I'm not a programmer, so I'm trying to understand how difficult it is to add language translation to an app or game. I play a mobile game called Kingshot that has a translation button beside each chat message. It translates messages into the language selected in the game, and although it isn't perfect, it works surprisingly well and makes chatting with people from other countries much easier. Why don't more apps and games offer something similar? Is translation difficult to build, configure, or integrate? Please explain the technical parts simply.
3 Answers
Most developers wouldn’t build the translator themselves. They would connect the app to a service such as Google, Microsoft, or another translation API. The app sends the original text and target language, then displays the translated result. Technically, the basic integration can be fairly quick, but the service usually charges based on how much text is translated. For a busy game, those costs can become significant.
Translation is becoming easier because newer phones and operating systems can do some of it on the device. Android and Apple provide translation frameworks, and some browsers also have built-in translation tools. On-device translation can reduce ongoing server charges and improve privacy, but it may only work on newer devices, support fewer languages, or require downloading language models. Older phones and desktop platforms may still need an online service, so developers have to support several different approaches.
The difficult part is creating a good translator, not adding a translation button. Languages don’t map word-for-word: sentence structure, slang, context, grammar, and gender can all change the meaning. Developers also need to handle poor-quality translations, offensive content, very long messages, server costs, privacy, and whether the translation service is available. A small game can still do this because it is paying for an existing translation system rather than storing a huge language database inside the game.
So the game is probably sending the chat message to an outside service, getting the translated text back, and showing it in the chat? That makes more sense than the entire translator being included in the game files.