Localization of Video Games

From the "Daily Yomiuri Online", this is the first of two articles explaining the process of video game localization.

Playing games with the world: It takes more than just translation

Andrew Sharp / Daily Yomiuri Staff Writer

The global video games industry is not bigger than Hollywood. But it's not far behind. More money will be spent on video games than on music this year, and the gaming market is projected to be worth 48.9 billion dollars by 2011, according to consulting firm PricewaterhouseCoopers.

Many games are written by Japanese game producers, then translated and adapted for the large gaming markets of North America, Britain and the FIGS countries (France, Italy, Germany and Spain), in a process known as localization, a process that has to please the notoriously persnickety creature known as the gamer.

"Localization isn't just about the translation of words, its about the other elements that make up the game: the difficulty level, any cultural references," explains Richard Honeywood, localization director at Square Enix Co. "All these factors have to be changed from one culture to another."

An example of this would be the skirts of the female characters in a popular tennis game that were shortened for the Japanese version of the game--no doubt pleasing the kind of gentleman you could find frequenting the less family-oriented areas of Akihabara.

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