Nintendo faces allegations of attributing incorrect credit to external developers

Nintendo faces allegations from employees at Localsoft and Keywords of failing to properly credit external translators.

Sources informed Game Developer that the company did not adequately recognize their contributions on games such as Paper Mario: The Thousand-Year Door, Animal Crossing: New Horizons, and The Legend of Zelda: Breath of the Wild.

The sources claimed Nintendo enforces a practice that excludes the names of translators from external firms in game credits and prohibits these translators from mentioning the projects on their resumes.

Game Developer contacted Nintendo, Keywords, and Localsoft before publishing the article but did not receive any comments.

A source mentioned that while at Nintendo, they were credited, but recalled a situation where in-house testers were not acknowledged in the credits for a Professor Layton game.

"Nintendo of Europe managed the localisation and publishing for the Layton series at that time," the source explained. "Even though the in-house translators protested this decision, the testers were ultimately not credited for that project. It's unclear if this practice has become standard."

Upon leaving Nintendo, this source continued contributing to Nintendo projects as a contractor for Localsoft and Keywords and claimed they were not credited for their subsequent work.

Another worker from Localsoft reported that external translators had to sign non-disclosure agreements, preventing them from discussing their involvement in these projects.

"If you observe the credits for Paper Mario: The Thousand-Year Door, for instance, you'll see only six individuals credited for localizing an entire game available in eight languages," the source noted. "A title of this size typically requires around 25 translators. Some languages are completely omitted as if they miraculously appeared in the game.

"For games like Animal Crossing or Breath of the Wild, the absence of 15 or 20 translators isn’t obvious due to the presence of in-house translators in the credits. However, Nintendo’s policy causes many external translators on major releases to go unacknowledged."

This is not the first time Nintendo has faced such accusations. Last year, Metroid Prime Remastered was criticized for omitting the original developers in the credits.

In March, the GamesIndustry.biz Academy examined the miscrediting issue and proposed solutions to address it.