wampir(M)	der Vampir	el vampiro
vortex	vortex(M)	wir(M)	der Vortex	el vórtice
wight	âme(F)	?	der Wicht	el alma(F) en pena *
wyvern	vouivre(F)	wiwerna(F)	der Lindwurm	el guiverno

[masculine article, but “alma” is actually feminine]

Table of race names and grammatical genders

En:	Fr:	Pl:	De:	Es:
dwarf	nain(M), naine(F)	krasnolud(M), krzat(M)	der Zwerg	el enano
elf	elfe(M)	elf(M)	der Elf	el elfo
gnome	gnome(M)	gnom(M)	der Kobold, der Gnom	el gnomo
half elf	demi-elfe(M)	półelf(M)	der Halbelf	el medio eelfo
halfling	halfelin(M)	niziołek(M)	der Halbling	el mediano
human	humain(M)	człowiek(M)	der Mensch	el hombre
tiefling	tieffelin(M)	diabelstwo(M)	der Tiefling	?

Table of profession names and grammatical genders

En:	Fr:	Pl:	De:	Es:
archer	archer(M)	łucznik(M)	der Bogenschütze	el arquero
assassin	assassin(M)	zabójca(M), skrytobójca(M)	der Assassine	el asesino
barbarian	barbare(M)	barbarzyńca(M)	der Barbar	el bárbaro
cleric	clerc(M)	kleryk(M)	der Kleriker	el clérigo
fighter	guerrier(M)	wojownik(M)	der Kämpfer, der Krieger	el guerrero
healer	guérisseur(M)	uzdrowiciel(M)	der Heiler	el curador
monk	moine(M)	mnich(M)	der Mönch	el monje
necromancer	nécromancien(M)	nekromanta(M), nigromanta(M)	der Totenbeschwörer, der Nekromant	el nigromante
priest	prêtre(M)	kapłan(M)	der Priester	el sacerdote
thief	voleur(M)	złodziej(M)	der Dieb	el ladrón
warlock	sorcier(M)	czarnoksiężnik(M)	der Hexenmeister	el hechicero
wizard	magicien(M)	czarodziej(M)	der Zauberer	el mago