4 I Lab is a small indie game development studio based in Minsk, Belarus. It was founded in 2011 by two friends, Mikita Susha and Mick Yurchanka. Soon the team grew up to 7 people and began releasing mobile games like The Gravity and V For Voodoo, trying to find themselves. They always had an ambition and desire to make something big, and two years ago finally got a vision of the game that they want to create.
4 I Lab‘s community manager Alexander Misilevich shares a story about their project Time Of Dragons - an MMO Shooter with a unique mix of fantasy creatures and high-tech warriors.
Hélène Poirier is the project coordinator at Red Stallion Interactive. She discusses localization in the MENA region and the RSI gaming platform in this article.
If the Americans have historically been at the forefront of video game development, logically providing games in English, they rapidly understood that the support of local languages was essential to perform in the global economy. Games were translated while game cafés (gaming-dedicated stores), and online gaming platforms emerged all over the world, serving gamers in different cultures and languages.
It would be unimaginable for a French or a German gamer not to find their favorite game in their local language! Yet, if this is true for gamers at large in the Western world, and to some extent in the Eastern European and Asian markets, gamers in other parts of the world have been largely forgotten, notably the Middle East and the Arab-speaking world. And with a lack of localized games also came the lack of a culturally and linguistically anchored gamers’ platform supporting the Arabic language, facilitating community exchange, and teaming in the local and regional fields, providing support for local payment methods and local currencies.
With a lack of localized games also came the lack of a culturally and linguistically anchored gamers’ platform supporting the Arabic language, facilitating community exchange, and teaming in the local and regional fields, providing support for local payment methods and local currencies.
RSI Gaming
Red Stallion Interactive was specifically created to do this for the MENA region [Middle East & North Africa]. Having recently launched in the Gulf (GCC) region, but available and operational from all MENA countries, the gamers’ dedicated platform is fully Arabic-English enabled, throughout game descriptions and other information, gamers’ profiles, groups, communities, chats, forums, etc., payment methods, and all else. Furthermore, it is Red Stallion Interactive’s intention to increase the availability of Arab-translated and fully localized games on its platform.
RSI Gaming launched in January and has already signed among its large portfolio the first game produced in Saudi Arabia by Semaphore, and derived from the Arabic Golden Age history - Unearthed: The Trail of IbnBattuta, Gold Edition, which will soon be launched on RSI platform, both in Arabic and English versions, for PC and Android. Also, as we are launching the international version of Blacklight: Retribution from Zombie Studios, we are cooperating with them to bring to market an Arabized version. Beyond these two flagship products, we are excited to announce that we’ve entered into a publishing deal with Imperia Online for the fully localized version of their most exciting medieval RTS game that goes by the same name, Imperia Online.
Imperia Online
We met with Imperia Online and were so thrilled by the full localization work they’ve done!
We met with Imperia Online at DWGE, and were so thrilled by the full localization work they’ve done! Such a great fully localized game: themes, textures, settings, references, language, of course, EVERYTHING! So we decided to sign a publishing deal with them, as well as to really get the opportunity to better understand their approach to localization, a virtually zero-fault exercise!
Here is an interview we had with Cvetan Rusimov, Imperia Online Chief Operating Officer.
Imperia Online (IO) has been a very successful F2P RTS game for some years, particularly in Eastern Europe and Russia, as well as Western Europe and Latin America. Why did you decide to localize the game for an Arabic audience?
Imperia Online is already translated in 26 languages and popular in over 100 countries. MENA has become the strategic region, where MMO games are developing real fast. So we decided it was the right time for us to go there! Several companies were interested in partnerships, and here we are, with a fully localized version for an Arabic audience, which will soon be available on the RSI platform!
Was the Arabic version your first localization experience?
No! The Arabic challenge immediately followed the release of the Russian localization, which was a huge success! We had clearly made the right moves for our game!
Our Creative Director first conducted significant research, taking into account cultural differences and feedback directly provided by our Arabic community, which we solicited.
Could you describe the approach you took to localize the game for an Arabic audience?
Our Creative Director first conducted significant research, taking into account cultural differences and feedback directly provided by our Arabic community, which we solicited. This led us to conclude that we needed to transpose our addictive game-play and inspiring story line to the MENA region specific settings and beauty.
You have been working not only on an Arabic translation, but also on localizing all textures, so that the game’s look and feel is really Arabic, including all the tools, weapons, buildings, etc..How did you achieve this?
Everything has been achieved in-house, through great teamwork. The research was initially conducted by the Creative Director, in cooperation with a team of developers, artists, QAs, who were all fully dedicated to the concept of Imperia Online Arabic Version. Clearly, our co-founders, with their many years of experience in online web gaming, also provided their experience and their guidance.
What were the most difficult aspects of the localization process?
There are many things that need to be considered before even starting the localization of an MMO game for the Arabic market. Of course, there are the buildings, the faces, the clothes, but the history really has to be researched… But, when you’re working in a nice environment, with a dedicated team, anything becomes possible! 🙂
What has been the reaction of Arabic gamers? How did they receive the Arabic version?
Reality turned out to be beyond our expectations. We took part in Dubai World Game Expo, and the “welcome” and “congratulations” were more than in our wildest dreams… We really loved what we experienced there, players really appreciating what we accomplished with the Arabic version of Imperia Online.
Reality turned out to be beyond our expectations.
We don’t think that English is an advantage anymore. Of course, we still have players from countries, where their language is not yet supported, and they manage and enjoy participating in our medieval world. And I’m sure they appreciate the many efforts we’ve made to get players to feel at home by creating fully localized versions!
Do you have other localization plans? Where?
Yes, we do. We’ve already gone live for the Arabic and Russian markets, enjoying the success, and are now getting ready for a fully localized version of Imperia Online for our Turkish players! We like challenges, that’s how it goes…
The fact that Imperia Online is a “Civilization” type game makes the localization more important, in that it enables people to relate to their own history and culture. However, do you think that other types of games should also be localized? So far, only a handful of games have been localized in Arabic: what’s your view on this?
There are many good games with a similar gameplay to ours on the market. All the decisions we made in regards to localization were based on our gamers’ vision, on internal discussions and on a vision, which we wanted o bring to the world. Game companies should know what is best for them, and how they chose to apprehend the localization aspects.
Imperia Online and other Arabized games will be heading to the RSI gaming platform soon
Moving Forward
Imperia Online and Red Stallion Interactive are still working on bringing the game to the RSI gaming platform, where it will benefit from the various localized community services, payment solutions, and other Arabized games, as the site develops.
At RSI, we are SOOOO THRILLED to bring Imperia Online to the market! The localization is so amazing, and is a reference that we will definitely meter against for all our future (and many) localization projects!
Watch out for Imperia Online available soon on www.rsigaming.com.
Gamundo is a cross-platform game development studio formed by veterans of multiple ‘traditional’ game studios from around the globe. The company is committed to creating high-quality next-generation, accessible and commercially successful games. Gamundo’s talented core team members have produced three titles together; including the highly recognized browser based social MMO Club Galactik. In this postmortem, Ilja Goossens from Gamundo shares with us the story of how the idea for Club Galactik came to be.
The initial idea behind Virtual Fairground, my first true gaming venture, was to build online games for kids aged 8 to 12 based on existing IP. In 2007, my business partner and I were involved with a ‘traditional’ game developer and an online community company. However, we noticed a shift from console- and client PC gaming towards browser-based gaming (remember: this was before the whole Facebook/social gaming hype and before the iPhone was released).
At the time, there were some online communities for kids and some virtual worlds (the most successful turned out to be Club Penguin, acquired by Disney for $750 million). In order to become a top 3 developer of these online worlds, we had to come up with a strategy that would give us a head start. We had several options; (a) having a huge marketing budget, (b) using an important publisher or (c) using existing intellectual property. We decided to go for the latter, since this would allow us to get a user base relatively quick and to monetize aggressively.
Identifying the property
We knew that the conversion from offline to online was huge in this target demographic
With kids entertainment you have two different target audiences: the kids (who play the game) and the parents (who pay for the game). When kids start playing our game, they will love it and want more. This is when they have to start paying for a subscription or virtual currency. Parents tend to pay more quickly when they know the brand themselves, or at least heard of it before. Go figure: would you buy a product of an existing brand, like Apple, or from a no-name tech company?
We set some criteria that the IP had to meet to be useful for our plans. A must-have was television exposure, because from our own experience we knew that the conversion from offline to online was huge in this target demographic. For example, a friend of mine is a games publisher in the ages 8 through 14 target demographic (he used to publish Runescape, amongst others) and he had a barter deal with multiple TV stations. They aired the commercials for the show and they got a share of the revenue instead. He used this as the main driver for the audience and they saw huge spikes of registrations during the TV campaigns.
The IP also had to have traction momentum in the main European countries and optionally the United States. The property needed to appeal to both boys and girls in the age group 8-12 and was preferably created by an established brand like Disney, Nickelodeon, etc.
Based on these criteria, we identified a handful of properties. We did so by attending a lot of shows and (licensing) fairs, like MIP in Cannes (a TV licensing fair), the New York Toy Fair, etc. We narrowed the selection down to the properties that had potential and we added 3 properties that were a bit off, because they were based on a book, toy line and a magazine.
Building a relationship
To make it a really good deal, we will pay for the development ourselves!
Now we had to get in touch with the IP owners and make sure we could secure the rights for the online game, meaning we had to start networking like crazy. We were a small startup, pre-funding, with just a good idea. Again, we started visiting fairs and shows and trying to get in touch with the right people. These were the owners of licenses such as the Smurfs, Donald Duck, Charly and the Chocolate Factory and Winx Club. These were IPs that everyone knew and had an established value. Our pitch: we can contribute to the success of your IP, we will drive traffic to the offline components of the product and we will create an additional revenue stream. And to make it a really good deal, we will pay for the development ourselves!
Once we established a relationship with the IP owner, we could start negotiating the deal terms. Back in 2007 and early 2008, online game were not that hot yet. But we wanted to be able to build our own product, not just build what the IP owner wanted. This is why we did not continue the Disney deal (we were quite far in the process already).
Building a relationship with the IP owner is the most important there is
There is a funny story related to the Disney deal though. We knew the online director from Disney; he was located in Burbank, CA. We told him we were ‘in the neighborhood’, but we were not even in the US. After making an appointment for a casual chat and a cup of coffee, we booked a plane ticket from Amsterdam to Los Angeles and flew in just to meet with him. Building a relationship with the IP owner is the most important there is. If they have the idea that you know what you are talking about and can deliver quality, that will be so much more valuable than a bag of money. A brand like Disney cannot afford a mistake, a bad product or complaining customers. They fully need to believe that you can deliver what you promise.
In the end, a company like Disney has many, many rules and regulations for the IP, so in the end it felt more like we would be doing work-for-hire that we had to pay for ourselves, instead of building our own product.
We had some great ideas for potentially successful properties. After negotiating with the owners of IPs like The Smurfs, Charly and the Chocolate Factory and Donald Duck we settled with Alphanim. Our job was to create an online game based on Galactik Football. The show was a hugely popular cartoon series on Jetix, aired in almost entire Europe. At that point in time, two seasons had been aired and season three was in development. Besides, the show was about football and the World Cup of Football was coming up. Our timing couldn’t have been better.
Negotiating the deal
To close the deal regarding Galactik Football, we had to negotiate the terms. Of course, this is a very complex and lengthy process that needs professional guidance. We decided to hire an attorney that was specialized in intellectual property, so he could support us to get the best deal and warn us for the pitfalls. There are two main points to discuss: financials and content. The financial part is about (upfront) minimum guarantees, revenue share, and marketing- and development budget. This is a necessity, but can be pretty straightforward. The discussion about the content is a whole different aspect, here you have to convince the IP owner that you will do justice to their product, create length, create an additional value and can deliver a game with the same quality and look and feel as the original product.
During these negotiations, we established a very good relationship with the IP owner. Regular visits to each other’s offices and meetings with the marketing, creative and development teams were an important part of the process.
The concept for Club Galactik
The initial concept was to create an online game with lots of real-world extensions and a presence in the TV series. We would create a training school for talents and call it Club Galactik. To create the feeling that all players were also part of the TV show, we had written a story line in the script that contained the school. Now every player of the game immediately became part of the TV series. Together with the creators of the cartoon, we designed a logo, characters and a space ship that were used both in the series as well in the online game.
Alphanim would produce a trading card game, convince the broadcasting stations to implement the game into their websites, organize real life events and create connected merchandize. This way we would be responsible for the online product, and Alphanim would take care of the physical products and the marketing and distribution. Unfortunately for all parties, it didn’t become the success we all hoped for…
We depended heavily on the conversion from offline (TV) to online. Unfortunately, Disney acquired Jetix just before we released the game and decided to cancel the show because this was a third party production. (They rebranded the channel to DisneyXD and only programmed their own productions.) The IP was not strong enough to kickstart the distribution of the game, but we still had to pay a yearly licensing fee, so we decided to cancel the game even before the full version went live.
To see what projects Gamundo’s currently working on and what other games they’ve done in the past, have a look at their website.
