Win over gamers with fully localized experiences and launch games 10x faster in new markets

The cost to localize a game varies widely depending on the size, complexity, and target languages. For smaller indie games, it might be a few thousand dollars. For AAA titles, it’s more likely to be in the range of tens to hundreds of thousands of dollars.

Here are some factors that determine price:

- Text volume: the more words you need to translate, the more money you’ll spend. If your game has lots of dialogue or lore, that’s going to be even more expensive because it’s harder to translate.
- Languages: Localizing into a handful of languages like French, German, Spanish, and Japanese will cost much more than just localizing one.
- Cultural adaptation: If your game has cultural nuances (like jokes or idioms), you'll need in-region and creative translators to transcreate your content, which often costs more.
- Voice acting: Recording new voiceovers for localized versions will also lead to extra costs.
- Testing: Once localization is done, it needs to be tested in-game. Localization QA ensures text fits on-screen and works contextually. Depending on the QA process you use, internal reviewers, Lokalise AI LQA, and external reviewers, this can add 10-20% to the total cost.

The Legend of Zelda: Breath of the Wild was localized into multiple languages, including character names, idiomatic expressions, and cultural references. Nintendo even re-recorded voice acting for each language. For example, in the English version, some characters sound polite and formal, while the Japanese version uses more casual tones that fit their cultural norms.

Another example is Pac-Man. Pac-Man was originally called ‘Puck Man’ because the main character resembled a hockey puck, and speakers of Japanese pronounced it as ‘pakuhuman.’ To avoid mispronunciations and confusion in the U.S., they adjusted the name to what we know today.