It's no secret that the Xbox is crashing fast in Europe, but many people are placing the blame in the wrong places.

One of the big problems that never gets brought up is game localization.  If you don't speak English, you are going to have a bad time with Xbox in a way that you wouldn't with either Sony or Nintendo.

Take this Reddit thread from the Forza community: https://www.reddit.com/r/forza/comments/17jryu5/how_come_german_localization_is_so_so_bad/

Microsoft have used automation/AI to handle the games translation and as a result the game is filled with confusing/hilarious errors.  As you go through the thread you'll realize that its not just limited to Germany or just Forza.  Why Microsoft cheap out on translations instead of using human staff is beyond me, but they do.

Next is the subpar official support throughout Europe. 55% of European countries don't have official Xbox Support - so when good luck getting digital games or services if you live in a country that Microsoft STILL don't support.

Think about that, in 55% of European countries, the Xbox Series S is just a paperweight unless you get gamepass/digital games through changing your IP region.  using VPNs to bypass limits goes against the whole turn on and play idea of what a games console is.

Xbox is doing meh while ps5 is doing well. It is pretty simple. One has forza and halo.... the other ratchet, spider man, God of War, last of us, forbidden west, returnal, sackboy, etc.... demon, FF16.

MS, just my opinion, needs to get serious about games, not services.  This is the first generation I didn't buy a Xbox...  and I don't feel like I'm missing out on anything special.  

Its not just limited to ingame text, and subtitles ect.
There are translation errors in menu's and UI on the system, also obviously because of auto-translate/machine translation,
instead of useing people that speak the language to translate it.

Theres been threads about it on resetera, neogaf ect.

exsample (about the threads):

https://www.resetera.com/threads/let%E2%80%99s-talk-about-xbox%E2%80%99s-ui-translations-around-the-world-what%E2%80%99s-going-wrong.779777/



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If you want to look at what its like between say 2 first party games, from xbox vs playstation (taken from resetera thread):


Spider-Man 2 text and dub options:
Audio and Text:
English, French, Latin American Spanish, Brazilian Portuguese, Italian, German, Portuguese (Portugal), Spanish (Castilian), Polish, Russian, Arabic, Japanese, English (US)

Text Only:
Czech, Danish, Dutch, Finnish, Greek, Hungarian, Norwegian, Swedish ,Korean, Chinese (Traditional), Chinese (Simplified), Indonesian, Thai, Vietnamese

Starfield which is Xbox's biggest release this year.:

Audio and Text:
English, French, German, Spanish (Spain), Japanese

Text only:
Italian, Polish, Portuguese (Brazil), Simplified Chinese


And theres a quality differnce in these translations too, apparently.
Like you can tell, one does the bare minimum, while the other goes the extra mile, for the translations.

Why?

Most on resetera just assume, its because xbox doesn't care enough to bother.

Ohhh that explains why the DeadEye Sniper class in Redfall is called “The Sniper with the Zombie Eye” in the Italian version 

This brand worldwide feels so tanked. And just seems like MS and Phil don't care.

Brand is in the gutter but what concerns me the most is they keep slurping more and more studios and companies. Soon they will be third party and i hope these companies they buy dont suffer a tragic faith.

I wonder if the lack of localization is a reason Xbox has previously done pretty well in Sweden. As unlike many European countries we normally don’t have dubbed movies or games (only subs, and not even that in games) so we have no choice but to learn english.

Same for denmark. However alot of countries in the EU, are very stubborn about takeing in media, in their not native lanague (or atleast with subtitles). So if its english only.... that game isn't being sold to a mother, getting it for a child ect. Theres teen/adults that refuse on principle as well (I'm thinking france/germany, where they are protective of their native tongue ect).

I have zero doubts, if Xbox put in effort with translations, equal too or better than playstation/nintendo, it would show a positive effect on sales over time. This would mean additional voice actors for games, getting real people to translate menu/ui elements, and game texts.

"55% of European countries don't have official Xbox Support" - I think this might be the big one.

Localization might be the thing as well, though I always find it odd that people in this day and age don't speak English.

As a stereotypical American who doesn't speak a second language I'm impressed with Europe.  Every country I've been to their English is as good as mine.  Except Scotland, accent can be rough for me.