Gamifying crowdsourcing as a way to translate video games

Abstract

Crowdsourcing has been a creative way to overcome the problem of translating and localizing software, especially for smaller projects that can not afford a localization team. Video games are no exception to that, and some have resorted to crowdsourcing as an innovative way of expanding their projects to more audiences. One of the main problems tied to crowdsourcing is the lack of participation from the audience. This thesis will cover this issue by creating several project proposals that need to be translated by crowdsourcing, then using gamification as a way to increase audience participation. The project will follow the methodology and techniques used to create the proposals, then analyze their viability and scope in real life scenarios. Different methodologies will be explored for each proposal in order to understand to which extent gamifying crowdsourcing can help translate smaller projects into other languages. Establishing a more specific description of the proposals, two prototypes of gamified crowdsourcing will be developed. Whereas the first one will use a gamified modding forum as a way to crowdsource the translation of a game mod, the second prototype will implement gamified elements inside a Unity mobile game to translate parts of it in exchange for in-game rewards.