League of Legends... in Arabic?

Cydralph··5 votes·1,509 views

Hello!

I was looking for a"suggestion box" to send this to but as I understand from the forums, posting it here would be the best option available.

I was thinking about adding Arabic as one of the playable languages to the game. There is a reasonably large Arabic-speaking player base enough to make it a good idea. Understandably though, it would take so much work and effort to translate everything to Arabic, but since the game has already been translated to so many languages already, it wouldn't be that difficult with so many experienced people who've already done it many times before.

I am both a professional English and Arabic language teacher and I think it's pretty doable given the company's desire to do so.

Do you guys think it's a good idea? Would riot be interested in such a thing? Azir

Edit 1: I agree, it would take so much time and effort, but with the availability of online language experts, it wouldn't be as difficult as say a few years ago. There are so many language professionals that you can find online on websites like italki, Memrise, Duolingo and many others that are accredited and would be willing to work for such a project. However, this is not to say that it is worth it or not. I am aware of the fact that Riot is a company and companies operate on the basis of what brings income.

15 Comments

letsfeedtogether2 votes

i think its not a good idea because there are a lot more things that need to be added and changed before such a small change.

Arcade Lulu2 votes

Not gonna happen Not worth it

SEKAI1 votes

[{quoted}](name=Arcade Lulu,realm=EUNE,application-id=3ErqAdtq,discussion-id=NEiE8uqE,comment-id=0001,timestamp=2019-05-19T15:54:05.983+0000)

Not gonna happen Not worth it

If they have the time and energy to translate the game into every obscure language possible for their EUW/EUNE release (there are not 2 or 3 or 4 languages in just these 2 servers, but TEN LANGUAGES translated in just TWO SERVERS), then they have the time to translate for one of the most used language used in the world such as Arabic (currently the 5th most used in the entire world by population).

It's totally worth it. It's just Riot doesn't give a shit about Arabic.

ZephyrDrake1 votes

{quoted}

If they have the time and energy to translate the game into every obscure language possible for their EUW/EUNE release (there are not 2 or 3 or 4 languages in just these 2 servers, but TEN LANGUAGES translated in just TWO SERVERS), then they have the time to translate for one of the most used language used in the world such as Arabic (currently the 5th most used in the entire world by population).

It's totally worth it. It's just Riot doesn't give a shit about Arabic.

considering that most games don't give a shit about Arabic and would literally translate games into every other language before Arabic should tell you how important the language is as a whole

SEKAI1 votes

{quoted}

considering that most games don't give a shit about Arabic and would literally translate games into every other language before Arabic should tell you how important the language is as a whole

More like Riot's priorities, than the language's actual importance.

The game is translated into say, Japanese and given their own server despite the utter obscurity of the language in the global scale (only officially used in a single nation, and it's not even the actual official language of the nation but a de facto one) and the utter nonexistent playerbase.

Meanwhile the game has no Arabic translation nor a Middle Eastern or African server despite the completely untapped market and the fact the said language is an official language in at least 20 nations and minority language in many others, constituting its status as the 5th most used language in the entire world.

And don't give me the "but no one would play League in all of Middle East or Africa" because I'm sure as hell ANY server would net more people than Japan, a nation that doesn't even use PC for gaming (certainly unlike say Middle East who has a historic record of PC gaming and pirating, and they only pirate games so much because there's no distributor at all so pirating is often the ONLY way they can get any games to play; you know, it probably might have something to do with of all the fucking sanctions whenever their governments literally does anything that's not funneling oil and money into western nations?), if it were to be allowed to exist. If they can put a server in Japan, they can afford to put at least one somewhere in Middle East and Africa. Clearly, finances and resources isn't a problem for Riot in this regard.

It's completely ignored because of some unspeakable agenda and shitty ass politics and that's about it.

ZephyrDrake2 votes

{quoted}

More like Riot's priorities, than the language's actual importance.

The game is translated into say, Japanese and given their own server despite the utter obscurity of the language in the global scale (only officially used in a single nation, and it's not even the actual official language of the nation but a de facto one) and the utter nonexistent playerbase.

Meanwhile the game has no Arabic translation nor a Middle Eastern or African server despite the completely untapped market and the fact the said language is an official language in at least 20 nations and minority language in many others, constituting its status as the 5th most used language in the entire world.

And don't give me the "but no one would play League in all of Middle East or Africa" because I'm sure as hell ANY server would net more people than Japan, a nation that doesn't even use PC for gaming (certainly unlike say Middle East who has a historic record of PC gaming and pirating, and they only pirate games so much because there's no distributor at all so pirating is often the ONLY way they can get any games to play; you know, it probably might have something to do with of all the fucking sanctions whenever their governments literally does anything that's not funneling oil and money into western nations?), if it were to be allowed to exist. If they can put a server in Japan, they can afford to put at least one somewhere in Middle East and Africa. Clearly, finances and resources isn't a problem for Riot in this regard.

It's completely ignored because of some unspeakable agenda and shitty ass politics and that's about it.

love how you made this gigantic post that said absolutely nothing. How many games have been translated to Arabic vs Chinese, Japanese... hell I have seen more games translated to Italian and Portuguese than Arabic. The Arabic language as a whole isn't as important as you think it is. This is not "shitty ass politics" this is something that has been going on since forever. Maybe Riot should translate it but obviously it's not high priority so it won't happen anytime soon. Love how you try to undermine Japan like that is going to achieve anything.

SEKAI1 votes

{quoted}

love how you made this gigantic post that said absolutely nothing. How many games have been translated to Arabic vs Chinese, Japanese... hell I have seen more games translated to Italian and Portuguese than Arabic. The Arabic language as a whole isn't as important as you think it is. This is not "shitty ass politics" this is something that has been going on since forever. Maybe Riot should translate it but obviously it's not high priority so it won't happen anytime soon. Love how you try to undermine Japan like that is going to achieve anything.

How does that post say "absolutely nothing"? More like you read absolutely nothing of the post than the post itself simply containing nothing. Don't worry, this is I guess like a common element around here so I hope this time you stick around for long enough to find out more.

I thought I made it EXTREMELY clear why I brought up Japan. Maybe if you'd actually read ANY PART of the post, you'd see that. Japanese server is only for Japanese playerbase: which is non-existent and we all know that, and their language is only used officially in a single nation so it's not like the server was ever meant for other surrounding nations. This means, AND AS I'VE ALREADY SAID, whether a language or a server is actually relevant or not is obviously not an issue with Riot since they can quite literally throw money at nothing as long as they want to as seen in JP server/translation.

Ultimately, it isn't about whether the language is "irrelevant", because I'm sure as fuck a language used officially (not to mention unofficially) in far more nations than Japanese ever was is not as sign that the language is less relevant. And EVEN IF IT IS, if Riot can translate the game and dedicate a server to a single nation where barely anyone plays it, there is 0 reasons to assume Arabic couldn't even clear that bar when it has far more countries and people using it. It's incredibly obvious that it's other factors at work, and no amount of your boldface denial and playing the willful ignorant is going to change that.

The problem is simple, as I've ALSO ALREADY EXPLAINED: People don't give a shit about Middle East and African nations that use these languages and NOT somehow because the language is not "relevant enough", is for various political reasons including but not limited to, the countless utterly bullshit sanctions placed prohibiting anyone doing business in those regions.

This is me quite literally paraphrasing the post I wrote that you replied to claiming to have read and found no content. Don't come back and ask me to paraphrase it for you again, with whatever some bullshit reason you can just pull out of your ass.

SEKAI1 votes

I figured I'd use a new reply, in case you bitch about the post that you completely ignored to read but claiming to have no content which then I go out of my way to kindly reiterate for you, to be a supposed "gigantic post that said absolutely nothing" yet again. But then again, it's probably just what you're going to do but whatever.

{quoted}

love how you made this gigantic post that said absolutely nothing. How many games have been translated to Arabic vs Chinese, Japanese... hell I have seen more games translated to Italian and Portuguese than Arabic. The Arabic language as a whole isn't as important as you think it is. This is not "shitty ass politics" this is something that has been going on since forever. Maybe Riot should translate it but obviously it's not high priority so it won't happen anytime soon. Love how you try to undermine Japan like that is going to achieve anything.

Remember, this is almost identical to the Flat-Earther's argument to the IMMEASURABLE amount of both theoretical and outright evidence proving Earth being clearly a spheroid (oblate spheroid to be more exact) or at least approaching "round", whereby they go:

Le Meme:

  • "Evidence for Earth is round" and shows a picture of bunch of books.
  • "Knowing Earth is flat" and shows a closeup of someone's eyes, as if awaken and enlightened.

Seeing through the irony of this endeavour is key in discovering the absurdity of your last reply wherein you accuse someone's argument being bad by the virtue of explaining shit.

This is the same for your complete rationalisation approach to argument whereby you go "I don't see Arabic translation that often, must be the language itself isn't used all that much or all that relevant." Sound familiar? Because Flat-Earther is also well acquainted with this kind of "logic" where they often voice beliefs along the lines of "I don't see people go to Antarctica that often, must be the government doing shady cover-up jobs and that Antarctica is really a wall of ice that stretch infinitely" or "I don't see people go direct flight from Australia to South America, must be because flat-earth map is the 1 true map since on it the distance between Australia and South American is so far away. Wait, direct flight does actually exist? Nah, those are fake, they actually never take off." etc.

I may sound like bullshitting, but that's actual arguments used by Flat-Earthers. Especially the very last one, it's the one they say has the highest credibility.

#You are doing that very same stuff. Just let that sink in.

................ ................ ................

You can't use me explaining why your statement is bullshit to flip it around and say because I explain why you're saying bullshit and therefore I must be the bullshitter. See? The rationale you took doesn't seem to make sense when you spell it out now, does it?

Or at the very least, bother a little and show a single example why my post was supposedly complete void or something, which you didn't at all. For Christ's sake, you made the accusation, the burden of proof is on you! But ofc let's be real, you only wrote "gigantic post that said absolutely nothing" not as a legitimate good faith criticism nor challenge (given you clearly never read a single word of the god damn post or else I wouldn't need to paraphrase my reply in the form of a second reply), but simply to shut down a conversation by completely ignoring it, while crediting yourself some kinda victory by self-ascribing a position of power with mere virtue of you waving your baseless dismissal. How poetic.

Sure, you can claim your shallow """victory""" all you want with all the blanket dismissal and whatnot in the world. But whatever you claim, it isn't a win in reason.

Khaled Ferros1 votes

[{quoted}](name=Arcade Lulu,realm=EUNE,application-id=3ErqAdtq,discussion-id=NEiE8uqE,comment-id=0001,timestamp=2019-05-19T15:54:05.983+0000)

Not gonna happen Not worth it

well well well...

ZephyrDrake1 votes

if it was worth doing they would have done it already. You also severely underestimate how long translations in games actually take even in the most experienced of people also you have no idea how many people they even have available that would be able to translate into arab

loli fidler1 votes

[deleted]

Anchobi1 votes

arabic is not a race kid

[zombie-brand-facepalm]

Saezio1 votes

I mean, they have translated it to greek, so I don't see why not

hrooza dota 1 votes

i dont see why not either , even tho i would still stick to English i think it should be an option

SSmotzer1 votes

A few minor problems with putting Arabic in LoL is that American are pretty ignorant, and they will see it as bad. Another is that acknowledging the Arabic speaking player base is a stepping stone to invite the Arabic leaders to attempt to police the game.

Like remember when Riot tried to okay an Arabic tournament and because it was acknowledged by Riot the tournament ended up getting policed by government officials, causing every female champion to be outright banned. If Riot attempted to make the Arabic players welcome, they may end up getting the game banned in Arabic speaking countries.

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