Joana M. Uriartt

I'm a EN > PTBR videogame translator with almost 8 years of experience.
Contact me if you would like to talk about translating your game!

About me

Hi! It's great to meet you!My name's Joana M. Uriartt and I'm a Brazilian translator living in the very cold South of Brazil.I graduated with a Bachelor's degree in translation from the Federal University of Rio Grande do Sul, specializing in translating from Japanese to Portuguese. My main experience, however, is with English as source text, a language in which I am proficient with high scores on both IELTS and TOEFL.I have loved and played video games since I was little, with my first console being the Mega Drive, but my passion for games began, as it was for many others, with the Gen I Pokémon games on the Game Boy. This was the game that also started my curiosity with languages, as I was forced to start learning English to understand what attacks my little monsters had. It was only at university that I discovered that I could work with games and translation, with my graduation thesis being about the subject.After leaving university, I entered the job market and started with games like League of Legends and Borderlands 3. Since then, I have worked on both large and small games, translating all types of text involved in the area, such as narratives, lore texts, dialogues and marketing.I’m still a scholar in the area, and I strive to keep myself updated about what happens in the industry along seeking specializations, so you can find in me a professional with academic knowledge and work experience that can always be useful when translating any game.

Portfolio

Here are some of the games I've worked on.
You can click on some of them and see an image with my name in the credits!

Services

What I can do

I have a translation capacity of, on average, 2500 words per day using the CAT tool memoQ as my main work tool.

In special cases, I've already done more than 2500 words a day because the text allowed me to translate faster, and the feedback I received from reviewers and editors tells me that didn’t result in any loss of quality, so it's something I can do, but it depends entirely on the text I’m working with. To be safe, I prefer to offer 2500 words a day, so my quality doesn't suffer.

For how much?

My rates can vary, depending on the agency and the project, starting from 0.04 EUR or U$0.04*, but reaching up to 0.13 EUR or U$0.15.

However! If you are an indie developer and your project is interesting or important to a specific community, I would love to adjust my rates or work with you to find the best possible option. Every voice deserves to be heard by the widest audience possible, so I'd love to work something out with you!

For translation agencies

My main experience is with translating for PTBR in teams with other linguists and managers. I can also proofread, but it's not really my preference unless it's absolutely necessary. But if the review is for MTPE or AI, don't call me. I will not do this for ethical reasons as I believe that translation should be done by humans, not machines.

For indie devs

I can help prepare the file and work with it without the need for a large team like you would normally find in agencies.

Translating your game is easier than you think and, while I can't give you hard market numbers to prove anything, my experience as a Brazilian player listening to other Brazilian players is that we tend to love a game that looks at us and decides that we matter as a public, so translating might get you a very involved audience that will love your game even more!

Why translate?

Translating games is an important part of increasing game accessibility, allowing it to reach a wider audience.

Not only that, but a suitable location allows players from all over the world to understand your vision of the game and the message you want to convey, even if the intention is just to provide a moment of fun. A wrongful or erroneous translation can completely take the player out of the immersion, so don't be afraid to talk to a language professional who knows what they're doing!

Understanding your game is part of what I do, and getting to know it's characters and story is the greatest part of my work. I think the most beautiful thing about translation is that I'm able to see the wonderful work someone else made and making it so that someone that wouldn't have access to it also see the same beauty that I saw. Translating isn't just about market value and sales, it also is a way to bring different people together.