Based on the activity of the global game market, lots of game developers and publishers provide games with multiple languages. But to be able to compete in the game industry, you shouldn’t just perform with same translation service that another competitor does. You must prepare translation with various languages to satisfy the gamers and also increase the potential users.

Then, what language should we translate our game into?

We, Latis Global, who provide game localization and game operating service for developers who launch overseas will introduce and discuss the global game market report from Newzoo, a game market research company.

Let’s see what language the future games must be localized into.

(Image Source: Global Games Market / NEWZOO)

1. Spanish

Currently, a lot of Latino view/consider game as a luxury instead of a leisure. Therefore, Spain is not very active on the game market compared to other countries. Spanish is the third most spoken language in the world after English. If you check the numbers of Hispanics who speak Spanish in the United States, there are 62.1 million people in America, which is 20% of the total population, who speaks Spanish and it is by no means a small number.

(Image Source: Supergiant Games’ Game Hades _Spanish / steam)

2. Simplified Chinese

Chinese video game market is the most important market in the world and its online population of more than 5 million play a game. However, Google play store is forbidden in China and several Android stores are running in the market. This is the reason why it needs to be localized for the Chinese market. China enforces the strictest regulations regarding video games, and those game contents must be changed according to the Chinese regulations. Due to the limited number of approvals released each year, it will take at least 80 days to be approved. So, if you are targeting for broad market, China must be included.

(Image Source: CD PROJEKT RED’s Cyberpunk 2077_중국어/ steam)

3. Portuguese from Brazil

Brazil has the highest mobile game gross in Latin America. So, translating the game to Brazilian Portuguese will cover half of Latin America. Also, due to their lower English comprehension level, we highly recommend translating and localizing the game should you wish to launch successfully in Latin America.

Also, Brazil has a higher number of female gamers compare to men, and their number of mobile gamers is higher than the number of video and PC games. Due to these Brazilian characteristics, we need to focus on localizing mobile games. Lastly, most Brazilians prefer cheap mobile devices, with RAM as low as 2~4 GB, which means that developers should ensure that their game is optimized enough to run on low-spec devices.

(Image Source: Supergiant Games’ Hades Brazilian Portuguese/ steam)

4. Russian

Russia’s future market will grow over $2.7 billion by 2024. Russia is one of the most promising languages and one of the biggest future markets in Europe. Statistically, Russians often give a greater number of negative feedbacks about services which is why it is now well-localized than any other country.

(Image source: CD PROJEKT RED’s Cyberpunk 2077_Russian/ steam)

5. Italian

Italy has about 16.7 million of gamers which is 38% of its total population and it is one of the top 10 gaming market in the world. Also, Italian is the language used in Switzerland and San Marino. According to Italy Game Association, their game industry grew by 45% from 2018 to 2021 and it expanded to 1,600 developers and 160 game studios. Italy has a low number of English-speaking people, and they can become very invested in developers with a high quality of localization service.

(Image Source: Square Enix’s FINAL FANTASY VI_Italian steam)

6. French

Translating into French provides a chance to contact with Monaco, Belgium, Switzerland, and some African countries. 20% of the total population in Canada also uses French and it is also a good target for Canada’s game market. French is also one of the most promising languages, it was even mentioned by Forbes magazine that French is one of the most fastest growing language in the world. By 2050, more than 750 million people will use French.

(Image Source: CD PROJEKT RED’s Cyberpunk 2077_French/ steam)

Also, the next fastest growing languages for game translation are Japanese, Korean, Thai and Polish. Korean received most attention as influenced by K-Pop. Korea is famous with RPGs (Role Playing Game) and there is no other country that can follow the experience and technique to make a good RPG game. Therefore, it is a good prospect in the game market if it is localized in Korea.

(Image Source: Zynga’s Empires & Allies_Language Selection / Zynga)

We have looked at which languages have a good prospect for game localization service in the future. Each country’s preference requires a different strategy of localizing. When gamers encounter a new game and it contains localized language and cultural contents, it will make users comfortable when playing the game. If you seriously think what users really wants and understand them, you will surely be able to draw the plan on the market you targeted.