Quebec working on deal for more games in French

"A spokesperson for the Quebec government said a deal is in the works for all games entering the province to be translated into French."

Sure, this can happen.. if they stopped bringing in non-French games; they can do this over night. On the other hand, this is another sign that video games are being taken more seriously as main stream entertainment in line with movies, music, etc.

Y porque no en español?

Es el segundo idioma mas hablado del mundo, despues del mandarin. Casi todo el continente americano habla español, y una parte de Europa tambien.

I want all games to have subtitles. Which are almost easier to localize anyway right?

YouhOU! a joystiq news from where im from !

as long as it doesnt delay games I couldn't care less, already play all my games in english and always throw away the french booklet they put in with the game when you buy it ! :)

Yeah, I suppose video games will get the props for distinction as an art form now, seeing how France is the central hub of fashion and art for the modern era...

Somebody smack me! =D

I live in the province of Quebec and I'm a French Canadian. I'm totally for this motion, however I wish it will not delay the release date of games for us. Personally, I prefer playing games in the original version (that is usually English, except some games from Ubisoft). But I think it will benefit kids who don't understand English well, at least before they learn it in school. I remember myself trying to understand what to do when I was playing Zelda on NES a long time ago. But on the other hand, it's when there is a need that you work harder to try to understand. By the way, please excuse me if my grammar isn’t totally correct :-)

I don't know how many times I'm gonna have to remind people of this...

Europe doesn't count.

hourra! vive le Québec!!

we only got french manual for all games. and for games are in french but all games will be nice. bu I hope it will be in the same disc as the english version.

So what this is saying is ... that the English Gamers In Quebec Will Suffer Due to the fact that Stores Will Import less English Games .. so store will be Stocked with less english games, and stores will go out of stock faster when New Games Come out .. thus having to make huge waiting List To get Those new games On the market ... not only will this Hurt English Gamers But French gamers ... who wants to be stuck on a waiting list for a game that came out a month ago... the game will eventuly Lose its Hype and people will be angry .... theres no fun in saying yeah i got the new Super Smash Bros. after 2 monthes of its releas. Does This Mean im going to need to start Buying my Games on E-bay from teh states at a Higher Price so i can actuly play the game when it comes out .... what will that do to Local game stores ... Like EBgames and Such ...

I live in montreal (thats in quebec for all those who don't know) and this scares me. It's not that I'm against having french games it's that if we start getting delayed releases I will flip out. This is QC's reaction to everything "Change it, our way is better" Which is complete bull.

This deal is probly more along the lines of "Let's yet agien fuck over the english and make sure the games here are ONLY in french!" [Insert French Laghting]

SONS OF BITCHES!

they BETTER mean that they will be offered in BOTH languages! All my french friends speak FLUENT english. they learned both fucking languages because this country is a two language standard. friggin french white trash government. this BETTER ONLY mean that they will get both languages (which im all for)but NOT only french games.

Wow must be tough to be english in quebec. I live in BC so I wouldn't know.

Gah! Forgot something important. Blame Canada! They're not even a real country anyway!

It was always fun going to Quebec and getting crap from people if you did't speak French. If you stop and ask for directions in English, they will often give you bad directions. (I know this having grown up near the Canadian border.)

The Quebec government is more concerned about preserving the French language than about its people. The Quebec government diverts money away from infrastructure and into language-preservation programs. As a result, the province is literally collapsing... a bridge in Laval collapsed last year killing 5 people, and trucks are banned from about 135 other bridges and overpasses because they are considered unsafe! I live in Ottawa (Ontario), and when I cross the river into Hull (Quebec), it's like crossing over to "the wrong side of the tracks"! The province is in a financial crisis, they can't afford to fix their infrastucture, but they somehow manage to fund all sorts of French-language cultural and arts programs! It's disgusting!

all i gotta say is that right behind that dudes is one of the most impressive sights in north america, into the river valley with the Chateau Frontenac seated on top of the city's ancient fort. What a friggin sight.

In response, I'd like to open voting on declaring the French language over aside from the word "pamplemousse".

Nothin' says cantaloupe like "pamplemousse"!

Or... you could just banish Quebec into the Twisting Nether and be done with it ; P

Nah, jk. Let's just keep French in France and force the Quebecois to speak Esperanza ;)

Great, as always the rest of Canada has to pay for stuff to be translated to French...

So like, real actual french or the Quebecois dialect? And if it's not in the quebecois' dialect, will the natives be restless? And if it is in the quebecois dialect...will anyone be able to fully understand it?

I'm from France and I don't care: just like for movies, I would like to play the videogame in its original language but with subtitles.

So if a videogame is in French, so be it. But if it was originally made in English, I'd rather get the English version.

Wow, so much racism in this thread(oh and yeah that's what it's called).

It isn't tough being english in Quebec (or anglophone as they call us here) and yeah it only make perfect sense to have games in the official language of the province if said language is already available for other countries in the world. As for the delays, I guess it is possible but I still doubt it. And as far as I know, it will still be possible to pre-order games online from amazon.ca and bunch of other sites in the worst case scenario.

Face the fact, Quebec is a French speaking province where it is really easy for english speaking people to go by since the province is surrounded by english provinces and states and where a lot of people are bilingual. It really isn't hard to adapt, so stop complaining and lying about all kinds of shit.

Thats great, I always found intruiging that games came with a french manual even though there was no way to play in French. French Manual in FFX wasn't all that usefull.

at least nowadays you can buy a game from France if you want to play in french.

I usually do not post comments on threads like this but this particular story really got my attention since I live in Quebec, and seen a lot of racism in the comments posted here.

First, Dave Silva tells that the Québec government request was made "Because people from Quebec are whiners who demand everything be in French because they're special." No. It made an agreement with the major software companies because Québec is a French speaking province, simply.

Wouldn't you do the same thing if, say, you lived in Mexico and couldn't play games in spanish although a spanish version was available in Spain ? This is what the agreement is about. Games that are available in french elsewere (ie. France), will be made available in Québec, so it will mostly be multilangue games like on the DS, as most major soft companies are already going toward multilanguage software/game packages.

To Realgambler, saying that "this is tax money being wasted" : You should read the 2 paragraph news text more carefully, as it says that the tab will be picked by the software companies. It doesn't bring a lot of pressure on the game developers since it only implies that game already translated for french markets will be distributed here. And since games in France are becoming more and more multilingual, I don't see any problem here. No english gamers will be stuck with a french version. Aren't you familiar with online shopping anyway ?

To Onimaster, saying that this is damaging English gamers in Quebec, and that you will have to buy your games from the States : Did you ever think about the 80% of french speaking kids who can't play games because they don't understand english ? Isn't it damaging, since Quebec has French as its official language ? Also, the law is for Quebec only, the games will most probably be multilingual, and you can always order from futureshop.ca, they are canadawide, so they will have both versions.

To Glostix, Raphael, Lucky and arch with their "assimilate or leave" attitude in Quebec : This is pure BS, and plan racism. Quebec is the only french speaking part of North America, isn't it normal to try to protect the culture and language ? You can go to english school, you can be served politely in english almost anywhere in big cities... and you speak about "assimilate or leave" ? They don't want to cut english off, they want the damn games that are ALREADY available in french to be distributed in Quebec ! Why do most english-speaking people living in Montreal always bash on the Quebec government as soon as it's possible, without any real cause ?

To Attila : Stupid people are everywhere. You can be certain that if en english-speaking person asks me for directions, I will do my best to direct him well. The reality is that some people here don't master english. If I go up to your neigbourhood in Canada or in USA and ask you directions in french, will you be able to anwser me ? Some people might also find that offensive. I do not. I realize that Québec is surrounded by english-speaking people, and try to adapt. But you can't force people to learn a second language. Do you speak one ?

To Evan : "The Quebec government is more concerned about preserving the French language than about its people." Again, this is pure BS. Yes, we have problems with roads in Quebec, and I agree 100% with you. But you simply have no notion at all of budget allocation or of government. I really shouldn't have to explain this to you, but the budget for culture is like .001% of what is allocated in road infrastructure. You just don't get it. And as I said earlier, this measure does not cost the taxpayer a single penny, as it will be absorbed by the software companies.

Martinus : NOBODY IN CANADA WILL HAVE TO PAY ! The law is from the Quebec government, and the companies simply import games that are ALREADY AVAILABLE !!!


Seriously, I have never seen so much Quebec-bashing in one thread, as if it were normal. I like english canada and the USA, I try to get the best of both worlds and keep in touch with both cultures, but ignorant comments like the ones I replied to simply help to fuel anti-Quebec racism for no good reason.

Please try to understand that we have a different culture/language and trying to protect it in the most accomodating way possible without hurting other cultures/languages. There may sometimes be mistakes or abuses, as everywhere, but this time it is not the case. So, please get the facts straight before you start bashing on us.

Thank you for your time.