Who works on those transcripts?
People on MEL’s team and hopefully you if you decide to join us! 🙂
How does it work?
It works in three steps:
1. The transcriber picks a mission from one of the Mass Effect game and does the basic scriptwriting with all the cutscene dialogues, choices and actions they see. For that they use their own video or rely on a very good walkthrough.
2. An editor checks the script to see if they are dialogues, descriptions, or formatting issues.
3. We publish the transcript after the eding is done.
Since we are talking about a video game with multiple choices, we don’t expect the transcriber to do a full transcript for every Renegade/Paragon or MShep/FShep options. We only want to know when dialogue options or interrupts are available and which one was picked.
What’s the priority when it comes to transcribing?
The main story of each game is.
Example: Chapter 1 of Mass Effect 1 called “Expose Saren” sees Shepard arriving in the Citadel for the first time. After the meeting with Udina and the Councilors, Shepard is free to wander around. They can do multiple sidequests and talk to a lot of NPCs before reaching the Citadel Tower where the meeting with the Council and Saren happens. The meeting is a part of the main story, the rest isn’t. That’s why those scenes in-between are called “additional scenes.”
We focus on the main story for now, but we still want those additional scenes transcribed since they can tell us more about the lore. They’re kept in a separate file and added as a link in our main transcript.
That sounds like a lot of effort. Why do you do this?
We believe transcripts will be helpful to fans. They can be used as reference or simply a source of entertainment.
I want to help but I don’t want to do it long term. Can I just transcribe one mission?
Absolutely!
Will I get full credit?
You’ll be credited in the transcript, along with other contributors. The transcript will be owned and hosted on MEL.com.
Do I have to be a transcriber?
No. You can be an editor, we always need one!
Cool. How should I join?
Thank you for your interest! Contact us at info@masseffectlore.com
Tell us who you are, which type of work you want to do, and we’ll add you to our discord 🙂
