Posted on: August 23, 2016

paercebal
Verified ownerGames: 737 Reviews: 9
Braindead language settings design
Like all Telltale games I've played (and I've played a few), this is a storytelling game, where immersion matters. The other reviews focus on the story or the characters. I will focus on how a braindead design decision throws you out of the story immersion. Telltale Games: This is for you. Indeed, the history would have been interesting if I had been able to change the subtitle languages (and indeed, the whole game language) to English. But I couldn't. I am french, but I have familiarity enough with English to understand MOST of the conversations. Of course, in some cases, I miss something. And in storytelling games based on drama, there's a lot of opportunity for some important words to slip by. This is why I rely on subtitles (the other reason being translation, no matter their quality, are always of lower quality than the original language). So, when I'm hearing English text, my brain is in English-mode. And when I miss some word, I look down at the subtitles and... They are in french, which makes me switch context (costly operation, both for threads and brains) and throw me out of game immersion. And of course, as the grammar is different, the words are, half the time, in different order. I understand the need for simplification, but sometimes, one goes too far (do we need to talk about Win8's horrendous UI decisions?). The frustrating part is: You know the options are there. Indeed, I own the games (TWD S01 and S02) on Steam and XBox 360!, and on Steam, the games are in english! I actually launched the two games one after the other!). The only thing I ask would have to CHOOSE THE FREAKING LANGUAGE. But apparently, this is too hard. The solution offered (change your Windows settings) is unacceptable (and anyway, it came to late). Despite having them on Steam, I bought those games on GOG, not knowing the languages were broken there, BY DESIGN. And I even bought Batman TWICE. I'd ask for a refund if I could. Apart this, the game seems playable.
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