移动游戏进入海外市场时需要注意的六大事项

原文作者：Vincent Chan 译者：Megan Shieh

在带领一款手游走向国际市场的同时，开发者们往往低估了本地化的重要性和途中可能遇到的困难。

根据长期观察，我们整理出了手游开发者在面向海外市场时常犯的六大错误。

常见错误一：没有制定明确的战略和计划

当你打算进入国际市场时，首先得创建一个能够回答以下几个问题的本地化策略：

你所中意的市场需要具备哪些特点？在这些市场中，包括人口、GDP、智能手机普及率、竞争者、语言、规章制度、文化和合作伙伴在内的种种关键因素能否达到你的要求和标准。

找出全球最符合这些标准的10个市场，并将它们按优先顺序排列。

在完全投入项目之前，是否得先调查一下选定地区的市场需求？

每个国家的市场需求分别是什么？

我们是否有能力同时面向多个市场？

该不该找个当地合作伙伴？

针对每个国家，我们都制定了哪些市场进入战略？

开发者对本地化不够了解、不够投入，往往会毁掉一整个海外进军项目，因此确保你有一个能够深入研究市场并拥有强大执行力的合作伙伴或团队。

如果没有制定正确的相关策略并将其严格执行，无论你的游戏支持多少语言，它都不可能成功。

常见错误二：在项目研发的早期阶段忽视本地化

许多开发商都会等到游戏研发完成后才开始考虑本地化，但他们没有意识到从编写第一行代码的那一刻起，自己就已经犯下了一个巨大错误。

因为这样一来在添加新语言和其他本地化元素时，他们往往需要重新修改已经写完的代码。大量返工将花费公司数千甚至数百万美元的额外成本，同时也会将研发周期延长好几个月，最终导致整个计划推迟。

与其做代价高昂的返工工作，不如提前制定出一个完善的“进军海外计划”。

Hearthstone（from gamesindustry.biz）

你现在写的代码是否为后期翻译阶段做足了准备？所有UI字符串都国际化了吗？目前选定的非文本元素，比如符号、颜色、货币符号、时间和日期格式都适合国际市场吗？

如果没有从一开始就将本地化列入考虑范围，那么后期添加的每一行代码都会使问题恶化。

常见错误三：本地化时没有考虑到文化元素

最基本也是最容易在早期出现的错误是，部分开发者认为本地化代表的仅仅是语言翻译，殊不知若想在海外市场取得成功，文化方面的元素也必须高度重视。

语言翻译是本地化的最基本环节，理想情况下，译者应该将游戏内容与目标地区文化结合到一起。

Turbine游戏工作室的产品开发副总裁Craig Alexander说：“在国际市场摸爬滚打多年，我们所得出的最大结论是仅仅翻译游戏内文字是不够的，本地文化是实施本地化时需要考虑到的一个关键因素。”

为了打造最好的游戏体验，你的译者必须充分了解外国的文化传统、目标国家的最新流行趋势并适当地利用这些信息。

这一法则同样适用于非文本内容。比如，在美国展示“和平标志”是一件再正常不过的事，但在像英国这样的地方，展示一个倒过来的“和平标志”就会被视为是一种侮辱。

为什么EA的《植物大战僵尸》能够在中国成为最受欢迎的手游之一？举个例子，该作的开发团队将游戏中的僵尸形象惟妙惟肖地与中国古代文化结合到了一起，游戏中的某些部分还以中国著名历史文化遗产“长城”作为背景。

记住，你可以通过充分捕捉并利用地域性独家特点来建立起玩家的忠诚度。

常见错误四：低估了在多个国家发行手游的难度

如果你认为每个国家的手游分销渠道都差不多，那就大错特错了！急于向海外市场推出游戏时，许多开发商往往会忽视这个问题。

你可知道中国并没有Google Play？有的是200多家安卓应用商店，整个市场非常碎片化。如果没有提前对这些商店进行深入了解，那你盲目制定出来的战略根本就没用。

每家应用商店都有自己的特点和特定受众。为了能够达到更好的发行效果，你必须深入探查这些商店的特点以及对应受众的喜好，并依据不同情况来调整你的游戏。

大型游戏公司通常会为不同的应用程序商店创建不同的版本。换句话说，如果他们想要在20家不同应用程序商店中发行同一款游戏，就会创建出20个不同的游戏版本和营销战略。

因为以上原因，所以在进军中国市场时，许多西方游戏开发商都会选择与当地发行商和本地化公司合作。

制定本地化策略时，一定要考虑是否需要与当地公司合作。

常见错误五：没有根据不同市场调整盈利模式

部分发展中国家的玩家平均收入往往跟不上像美国这样的发达国家，所以你制定的商业模式一定得符合当地的实际情况。

在中国发行《植物大战僵尸2》的时候，一开始EA想要将盈利程度优化到最大，结果把游戏弄得又难又贵，引起了许多用户的不满，导致游戏评价从原来的5星好评直降到了2星。

为了扭转局面，他们吸取教训并从中找到了一个合适的游戏难度，也学会了如何更合理地在游戏中收费。现在，他们得到的差评比以前少了很多。

确保你不会重蹈覆辙。

常见错误六：在发行前，没有在真实设备上测试也没有审查翻译效果

这是一个不该出现的问题，然而许多开发商却接二连三地犯下同样错误。

努力工作了这么久、创建了一个优秀的本地化计划、把UI字符都翻译好了，然后正式启动发行。突然间，你意识到有东西坏了。结果是一些特别长的德语单词扰乱了你的游戏界面！但最糟糕的是，当老板问你怎么会这样的时候，你说“我以为翻译人员会考虑到这方面的事情…”

不要想当然，也不要听天由命。因为如果真的出现了这种本可以轻易避免的问题，那么责任就在你自己身上。在选择本地化合作伙伴的时候，确保他们提供本地化测试，并会在多款移动设备上审查本地化效果。

不要让这种愚昧的小错误影响到玩家对你游戏的看法。

本文由游戏邦编译，转载请注明来源，或咨询微信zhengjintiao

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 tried 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, 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 apply 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 gamers 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. You 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, dropping 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 a 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! (Source：oneskyapp.com  ）