Going Global
Rowe asked the panelists about how to build an online game's global relevance. Said Christensen, "WoW has done a great job of localization, but in some ways they're almost thought of as an Asian company because of their long history of success in Korea. We're working Asian and Indian companies and developers to help us localize our development."
"We've had to learn that too," Ferrari agreed. "They're completely different business models, retail models, governmental regulations. Now you have to put technology in our games for the Asian markets to time players out after a certain amount of time."
Alexander says Akamai has also had the same challenge. "How are you going to implement the provision of the game and follow the rules and regulations in the local environment?" He posited.
"Europe is the next market," Buttler asserted. "There are 400 million people who are rich and at peace and looking to play."
Said Goldstein, "We have 6 publishers for our game. 2 for us and Europe, and 4 for Asia. It is'nt just about languages, but about unique content. We have 2 SKUs and 8 languages in Europe. We have 30 builds and 30 SKUs for Asia. It's an incredible amount of work, and you need to be extremely careful picking your partners."
Added Ferrari, "And all the different builds add more production time and affect your release schedules and planning."
Commented McNaughton, "One thing we have to consider at AMD is we always want to make sure we want to bring as much power as we can to the most affordable level. So for us, we need to look at each geography very differently, because the sales of PCs are very different in different markets. How do we bring the tech down affordably and raise the bar?"
Christiansen pointed out that there are moral and cultural issues, too. "If you want to be successful in a different country, you need to bring in a local partner."
Noted Ferrari, "Localization also means looking at the technology in the country."
"Not all media works in all markets," cautioned Buttler. "You can pick and choose, and decide that you want the biggest and best out there and build something else for the other markets."
Goldstein opined that there's no such thing as a "global launch. "Global to me means one product you release all at once all over the world. That would be Nirvana," he said.
Stated Ferrari, "We build our games for North American players first. For Lord of the Rings Online, we do as much business in Europe. Germany is huge for us."
Added Daglow, "Historically, you'll see that with things like Starcraft, the Asian market just loved the game, and later the company built specialized versions for those markets. So sometimes it's serendipity versus planning."
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