By Dr. Serkan Toto – On Japan's Game Industry
Messenger app sensation KakaoTalk is the clear winner in its home market of Korea (65 million users worldwide) but hasn’t been able to win over users in Japan where LINE is the undisputed king. KakaoTalk has been available in Japanese for quite a while now, but now maker Kakao Corp. is ready...
NHN Japan has announced that LINE Birzzle, the first social game released on the LINE platform, reached 10 million downloads worldwide. Developed by Korea-based Enfeel, the title hit iOS and Android on July 4 this year and managed to rack up 2 million users in 24 hours. LINE Birzzle needed just 97...
It’s pretty difficult (I would even say next to impossible) to be able to track what’s going on in Japan’s social and mobile gaming industry without being based here and knowing the language. The task gets even more difficult when you take into account there is hardly any source...
“Bushimo” is the name of a new social gaming platform Tokyo-based Bushiroad announced at Tokyo Game Show 2012. The new service will be exclusively available on smartphones starting sometime this winter, going (to some degree) against the likes of Mobage, GREE, or LINE. Bushiroad says...
I am not seeing many Japanese social game developers jumping ship from Mobage or GREE to LINE, but LINE operator NHN Japan did a step in the right direction at the Tokyo Game Show 2012 (which ends tomorrow). The company signed a deal with Korea-based WeMade, under which WeMade will distribute a...
There is already a social gaming platform embedded in Japan’s real-identity social network Mixi (on both the PC and mobile versions), but that’s apparently no reason not to open a second one. Dubbed mixi Park, the new social gaming platform was launched today by Mixi itself and Konami...
By Dr. Serkan Toto – On Japan's Game Industry