In Other Words
The cost of being misunderstood
23 July 2026 44:07 Phrase
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About this episode
In a market where 130,000 games compete for attention on Steam Store, and players can get a full refund with a single click, a poor language experience can cost you the player before the game even starts. Tamara Tirják spent a decade building the localization program at Frontier Developments, one of the UK's leading game studios, before moving into independent consulting and research. On this episode of In Other Words, she joins host Jason Hemingway to share what that decade taught her about the business cost of getting language wrong.
Tamara explains why localization is almost always where the cost becomes visible, even when the problem started somewhere else. She shares how AI is fueling unsanctioned "shadow localization" across organizations, and why the gaming industry's hard line on AI-generated content, including a Game of the Year winner losing its award over AI placeholders, carries weight well beyond games.
Plus, she talks about helping invent Planco, the fictional language used in Planet Zoo, and what it taught her about how players respond to language even when they don't understand a word of it.
What You'll Learn:
- What happens when 130,000 competitors are one refund button away
- The Game of the Year that lost its award over AI
- What a language where "wippi" means happy reveals about player experience
- The rise of "shadow localization" inside organizations
- Why your language team is the strategic asset you're not using
Tamara Tirják is an independent localization consultant and researcher with over a decade of experience building localization programs at Frontier Developments, one of the UK's leading game studios. Specializing in game localization strategy, language operations, and the business value of multilingual content, Tamara has led high-velocity content pipelines for premium titles including Elite Dangerous and Planet Zoo, where she contributed to the creation of Planco, a fully constructed fictional language. Her research with Nimdzi explores why localization teams struggle to prove ROI and how organizations can reframe language as a revenue enabler rather than a cost center.
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Highlights and YouTube Chapters:
- 00:00 Introduction
- 01:59 From translator to strategic leader
- 03:41 Building a localization ecosystem in a game engine
- 07:34 The hidden cost of proprietary tools
- 09:54 Automation that works when it breaks
- 14:22 Why localization keeps losing the business case
- 17:29 130,000 competitors and a refund button
- 21:06 Turning data into strategic influence
- 25:50 Velocity vs. scale: Two models for trust
- 30:55 Why AAA gaming still resists AI content
- 34:39 Inventing a language for Planet Zoo
- 39:44 Across Markets Reading the revenue curve across markets
- 41:51 The biggest untapped opportunity in global business
Episode Resources:
- Tamara Tirják, Localization Leader & Consultant
- Jason Hemingway, CMO at Phrase
- Phrase Website
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