Obviously, this full version of proposal is too long due to my indecent English writing skills.
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We'll be following basic romanization and spacing rules from the national standard Basic Rules of the Chinese Phonetic Alphabet Orthography, GB/T 16159-2012.
The original document is available here (Chinese). Wikipedia has also transcribed and translated the spacing rules here (English) for easier understanding.
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Tones will be ignored.
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Umlaut
ü, will be kept however (*1), because we still have them in redump.org.
...Or maybe extend that to everything, I'm not sure.
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Step 1: Romanize everything that's either a title or subtitle regardlessly, because we'll record (almost) everything anyway;
If they do not need romanization, that's good for you. But still, take a note of everything.
Information to be gathered:
- Original title(s) & subtitle(s) (non-Roman / Latin, if exists);
- Official title(s) & subtitle(s) in another language (Romanized, if exists, commonly seen in Asian releases);
- Parent / clone info (if exported / imported / re-released);
- Any other alt titles that tries to ruin your day.
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Step 2: Check the language and release type, pick a title for
Title (Latin)(*1):-
For imported / exported release, use the in-game title to rule out everything else;
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If it's a domestic game without an official Latin / Germanic title, pick an appropriate Latin main title Romanized from the language of that region;
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If it's a domestic game with an official Latin / Germanic title:
- If the official Latin / Germanic title is phonetically the same as its non-Latin title, choose the official Latin / Germanic title as the submission's Latin main title;
- Else, Romanize the non-Latin title(s) and pick one.
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If it's a re-released game with a different name, use the in-game title to do decisions.
Unaltered in-game title, unless special conditions, means a new edition, not a new game. However please stay cautious, because once in a while, it's the other way around!
Do include the subtitle if necessary (e.g. visible on the box / disc), even if it's not in the game - as long as it doesn't bring extra conflicts, it should be kept for better keyword matching.
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Step 3: Formatting
Title (Latin)field;"Non-Latin title" field will not, and should not be affected, feel free to keep any stylized stuffs and Asian exotic charms there.
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Hyphens
-, tildes~/ wave dashes～and any other marks that are meant for a subtitle will be converted to colons in main Latin titles;Examples:
Ever17 -the out of infinity-->Ever17: the out of infinityFengse Huanxiang 2 ~aLIVE~->Fengse Huanxiang 2: aLIVE -
Any non-Latin special marks that sits in the middle of two words, acting like a space will be converted to spaces. Latin marks are not affected;
Examples:
ノーモア★ヒーローズ->No More Heroesオシャレ魔女♥ラブandベリー->Oshare Majo Love and BerrySteins;Gate->Steins;Gate(no conversion) -
Any non-Latin special marks that combines multiple syllables into one word will be converted into hyphens.
Example:
キラ☆キラ->Kira-kira
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Step 4: Drop every other title(s) and parent / clone info in the comments or as a separated field.
I'm still not sure if we can use separate fields for complicated titles, and I'm even less sure about the parent / clone function on redump.org.
But if we're going to do it by the tables, we'll be needing the following fields:
- Official Latin Alt-title (if not preferred as main title);
- Disc Title - non-Latin (if disc title needs to be Romanized);
- Title - Literal translation (if non-Latin title is chosen, not necessary);
- Disc Title - Literal translation (if non-Latin disc title exists, not necessary);
- Parent (if imported), Clone (if re-released), Child (not necessary?) - already implemented, need more utilization.
Alternatively, comments will do.
Either way, I'd like to propose the implementation of "Edition / Release (Non-Latin)" field if possible, especially for Asian re-releases and bundles.
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Duct-tape solution. Not the best we can have, but it works when it works, and requires minimal commits.
- If an edition / release name is not within the common options, leave the identification of the edition / release in the comments;
- Alternatively, comment these information with a bracket, or preferably, implement an "Edition / Release Type" field.
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This is not a preferable option because it will take too much manpower to implement and do all those corrections. But I'll leave it here anyway for discussion.
- Implement a new "Edition / release Type" field, consisting of:
Original, Limited, Re-Release, Demo, Promo, Press, Budget, Tools, Extra- Re-design "Common Editions / Releases" options into:
Shokai Genteiban, Genteiban, Shokaiban, Cosmi, Green Pepper, SoftKey, Sold Out Extreme, Sold Out Software, White Lable, Xplosivwith possible additions- Re-name "Other editions / releases" field into "Edition / Release Name".
- Discuss and reach an agreement on Pinyin implementation, CJK games naming standard, and (optionally) edition / release classification;
- Start implementing proper word partitioning in Pinyin on redump.org;
- Rechecking, and renaming all existing Chinese titles with proper titles;
- Fix Chinese titles in the WIP queue the same way;
- Collect suggestions and inputs on similar issues with Japanese and Korean, for we don't have Romanization standards for both languages and it's a concern for many people.
*1 This is open to debate. If we decide to give up umlauts in German, Chinese will do it with v instead. Otherwise, we can keep it.
*2 A side-note for checking game languages: do not simply decide the language by game title only! For example, there are plenty of Asian games that has an English title with everything else in its own language!