By Dr. Serkan Toto – On Japan's Game Industry
After opening one office after the other outside Japan last year, GREE is planning to open a social game development studio in Osaka later this month. What’s interesting is that this office will be the first of its kind outside Tokyo: the company does employ hundreds of people in Hokkaido and...
CyberAgent is continuing to expand its social gaming business. The Japanese web powerhouse, which is currently listed at the Tokyo Stock Exchange with a US$1.9 billion market cap, has acquired a majority stake in Tokyo-based R-Force Entertainment. The Tokyo-based game maker has been around since...
GREE just announced they will set up a booth at the Electronic Entertainment Expo (E3), to be held in Los Angeles from June 5-7 this year. It will be the first time for GREE to take part in the event, which is the world’s biggest of its kind. The company is planning to showcase games and use...
DeNA‘s US company ngmoco recently laid off 30 people, TechCrunch and Inside Mobile Apps are reporting. According to TechCrunch, the group includes “senior leaders including a director of platform tech and the chief marketing officer”. The same blog is reporting that one game has...
It’s not a secret that GREE has been outpacing DeNA in recent months: the market cap today at the Tokyo Stock Exchange for DeNA stood at US$4.9 billion (DeNA stock soared today), while GREE reached US$7.8 billion. Nikkei Online has tried to visualize the race between the two rivals in recent...
Action social games are pretty rare – reason enough for me to highlight a new entry in this genre in Japan, “Shuriken Smaaash” from Tokyo-based developer Nijibox. Another reason the game stands out is that it has been released on Mobage in the form of native apps, for Android and...
By Dr. Serkan Toto – On Japan's Game Industry