Ever seen a tiny tweak cause some pretty big waves? That’s language for you. And that’s exactly what happened with Helldivers 2 recently, according to Reddit users. Since 2024, the game has been a massive financial success for Arrowhead (the studio that created it), and it’s a solid lesson for anyone working on global products.
Long story short: Since last week, (Super-)Earth is under attack. All cities have fallen except one, for which Chinese players performed the most heroic defence. During the process, each city around the world got a message that showed “% Held”, meaning that players only had to withstand the invasion until the end of the campaign. But for players using the Chinese translation, it showed “Defence success”, which remained stuck at 90+% completion.
The Chinese had performed the best defence, because they were ordered to. And now they’re not happy about it.
As you can see, for Chinese players, the translation basically meant “Once you reach 100%, mission complete!” So when the objective didn’t actually complete right then, you can imagine they felt pretty misled. Cue the review bombs and a fair bit of head-scratching all around. We’re talking about several thousand players collectively spending thousands of hours to complete the task.
This whole situation really shines a light on just how crucial, and tricky, great localisation is, especially when a game is doing so well and has such a large and diverse audience.
First off, context is absolutely king, isn’t it? What seems like a harmless phrase in one language can land very differently in another without the full in-game picture. Translators and reviewers who don’t get enough context simply can’t get things right.
Then there’s the question of who’s ultimately on the hook when things go sideways. It’s often a mix: the dev studio, the translation team, and even how player feedback is handled. It shows how vital clear communication and proper checks are.
And let’s be real, despite what most people think, localisation isn’t just some final polish you tack on at the end, it’s a core part of the user experience and your public relationship with your global audience. Get it wrong, and you can see player trust take a serious hit, fast, no matter how much revenue is coming in or how good your product is.
So, what can we actually do about it? More money? Lay-offs? New tech? More cheap outsourced workforce to quality-check the other cheap outsourced workforce?
I dislike doing this, but I’ll preach for myself here: investing in solid in-context reviews (seriously, not just spreadsheets!), maybe bringing bilingual community members in for early testing, hiring competent linguists to ensure ownership of all your content, and, of course, just being straight-up and transparent when mistakes inevitably happen – these things can make a huge difference. Being proactive here isn’t just about dodging PR nightmares, it’s about building a truly better experience for all your users, wherever they are.
I’d love to hear the thoughts of fellow Chinese linguists.
And to all: what are your team’s go-to strategies for nailing localisation and making sure everyone’s on the same page?
If this post gets seen by stakeholders at Arrowhead or elsewhere, I’d love to hear your take on this.
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Clément Dhollande French Translator and Tutor 