An official English translation of "Policenauts" was announced for release on the Sega Saturn in 1996 in North America. It appeared in catalogs with promotional box artwork, but the game never materialized. Kojima discussed making an English translation three times, but encountered translation difficulties. As he explained, the Japanese dialogue was parsed into phrases with flags the program could reference, and making English dialogue work with this system would be too difficult. According to Jeremy Blaustein, who worked in Konami's international business department and led the translations of "Snatcher" and "Metal Gear Solid" (1998), there were never plans to localize "Policenauts". He personally felt it was one of Kojima's weaker games, not enjoying the "space cowboy" theme and feeling it lacked the tension and humor of "Snatcher". Industry journalists have speculated in hindsight that Konami may have passed on localization because of "Snatcher"'s commercial failure and "Policenauts"' long scenes and protracted dialogue during an era of heightened consumer interest in 3D action games.