全文：https://thegeekwriter.com/blog/that-lost-astronaut-you-chatted-with-five-years-ago-is-making-a-comeback/
（图片是Canva上的作者创作的）

话说还有人关心这个游戏吗，没有我可就不译了

不是可以直接翻译网页吗

翻译了一小部分有感而发：看别人翻译的作品总嫌人家翻译腔，但是自己做的时候未必好到哪里去……现在我对自己的中文语感已经不是很自信了……
碍于译者水平所限，以下部分翻译或有不合原意、文法错误之处，望各位不吝赐教！
全文较长，将分层发布。
翻译过程中借鉴了Google翻译、Bing词典，向他们表示感谢！

It’s Time To Help An Astronaut OnYour Phone Again
是时候再次用手机帮助那个宇航员了
Dave Justus and the team behind the amazing Lifelinegames are making a comeback, and they answered many of your questions in thisinterview. Check it out!
Dave Justus以及了不起的Lifeline游戏系列背后的制作团队归来了。在这个采访中，他们回答了你们许多问题。看看吧！
By Oren Cohen/July 16, 2021/Blog
作者 Oren Cohen/2021年7月16日/发布于个人博客
Made by the author on Canva
配图由Canva上的作者制作【见2L插图——译者】
A few weeks ago, I reached out to Dave Justus –the writer of the original Lifeline mobilegame – to ask questions following a reveal that a new Lifeline game is in themaking years after the last one was released.
几周前，他们透露Lifeline游戏系列的新作已在制作中，距离上一作发布已过去数年。因此，我联系到DaveJustus——初代Lifeline手机游戏的故事作者——问了这些问题。
Dave was kind enough to forward my questions alongsidefan questions to 3 min. games, and both he and the team answered many of them.Thank you again, Dave and co!
Dave十分友好，他把我的问题连带粉丝们提出的问题转交给了3 MinuteGames工作室，由他和工作室的其他成员共同回答这些问题。再次向你们表示感谢，Dave和其他成员！
Below you’ll find answers from Dave Justus, Colin Liotta,and Mars Jokela of 3 Minute Games, with the addition of special guest answersfrom Lilah Sturges.
下面这些回答大部分来自3 Minute Games工作室的Dave Justus、Colin Liotta和 Mars Jokela，特邀嘉宾Lilah Sturges亦有作答。
This Q&A is divided into two sections: The firstsection is comprised of my questions. The second part is solely comprised offan questions including an indication of the person who asked the question.
这个问答分成两部分：第一部分是我的提问，第二部分仅有粉丝的提问，提问者亦有注明。
Before we dive into the Q&A: If you’re unfamiliarwith the Lifeline series, they are mobile games where you chat with a fictionalperson on the other hand and help them with their quests. If you’re notcareful, your help could cost them their lives.
在开始我们的问答之前，向不太了解Lifeline游戏系列的读者说明一下：Lifeline系列手机游戏中，你会与虚构的角色远程交流以此帮助他们完成任务。如果你不够小心，你的帮助可能让他们付出生命的代价。
I purchased and played the first lifeline game around2015-2016, and I immediately fell in love. I’m in no way sponsored by 3 Min.Games, but I would totally recommend these games to anyone who will ask.
2015~2016年前后，我购买并游玩了第一款Lifeline游戏，瞬间我便爱上了这款游戏。我并没有得到3 Min.Games任何形式的赞助，但我肯定会跟有可能感兴趣的所有人推荐这个系列的游戏。
If you’re reading these questions and answers and havenever played the games before – some of these answers include spoilers! I’llnot warn you again.
如果你未曾玩过这些游戏就准备继续往下读——有些回答会剧透！下文不会再有警告了。
Let’s dive in!
开始喽！

Oren: Dave and co, thank you so much for taking the timeto answer these questions! Before we begin diving deeper into the actual game,I want to start with an introductory question: Can you tell us a bit about howthe lifeline games started and what ultimately happened that led to this “bigpause” that has now ended with the revival of the games?
Oren：Dave及其他成员，感谢你们拨冗回答这些疑问！深入讨论游戏本身之前，我想先从一个介绍性的问题开始：能稍微讲讲Lifeline系列的开始有何契机，而之后又是什么导致了现在以游戏系列的复活告终的“大停摆”呢？
Dave: Mars and Colin from 3 Minute Games originally askedauthor Daryl Gregory to write the first Lifeline game.His schedule at the time didn’t allow it, so he was kind enough to suggest thatthey tap me for the job… and by doing so, he changed my life in ways I’ll neverbe able to repay. I had only a handful of professional credits at that point,so 3 Minute really took a chance on an unknown quantity when they brought me onboard. They gave me some parameters – this was to be a science fiction storyabout a marooned astronaut, gameplay should last about three days, here’s yourdeadline – but otherwise gave me free rein to create the character and world,which was a big gamble on their part. Fortunately, it seems to have paid off.
Dave：最开始3 Minute Games的Mars和Colin邀请作家Daryl Gregory为初代Lifeline撰稿，而他当时的工作排程太满因而无法完成。承蒙他的好意，他建议将这个事情交给我来做……他的推荐改变了我的人生走向，我无以为报。那个时候我只有一小撮专业学分，所以3 Minute拉我入职这个举动的确相当于冒险赌一个未知数。他们给了我一些参数——我要写一个科幻故事，这个故事的主角是一个孤立无援的宇航员，游玩时长应该落在三天左右，这个是你交稿的截止期限——但此外他们也给了我自行构想角色和世界的自由，从他们的角度来想他们下了不少注。还好，他们的挹注似乎有了回报。
The “big pause” that you reference was a result of 3Minute’s parent company, Big Fish Games, deciding to try some new things with theirinteractive fiction apps – which led to Lifeline Universe –but then ultimately deciding to focus on other priorities. Lifeline Universe never made it out of Androidbeta, so a lot of players – iOS users especially – never got to see thosegames. And by that point, the three of us had all gone our separate ways fromthe company. I’d given them an outline for the fourth Taylor game, Bad Astronaut, but I don’t know how much of it (if any)got used, because I never got to play it on my iPhone.
你提到的“大停摆”是3 Minute的母公司Big Fish Games造成的，他们决定要在他们的互动小说应用尝试一些新玩意儿——最后带来了LifelineUniverse——但是最后他们决定专注于其它优先事项上。Lifeline Universe未曾走出Android公测正式发布，所以不少玩家——尤其是iOS用户——未曾见过那些游戏。而那个时候，我们三个都离开了公司走上不同的道路。我有给他们大纲做第四款Taylor游戏Bad Astronaut，但我不知道那个大纲有多少内容有被实际用上（如果确实有用的话），因为我一直未能在我的iPhone上玩到。
The three of us started talking again last year, inhypothetical terms, about acquiring the rights to Lifeline and picking up where we’d left off. Colincan tell you more about what it took to move from “hypothetical” to “holy crap,this is happening,” but that’s where we are today: It’s happening, and wecouldn’t be more excited to be polishing up the old games and creating new onesto continue expanding the world of Lifeline!
去年我们三个用假设的语气聊过要获取Lifeline的权利【所有权一类法定权利——译者】，并从我们离开的地方接手继续。Colin可以更加详细地告诉你从“假设”来到“哇靠真的可以耶”所需要的努力，不过不管怎么说这个就是我们目前的进度：我们可以继续了，打磨旧游戏并创造新游戏扩展Lifeline世界简直不要让我们太兴奋！
Colin: While at Big Fish, Mars and I ran a smallsemi-independent studio called 3 Minute Games where we tried out a wide varietyof different experimental game ideas. One of those experiments, Lifeline, succeeded beyond our wildest expectations andled us down a whole new path of creating interactive fiction games.
Colin：还在Big Fish的时候，Mars和我经营着一个小型半独立工作室3 MinuteGames，我们在此尝试了各式各样实验性性质的游戏想法。其中的一个实验品Lifeline成功了，远远超过我们最狂野的期待，也带领我们走上了制作互动小说游戏的全新道路。
As Dave mentioned, over time Mars and I left Big Fish andthe priorities within the company shifted. Unfortunately, this meant that theoriginal Lifeline games went un-updated for several yearsand there were no new stories in that series being created. The three of uskept in touch though, and after some discussions with Big Fish, we realizedthat we could start our own fully independent company and take complete controland ownership of the games. We are now thrilled to be able to breathe new lifeinto the original games and continue the stories that our fans (and us as well)have been waiting for.
正如Dave刚才提到的那样，随着时间流逝Mars和我离开了Big Fish，而公司内的优先事项也转移了。很不幸，这就表示原版Lifeline游戏系列停止更新了许多年，同一系列下也没有新故事有在制作。不过我们三个倒是保持了联系，跟Big Fish的一番交谈过后，我们意识到我们可以创办我们自己的全独立公司，完全掌控游戏及其所有权。现在我们很激动，终于可以给原版游戏系列注入新生，继续粉丝们（当然还有我们）一直在期待的故事了。

What can we expect to see in terms of storylines goingforward? Are you focusing only on Taylor at the moment, or are we going to seethe comeback of Arika and other characters?
我们在故事线的发展方面能够期待些什么？当下你们是仅仅专注于Taylor的故事，还是说我们能在未来看到Arika和其他角色的回归呢？
Dave: I don’t think it’ll surprise anyone when we saythat our first new game is a Taylor game. That character has struck a loud andresounding chord with fans – and, frankly, with us too. So we know what thisTaylor game is, and we have a good general idea of what the next one will be,too.
Dave：我不觉得我们告诉大家我们第一款新游戏是Taylor游戏会让任何人感到惊讶。那一个角色在粉丝之间引起了巨大而嘹亮的回响——而且老实说，我们自己也一样。所以我们知道这个Taylor游戏是什么，对下一个会是什么也有一个总体的构思。
But we’re mindful that Arika and Alex and Wynn all havetheir own fan clubs, and we’d love to dive back into those stories too. Rightnow, 3 Minute is a tiny company, so we want to be cautious about overpromising– but we’re ambitious and optimistic, and we’d love for Lilah Sturges to writeAlex out of that cliffhanger, and for Daryl Gregory to dig deeper into Wynn’sweird and horrific world, and for me to check in on Arika in the Quintessence…and about a million other ideas as well. So if things go the way we’re hoping,then yes, Taylor should have plenty of company in the future.
但我们也考虑到Arika和Alex和Wynn都有他们自己的粉丝群体，我们也十分乐意返回去写这些故事。现在的情况是，3 Minute是一个小小公司，所以我们对过度承诺十分慎重——不过，我们又有野心又乐观，我们十分乐意让LilahSturges把Alex带出那个悬念，让Daryl Gregory深入挖掘Wynn那奇怪而令人战栗的世界，让我好好检查检查Quintessence里的Arika……以及上百万个其它故事。所以如果事情按照我们的愿望顺利进行，那么没错，Taylor未来应该会有大量的同伴。
Mars: To add to that – we also know that plenty of fanswould love to hear from Adams and Blue again. It’s a little bit trickier for usto update the original Whiteout and tobring Whiteout 2 back around, but it’s on our minds too!
Mars：补充一句——我们也知道不少粉丝想要再次看到Adams和Blue。要更新原版的Whiteout并带回来Whiteout 2对我们来说有点棘手，但我们也有这个想法！【译注：Lifeline Universe应用中有完整的Whiteout 2作为一代的续作，出自一代原作者之手，而现在Lifeline Universe被废弃了，因此说是“back”。】

Once the writing part is done, what needs to happen totransform a completed storyline into an app on our smartphones?
写作部分完成之后，需要什么过程才能把一个完整的故事线转变为我们智能手机上的一个应用程序呢？
Colin: There are many different pieces that go intomaking the finished app. We try to create a unique art style for each game thatcan help to enhance the tone of the story. For example, in the original Lifeline the background and borders help to evokea feeling of desolation and alienness, whereas in Lifeline 2: Bloodline the font, scrollwork, andgolden borders all help to make it feel magical. Similarly, the music iscrafted to evoke different feelings and we fade between different music piecesas the story moves along.
Colin：有许多不同的部分会加入到制作最终应用的过程中去。我们努力为每一个游戏创造独特的艺术风格，藉此增强叙事基调。举例来说，最初代的Lifeline游戏中背景和边框有助于唤起一种荒凉和陌生的感觉，而Lifeline2: Bloodline中的字体、漩涡形的装饰以及金色的边框有助于让人产生魔幻的感觉。与之类似，音乐有意地制作成不同的感觉氛围，而我们也让不同的音乐片段随剧情发展切换时有了淡入淡出的效果。
On the coding side, we have created many differentengines for each of the different platforms that the games run on. There wasthe original iOS version written in Objective C, and the original Androidversion written in Java. But more recently we have also created a Unityversion, a web version, and a new iOS version that uses Swift and SwiftUI.
编程方面，我们有为每一个游戏运行平台搭建起不同的引擎。曾经有用Objective C写的原始 iOS版本和用Java写的原始Android版本。但更近期的时候我们同时也创造了Unity版、Web版以及使用Swift和SwiftUI的iOS新版。
Probably the trickiest (and most interesting) part forcoding the games is creating the seamless syncing between the phone and watchversions. Especially early on we had to dig very deep into the code for bothdevices to create an experience for the players that would ultimately feel verytransparent and magical.
可能编程方面最为棘手（也是最有趣）的部分就是在手机和手表版本之间做到无缝同步。尤其是早期时候我们不得不非常深入地挖掘供两个设备使用的代码版本，以此为玩家创造一个透明【原文“transparent”，应该是“无感”的意思——译注】而魔幻的最终体验。

How long does the overall process take to bring an ideafor a lifeline story to an app on our phones?
将一个Lifeline故事的想法变成我们手机上的应用程序，总体过程需要多久？
Dave: My part of it, the writing, in an ideal world,takes about four months – from a blank page to a pitch to an outline to a fullywritten game. There’ve been a few cobwebs to shake off this time around, but aswe keep at this, my process should get smoother each time.
Dave：剧本写作是我所负责的部分，理想世界中大约用去四个月——从一张白纸到一个最高点到故事大纲再到一个完整写好的游戏。这段时间前后有一些蜘蛛网需要甩掉，但随着我们持续做这件事，我的进程应该会一次比一次顺。
Mars: Most of the additional work that Colin mentionedcan be done at the same time as the writing. The only major thing that can’tbegin until the story is done is localizing to other languages. We care a greatdeal about localizing the games, not justtranslating them – this means the whole story is localized for the targetlanguage and audience, and the jokes and references are updated so they makesense for the people who will be reading them.
Mars：大部分Colin提到的附加工作都能在写作的同时完成。唯一一个直到故事写完才能开始的主要工作就是本地化了。我们十分关注游戏的本地化工作，不只是翻译而已——这就意味着整个故事都会为目标语言和观众进行本地化，而笑话和指涉都要更新，这样才能让译文的读者读得通文本。
To localize one game usually takes about six to eightweeks or more, depending on the length of the game. Sometimes the new languagesare all done at once leading up to the initial release of the game, andsometimes they are done later, and the game is relaunched in the target regiononce the localization is complete.
通常本地化一个游戏至少耗去6~8周时间看，这取决于游戏的长度。有时候新语言的本地化工作全部完成就带来了游戏的第一个正式版发布，而有时候本地化工作在初版发布之后不久才完成，待本地化工作完成后游戏就会在目标地区再度上线。

Dave, I remember you spoke in the past about using thetool Twine to write the storyline. Is that still the case? Do you have any tipsto share about writing a branching, multi-choice storyline like this?
Dave，我记得你曾经说过使用Twine这个工具编写故事线。现在还是这样吗？在编写类似的多分支、多选择故事线这方面，你有什么小贴士吗？
Dave: I do still use Twine, and I’m quick to point outthat my personal preference is for Version 1 over Version 2. That’s simplybecause V1 seems to be geared more for the layperson, with color codes andalerts and hover text all designed to make it user-friendly for dummies likeme. V2 seems to cater more to those who already have some programming ability;it doesn’t hold my hand nearly as much as I need it to.
Dave：我确实还在用Twine，而我要毫不迟疑地指出我个人偏好使用版本1而非版本2。原因仅仅是V1似乎更多地面向外行人，有颜色标识和警告和悬停文本【原文“colorcodes and alerts and hover text”——译者】所有这些设计让它易于我这样的笨蛋用户使用。V2满足的似乎更多是已有编程能力的用户，而不是尽量贴近我的需要手把手地带我。
I think the best tip I can offer is: Don’t let your storyget away from you. When writing a branching narrative, it is extremely easy to just keep branching; you’llstart from a single passage, and even if you only present two choices (as we doin the Lifeline games), two becomes four becomes eightand so on, and you can very quickly find yourself writing dozens of tangentsthat distract from your narrative. So make sure that you periodically collapseeverything back into a single passage again, one that definitively moves thestory forward. It’ll make for a stronger, more propulsive narrative, and it’llalso help preserve your sanity behind the scenes.
我觉得我能给到最好的贴士是：不要让你的故事离你而去。多分支的叙述模式在写作时极端容易让分支一路分下去，你会从单一段落开始，即使你只提供两个选项（就像我们在Lifeline游戏做的那样），二会变成四，四会变成八，一直变下去，然后你很快就会发现自己写了大量离题的分支转移你对主要事件叙述的注意力。所以要确保自己有阶段地把一切事物折叠回单个段落，这个段落必须绝对可以推动故事前进。这有助叙述变得更为坚固，更有推进力，这也能让你在幕后保持头脑清醒。

What kind of research or preparation do you do beforewriting characters like Taylor, Arika, and Alex?
在开始写Taylor、Arika和Alex之类的角色之前，你们都会做些什么样的研究或者准备呢？
Dave: Taylor is the most research-intensive of mycharacters. The amount of stuff I don’t know about outer space, you could justabout fit into outer space. So there’s a lot of Wiki wormhole time there,either checking to make sure I can do something in my outline, or discoveringsome interesting new factoid that then becomes part of the story. I try to putsome instructive science in each Taylor game as well, like the makeshiftcompass in the first game or the various fire extinguishers in Halfway To Infinity, so that if anyone gets caughtplaying the game during class, they can argue that they’re actually learningsomething.
Dave：Taylor是我的角色中研究最密集的【最需要研究的——译者】。我所不了解的关于外太空的知识量多到差不多能填满整个外太空了。所以我用了不少时间像蛀虫一样啃着维基【推测这里的“Wiki”指代维基百科而非其它维基项目——译者】，要么是检查确保我能在故事大纲上做点什么，要么就是寻找些后来成为故事一部分的有趣消息。我也尽力在每一个Taylor游戏中加入些教育科学，比如第一款游戏的临时指南针和Halfway ToInfinity中不同的灭火器，这样如果有人上课玩游戏被发现了，他们可以争辩说他们实际上确实学到了点东西。
With Arika, it was more about the geography of thePacific Northwest, and how long it would actually take to move between variouslocations. And for both characters, of course, I’m constantly confirming my popculture references and cataloguing various shades of green, so there are plentyof tabs open on my browser while I’m writing.
就Arika而言，更多的是太平洋西北部的地理知识以及在不同地点之间移动的实际耗时。当然两个角色我都有经常确认我的流行文化指涉并编目各式各样格林怪的阴影，所以我写作的时候浏览器会开一堆标签页。
SPECIAL GUEST ANSWER FROM LILAH STURGES: I actuallydid a ton of research on our Alex! I spent some time talking to an actualhomicide detective to get an idea of what his job was like, and that gave me alot of insight into the job. This detective that I spoke to wasn’t tough orshowy or flashy — he was very thoughtful and soft-spoken, and I liked that alot for Alex. That’s a big part of where the character came from. The rest wasjust good old-fashioned book learnin’!
特邀嘉宾LILAH STURGES的回答：其实我在我们的Alex身上做了不少功课呢！我花了点时间与凶杀案侦探交谈，从而对他的工作有个大概的印象，也让我对这个工作有了点见解。我交谈的侦探不难搞，不迟钝，也不浮华——他很体贴，说话温柔，而我很希望Alex是那样。其余部分只是优质而老套的书本知识！

After the release of the first Taylor game, the app storefilled with “lifeline-like” games, and I played some after I finished my otherlifeline games. None of them felt like the real deal because the UX waslacking. Is that something you recognized? Do you plan to offer the engineyou’re using as a separate tool people can use to publish their own stories?
初代Taylor游戏发布之后，应用商店充斥着“类Lifeline”游戏，我玩完我其它Lifeline游戏之后也玩了一些。由于用户体验较差它们没有一个像是货真价实的Lifeline游戏。你们认可吗？你们有没有计划提供你们现在使用的引擎，让它成为大众公开发布自己故事的独立工具？
Dave: I guess that depends on what “UX” encompasses foryou. My main goal was to make the games feel like conversations with realpeople… like you were actually getting texts from a friend, rather than promptsfrom a video game. Real people sometimes stumble over their words, or changedirections mid-thought, or make dumb jokes when they’re nervous. After writingTaylor as such an emotionally open character, I knew that Arika had a verydifferent voice; the player had to earn her trust and her confidence. When Iwork on dialogue – for these games, or for anything else I’m writing – I’lloften try it out loud, changing a word or inflection until it sounds exactlyright to my ear.
Dave：我想那取决于“用户体验”对你来说包括什么。我的主要目标是让游戏体验感觉起来像真人之间的对话……仿佛你确实是在收到一个朋友发来的消息，而不是电子游戏的台词。真人有时讲话磕磕绊绊，想事情想到一半就转向，抑或是紧张时讲些愚蠢的笑话。在把Taylor写成这么一个情绪开放【坦诚，不设心理屏障——译者】的角色之后，我知道Arika的声音会大相径庭：玩家必须努力赢得她的信任和信心。当我推敲对话内容时——这些游戏或者任何其它我在写的作品——我经常会试着念出来，修改措辞或者抑扬顿挫直到我的耳朵听着舒服为止。
Colin: We are actually hard at work on developing a newweb-based tool that we’re calling LineEdit thatis designed to make it easier to create these specific types of games. The toolcan be used to author the game, but it also makes it easier for multiple peopleto collaborate on editing the story, and probably most importantly, it makes itmuch easier to translate the story into multiple languages. The Lifeline gameshave always been translated into at least 6 languages and many of the standardfile formats like Twine and Ink are not very well designed for translating, soit’s always been a bit of a struggle. For the future games we’re hoping to makethe whole process much faster, reliable, and easier, and assuming that the toolworks how we’re hoping then we’d be excited for other people to use it as well.
Colin：其实我们正在努力开发一款基于Web的新工具——我们称之为LineEdit——旨在使这一特定类型的游戏制作起来更加方便。这个工具能用来编写游戏，同时也让多人协作编辑故事更加容易，最重要的大概是这个工具令翻译故事到许多不同语言更加容易了。一直以来Lifeline游戏系列至少被翻译成六种语言，而许多标准文件格式例如Twine和Ink并没有设计得方便翻译，所以这个问题也一直挺棘手的。希望以后的游戏开发中我们能让整个过程更快，更可靠，更便捷，假设工具能像我们期待的那样运作，我们会很高兴让更多的人一道使用。

Dave, the fact that Taylor’s gender is ambiguousfascinates many people and resonated with many non-binary people who played thegames. Was that something you considered while writing the character orsomething that came by as a result of “speaking directly” to the player? Didyou have a specific gender in mind when you wrote Taylor?
Dave，Taylor的性别暧昧不清这一事实令许多人着迷，在非二元性别族群的玩家中亦引起鸣。这是你在写角色时就构思好的还是作为（角色——译者）与玩家“直接对话”的结果偶然获得的？写Taylor的时候你脑中是否有一个特定的性别？
Dave: The idea of Taylor not having a specified genderwas already in place when I came on board, and I thought it was genius. Andeven though it was purposeful, I don’t think any of us anticipated just what apositive reaction we would see from the LGBTQ+ community. Taylor could bewhatever they most needed or wanted from the character. Players assigned Taylora gender, or no gender, often unconsciously – and we worked hard to make surenot to break that reality for anyone. (Which got really tricky with the introduction of the T2character… but we enjoy a challenge!)
Dave：Taylor并无特定性别这一想法在我入职时便已就位，我觉得这个想法真是天才。尽管这是刻意为之，我仍不觉得我们的任何成员能预料到性少数群体会给予正面评价。Taylor可以是他们最需要或者最想要的任何角色。玩家通常无意识地赋予Taylor一个性别，或认为其无性别——而我们很努力地为所有人确保这个现实不被打破。（T2这一角色的引入使保持这个现实变得十分棘手……不过我们喜欢挑战！）
Writing the first game, I thought of Taylor as male – andseveral of my friends have said they couldn’t help but picture my voice sayingTaylor’s dialogue. But after we started taking in the reaction from the fans,when I came back to write Silent Night, Ifound myself thinking of the character more as non-binary. It’s a questionpeople asked a lot when we would do, say,the #TalkToTaylor Twitter events – “Is Taylor male or female?” – but honestly,the more I write the character, the more I don’t thinkthere’s a definitive answer.
编写第一个故事时，我把Taylor想成男性——我有几个朋友也跟我说他们情不自禁地想象着我的声音把Taylor的对话念出来。但我们开始接受粉丝的反应之后，当我返回来写SilentNight时，我发现自己更多地把角色看作非二元性别者。这个问题人们经常问到，比如说Twitter活动#TalkToTaylor吧——“Taylor是男性还是女性？”——但老实说我越写这个角色越觉得没有确定的答案。

Did you ever believe such a vibrant, colorful communitywould be founded around these stories?
你过去是否相信，围绕这些故事如此一个生机勃勃、五彩斑斓的社区会被建立起来？
Dave: In a million years, I couldn’t have predicted theresponse to these games. I mean, the download numbers were staggering enough…but then we started seeing fan art, cosplay, fan fiction. It was, frankly,completely overwhelming. As a creator, you always hope that your work isconnecting with people… but I don’t know that I ever believed my words would beso meaningful to so many.
Dave：即使一百万年过去，我都无法预测针对这些游戏的回应。我的意思是，下载量已经足够惊人了……但之后我们开始看见同人艺术、扮装（cosplay）、同人小说。老实讲，这个数量绝对是压倒性的。作为一个创作者，你总会希望你的作品能跟大众有所联系……但我不知道我是否曾经相信过我的话语对这么多人有这么重大的意义。
And let’s be honest: Without the community of fanskeeping the lantern lit, even during the darkest times, we wouldn’t be havingthis conversation right now. The fact that the Lifeline Discordremained active, and hopeful, during the games’ absence was one of the topfactors in our decision to pursue the rights to make more of these games. Weowe our continued (and future) success to the fans, and that’s top of mind forus as we polish up the old games and work very hard to make sure that the newmaterial doesn’t disappoint.
我们不妨说实话吧：如果没有粉丝们即使在最黑暗的时候都一直让灯笼发光发亮，我们现在就不可能有这段对话了【指本采访不可能存在——译者】。Lifeline的Discord频道即使在游戏停更的时候仍保持活跃而充满希望这一事实，是我们决定继续追求制作更多这样的游戏的权利的最主要因素之一。我们还欠粉丝（游戏系列的——译者）继续成功以及未来的成功，这是我们打磨老游戏并努力确保新的创作构想不会令人失望时的最大信念。