作者：Vincent Chan

根据WSJ，全球手机游戏市场的价值有可能在2017翻八倍，即从2010年的37.7亿美元快速发展到296亿美元。而在全世界中，以中国和日本为首的亚太地区更是手机游戏开发商的最大市场，即48%的全球收益是来自这里，并且这里的付费玩家数更是排名第二的北美区域的3倍。

基于这些数据，我们便不会对每年有无数手机游戏尝试着扩展海外市场这一举动感到惊讶；但事实上却很少有游戏能够取得真正意义上的成功。

部分原因是手机游戏已经成为了当代的淘金热现象。来自世界各地的开发者涌入市场希望能够在此发横财，从而导致今天的手机游戏市场充满了竞争—-不管是在国内还是海外市场。

但最重要的原因还是开发者经常低估手机游戏本土化的挑战与重要性。

根据我们帮助手机游戏走向世界的经验，我将列出开发者在进入国际市场时经常犯的6个问题。如果能够避免这些问题，你便能够有效提高自己的成功几率。

1.缺少明确的国际策略和计划

游戏开发者可能犯的最基本的早期错误便是未能理解本土化不只是语言翻译。

不管何时你计划将游戏带向世界市场，你需要先回答的一个本土化策略问题便是：什么元素能够为你的公司塑造一个具有吸引力的市场？（游戏邦注：如人口，GDP，手机渗透率，竞争者，语言，法规，文化元素，合作者等等。）

基于这些标准你所选择的前10个世界市场是什么？

我们是否能够在做出最终决定前先测试市场的需求？

每个市场的需求各是什么？

你的公司是否能够同时进军多个市场？

你是否应该寻找当地的合作者？

你在每个国家的市场策略是什么？

缺少本土化了解将会扼杀你的国际行动。

因此，你需要确保你们公司拥有强大的后盾支持能够推动更深入的研究，并且一旦你们做出了国际化的决定就需要去探索目标市场并落实行动。

如果未能制定合适的策略并行动起来，你的游戏便会失败，不管它支持多少种语言。

2.在游戏开发早期阶段忽视了本土化

许多游戏开发者将有关本土化的议题延迟到了开发的后期阶段，但当他们开始编写前几行代码的时候却未能意识到自己犯下了一个严重的错误。

这便意味着当需要添加新语言和本土化需求时，他们只能进行大量返工并花费额外的成本回头去修改代码，这将耗费你们公司很多钱和时间，甚至有可能延迟游戏面向海外市场发行的时间。

比起一段时间后再进行昂贵的返工，你的团队应该事先制定好游戏国际化的决策。

你的代码是否适合预翻译阶段？你是否具体化了UI字符串？你是否仔细考虑那些国际化非文本元素，如符号，颜色，时间和日期格式，货币符号等等？

如果你的代码未能在一开始就进行本土化，那么随着你不断添加代码，问题将会变得越发严重。

3.缺少“文化化”过程

为了提升一款游戏在国际市场上的成功几率，你就必须专注于文化元素。

基本的语言翻译只是任何游戏开发者需要做的基本事宜。更理想的情况是，你的翻译者将根据目标市场的文化去调整你的游戏内容，因为文化化是必要元素。

游戏工作室Turbine的产品开发副总监Craig Alexander说道：“对于国际市场我们所学到的是，只是翻译游戏内容去进行本土化远远不够。相反地，我们需要对其进行文化化。”

为了创造最佳游戏体验，你的翻译者必须理解外国文化传统，目标国家最新的流行文化以及当地一些参照对象等等。

这同样也适用于非文本资产中。例如，尽管在美国比V手势很常见，但是在英国这却是一种侮辱性的标志。

为什么艺电的《植物大战僵尸》会成为中国最受欢迎的手机游戏之一？让我们着眼于这款游戏的本土化设计以及其背景中的长城。我们需要记住的是，我们可以通过在游戏中呈现一些区域独有的体验而提升玩家对游戏的忠诚度。

4.低估了全球手机游戏分销的挑战

如果你认为每个国家的手机游戏分销渠道都是一样的，你便大错特错！如果你是匆忙将游戏推向海外市场，你便经常会忽视这一问题。

你是否知道在中国不能使用Google Play？相反地，这里有将近200个Android应用商店并创造了一个高度分散的市场。如果缺少一个适当的系统去追踪这些渠道的性能，你便不能准确地制定策略在这个国家发行你的应用。

每个应用商店都凭借着自身的特色吸引着不同的用户。而你需要着眼于他们的不同行为并调整你的游戏去适应不同的情况。例如，市场领导者经常会根据不同的应用商店创造不同版本的游戏。换句话说，如果他们的目标应用商店有20个，他们便会创造20个不同的游戏版本和市场营销策略。

鉴于这些复杂性，许多西方游戏开发者会在进入中国市场的时候选择与当地的发行商或本土化公司合作。

当你的团队制定出本土化策略计划时，你需要确保能够与当地市场的合作者进行讨论。

5.未能本土化盈利策略

尽管你的代码和内容可能是最显著的本土化目标，但其实你的盈利模式也同样重要。

在像中国等发展中国家，游戏玩家的收益可能不像美国平均玩家那么多。所以你的业务模式就需要反应出这种现实。

当《植物大战僵尸》刚出现在中国市场时，他们便尝试着优化盈利模式，即将游戏变得较复杂且较昂贵，但这却导致其用户评价呈现消极趋势，并且使得游戏的评级从5颗星掉到了2颗星。为了克服这种情况，他们吸取了经验教训并改变了游戏的经济模式。所以现在这款游戏所收到的消极评价大大减少了。

在游戏开发者大会上，艺电中国分公司的总经理Leo Liu说道：“中国市场是不同的，你必须准备好面对任何与西方视角不同的情况。”

6.发行前未进行设备上的测试和翻译评价

这是一个很容易避免的外行问题，但是我们却一而再再而三地遭遇这一问题。

你努力地创造了游戏，制定了优秀的本土化计划，翻译了UI字符串，并发行了游戏，但突然间你却意识到一些内容出现了错误。你发现一些较长的德国文字破坏了你的游戏UI！但最糟糕的情况是，当你的首席执行官询问你为何会发生这种事时，你却说：“我本来以为翻译者会做好这些事。”

不要将责任推脱到任何人身上。最后，如果确实存在问题，并且你本来可以阻止的问题，那么责任肯定是在你身上。

专业的翻译者有时候也会犯错，特别是在复杂，分散且快速发展的手机世界。

你必须确保你的本土化合作者能够提供多种手机设备的本土化测试和评价服务，因为你可负担不起因为漏洞百出的游戏而让用户失望的结果。当你获得糟糕的评级时，你便不可能在手机世界中隐藏你的游戏的糟糕质量了。

结论

的确，面向国际市场推广游戏并不是件轻松的工作。因此，明确产权，事先制定有效的策略并落实行动非常重要。如此你的手机游戏便能够有效地利用巨大的国际化机遇！

（本文为游戏邦/gamerboom.com编译，拒绝任何不保留版权的转功，如需转载请联系：游戏邦）

Why Do Mobile Games Often Fail at International Expansion?

By Vincent Chan

According to WSJ, the global mobile game market is expected to increase eightfold from $3.77 billion in 2010 to $29.6 billion in 2017. And among all the countries, the Asia Pacific region, with China and Japan as leaders, is the biggest market for mobile game developers with 48% of the global revenue and three times more paying gamers than the second biggest region, North America.

Considering these statistics, it’s no surprise that there are countless mobile games trying to expand abroad each year; however, very few can claim success.

Part of the problem is that mobile gaming has become a modern-day gold rush. Worldwide developers flooded the market hoping to strike it rich, making today’s mobile game market extremely competitive, no matter in domestic or oversea markets.

But the biggest factor is that developers often underestimate the challenges and importance of mobile game localization.

In our experience of helping mobile games go global, here are six common mistakes they make when jumping into the international market. Avoid these, and you will greatly increase your chances of success.

1. No explicit international strategy and plan

The most basic and early stage mistake a game developer can make is failing to understand that localization is more than word-for-word language translation.

Whenever you plan to take your game global, first establish a localization strategy that answers questions like:
What factors characterize an attractive market for your company? (e.g population, GDP, mobile penetration, competitors, language, regulation, cultural factors, partners…)

What’s your prioritized list of the top 10 world markets based on these criteria?

Can we test the demand of a market before going all-in?

What are the market needs of each?

Can your company address multiple markets at the same time?

Should you find a local partner?

What’s your go-to-market strategy for each country?

Lack of commitment and understanding in localization often kills an international initiative.

Therefore, make sure your company has a strong corporate champion to drive the in-depth research, explore the markets and own the execution once the strategy is done.

Without formulating the right strategy and translating it into actions, your game will fail, no matter how many languages it supports.

2. Ignoring localization in the early phase of game development

Many game developers try to postpone localization-related discussion until the end of the development cycle, but they don’t realize that they have made a huge mistake from the moment they write their first line of code.

What this typically equates to is a lot of rework and additional costs to go back and modify your code to work when you add new language and localization requirements, costing your company thousands (or millions) of dollars and months of delay in getting into overseas markets.

Instead of doing costly rework down the road, your team should make an explicit decision on internationalization upfront.

Is your code well-prepared for the pre-translation phase? Are your UI strings all externalized? Have you given careful consideration in international non-text elements such as symbols, colours, time and date formats, and currency symbols?

If your code isn’t localized in the beginning, the problem is getting worse with every line you add.

3. No “culturalization” process

To increase the odds of a title’s success in international markets, great attention must be paid to the cultural aspects.

Basic language translation is the bare minimum that any game developers should be doing. Ideally, your translators should be able to adapt your game content to the local culture because culturalization is a necessity.

“What we learned about international markets is that it’s not enough to localize the content by just translating it. Instead, we have to culturalize it,” Craig Alexander, VP of Product Development for game studio Turbine, said.

In order to create the best gaming experience, your translators have to understand foreign cultural traditions, the latest pop culture in the targeted country, local points of reference, etc.

The same applies to non-text assets. For example, while showing a peace sign is normal in the USA, a reverse peace sign suddenly becomes an insult in places like the UK.

Why did EA’s Plants vs. Zombies become one of the biggest mobile hits in China? Just look at the localised design of the zombies and the Great Wall background in the picture below. Keep in mind that you can build gamer loyalty by fully capturing a regionally exclusive experience within the game.

4. Underestimate the challenge of global mobile game distribution

If you think that all the mobile game distribution channels in every country are similar, you are making a big mistake! In the rush to launch overseas, this is often the most overlooked problem by game developers.

Do you know that China doesn’t have Google Play? Instead, it has around 200 Android app stores creating a highly fragmented market. Without a system in place to track the performance of these channels, you basically can’t have accurate strategies for distributing your app in this country.

Each of those app stores serve a different audience with their own characteristics. You need to look at their different behaviours and adapt your games to different situations. For instance, market leaders often create different versions for different app stores. In other words, if there are 20 app stores they want to target, they will create 20 different versions and marketing strategies for their games.

Due to these complexities, many western game developers work with local publishing and localization partners when they are trying to expand to China now.

When your team comes up with the localization strategy plan, make sure to discuss whether a local partner is needed.

5. Failing to localize the monetization strategy

Although your code and content may be the most obvious localization candidates, your revenue model is equally critical.

In some developing countries, like China, their game players don’t make as much money as the average US gamers. Your business model needs to reflect that reality as a result.

When Plants Vs. Zombies 2 launched in China, they initially tried to optimize for the monetization too much, making the game way too hard and expensive to play, which backfired on user’s reviews and dropped their rating from five star to two at one point. To overcome this, they learned from the experience and tried to figure out the right balance of difficulty and how to reasonably ask for money by changing the game’s economy. Now they get far fewer negative reviews than before.

When sharing his learnings at the Game Developers Conference, Leo Liu, GM of EA Mobile in China, said, “The Chinese market is so different, you have to be prepared for anything unusual from the Western perspective.”

Make sure you won’t repeat their mistakes.

6. No on-device testing and translation review prior to release

This is an amateur problem that is so easily avoidable and yet we came across it time and time again.

You work so hard on the game, create a great localization plan, translate UI strings, it launches, and suddenly, you realise something is broken. You find out that some extra long German words break some of your game UI! But the worst part of this scenario is when your CEO asks you how this happened, and you say, “I thought the translator was taking care of it…”

Never assume and never leave anything to chance. At the end of the day, if something does go wrong, and you could have easily prevented it, the responsibility is on you.

Professional translators are human and people make mistakes sometimes, especially in the complex, fragmented and rapidly evolving world of mobile.

Make sure your localization partners provide localization testing and review services on a number of mobile devices because you can’t afford to disappoint your users with buggy games. After you’ve received a poor rating, there is no way to hide poor quality in the world of mobile.

Conclusion

It’s true that international expansion is hard to get right. Therefore, clear ownership, good strategy up-front, and great execution are critical. That way your mobile game will be in a great position to take advantage of the huge international opportunity!

If you want to learn more about whether your mobile games are on the right track in terms of localization strategy, I invite you to get a Free Assessment with our Localization Managers today. We’re here to help! Simply click the banner below to join the invitation.(source:gamedev)