Why localize your game into Brazilian Portuguese?
If you are still thinking about what languages you’d like to localize your game into – or if I’ve suddenly appeared in your DMs/mailbox offering a service that you’re not even sure is worth the time and effort it will take to implement in your game – I hope this brief overview of the Brazilian gaming market can be useful to you, or at least informative.
In November 2020, Newzoo reported that Brazil had 81.2 million gamers, and as of April 2018, Brazil was fourth on the list of countries with most Steam users, behind only the US, China and Russia.
An unfortunate reality of our country, however, as indicated by a 2013 report from the British Council, is that only 10% of Brazilians aged 18-24 state that they have some knowledge of English, with all other age groups having an even lower percentage of English speakers.
What’s worse is that even among those who do know some English, 47% of them have only “Basic” knowledge of the language, followed by 32% with “Intermediate” knowledge, and only 16% who are considered “Fluent”.
This alone already shows how having your game available in Brazilian Portuguese can introduce it to a huge new audience of players who would otherwise dismiss it merely because they don’t understand it.
Furthermore, the 2016 edition of Pesquisa Game Brasil shows that localization is the fourth most important criteria for Brazilian gamers when deciding to buy a game.
And if you really like numbers, the 2021 edition of PGB brings even more data:
72% of Brazilians have the habit of playing electronic games, regardless of platform, with 68% of those saying that gaming is their number one form of entertainment.
51.5% of Brazilian gamers are women, thanks in part to mobile gaming, where they represent 62.2% of players. On PC and consoles, women represent 40.4% and 38.1% of players respectively.
In terms of platforms, 43.8% of Brazilian gamers play on mobile, 27.5% on PC, and 25.8% on consoles.
As for age, 22.5% of Brazilian gamers are between 20 and 24 years old, followed by 18.6% between 25 and 29, and 16.7% between 30 and 34.
Finally, while 46% of Brazilian gamers identify as white, people of color represent over half of our gaming population, with 36.7% identifying as brown, 13.6% as black, 2% as yellow, 0.6% as indigenous, and 1.1% as “other”.