By Dr. Serkan Toto – On Japan's Game Industry
DeNA has quietly shut down a total of five games on the Mobage platform in Japan recently, offering players who have purchased (but not yet used) virtual currency for the titles reimbursements. The list news site Social Game Info released today includes a few big titles, especially the first two:...
There is no end to the Puzzle & Dragons hype in Japan, it seems. The country’s top smartphone game now has over 12 million users, is generating a staggering US$62-86 million – per month, and has been advertised with a new campaign on national TV since the end of March. Maker GungHo...
I was recently asked by Eric Seufert, marketing and mobile user acquisition specialist at Grey Area in Helsinki, to give an interview on Japan’s mobile and social gaming scene. Eric has an excellent blog, on which he analyzes various aspects of the mobile industry, most recently the gaming...
Here is a presentation I gave a few days ago in Tokyo on Japan’s social and mobile gaming industry. It’s dubbed “Social Games In Japan 2013: Status Quo, Trends And Internationalization”, and it covers exactly what the title suggests. (I need to add that nobody in the...
I put together the following article for Social Casino Intelligence, the biggest publication covering the global social casino industry. The link to the online version of the original piece is here. The US$5 billion social gaming market in Japan is unique in many ways, but one of the most striking...
In Japan, a title called “Kaito Royale” is often credited with having kick-started the social gaming boom in this country as a whole. The first-party game – which works much like Mafia Wars – from DeNA was launched on Mobage in October 2009, and is still very, very popular...
By Dr. Serkan Toto – On Japan's Game Industry