Chinese Game Localization

Do Chinese Players Play Games in English?

Most Chinese players won’t play a game that isn’t available in Chinese. In a pre-release survey for Slay the Princess, only 32% of Chinese players said they would play the game in English. Another example from GameDiscoverCo: Nebulous: Fleet Command sold over 125,000 copies in English only, and China accounted for just 2% of them.

Simplified or Traditional Chinese?

Simplified Chinese is the written standard in mainland China, while Taiwan and Hong Kong use Traditional Chinese. They’re both called Chinese, but they’re very different languages: they’re in fact not mutually intelligible.

We provide both Simplified and Traditional Chinese localization services through different language teams.

Culturalization for the Chinese Market

A line or an image that works in the West can read very differently in China. Our culturalization check runs during translation and again during LQA, and anything that may not sit well with Chinese players is flagged to you before release.

Publishing in mainland China has its own rules on licenses and platforms. Looking for more info on the legal side of localization in China? Check our guide to publishing games in China.

How Much Does Chinese Game Localization Cost?

Our rate for Simplified and Traditional Chinese is €0.08 per source word. For example, a 10,000-word game would cost you €800 per version. This gives Chinese the best cost-benefit ratio of all languages: it’s one of the cheapest, and it reaches more Steam users than any other.

All prices include translation, editing, proofreading and QA. We have no minimum order and no project management fees.

Also, here’s something unique: say you already ordered translations, but you need to change a few parts of the text before launch. We can revise our translations at no additional cost.

Chinese Localization Testing

When localizing into Chinese, there are 2 potential issues caused by the nature of the language:

• Sentences take less space → UI can look very empty and awkward
• Font choice → not all fonts support all Chinese characters

We provide you with native Chinese testers to play your localized build and log each display and language bug with a suggested fix. This service is billed per hour of work (€27 for Chinese), and one hour usually covers around 2,000-2,500 words.