WGE MAG: 53
“Only time will tell if our investment paid off, but had we not decided to localize Bag It!, we never would have known the possible return on that investment and probably would have always been wondering, “What if…?”
distribution, payment and customer service allies. As of the writing of this article, we are still investigating and evaluating the myriad of potential partners.
We also had to determine the global price points for our game. In China, a significant majority of the gaming market is driven by free, ad supported games with in app purchases. Creating this part of our business model was always in our long term plans, but knowing that the second largest smartphone market in the world required this, combined with a rise in piracy, caused us to accelerate this process.
This decision created a huge challenge for us as a small studio. We now knew that we had to localize the game into 7 different languages AND implement a system for advertising concurrently. The task list seemed endless and the overall timeframe was unforgiving, given our limited resources. That said, we felt that with the upcoming holidays, we had no other choice but to set an aggressive internal deadline and finish up before the end of the year.
Within the first week, the piracy rates in foreign countries (especially China) were staggering, dwarfing our actual sales. If we had any lingering reticence about the need for localizing the game, those first few days stiffened our resolve.
Our first step was starting to contact translation and localization companies with a request for a proposal. In addition to conducting our own research, we also had a number of referrals from our industry contacts. We ultimately decided to work with a U.S. based company, whom was also well known for their international track record. We created spreadsheets that not only covered all of the text in the game, but also the text in our marketing screenshots, our app descriptions, and our metadata. After signing a contract with the translation vendor, we sent off our text and moved on to our next task – distribution channels.
From attending a panel at GDC Online, we knew that many countries had differing forms of distribution for both iOS and Android. For example, in China, the Android app market is fragmented with countless app stores and a variety of different billing solutions. In contrast, all payment processing is consolidated through mobile carrier billing in Korea.
Furthermore, when considering Japan, customer service and responses to reviews are highly valued and having a partner who can respond to these requests was imperative. With this data from just a sampling of countries, we knew that we had to find
We also had cultural considerations that added to the growing pressure of our impending release. As a Western developer entering foreign markets with characters that were based on U.S. supermarket products, we had to analyze how to make the game feel local. For example, we noted that when Fruit Ninja was localized for China, they added a new fruit (a peach), a Chinese zodiac background and the Fire Cracker Knife to their game. While it seemed easy enough to say that we could add similar localized elements, the associated financial costs to produce the art also had to be considered. As an example, the cost for creating a new character was an expensive endeavor in its own right. Adding one seemed reasonable, but if we made one for every country, it would quickly become a fiscal impossibility.
As we neared the end of our localization process, gaining visibility into all of the impacts of localization and breaking up the tasks into bite-sized pieces was definitely a best practice that I would suggest for any small to mid-size studio exploring this decision. It made what first appeared as an insurmountable task more manageable for the entire team. Only time will tell if our investment paid off, but had we not decided to localize Bag It!, we never would have known the possible return on that investment and probably would have always been wondering, “What if…?”.
You can learn more about Hidden Variable Studios and updates on the Bag It! World Tour by visiting them at any of these channels:
HVS website:
www.HiddenVariable.com/Games Facebook:
www.facebook.com/HiddenVariable Twitter: @Hidden_Variable
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