Playwing is an independent game developer and publisher that was established in 2017. Their publishing team reached out to scale the website for Century: Age of Ashes globally across the EMEA, NA, LatAm, and APAC regions. The earlier website was primarily in English, which was a smart strategy for quickly attracting an international audience rather than a global one in multiple regions.
Improve existing workflow with automation
Separate roles, smooth process
In this process, we considered all the many responsibilities involved in translations. It enabled us to see the big picture of what we were going to accomplish. We also analyzed all the design and technical steps required to complete this mission.
Improve translators efficiency
Since English is the main language of Century: Age of Ashes, all translations are based on the English version of the text.
Translators are the main users of the localization system. They are physically located across all regions and time zones. The APAC region’s day typically ends when the EMEA region begins to work, while the NA and LatAm regions are still sleeping. Because the translation tasks are independent, they can run smoothly. If a translation is needed quickly, an on-call rotation with the vendors must be implemented.
To ensure that all translation operations run well, a workflow has been defined. When a new translation is published, all other languages are labeled as “needs updating”. When a new text must be translated, translators will be informed. A release schedule may be set to automatically send the new translation at a specific time, avoiding having partially translated content on the game site and allowing for a global update at once.
Automate Customer Support tickets for different languages
Customer support is an essential part of the player experience for a Game as a Service, including periodic content drops. Support tickets are sent through a specific form on the game site. Because the game site is localized and marketed to a global audience, players usually send comments in their native language. Typically, game publishers and developers have their own support ticket management solutions. We connected the game site with their technologies, allowing Playwing to keep their efficient workflows and pipelines.
User interface and SEO adaptation
SEO localized
The following problem was telling Google that the game site had various translated versions of the same page. Except for the blog articles that remained in English - Google needs to know that as well. Everything needs to load fast because performance matters in SEO.
6 characters in Chinese, 24 characters in Russian
When it comes to fitting text into a small box, design limitations are always a challenge. It’s indeed tricky to find the right balance between translators and designers. Can they rewrite the text shorter and keep it compelling? Tradeoffs might sometimes be made while bearing in mind that content is king.
For right-to-left (RTL) languages, such as Hebrew or Arabic in the MENA region, the design composition would need to be significantly adjusted.