One simple problem makes localizing Pokemon Crystal much harder than you might think

Pokemon Crystal was the first game to introduce a gender option for the player character, but this made localizing it a little tricky.

The first question you’re faced with in Pokémon Crystal might be a simple one: “Are you a boy? Or a girl?” Granted, it’s not the easiest question for everyone, but Pokémon Crystal only gives you two options, so the process is still simple. It’s not something you’d think too much about now, but at the time, it was a big deal for video games. However, Nob Ogasawara, one of the original localizers of Pokémon games from the original Red and Blue to Platinum, shares a behind-the-scenes look at the localization process for such a choice, and it turns out it’s a little more difficult than you might initially think.

Upon seeing the option, Ogasawara initially thought, “‘Great, this is progress. It allows girls to play games.’ (Yeah, naive. I’m glad they’ve progressed.)” However, as he said, “Reality set in. There were no gender-specific texts. There was no ‘what is [v1] What are you doing here? ‘v1 = he, she. ‘” What Ogasawara means by this is that Japanese is not a gendered language like English, and there are no specific pronouns that change based on gender, so there is no program that will automatically change the player character’s pronouns based on whether they choose to be a boy or a girl, because that doesn’t happen in Japanese.

“So, I had to figure out a way because I couldn’t use gender-specific pronouns to refer to the main character,” Ogasawara continued. This led to lines like “What is that little guy doing here?” and “This little guy is tough!” Ogasawara did point out, though, that plural “they” was technically an option, since Pikachu is the yellow version of the sidekick Pokémon. Apparently, the singular “they” is more common these days, but in a reply to someone on Twitter, Ogasawara noted that it “hasn’t really gone mainstream yet.”

“Most people don’t even notice this kind of thing. I’m totally fine with it – as long as people don’t stumble over grammatical errors and can navigate the text without difficulty, I’ve done my job… For me, it’s also a question of professional pride. I could have easily done half of it and called it a day, and the teller would have happily eaten such output, but I know I can do better – and what’s worse, my translator knows it too. Impossible.”

This tidbit from Ogasawara provides a great and useful insight into the complexities of localization, an often underestimated aspect of game development, and shows you that you can’t just translate word for word.