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German Market Localization – 8 Powerful Tips You Should Know

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As a game developer, you want to reach new markets, expand your business, increase your fan base and sales around the globe, but mostly in Western and Eastern Europe. What does it mean? And why is the German market important for the gaming industry? Which are its special characteristics that make you consider localizing your game for the German audience?

Well, let’s start with the beginning.

Expanding your game in Europe means you address a mature market. Generating revenue of $29.6 Billion in 2020 and having a 7.8% increase YoY, Europe is the third game market in the world, after Asia-Pacific and North America.

German market localization - Europe ranking

However, localization for the European market is complex, as the audience is very unique due to the variety of languages that they have in their respective countries in the region.

Typically, video games consumed in Europe would always receive translation and localization. If in the previous articles we explained why it’s important to localize for the Polish, Finish, Swedish, Dutch and Danish markets, with this post we’ll start our series of articles about localization for Western Europe.

Basically, this means to translate and adapt your game from all points of view to the four audiences: French, Italian, German, and Spanish. This practice is so popular across many industries, that the translation made for this region even has received its own acronym – FIGS or EFIGS if we also include English.

With a gaming industry revenue of $6,084 million, the German market was the fifth market around the world in 2020 and it’s also a very complex one. Therefore, we considered we should focus on this audience, helping you to better understand what the localization in the German language involves and how you could conquer this market.

German market localization - countries ranking

German market overview

Translating and localizing your game in German opens the door to a vast market. With around 130 million native speakers, German is the most widely spoken mother language around the globe. It’s the official language in Germany, Austria, Switzerland, Belgium, Lichtenstein, and Luxembourg. Moreover, around 7.5 million people in 42 countries worldwide belong to a German-speaking minority.

German market localization - German-speaking countries

Other gaming industry statistics are:

from a population of 83.8 million people living in Germany, 65 million+ are regular gamers;
56 million+ people play mobile games, while 47 million+ play pc games and 20 million+ are console games.
Germany holds 20.2% of the market share of the gaming industry in Europe
According to Newzoo and G.A.M.E. Association, Germany is the largest video game market in Europe
German has continuously become one of the go-to languages especially for video games localization in Western Europe
Even if the Germans have a high-level English proficiency, German language voiceover is commonly added, as more than two-thirds of gamers tend to play games in their own language.

Sure, it’s much easier and more enjoyable to immerse yourself in a game that is set up and perfectly fits your culture, customs, language, social and political rules.

However, when translating and localizing your game for the German-speaking audience, you have to pay great attention to:

Dialects that characterize the German audience

Like it or not, Germany unified into a nation-state in the 19^th century. Until then, Germany was made up of different kingdoms, free cities, and duchies, each of them having its own dialect.

First, there is the so-called High German dialect (Hochdeutsch), which is generally accepted as the standard form of the German language. Then there are dozens of dialects throughout Germany, which differ quite a bit from each other.

Moreover, Austria, Switzerland, and Luxembourg have their own dialects of German, so it’s important to know what country you’re localizing for. And this is because an English word, for example, can have different translations, depending on the German dialect it is translated in.

German market localization - German dialects — Source

Let’s check some examples:

The English Tomato, in Germany is Tomate and in Austria Paradeiser
The English Potato in Germany is Kartoffel, and in Austria is Erdapfel
The English Ground beef in standard German is translated as Hackfleisch while in Austrian German is translated Faschiertes,

and the examples can continue.

In this context, before trans l ating your game from a foreign language into German, you should decide first what part of the German-speaking countries you want to localize it for. This way, your translation and localization teams can pick the appropriate dialect, adding some extra “spice” to the translation.

Formal and informal style

Depending on your game and the characteristics of your players, you’ll need to be very careful when choosing between using formal or informal German.

Formal German is more polite but can give the feeling of being dated or distant. Informal German is more personal and becomes more and more common as cultural norms shift. However, to some, it may still seem rude or invasive speaking style.

For German translators, the decision of what level of formality to use when translating texts for games depends mostly on the client’s requirements. If the client wants the game’s characters to address formally, then the translator will use the formal Sie. If it’s required an informal style, then the linguist specialist will use the informal du.

However, when translating and localizing a game for the German market, you should keep in mind a few things:

First, you can’t just jump back and forth from formal to informal. This is proof of inconstancy, it can just confuse the German gamer and harm your game.
Second, in a tutorial or when speaking to a player through the in-game support system, Germans prefer to use the formal Sie.

Word length

The length of the German words is another well-known problem for the translation and localization teams because the German sentences often just don’t fit the length limits.

This is mainly due to the articles preceding the nouns and case endings that can’t be changed because they play important grammatical roles. Plus, German words are, on average, much longer than English words, not to mention Russian or Chinese ones.

However, German has also some advantages from this point of view: compound words. And the rule for creating compound words is simple: you take the roots of separate words, put them together, and you have a new word. In many cases, the new word is a long one, but it gets the job done.

A few examples of compound words:

German market localization - compound words

Sometimes, an English phrase of 3-4 words can be replaced in German with one compound word:

Rechtsschutzversicherungsgesellschaften = insurance companies providing legal protection

Verbesserungsvorschlag = suggestion to improve the game

Anglicanism or usage of the English words

When localizing for the German market, one good thing is the fact that Germans have a high level of English proficiency. Therefore, they don’t have any problem when using English words, particularly in the gaming and computer industries.

Verbesserung doesn’t fit the limit? Well, then it’s not a problem to use Upgrade!

As an example, in the German interface of the GTA online game, we’ll see many English words, and these are considered to be Anglicisms.

Consider the non-standard interface when translating for the German market

When working on tutorials related to any game that is localized for the German audience, it’s important to keep in mind that the German keyboard is different from the English one. It has keys for the special German characters: ä, Ä, ö, Ö, ß, ü, Ü and a slightly different layout.

Also, the Ctrl button, on most German keyboards is called Strg, from the word Steuerungstaste.

German market localization - German Tastatur

Modesty

Germans like moderation and don’t favor exaggeration or comparative advertising. So, when translating the advertisements and marketing texts, avoid expressions such as “my game is the best in the Universe” or “this is better than every other game in the world”.

The exaggerations will obstruct you to build trust among your gamers, and move you a step away from the European Union’s Directive on Misleading and Comparative Advertising. If you want to win the German audience’s heart, it’s advisable to choose more low-key wording.

Forbidden Topics

Excessive violence, racism, and Nazism are controversial subjects in Germany and therefore, until 2018 there were very strict censorship laws for games. For example, Resident Evil 4 was banned due to high-impact violence.

After this year, the rules were a bit relaxed, and nowadays developers have more freedom. So, currently, almost anything that is socially appropriate is allowed. But even though the blockages were removed, there are still some topics that are better not to mention when you want to expand your game into the German market. Anything involving Hitler or World War II is still taboo.

Gender Neutrality

As it’s not always possible to guess the gender of a character at first glance, it’s advisable to ask for more information about this. This way, you’ll know which are the right words to use to prevent any grammatical gender mistakes.

For example, you cannot use the word Kämpfer (Warrior) for a female character. It must have the suffix -in, indicating the female gender in German: Kämpferin.

Final words

Overall, the German audience is extremely important for the gaming industry’s growth, and it will remain a priority choice for game developers and publishers. At the same time, gamers also take locali z ation very seriously, as they want to enjoy the game and immerse themselves in it instead of thinking they have just a translated version of the original game.

So when you translate and adapt your game in a way that suits the culture, customs, and regulations of the German market, chances are that German players will spend more money on your game.

July 28, 2021

Top 10 Languages To Localize Your Game In 2021 And Beyond

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As a game developer, you have decided that you want to have a successful game, reach more players, and make more sales. But what markets should you focus on? And in what languages should you localize it? Should you choose a European language? Or an Asian one? What languages should you start with? And in what order? It can also be difficult to decide whether to localize the entire game or just part of it.

All these things are not simple and can be summarized in two questions:

How much does localization cost?
Will it be successful/attractive for the speakers of X language and have good sales for the market?

Many factors come into play when choosing languages for translating a game. That’s why, in this post, we’ll talk about the must-have languages that will allow you to adapt a game to the most profitable markets.

However, before discussing more on this topic, let’s clarify a few things that will impact your costs and therefore your decision:

you can opt just for the basic localization. In addition to translating in-game texts, this includes translating the description, keywords, and screenshots (if you choose to publish and sell your game online through Google Play, the Apple Store, Steam, or another platform for gamers.
if you choose to go further, you can choose to implement a partial localization (in-game text & subs) or for a full localization (including audio files).
regardless of how you publish your game – online or offline, on your own website, or different platforms for players – the translation of marketing and advertising materials is mandatory.

4 Questions To Answer Before Selecting The Languages For Your Game Localization

Before choosing languages to translate and localize the game, consider answering a few questions:

what are your game genre and monetization model? Is it a freemium or a paid one, based on in-app purchases?
if you intend to use players’ platforms to publish your game, what are they? And what are the most popular languages on those platforms?
how fierce is the competition on the intended market and who are your main competitors? Did they fully translate their games, or did they choose a partial localization?
what is the English proficiency of your target market? Do they use the Latin alphabet or do their languages have nothing in common with it?

You need the information resulted from these answers to understand whish potential has your game on the market you want to target and how it matches with the local preferences. An important factor is also what expectations potential customers from certain countries have. For example, in Poland, it’s pretty common to only have text localization and English voice-overs while in France, Italy, Germany, and Spain, gamers expect full VO, especially on big titles.

The answers to these questions will help you understand what chances your game has on the target market and if it matches with the local preferences. Also, the expectations of potential customers in certain countries are another important factor. For example, in Poland, it’s quite common to have only text localization and voices in English, while in France, Italy, Germany, and Spain, players expect full VO, especially for big titles.

Also, you should know that there are non-speaking English countries where the natives have a high proficiency in English. Therefore, players don’t mind playing games in English at all. Especially if the amount of text is minimal or the concept of the game is a familiar one.

You can also check the language specifications in T-Index or the EF English Proficiency Index. It can be useful to know which countries have low and very low English proficiency skills, as they probably won’t accept the unlocalized games at all.

10 languages to localize games - English proficiency

Which languages are worth translating your game into?

According to the Newzoo report, in 2020 there were 2.7 billion gamers globally, generating a total turnover of $159.3 billion. In 2021, the number of players is expected to increase by 5.3% over the previous year, reaching 3.0 billion players, while the estimated global revenue will be $ 175.8 billion by the end of the year.

top languages for game localization - revenue 2021

In 2020, the top 10 countries producing the max game revenue included China, the USA, Japan, South Korea, Germany, UK, France, Canada, Italy, and Spain. These 10 countries generated almost $138.3 billion, meaning almost 87% of the global revenue.

These markets were followed by Russia, Mexico, Brazil, Australia, Taiwan, India, Indonesia, Turkey, Thailand, and the Netherlands. All added another $ 11.5 billion, which means 8% of the gaming industry’s global revenue.

Therefore, by localizing into all these countries, you’ll get access to the markets with nearly 90% of the world’s game revenue.

Top 10 Best Game Localization Languages

Even if at SandVox, we translate and localize games in 30 languages, our must-have list includes EFIGS+CJK+ PTBR+RU.

English

The English-language location provides access not only to the United States and other English-speaking countries but also to much of the rest of the Western world. Even if players might prefer a local language version, if the game is good, they will also play it in English. Given the specifics of each of them, you can consider the separate location for British, American, and Australian English.

French

Like English, translation, and localization in French open the door to several French-speaking countries. In addition to France, this market includes Belgium, Switzerland, Monaco, and several African countries. Metropolitan French (or European standard) also works for Canada (about 20% of the Canadian population speaks French), although Canadians might prefer the local version.

Italian

Italy is the 9th largest gaming market in the world, with Italian being officially spoken in Italy, Switzerland, and San Marino. Due to the low level of English proficiency, in these countries, consumers are used to high-quality gaming localizations.

German

If you localize in German, you will reach German and Austrian players, as well as those from Switzerland, Luxembourg, and Lichtenstein. Linguistically, German is closer to English than any of the other FIGS languages (French, Italian or Spanish), and German players tend to speak English better than other non-English speaking nations. It’s up to you whether you decide to have a localized German version or not.

Spanish

Among the FIGS languages, Spanish is a special case. Even though the localization in Spanish was originally intended only for Spain, nowadays you should consider the growing Latin American market, with a population of hundreds of millions.

This makes Spanish the second or third most spoken language in the world depending on methodology. Although the value of the Latin American market remains very small compared to that of Europe, we see here a faster growth than any other region.

Simplified Chinese

Simplified Chinese is the most widely spoken language in the world, and China is not only poised to surpass the US as the largest gaming market this year but is also expected to grow at an astonishing rate in the upcoming years. In 2014, the country lifted the 14-year ban on consoles and has an unparalleled appetite for the internet, mobile phones, and electronic entertainment. However, China remains one of the most difficult markets to enter due to cultural differences, local laws and regulations, and a strong local industry that knows exactly what Chinese gamers want. All this makes Mainland China a risky business with high investments, but with a possible high return for localization.

Japanese

Along with the USA, Japan was the birthplace of the modern gaming industry, the origin of giants as Nintendo, SEGA, and Sony, and beloved brands like Pacman, Sonic, and Mario and therefore, the Japanese must hold a special place in all game enthusiasts’ hearts. It is now in third place worldwide after the USA and China and is well-known for dedicated lifelong gaming fans who don’t hesitate to spend a lot of money on games they love. When it comes to foreign products, it remains part of the “mysterious Orient”, despite abundant exchange between Japanese and Western games. The blueprint of what makes a successful localization from the West to Japan or vice-versa has not been found yet and many of the world’s biggest companies have failed when tried to enter this market.

Korean

Korean is also one of the most important 3 languages for Asian localization. Despite a relatively small population of under 50 million, South Korea has a gaming culture like in Japan. The Korean gaming industry is extremely competitive, and to be successful, a Western title usually requires deep and correct adaptation, a thought-out strategy, and ideally a local partner. The country is well known as a major hub for eSports with live events attracting millions of viewers.

Brazilian Portuguese

With 81.2 million players, Brazil’s digital game market reached $1.6 billion in 2020. While the whole region of Latin America is still very small compared to all others, it is also the fastest-growing. This puts Brazilian Portuguese in the same basket as Latin American Spanish as two major emerging languages for the gaming industry. However, while Spanish used in Spain and Latin American countries are not that different, the Portuguese used in Brazil requires a dedicated localized version.

In terms of the gaming industry, the Latin American region is still very small compared to all the others, but it also has the fastest growth. This puts Brazilian Portuguese on the same stage as Latin American Spanish, both of them being considered major emerging languages for the gaming industry. But if the Spanish used in Spain and Latin American countries are almost the same, the situation is a bit different for the Portuguese language used in Brazil, which requires a dedicated localized version.

Russian

Russia is a different niche compared with the established European and Asian markets. In terms of global gaming revenue, Russia ranks #12, but has the highest percentage of PC gamers globally, with over 90% playing games on the PC. The mobile gaming market in Russia is relatively new, giving developers a high probability of success. Anyone entering the Russian market will face fierce competition from well-established local companies, some of which are virtually unknown outside the country. As the Russian economy tends to be volatile, and because of high retail prices and poor copyright enforcement, piracy can cause serious problems.

Final Words

In short, the main European languages are a safe bet, regardless of the original version of the game. English, French, German, Spanish, Portuguese, and Italian are the traditional languages to start with. In Asia, China, Japan, and Korea are massive markets with very high potential. But if you want to be successful here, the quality of the location must be very good. Latin America and Russia are growing fast, but the market size and average revenue per user are much smaller.

No matter what decisions you make, when choosing the languages for localizing your games, you need to consider not only the cost of translation but also all the collateral expenses that can come up.

July 15, 2021

6 Foolproof Strategies To Promote Your Game On Social Media

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The power of social media as a marketing tool is recognized by entrepreneurs and businesses all over the world. You can see a large number of brands, old or new, small or big, selling their products online. So, why not use the power of social media to promote your game?

The global gaming market had a turnover of USD 173.70 billion in 2020 and it’s expected to reach a value of USD 314.40 billion by 2026. With 9.64% growth in the forecast period (2021 – 2026), it’s very clear that the gaming industry is here to stay.

The market is more competitive than ever, with large development studios and indie developers fighting to attract the target audience.

At the same time, the COVID-19 pandemic influenced the way brands communicate with their clients and potential customers. According to Content Marketing Institute report, 42% of B2C marketers stated they have a documented content marketing strategy in 2021, up from 33% the previous year, while 68% of them reported their organization implemented moderate or major adjustments to their content marketing strategy, in response to the pandemic.

Promote-your-game-social-media-content -report

With so many lockdowns in 2020 and the first months of 2021, online competition in communication and the usage of social media exploded.

To face this challenge, B2C marketers reported that the top three organic content distribution channels they use to engage with their audiences are social media platforms (82%), their organization’s website/blog (79%), and email (76%).

Using social media for gaming should be part of your marketing and localization strategies, but just signing up on Facebook, Twitter, Instagram, or YouTube is just not enough. Even if they are the most popular organic social media platforms used by the B2C marketers in the last 12 months.

But how do you get in on the action? What does it take to build up your gaming audience and advertise your game via social?

Good questions! In this post, we’ll show you 6 foolproof strategies to promote your game on social media. However, before designing and implementing any social media strategy, you should start with two fundamental steps that will help you lay the foundations of a successful online presence and get your game the attention it deserves.

Define your audience before starting to promote your game on social media

The first step is to set up your ideal customer profile. Who are the people who will like, play, download or buy your game the most? How do they look like? Are they teenagers, young adults, or mature adults? Which age group do they belong to? Where do they live? What is their income? What do they appreciate the most? Which social networks do they use? And when? And the questions can go on.

Defining your ideal audience will save you time and money and will prevent you from pushing your game to the wrong audience that doesn’t have any interest in it. And you must do this not only with the original version of your game but also when you want to expand globally.

In this case, when creating a localization strategy for a specific market, you have to consider its specificity when adapting the profile of your ideal customer. If you don’t know where to start, a good idea is to take a look at your competition to see where they invest the most effort and how they communicate with their fans. Try to figure out how they defined their audiences, and which part of their strategies you can easily replicate and then target your market accordingly.

Set up your brand voice

Before starting tweeting, posting on Facebook or Instagram, or create your first YouTube video clip, or even deciding how to advertise your game, be sure you match your social media voice with your brand and game personality. To do this, you must decide first who your brand is, by answering the following question:

If your game would have been a person, who would it be like – act like – speak and sound like? Let’s say you developed a management problems’ solving game, targeting the C-levels managers. Then is no point in having an edgy and irreverent-speak. Once you found your voice, use it consistently, not just on social networks, but also when leverage the power of SEO to increase your website’s organic traffic.

Once you defined your target audience and set up your voice, it’s time to learn how to use social media to maximize your opportunities.

Be consistent when you start to promote your game

After deciding which social media channels are the best to engage with your potential consumers, be consistent. Don’t stop, don’t slow down.

If you want to build a solid fan base, you must constantly post, share and engage people. Otherwise, they might think you are not authentic or lost your interest and they’ll go to your competitors.

Always produce fresh content, share related content on a consistent basis, and interact with your followers. Whenever someone posts a comment, uploads a picture or video, jump into the conversation. This way, you’ll develop good relationships with people and businesses whose content you’re sharing – and they’ll return the favor.

Use a trial during the pre-launch phase

With a game in the development and/or localization stage, it’s time to think about the pre-launch campaign and elevate your game. If you’ll be waiting until your game will be released, you’ll lose a good time’s worth of advertisement opportunities.

Generally speaking, gamers are digital natives. Chronically online, they are always hunting for new content to check out. That’s why so much of social media for gamers is centered around creating a sense of hype.

Therefore, creating a teaser to promote your game and share it on your social media channels or posting announcements about an upcoming release date helps you building anticipation that gets people talking (and ultimately tuning in).

You’ll also need to decide what the marketing story of your game will be and create the narrative that will help you to inform people.

On 7/20 we'll debut the first #NintendoDirect Mini: Partner Showcase, a series focused on titles from our development & publishing partners. We'll share a few updates on a small group of previously-announced #NintendoSwitch games. Check out the full video release at 7am PT. pic.twitter.com/GbEbxVL6fD

— Nintendo of America (@NintendoAmerica) July 20, 2020

Partner with streamers and up-and-coming gamers

As influencer marketing is used by brands to build social proof, it makes perfect sense for you to partner with streamers and gaming personalities. Doing so not only introduces your company to a new audience but also puts a face to your marketing efforts.

“It was the best moment of my career”@FRANA_OW clutches the fight and pops off as Zenyatta.

🧡OW: https://t.co/eoVULM89gJ pic.twitter.com/7VddaFlxKO

— Overwatch (@PlayOverwatch) July 30, 2020

It might seem silly, but video game marketing should be fun. Showing players enjoying your game is a simple way to do exactly that. Besides, gamers are also eager to grow their brand and channel and therefore try to find and advertise games that suit their audience. So, partnering with them is like finding the right match for your game, while bringing that much-needed sense of authenticity.

Pro tip: Grab the crown. pic.twitter.com/yvaqJFaGaY

— Twitch (@Twitch) August 5, 2020

Use the apps to schedule and share your content

As mentioned before, having consistency in posting on social media is one of the main keys to success. And for this, you need a strategy and a social media content plan when start to promote your game.

When creating the social media calendar, consider the following posts to schedule and share:

Live event announcements (streams, esports)
User-generated content such as fanart or cosplays
Press mentions and positive reviews
Screenshots and videos from upcoming games
In-game updates and bug fixes
Questions for your community
Time-sensitive offers and promotions

Excepting planning in advance, you can:

create a social media calendar and post by yourself every single time, or
automate the whole process and use an app to schedule and share your content.

Apps like Buffer, Coschedule, Hootsuite, or Sprout Social are robust and cohesive social media business solutions, built to scale.

Understand and apply the best practices specific to each social media platform

Whether you are part of a small, limited-resource game marketing team or a bigger one, the principle is the same: understand and apply the best practices of each social media platform you intend to use if you want to succeed.

Moreover, when resources are relatively limited, you should prioritize. Start with the social network that works best for you when it comes to building your audience. Is it Facebook? Or Twitter? Or Instagram? Or YouTube?

Before deciding what fits you the best, consider that:

Twitter should be a top priority when it comes to social networks for gamers. The platform is prime for breaking news and already has a dedicated gaming audience looking for day-to-day updates.
Facebook – is fair game for studios as well, especially given that it’s s a popular place for offers and ads. That’s why is also ideal for attracting attention to long-term promotions.
Instagram for gamers is more focused on community updates and user-generated content like fan art and cosplay photography.
YouTube – to connect with your gaming community

Analyze your social media channels

Once you’ve implemented all of these techniques, you must measure your results and adjust your actions accordingly to maximize the potential of your social media campaign. Unfortunately, no communication campaign works on a “set-and-forget” basis.

Measure the success of your social media posts comparing to other content distribution channels to see if they’re gaining any traction. There’s a wealth of resources online to help you with this. If you created one, you should also keep an eye on your landing page to see what type of traffic you’re receiving. This can tell you how most people find out about your game.

Final words

Gamers are a unique audience. Passionate and plugged in, they’re likewise the most likely to follow and engage companies and they’re fans of.

Our post about how to promote your game on social media will get you started with ideas to level up your gaming marketing. Speaking of which, make sure to check out the latest SandVox blog posts for additional tips on how to effectively reach a wider audience and tap into what your fan base and followers really want.

July 8, 2021

20 Questions To Ask (And Answer) Before Localizing Your Game

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Localizing your game is one of the main things you can do if you want to reach a global market, grow your revenue, and expand your player base. But even if at the first glance it seems to be an easy task, localization involves many aspects and comes with a certain risk.

Beyond the surface, things are much more complicated than they seem and involve the cooperation between linguists, editors, testers, developers, graphic designers, actors, marketers, and even a localization company. And to complicate things even more, you can also add stakeholders to the list. With so much pressure, you might ask: “Does it worth it? Or it’s better to use the original version of the game all over the world?”

When your game’s success and turnaround (ROI) depend on you, you would want to know that the investment of time and money was worth it.

In this blog post, we’ll cover a few aspects to think about before starting your game localization – from some basic aspects to the strategic, financial, and operational ones.

Basic Questions About Localizing Your Game

1. What does localizing mean?

In addition to simply translating the words from one language to another, localization means to consider the elements specific to a market and adapt the content in a way that fits the requirements and it’s suitable to that market.

In other words, localizing games means:

editing for cultural, historical, religious, and legal sensitivities
replace the artwork to fit with the targeted market
recording new voices
transforming and adapting user interfaces
create new user manuals
develop new packaging and marketing communication

2. Which is the localization workflow?

To have a successful localization, you need to go through the following steps:

Preparing for localization – is the stage where you learn and analyze everything and prepare for what’s next – about your game and the targeted market: cultural, historic, religious, and economic elements, and taboos. You collect all these elements and create a localization project, that will act as a guide for everyone involved – linguists, developers, designers, marketers
Translation – turns your game assets from one language to another
Revisions and editing – corrects grammar, spelling, and stylistic errors, check translation consistency and ensures terminology is consistent
Regional adaptation – makes sure the translated content complies with local regulations and standards
Linguistic quality assurance (LQA) – tests the quality of the translation and how new elements integrate into the game.

3. How long it will take to localize my game?

There is not a standard time to localize a game. The length of this process depends on the number of words that must be translated and the elements that must be adapted to the new market.

However, you have to know that any changes you add during your game localization, the more time this process will take.

4. Is bad localization risky?

Regardless of whether we are talking about a game or a different product, bad localization can be a true disaster. Get a wrong cultural reference or break some taboos and you can offend the entire community. If you make mistakes and violate any legal terms or standards, you can risk your game not being published on the market.

So yes, bad localization can be very risky and can break your entire game – both in terms of reputation and financially.

Strategic Considerations

5. Do I really need game localization?

Localization helps you to reach more potential ideal customers from your target audience. And the more audience you reach and convince to play, download, or buy your game, the higher are your sales, revenue, reputation, and player base.

So yes, if you want to have a game that reaches a global market and maximize its success, you need localizing content of your game.

6. Which localization languages should I choose?

When expanding on the major gaming markets, the translation and localization teams group the most important languages in two categories:

EFIGS (English, French, Italian, German, and Spanish) – when you want to reach the USA, Latin America, Australia, and Europe
CJK (Chinese, Japanese and Korean) – when you want to enter the Asian markets

These groupings act as a useful guide, but your ideal market depends on the nature and audience of your game.

7. How do I find the right market for my game?

Finding the best markets for your game can be a tricky and daunting task. But you can start by looking at data from similar games released in particular markets and make an idea about which game genres and styles are likely more or less to succeed in certain territories.

The starting points to consider are:

the size of the market
the success rate of your game genre in specific regions
the most restrictive and the less restrictive countries
the countries with the highest and lowest level of English

8. I want to localize my game in more languages. Should I start with all of them?

If you decided the markets you want to enter on, then doing all of it in one go can pay off.

Using one provider for all the localization languages will result in more consistent translations, as they use the same original sources, style guide, and reference information. In addition, if there is a bug in the translated versions of your game in one language, the team can cross-check and fix the errors that appear in all translated versions.

Besides, all future updates can be implemented very easily if you have only one provider.

9. Should the people who localize my video game be gamers?

Yes, absolutely. Hiring a localization team made by game players means they understand the importance of language used in a video game and they can easily implement the local terms and idioms. Besides, the more games they play, the better they know the importance of a positive user experience is and they can improve your game.

Financial Questions

10. How much does the localization cost?

The cost of a localization project involves more aspects, such as volume of work, quality, delivery time, and the prices can vary according to the project’s complexity. However, there are a few types of fees to consider when estimating the budget of your game localization project:

Familiarization, glossary creation, style guide creation, developing the testing plan, quality assurance, and project management: hourly prices
Translation and revision: per-word rate.

11. Which are the languages with the best price/audience ratio?

The size of your target market and the genre of your game should be the starting point of the revenue you get from your localized game. However, here are some costs and reach of some languages:

Simplified Chinese – is relatively inexpensive and can open the door to a huge potential audience

French – will help you to expand not only in France and Canada but also in all other countries that are former French colonies.

Russian – the Russians have pretty low English levels, but they are a huge market. So, if you want to expand to the former Soviet Union countries, you should definitely localize your game. Luckily, localizing from English to Russian is very cheap.

Spanish – is one of the five most widespread languages in the world and your video game localization can bring you important revenue.

12. How can I reduce the cost of my game and content localization?

There are two ways to reduce the costs of your localization project:

Limit your changes. Even minor changes introduced after you start localizing your game will increase your costs.
Be consistent.

13. Should I hire agencies or freelancers?

Generally speaking, freelancers can be cheaper than agencies. But agencies offer you a higher quality and a much larger variety of services and languages for translation and localization, such as quality assurance. But the best part is that agencies act as a single point of contact for all your needs related to the localization project – from graphic designers to actors for recording the voice-overs. This will reduce substantially the project management efforts on your end.

Operational Considerations Before Localizing Your Game

14. Which format should my content be in?

Using clearly formatted spreadsheets for handling your translation and localization project simplifies the import of information into the translation and localization software. That’s why the spreadsheets (and their tabs) must be all laid out using the same template or format.

However, the best formats are multilingual compatible. A perfect example is an .xliff. These are files designed to be multilingual and allow for contextual information, etc. to be included.

15. How much context should I give to the localization team?

The more context you can provide, the better. If you can give the localization team a full version of your game to play through, then do that. This way they will become familiar and understand your game much easier. If not, provide them with as much information as you can about the tone, style, and background context of the game. This way you’ll help them to produce a higher-quality result.

16. When should I start thinking about localizing my game?

The sooner the better. If you start thinking from the beginning about which markets you want to expand, it saves a lot of technical issues later and you’ll avoid language and culture-specific issues, like noun/gender issues, special characters, and non-breaking spaces.

Thinking about localization early also sets you up to complete the project on your timeline, rather than force out a lower-quality rushed job at the end of development.

17. Subtitle or voice over?

This depends on the style of your game and the preferences of your audience. If your game is an online first-person shooter without a story, often there’s no real need to translate the game’s audio. But if it’s a story that relies on dialogue, the improvement to a player’s experience that audio translation adds is worth the investment.

18. What is Localization Quality Assurance (LQA)?

LQA is the last step in making sure of having a high-quality localization. Basically, LQA means:

linguistic testing checks the accuracy and consistency of the translation within context, flags missing content, and correctly formats things like times and dates
cosmetic testing checks the consistency with the source material and whether images and graphics are localized correctly
cultural testing makes sure the game’s material passes the target region’s content laws
certification testing checks the game will pass hardware manufacturer certifications.

19. What’s an indicator of a good LQA?

One of the best ways to analyze LQA standards is through submission rates. Submissions are all the checks and balances you need to tick off before a hardware manufacturer will accept a game — for example, a controller disconnect message needs to display the right terminology at the right time. If a submission rate is in the 95-100% range, you’re probably in good hands.

20. How do I make the difference between a good translation service and a bad one?

There’s no certain way to know you’ll get a high-quality translation. But there are some things you should ask from a provider before hiring them:

check the credentials of the company
ask for critical user feedback
look for native speakers
look for real knowledge of the subject
ask for an explanation of why they would translate in a certain way
check a provider has experience working with string files and files that contain tags and code.

Any questions for us?

Because we are the translation and localization experts during the projects we’ve partnered with, we have seen and experience a lot.

Therefore, if you are looking for answers before localizing your game, we are here to help. Let’s talk!

July 1, 2021

7 SEO Strategies for Gaming Websites – What You Need To Know

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The gaming industry took the internet audience by storm, becoming one of the primary sources of entertainment worldwide. In addition, the COVID-19 pandemic and the multiples lockdowns have had contributed to the booming of this industry, especially for online games. So, it’s no wonder that gaming websites use SEO strategies as part of their marketing plan to attract their audience.

Gaming-focused Digital Strategies

In 2020, the video gaming industry had a revenue of $159,3 Bill i on and it’s forecasting to be worth $200 Billion by the end of 2023. The development of new technologies and the emerging of new markets and opportunities contribute to the increasing of the gaming industry, but also to the competition to find new players and boost sales. This is where digital marketing strategies and SEO can help you.

To be visible to your target audience, you need to invest in those marketing and communication strategies that work for your brand. You can use the same principles and best marketing practices that work for any online business and combine them with different SEO strategies specific to the gaming industry.

What Is SEO And How It Works?

SEO stands for search engine optimization and means increasing the quantity and quality of traffic to your site in search engines when people search for information related to your business. SEO simply refers to the unpaid display of your website (also known as “organic traffic”), that is originated when people are looking for different inquiries.

Implementing effective content and SEO strategies helps your website to rank in the top pages of SERPs and this is important as people prefer not to spend too much time when looking for some information online.

Major Factors to Consider When Choosing Your SEO Strategies

Having a solid SEO strategy involves many elements. Some factors are the basic elements that every online business has to take into consideration, other of them are specific to the gaming industry. Here are the most important three aspects you should think about before designing your SEO strategy.

Know Your Target Market Before Design Your SEO Strategies

Knowing the market and its characteristic is the first step for any business, not just for gaming companies. Think about this: if you don’t know who your players are, how can you reach them, talk to them and convince them to play or download your game? You can’t, at least not in an engaging way.

When you know your target market, you can create an efficient marketing strategy that in addition to SEO includes content strategy, email, social media, and offline marketing campaigns. Usually, in this step, you gather information about your ideal customer(s) and set up their profile(s). By knowing this information in advance, you can create a marketing plan and set up your budget to accomplish it.

Know What Gaming Site You Want To Be

With so many game genres, system requirements, and many other aspects to consider, deciding which gaming site you want to be is an imperative step that will also help you to build your best SEO strategy.

As the majority of gaming sites involve game-related content like gaming blogs and videos, rulebooks, and portals, the first two steps of this process help in attracting the right target audience for your gaming site.

Analyze Your Competition

The main goal of efficient SEO strategies is to help your website get ahead of the competition and meticulous competitor analysis will help you get an edge over them. This way you can identify the areas where they excel and replicate their success. At the same time, you can figure out which gaps and weaknesses they have, so you can take advantage and increase demand for your website.

SEO Strategies To Implement For Gaming Websites

Optimize Your Website for Both Short- and Long Tail Keywords

On-page SEO optimization is an imperative step in designing an efficient SEO strategy and a key factor in how well will rank your website in search engine results.

This involves expertise in precise and targeted keyword research and in combining the usage of short and long-tail keywords and you’ll find this approach for the best gaming websites.

Here are a few aspects to consider:

– Long-tail keywords are known to be more specific and generate less traffic than the short ones, but also have lower competition and generate more conversions;

– With a large number of players opting to use the long-tail keywords for their searches, take advantage and optimize your website to fit their needs.

To find the best keywords for your website, make your keywords research using SEO tools such as Ahrefs, SEMrush, Moz, Keywords Everywhere, or Ubersuggest. All of them offer you very accurate data related to keyword performance (search volume, SEO difficulty and trends).

Combine the usage of short and long-tail keywords for your website optimization with solid SEO link-building strategies and with engaging and useful content, and you’ll help your website to rank higher in search engine results.

Create Blog Posts and Video Content

According to Wyzowl’s State of Video Marketing Survey 86% of businesses use video as a marketing tool, increasing slightly from 85% in 2020.

Video content has become nowadays more important than ever and 9 out of 10 viewers state that they want to see more videos from brands and businesses. In fact, it’s predicted that in 2021, a person will spend every day about 100 minutes watching online videos.

So, creating unique video content related to gaming tricks and tips, games tutorials, reviews, etc, can attract viewers, substantially improve traffic and increase your gaming website downloads. In addition, many forums and portals have already gamer communities waiting for engaging and helpful content so gaming blogs are very popular among them.

It is also important to make your videos and blog posts SEO-friendly, as Google shows both Youtube videos and written content in their search results.

Use Updated Content As Part Of Your SEO Strategies

Your frequent website updates offer search engines plenty of fresh content and sources of new information for their search requests. In other words, when you update your website frequently with fresh high-quality, and SEO-optimized content, Google will love you for this.

Besides, fresh content also means frequent indexing, so you have the opportunity to rank higher, based on the content you provide.

Think Mobile

As the number of people using mobile devices has increased in the past few years, Google announced switching to mobile-first indexing starting with 1^st July 2019. This means Google predominantly uses the mobile version of the content for indexing and ranking.

The new websites have already included this option that improves the user experience through better navigation. But if you have a website older than that date, you must optimize it for mobile as soon as possible.

IN terms of website design, it also means you have to place the main information in a way that is visible for both mobile and desktop versions.

Optimize For Voice Search

With 71% of consumers preferring to conduct queries by voice instead of typing, voice activation and recognition systems are utilized more than ever before. So it’s better to take the advantage of the technology development as sooner as possible.

Voice-based search terms work better when your content can be seen in Google’s Featured Snippet. So make sure that the question inquiry and the answers a5re on the same page, as Google tends to ensure that users get instant results and favors more those sites.

Use Gaming Forums To Create Quality Backlinks

As mentioned before, gaming forums are the best target area for SEO for gaming sites, and quality link-building plays a major role here. Gaming forums are the best way to increase the social interaction of gamers and to draw attention to your gaming website. Providing the gamer communities with relevant links which have the content they are looking for, will not only generate their interest but also help you in elevating your efforts in implementing the best SEO strategies for gaming sites.

Use Social Media

No matter what industry you come from, social networks are the best place to promote your business or products. Posting relevant content on social media platforms and engaging your target audience in commenting, liking, and sharing posts can generate more interest than generic SEO strategies. In addition, by generating viral content through SEO for gaming sites and by using social tools such as hashtags you can increase traffic to your website.

Takeaway

Implementing SEO strategies for gaming sites means taking the same steps as for any other industry – from identifying your target audience to keyword research to taking the advantage of social media and building quality backlinks through gaming communities. However, you need to be strategic both in choosing the right target market for your game, in optimizing your content for the right keywords, and in using the right platforms to gain the most visibility with your target audience. Also, the relevance of the content is essential because players only want what is useful and captivating when accessing a gaming site.

June 23, 2021

Video Game Translation Best Practices

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The success and longevity of a game depend almost always on its presence on the global market, characterized by a large number of game players who become more open-minded, wiser, and more demanding with their acquisitions. Therefore, you should make sure that you have a high-quality video game translation and localization, as they can make or break the reputation of a game and its sales on the international market.

Besides, during the internationalization, translation, and culturalization of your game, you’ll face various challenges that are not so easy or funny to overcome. But its triumph you will enjoy represents the reward of providing the ideal versions of your game to players around the world.

So, what does it take for a game to be found worthy of entertaining today’s most sophisticated customers? And which are the translation best practices that will ensure you successfully provided your target market with a captivating product?

Read on to find out what you have to do and what are the translation best practices to take the game experience to the next level.

With 2.7 billion users from all over the world in 2019, the video games market is worth $152.1 billion. In 2020 the global gaming market reached $155.89 billion and it is estimated it will amount to 268.8 billion U.S. dollars annually in 2025.

Even if this market has a continuing growth, the video gamers are an extremely sophisticated and complex audience, with a mindset different from an average customer, very specific tastes, and cultural behavior. In this industry, even the slightest mistake can lead to a serious drop in sales.

Therefore, video game translation is a tricky process and not very easy if you want to get the best results. In addition, you must have specialists who understand your audience and provide you with the right translation and localization services.

However, to have a game that engages the player and brings his experience to the next level, you must go through the following steps:

Pre-production

Before starting your game translation project, make sure that your game is really ready for translation. In other words, to work with your translation and localization agency as smooth as possible, complete various related tasks in advance, such as:

Gather the various pieces of information that will lead to the accurate and high-quality translation and prepare the specific documents
Complete the legal documentation and agreements
Establish the translation process workflow and the procedures
Set the project management structure and define the communication protocols
Adopt a realistic budget for the translation project
Prepare for the next steps following translation and learn how to handle the QA issues that might occur

Video Game Translation

Converting game texts and dialogues from the language in which they were originally created to a different one means more than just a word-for-word replacement. You must pay attention to the smallest details, and that means translating clichés, idioms, and other expressions into equivalents in the target language. Also, make sure you match all the in-game audio, texts, and graphics with the new version of your game.

Generally, the translation process entails:

Translation — this means playing the game, studying the style guides and specific glossaries, learning the game’s context, and translating the text and audio files. This stage also includes editing, proofreading, and quality checking and/or testing the translated content, which are usually made by an independent team of translators.
Quality assurance — this step includes a close analysis of all text elements to correct in detail any error that might occur, especially spelling and grammar. Audio files are meticulously checked to detect and fix any problems, such as distorted or muttered words, and sound quality issues.
Files conversions — when the quality assurance processes are complete, the translated files are converted to the game’s original file formats. Translated text files are copied into the game code while translated audio files are converted to MP4, WMA, or other audio file formats used in the original version of the game.
Follow-up QA testing — At this point, the linguist experts or a third-party quality testing provider may perform additional quality examinations to ensure that the newly translated material and the game’s coding are ideally integrated.

To meet the high standards of the industry requires a meticulous process and following the most important video games translation best practices.

If you want to succeed in the global market, then all translated and localized versions of the game must have the same quality as the version created in the source language. Therefore, you need to make sure that professional translators use cultural references and regional dialects, use slang, and apply the nuances specific to the intended language.

Understand the culture of your target market

It’s important to know what was successful and what has failed in that area and why so researching the culture and the gaming market in the country where you want to expand your game is a key process of your translation and localization project. That’s why testing the game to discover how any cultural features and other aspects of it will be received in the area are very important steps. The areas with a strong cultural sensitivity are:

History — an inaccurate portrayal of a nation’s important historical moments can trigger surprisingly strong negative reactions.
Religion — inappropriate allusions and the use of religious and cultural symbols and concepts considered taboo can offend and even cause serious consequences for in-country game developers and their partners.
Ethnicity — racial stereotypes, prejudices, and failure to properly manage the ethnic diversity in-game can lead to direct and brutal rejection of the product in the target market.
Geo-politics — some countries do not permit media and gaming industry products portraying boundaries that conflict with the government’s claims to external land areas as part of its sovereign territory.

Promote teamwork and communication

To make the whole process smoother, keep transparency and promote a collaborative team relationship between author, game developers, and professional translators throughout the whole translation process. This way you make it easier to maximize the quality of outcomes and ensure a much more satisfying experience for everyone involved.

Effective communication between translation professionals and developers enhances the ability of everyone involved to get the most out of the process, and benefits players and the success of the game.

Complete all pre-production work

Determine whether your game is ready for the translation process. Create a checklist, and use it to complete pre-production tasks, including choosing languages for localization, preparing the legal documents, creating a budget for video game translation services, setting the project workflow, testing in target markets, and other pre-production work.

Test and collect feedback

Establish well-functioning channels for submitting and receiving feedback and gather it from your game’s multilingual consumer base. After the translation is completed, advise your clients to perform testing and check if the outcome fits with your localization strategy.

Efficient time management

Superficial research, rushing up translation and other related tasks result in errors and compromise the quality of results for all parties involved, from players to shareholders and employees of the gaming company. Proper planning and preparation of translation and video game localization projects allow for methodically executed processes and substantial quality. Time management skills make often the difference between games with average performance and those that become international hits.

Some other aspects you should keep in mind when you want to successfully translate and localize your game in different languages and prepare it for a global audience:

Look to identify and fix potential translation problems as early as possible in the design and development process.
Write source code in a way that allows translation with minimal rewriting.
Leave room for translated strings to occupy a larger space than the original text.
Before starting localization, hire native players to test your translated version of the game to discover cultural issues.
Make sure your game meets all national and local government constraints does not affect cultural sensitivities.
Provide translators with a thorough understanding of context. Leave notes in text strings to help translators understand their use in the game.
Provide translators with elements that make it easier for them to understand the context of the game leave notes in text strings to help them understand their use in the game.
When inserting localized strings, assure that translators are allowed to reorder words in any way they wish.
Limit substitutes you use in coding to a number or a single word.
Set up a system for tracking changes to the source text to prevent duplication in ordering strings and to avoid difficulties in integrating translated strings back into the game. This can be especially important when releasing frequent updates with added content.

Final Words

High-quality gaming translation and localization will help you to maximize a game’s value, facilitate its success and avoid potentially serious costs of lost revenues, public relations failures, and brand damage. Beyond its accuracy, a successful translation should enhance the player’s experience through engaging and natural interaction. Achieving this result depends largely on the success of open communication and collaboration between developers and translation experts. Employing video game translation best practices further helps maximize accuracy, minimize risks of errors, time wasted, and the needless duplication of efforts.

June 10, 2021

Best-selling Book Genres For 2021 – What Your Readers Love?

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2020 is that year that brought unexpected situations, events, and changes in almost every aspect of our life. And the world of writing – from the book genres to reading and publishing does not make any exception.

Due to the COVID-19 crisis, multiple lockdowns and social distancing measures, people were forced to move dramatically towards the online channels, both for the purchase of various goods and entertainment. As a response, many industries had to take massive, urgent, and previously unthinkable actions to move into the digital world, too. A McKinsey Global Survey shows that COVID-19 has accelerated the adoption of digital technologies by 7 years globally, while the situation is not much different by geographical regions.

Best-selling-book-genres-for-2021---McKinsey-Global-Survey — Sou r ce

However, unlike many other industries, the publishing world has faced these changes for almost a decade now. According to the recent data provided by Statista, a total of 191 million e-books were sold in the United States in 2020. The sharp increase of 21 million e-books sold in just one year (2020 compared to 2019) could be the direct result of the coronavirus outbreak, which led to a large growth in online media consumption.

Direct access to bookstores was one of the last big advantages of the traditional publishing houses, but it has now been lost due to blockages around the world and to the public’s effort to stay home whenever possible.

This is good news for the online bookstores and self-publishing platforms, and bad for physical libraries. In addition to the social distancing measures during the Coronavirus crisis, many other factors influence the increased adoption of the e-book market and the publishing industry trends:

The constant sophistication and technical development of reading devices provide an experience similar to that of reading a paper-printed book and are the key factors influencing the global e-book market. Increasing the use of smartphones, tablets and the multilingual feature of e-books is an essential advantage that determines the increased global demand for e-books.
Online applications or services provide easy access to a wide range of e-book libraries, thus emerging as cheap alternatives to the traditional method of delivery. The services available for these e-books, such as e-loans, have also supported the adoption of e-books worldwide.
Publishers and libraries are also noticing increasing demands for e-books. Hachette Book Group, one of the major publishers, announced that in 2019 the publishing company generated EUR 2.38 billion, representing a 5% increase over 2018.
Environmental protection campaigns by governments around the world, especially to reduce paper consumption and save trees, also increase the demand for e-books.
Libraries around the world have closed most of their services to mitigate the spread of COVID-19. But many of them still offer access to reading electronic materials. Besides, due to the low cost of e-books, librarians can now buy more copies, thus contributing to market growth.

In those circumstances, it’s not a surprise that smartphones have become even more of a lifeline than before. A recent We Are Social research reveals that 5.22 billion people all over the globe use a mobile phone, representing an increase of 93 million since January 2020.

best-selling book genres 2021 - We Are Social

All these data suggest that content for smartphone users is a great focus for your digital publishing efforts this year. However, the same report indicates that around 66% also use laptops or desktops for browsing and reading, meaning you shouldn’t ignore other platforms.

Anyway, it doesn’t really matter how people access the books. The most important thing is that, regardless of their format – from hardcovers to softcovers to e-books and audiobooks, bestsellers belonging to all book genres manage, in one way or another, to reach their readers in all corners of the globe.

Thus, it seems the pandemic hasn’t changed just the way people read and buy books, but it also affected the book categories, because since 2019:

nonfiction for young readers saw the most increase in the book publishing industry, maybe also because the schools were closed and much of the education happened at home
books about social issues and social justice also gained popularity in 2020
for childrens’ nonfiction categories, education/language/references, and hobbies/games/activities were the most popular subcategories.

Still, no matter how trends change in one context or another, several book genres typically produce bestsellers, and at least for 2021 are trending categories.

Best-selling book genres in 2021

Romance

In terms of book sales, romance novels are one of the most popular genres of fiction books. As human beings, we look for love stories and romance book lovers invest a lot of money in their reading habits. That’s why romance fiction is a billion-dollar genre, with estimated sales of $1.44 billion including self-published titles in 2016 – according to Bookstats. In addition, the Author Earnings’ annual report shows that in the last nine months of 2017, were sold 50,957,116 units of romantic e-books for a total value of $ 162,028,816.90.

However, romance will continue to be the most loved and profitable genre in 2021 too, as readers tend to remain loyal to their favorite authors within the romance category. Popular romance subgenres include inspirational romance, romantic suspense, young adult, contemporary romance, and historical romance.

Mystery

Many popular mystery books attract a large number of readers, standalone and series alike. The structure of the mystery novels is basically simple: they start with an exciting hook, keep the audience interested and engaged with specific suspenseful pacing, and draw a conclusion that answers all the readers’ questions.

As mystery books can be easily adapted into Netflix films and series, graphic novels, comic books, games, and interactive stories with reading apps, they get great help in becoming one of the best book genres. The best-selling mystery subgenres include cozy mysteries, police procedurals, true crime novels, hardboiled detective stories, and scientific mysteries.

Due to their speculative literary character, thriller and horror genres usually overlap with mystery and fantasy. Both categories are read throughout the year because people are always obsessed with the paranormal/supernatural and the dark side of human life.

Fantasy and Science Fiction

Despite their differences, book genres fantasy and science fiction (sci-fi) are closely related in multiple ways. Both genres tend to have an extensive number of imaginary and creative elements, and both are considered speculative fiction.

Even if many sci-fi stories can take place in a dystopian past, most of them are set in a frightening and insecure future and have to deal with unexpected events generated by the ramifications of scientific and technological development.

Fantasy subgenres include steampunk, urban and high fantasy, dark fantasy, epic fantasy, and sorcery and sword. At the same time, certain fiction genres like magical realism blend the pure attraction of fantasy with the challenging techniques found in literary fiction. And Gabriel Garcia Marquez’s One Hundred Years of Solitude is a good example of this idea.

Thriller and Horror

Authors like Dan Brown and David Baldacci dominate the list of best-selling thriller books, while Stephen King is recognized as a master of contemporary horror.

Young Adult

As young adult (YA) fiction brings popular adult genres into literature for teen audiences, these book genres will continue to sell like hotcakes in 2021. From sci-fi to romance, murder, or fantasy, the best books in the YA fiction genre include the same powerful stories and characters that are found in books for older readers. Often, themes for teenagers, such as adulthood or rebellion, overlap with existing literary tropes. J.K. Rowling was hugely successful in this niche with her Harry Potter series, as well as Suzanne Collins with The Hunger Games or R.L. Stine who through the series Goosebumps and Fear Street brings horror fiction for the audience of children and teenagers.

Best Themes for Book Genres In 2021

Pandemic: In the following years, the COVID-19 pandemic and the crisis generated by it will influence the works of many writers. Elements and themes such as global isolation, panic, natural disaster, and socio-political disorders and transformations caused by diseases and health crises, will appear in fiction and non-fiction books.

Dystopian: Usually a popular item of (social) fantasy and science fiction, dystopian elements will be used in many other book genres in the next years, including YA fiction. Due to the actual medical, social, economic, and political context, dystopian literature became very popular during the pandemic and for sure will inspire future works.

Artificial Intelligence (AI): Humanoid robots that also own human intelligence have always represented popular and catchy characters in sci-fi. Due to the development of robotics and AI, readers will see an increase in literary works dealing with artificial intelligence that takes different forms.

Women: Even if they have been a trend for a while now, female writers will continue to take the publishing world by storm. There are already published many works belonging both to the book genres nonfiction and fiction that present strong and independent female characters but also there are female writers who publish in sci-fi.

Bottom line

We don’t suggest you decide to write a romance novel just because it’s the most popular book category. The best option is to write the book you want to write and will best represent you. But it’s also important to know where your fiction might fit into the marketplace. Knowing which book genres are popular will help you to make the right decisions about who your readers might be and the channels you might end up using for distribution and promotion.

May 27, 2021

Different Translation Services for Different Needs

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Translation services – a must-have or a headache?

Let’s say you have an app or a game that you want to be downloaded by users from all over the world. Or you have a business you want to expand globally.

You are probably thinking of translating it into various languages to make it more accessible.

You’ve heard various terms, such as translation, localization, transcription. One way or another, they all belong to that industry. But what would best suit your needs?

This infographic helps you understand at a glance which is the optimal solution.

If you want to know more details, read our blog post “Translation, Localization, and Transcreation – Which Is The Best?“.

Or contact us. We are here to help you meet your fullest potential.

May 24, 2021

Category: Articles

Content marketing

Blogging

Influencer marketing

Video content – the king of game marketing strategy

Social media

Email marketing

Live events

Bonuses, free plays and downloads

Reviews – one of the most powerful game marketing strategies

Wrapping up

Can Artificial Intelligence replace completely human translation?

Pros and Cons of using Machine Translation Software

Which are the top five machine translation services to use?

DeepL Translator

Google Cloud Machine Translation

Microsoft Translator

Amazon Translate

Systran Pure Neural MT

Wrapping up

German market overview

Dialects that characterize the German audience

Formal and informal style

Word length

Anglicanism or usage of the English words

Consider the non-standard interface when translating for the German market

Modesty

Forbidden Topics

Gender Neutrality

Final words

4 Questions To Answer Before Selecting The Languages For Your Game Localization

Which languages are worth translating your game into?

Top 10 Best Game Localization Languages

English

French

Italian

German

Spanish

Simplified Chinese

Japanese

Korean

Brazilian Portuguese

Russian

Final Words

Define your audience before starting to promote your game on social media

Set up your brand voice

Be consistent when you start to promote your game

Use a trial during the pre-launch phase

Partner with streamers and up-and-coming gamers

Use the apps to schedule and share your content

Understand and apply the best practices specific to each social media platform

Analyze your social media channels

Final words

Basic Questions About Localizing Your Game

1. What does localizing mean?

2. Which is the localization workflow?

3. How long it will take to localize my game?

4. Is bad localization risky?

Strategic Considerations

5. Do I really need game localization?

6. Which localization languages should I choose?

7. How do I find the right market for my game?

8. I want to localize my game in more languages. Should I start with all of them?

9. Should the people who localize my video game be gamers?

Financial Questions

10. How much does the localization cost?

11. Which are the languages with the best price/audience ratio?

12. How can I reduce the cost of my game and content localization?

13. Should I hire agencies or freelancers?

Operational Considerations Before Localizing Your Game

14. Which format should my content be in?

15. How much context should I give to the localization team?

16. When should I start thinking about localizing my game?

17. Subtitle or voice over?

18. What is Localization Quality Assurance (LQA)?

19. What’s an indicator of a good LQA?

20. How do I make the difference between a good translation service and a bad one?

Any questions for us?

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