Topic: Climate and date in factory names

[Duke]

Originally, most of the factory names also included the climate and date to which they belonged. I wasn't sure how necessary it was to include that information in the factory name, so I removed them when I was translating.

Does anyone object to my decision to excluding the climate text and dates from the factories names? Was there a reason for it that I may have missed?

[makie]

[en]
The factories should have a unique name. So that if someone writes about a problem here in the forum, it is clear with which factory he has a problem. In Germany we don't have climate zones but regions. The plan was for each region to have its own factories, houses and monuments. Every region has its own architectural style. The idea was to show that in the game. Then there is the change in time. Production increases, the production chains become more labor-sharing. The production depth is decreasing, the semi-finished products are transported more frequently.

Suggested by me, but not yet implemented: The replacement of factories with newer ones. Or the end of production and the factory becomes a museum.

Each region has its own markets with slightly different product ranges. The markets grow when they are well supplied. More modern markets start with higher production. That is why there is often the same graphic with different intro_years.

We have not yet reached our goal of diversifying into regions.
We want more, including more factories.

That is the reason why regions and dates are in the name.

[/en]
[de orig]
Die Fabriken sollten einen einmalige Namen haben. Damit wenn jemand hier im Forum über ein Problem schreibt, es klar ist mit welcher Fabrik er ein Problem hat. Wir haben in Deutschland keine Klimazonen sondern Regionen. Der Plan war jede Region bekommt ihre eignen Fabriken, Häuser und Denkmäler. Jede Region hat ihre Eigenheiten im Baustil. Die Idee war das im Spiel zu zeigen. Dazu kommt dann noch der Wandel in der Zeit. Die Produktion steigt, die Herstellungsketten werden arbeitsteiliger. Die Herstellungstiefe sinkt, die Halbfertigprodukte werden häufiger transportiert.

Von mir mal angeregt, aber noch nicht umgesetzt: Das ersetzten von Fabriken durch neuere. Oder auch Produktionsende und es wird ein Museum aus der Fabrik.

Jede Region hat ihre eigenen Märkte mit etwas unterschiedlichem Warenangebot. Die Märkte wachsen wenn sie gut versorgt werden. Modernere Märkte beginnen mit höherer Produktion.  Deshalb gibt es oft die gleiche Grafik mit verschieden Erscheinungsjahren.

Wir sind noch nicht am Ziel, bei der Diversifizierung nach Regionen.
Da wollen wir noch mehr, auch mehr Fabriken.

Das ist der Grund warum Regionen und Jahreszahlen im Namen stehen.
[/de]

[Duke]

Ok thank you. I will reinclude the region and date in the factory names for the English translation.

[makie]

Thank You for the translations.

[ampersand]

[en]
The factories should have a unique name. So that if someone writes about a problem here in the forum, it is clear with which factory he has a problem.

Then there is the change in time. Production increases, the production chains become more labor-sharing. The production depth is decreasing, the semi-finished products are transported more frequently.

Each region has its own markets with slightly different product ranges. The markets grow when they are well supplied. More modern markets start with higher production. That is why there is often the same graphic with different intro_years.

That is the reason why regions and dates are in the name.

This a very good reason to have a unique name of every factory. I wonder why is it always intro year and region to make it unique? Both year and region are distinctive and unique.

Are they important? For some players it may be, for others it may be not important at all what region and intro year it is.

Are they so important that year and region must be in the name? The same answer.

Is there any other place to tell the player from what year and region the factory is? Yes, in the factory description, for example.

Is there any other way to communicate about which particular factory we are talking about. I think yes.

Is the description visible and accessible enough for all to find it? May be not to everyone.

And the most important: How many players have written in the forums about problems with any factory where intro year and region were important for the solution of the problem? I have not counted, but both in the German and Int'l forums these are not large numbers of more than ten posts about game bugs.

I have written it because I personally like a lot nice, variable graphics of all objects in the pakset. I also like to look for information about every factory goods (it is placed much deeper than the factory name). Even if played in German I think that I would not like to play with texts like (Norddt.) in the name (for it is impossible to fit all the climate letters in the name).

[makie]

The names have grown in the development of the set. There was no plan behind it. The first factory was called Market, but one is to few. So more graphics were created and thought was given to what extent these two markets differ. Later it was necessary to stagger them in time. So it makes sense to take the year.

The climatic and year is necessary if you try to build up a map your self by hand.

Only the Translator can select and show factories by climatic, time range and goods (input / output) in a proper way.

[Vladki]

I considered doing some translations too, but the year/era and climate/region specifications were unclear to me.
If you build factories yourself (as publicplayer) you can see the intro/retire year and climate, without it being embedded in the name. (Just look at pak128.britain, which has changing factories during the years.) So this is imho not a good reason to put it in translations.
Of course the year and climate has to be in the "untranslated name" for the game to distinguish them, but I think it is not so much important in the translated name in the game. 

However if the pak designers want it, it's their choice and should be respected. However it would be nice to have a "translators guide" explaining the climate/regional system along with all variants and abbreviations of regions.

[makie]

I am open if someone has a good suggestion. Especially since we talking primarily about the English translation.

For me it is important that the names are unique, else it is difficult to talk about a specific factory.
And yes, it should be the name, because it is written in the heading of the dialog box. 

Once there was a discussion about naming factories with synonyms. One named Inn the next named Restaurant, tavern and so on.
The problem they are stand no longer together in the factory list. You have to remember there is another one some line further down.
We had this problem with a factory named "Großbäckerei" this is not found if you looking for "Bäckerei". So the name was not chosen wisely.

For the german translations: I have adopted them and I am used to them. I'm used to them from the time, I was just only a player. I and many other players would have to retrain if we were to change the names. I couldn't decide that alone, we have to decide that in the team. That is why we will at least only change the German translations if it offers clear advantages. I think there is an old discussion about this topic in the German forum.

For other languages, well, any translation is better than none.

It was the suggestion somewhere that the program should add the city-name to the name of the factory.
For better handling of connections and factory-list. I would prefer this.

[Vladki]

IMHO synonyms are not a good solution. When translating you may run out of suitable synonyms. These would be good if the factories differ in more attributes than just time and place. Like a restaurant (accepts beer and meat), and pub (accepts only beer).