By Dr. Serkan Toto – On Japan's Game Industry
Mega-popular card battle game Rage Of Bahamut has passed the 10 million user mark, maker Cygames announced today. The company reported 3 million users for their flagship titles just 3 months ago – in other words, users are going totally nuts over the Mobage game. In Korea alone Rage Of...
Zynga Japan will close its office in Tokyo at the end of next month, CEO Kenji Matsubara posted on Facebook today. The move was (kind of) pre-announced back in October by Zynga proper’s CEO Mark Pincus. One month later, Zynga Japan said it will stop supporting three games by today. Here is...
I can’t say this is a big surprise: GREE has just launched its own messenger app on the App Store and Google Play – very, very quietly. Aptly named GREE Messenger, the app is limited for download in a few countries for this soft launch. On iOS, for example, it’s available in the...
The following charts are part of a presentation I recently gave on Japan’s social gaming industry, highlighting the differences between GREE, Zynga, and Mobage operator DeNA in terms of financials. What many people outside Japan don’t realize is that when it comes to business, both...
Square Enix’ Mana series of RPGs, which started in 1991, is getting its first social version. “Seiken Densetsu – Circle Of Mana” will be exclusively available on GREE sometime next year (in the form of an app for iOS or Android). Players can already pre-register for the...
GREE, which hasn’t seen a few hits on its platform in quite some time now, can be happy: Metal Gear Solid Social Ops, the first social game in the Metal Gear franchise, seems to be a success. The GREE-exclusive title launched on December 4, was off to a good start, and passed 500,000...
By Dr. Serkan Toto – On Japan's Game Industry