The recent news of a Spanish localisation didn't surprise me too much; WoW has been spreading like wildfire across Europe, and a key way to capture territories outside the UK is to offer a native-language version. However, in my travels across a number of European servers, I've seen very few Spanish players.

However, there seems to be a preponderance of Nordic gamers, and I've also encountered several Dutch speakers in my travels. With the lack of specific-language servers (let alone a client version), these players often post messages in general chat searching for fellow countrymen--on some servers, any foreign language is met with venom, but on others players are very helpful. Having observed this on several servers now, it seems that PvP and RP-PvP server residents are most hostile towards any non-English speakers, although that's something of a generalisation. Perhaps it's due to the frustration of having to type names like Bjørn.

Playing in Europe is a great way to get an international flavour to your gameplay, although it's sometimes surprising to find out someone is from Holland or Belgium when they have been speaking better English than the UK-based players for weeks.

Tags: commentary, europe, localization, spanish

Filed under: Analysis / Opinion, Blizzard