The act of making a product suitable for a culture foreign to its native region. For example, translating and recasting the voices of characters in an anime to
English. This can also include some other modifications, such as changing a play on
words or a common idiom native to the original region that wouldn't make sense in a foreign language, or even censorship of certain images and actions like removing a cigar from a character or replacing piles of
bones with loaves of bread.
The Japanese and Korean localization of League of Legends excluded Graves' cigar because depictions of smoking would bump the rating of the
game to 17+, making it inconsistent with the American version's rating.
The American
English localization of the hit new
game "Britain's Bikini Battlers" removed the "u" from color, flavor, behavior, harbor, honor, humor, labor, neighbor, rumor, splendor, favor, endeavor, clamor, glamor, valor, vapor... well, you get the picture. Also, they replaced the word "
arse" with "ass" and got rid of the joke about Tories running through wheat fields.
