Why You Need to Translate Video Games in Different Languages

Normally, it is difficult to play any video game if you are not familiar with its language. Therefore, games should be available in different languages if you want to expand into global markets. In this way, players can enjoy games by understanding their requirements. video game translation services are provided by various companies around the world. Their primary goal is to eliminate the language barrier, provide a better user experience and get maximum benefits as profit from foreign markets.

Different languages for game translation

English is considered an international language, but still, there are various languages into which games are translated worldwide. Some popular languages that are also being utilized for game translation are German, French, European Spanish, Brazilian Portuguese, Russian, Italian, Simplified Chinese, Japanese, Korean, and Polish.

Various countries are gaining revenue, profits, and benefits from gaming translation. The top 10 of them are China, the USA, Japan, South Korea, Germany, the UK, France, Canada, Italy, and Spain.

Importance of video game translation

Translation is important to unfold information, knowledge, and thoughts.

Values the player: The gamer feels valued and gets connected to the game for a long period.

Increase ranking: Translation may improve your play store ranking.

Boost up downloading: It may increase the number of downloads by expanding the market reach.

Enhance user engagement: When a game is available to a player in his native language, he feels more connected with it.

Increase market values: The availability of games in the required language to players may increase the market value of the game.

Common challenges in translating video games

Achieving the highest translation quality often requires a blend of creativity and linguistic ability. The translators have to face various challenges while translating the games.

1. Expectations and requirements of the players.

Meeting the demands, requirements, and expectations of gamers is the most challenging part of translating video games. The modern gaming industry has become globalized. With a greater approach to games from an international market, gaming fans have increased their demands for translating games.

 As a result, this has forced developers and game publishers to take gaming translation more seriously. In order to improve the gaming experience in different languages, it’s better to go for game localization. Otherwise, players may express their frustration online whenever games are unable to fulfill their expectations.

2. Creating alternatives

In creating alternatives for non-translatable wordings, it’s common to find sufficient creative languages and concepts that lose their original meaning when translated. This implies that direct translation is easy, but it loses its impact through differences in:

• Natural or ideal meanings
• Cultural interpretations

Simply put, it can be really challenging to maintain the original tone and message when the gaming content contains such text which contains non-translatable words.

3.  Considering cultural differences

Occasionally, games consist of content specific to a particular culture. Such as

• Historic event references
• Religious trusts
• Pop cultures

It is very important to maintain cultural relevance while translating games for other regions and cultures. Thus, if you don’t succeed in properly adapting these cultural elements to the targeted audience, it can confuse and negatively affect the player’s experience.

Tips for selecting professional translation services

With the increasing importance of translation and localization services, there are more translation companies in the market than ever before, which can make the decision difficult for you. Various translation companies in the market are providing these services. In order to choose the right professional translation agency for your games, you need to consider multiple factors. 

Skilled-translators team

A company should consist of a group of skilled translators that are specialized in gaming translation. A translator who is inexperienced or is not sufficiently specialized in the field may commit errors.

Simplified the process of translation

Proper management by the translation company throughout the procedure of translation, edition, and revision is necessary. This can simplify the translation process, and reduce the hassle. Look for a company that has a simplified process to get better and faster results. This is even more important for website localization services. Why? Because the process of localization is more complicated and a simplified process can make things easy.

Manage project delivery time

This is the point where the experience of the company can be judged. A company must have experienced translators, proficient in processing translation requests and completing the project concisely in a short period with the guarantee of good quality of translations. 

Manage maximum work volume

A company should have the capacity to manage high volumes of workload, and the ability to work with documents of different lengths. Thus, it is important that you choose a company that can manage to deliver both quality and quantity within a standard period.

Good customer services

Different companies have different client service programs. Proper customer service means a fast response either by call or mail. Personal communication with the client is important. 

Conclusion

Translating games into different languages can boost accessibility, expand the market reach and generate some other benefits as well. These all factors demand the need for gaming translation in different languages to increase market value and engagement of the players.