As I mentioned here on my company blog last September already, no other than Yahoo Japan (4689), the country’s biggest online company, has been planning to enter the mobile gaming business.
Fast forward to today, and GameBank, the subsidiary Yahoo Japan set up for its new unit earlier this year, is now ready to show its first apps.
The company has drummed up a lot of interest earlier this week with a press conference, discussion panels with other game makers, a PR blitz etc. to demonstrate how serious it takes mobile gaming.
During said press conference on April 9, Gamebank CEO Masamitsu Shiino said that around 90% of Japan’s smartphone owners are using Yahoo.
The plan now is to use this massive user base to promote new games to but also link apps to the roughly 100 services Yahoo Japan offers whenever it makes sense.
Content-wise, Gamebank will try to focus on the hardcore segment of the smartphone market, an area the company itself calls “niche” in Japan – which is certainly true.
The official reasoning here is that the first Japanese company to come up with a game appealing to local “core users” will land a long-lasting hit.
Gamebank has already revealed what the first four games will be. Interestingly, two of these are certainly not hardcore:
- Orbit Saga (a 3D action RPG)
- Minna No Tsuri Bakansu (a social fishing sim)
- Daishuugo! Wai Wai Party / tentative title (real-time mini gaming)
- Soul Gauge (an online MMORPG)
These four apps are scheduled for release in Japan within 2015. Click here for further details.
GameBank is planning to release a total of ten apps over the next two years, with no word out on possible international versions at this point.
