By Dr. Serkan Toto – On Japan's Game Industry
Did you know that GREE and DeNA spend millions of US dollars to promote their social games on Japanese TV? In the July-September 2010 quarter, for example, both companies have invested around US$35 million each in TV advertising. GREE and DeNA were practically absent from the television advertising...
GREE released one of its hit titles playable on Japanese feature phones, Monster Planet, as a smartphone version (Android, iPhone) earlier this week. I tried it out on the iPhone, and the port is really good. The Pokemon-like monster raising game is playable directly in the smartphone browser and...
I attended Startupdating #5 yesterday, an event in Tokyo that connects Japan’s web entrepreneurs with engineers looking for new opportunities. Speakers at the event were Hironao Kunimitsu (CEO of Gumi) and Taisei Tanaka (CEO of Geisha Tokyo Entertainment). Their companies are among the...
First off, it’s important to understand that currently, social gaming in Japan largely means mobile social gaming. Second, it’s a multi-billion dollar market with mind-boggling profit rates for the biggest players involved. As such, many social gaming startups were created lately. You...
GREE has finally announced it will enter the social gaming market in China. Tencent, the world’s third-largest web company by market cap, will be GREE’s partner. That’s a spectacular move and sign that it becomes harder and harder for GREE to expand the mobile social games...
GREE accelerates its smartphone development. The mobile social games company just announced 15 new games by third-party developers have been added to its Android/iPhone-optimized mobile website. Partners include companies like Sega, gumi and Tonchidot (full list in Japanese here). More information...
By Dr. Serkan Toto – On Japan's Game Industry