Social Games In Japan 2013: Status Quo, Trends And Internationalization
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This document summarizes the status of Japan's social gaming market in 2013. It discusses the fragmented market dominated by GREE and DeNA, with an estimated market size of $3-4 billion. It also outlines 10 key trends, including the rise of smartphones, chat apps, and puzzle games like Puzzle & Dragons. Internationalization efforts by Japanese companies have struggled, but some content is finding success abroad, and the future may lie in content provision over platforms.
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Social Games In Japan 2013: Status Quo, Trends And Internationalization
- 1. Japan‘s Social Gaming Market 2013: Status Quo, Key Trends & Internationalization By Serkan Toto, PhD www.serkantoto.com Image credit: DeNA
- 2. About Me • Social and mobile gaming industry consultant • Advisor for startups in Japan and the US • Japan contributor for TechCrunch.com • Based in Japan since 2004 • Hardcore gamer • Personal site: http://www.serkantoto.com
- 3. Visit My Website For Free Information On Japan’s Mobile Game Industry (http://www.serkantoto.com)
- 4. Contact Information Twitter: @serkantoto LinkedIn: http://linkedin.com/in/serkantoto Email: serkan AT serkantoto.com
- 5. Agenda I: Status Quo Of Japan’s Social Gaming Market II: 10 Key Trends In Japan (And Asia) III: Internationalization Efforts
- 6. I: Status Quo Of Japan’s Social Gaming Market
- 7. Japan‘s Unique Social Landscape • 4 homegrown social networks with roughly 25-40+ million registered users each: – Mixi (80% mobile social networking) – GREE (mobile social gaming) – Mobage (mobile social gaming) – LINE (mobile chat application) • Twitter: 30+ million users • Facebook: 19+ million MAU
- 8. Fragmented Game Market • ~300-400 social game providers in Japan. • 20+ game platform providers (all mobile). • 2 dominant companies as platform and game provider hybrids: GREE and DeNA (“Facebook+Zynga in 1“). • LINE (since July 2012), Kakaotalk (February 2013), and dgame (December 2012) emerge as domestic competitors.
- 9. Japan‘s Social Gaming Ecosystem
- 10. Size Of Japan‘s Social Gaming Market -> Projection from Morgan Stanley, January 2012
- 11. Size Of Japan‘s Social Gaming Market -> Projection from Nomura Research, January 2012 Image credit: The Nikkei
- 12. Size Of Japan‘s Social Gaming Market -> Other sources (July 2012) • Ministry Of Internal Affairs: US$3.26 billion (2011) • Japan Online Game Association: US$3.6 billion (2011) -> SuperData: US market sized at $1.4 billion in 2011, to grow to $2.4 billion by 2014.
- 13. Size Of Japan‘s Social Gaming Market -> Projection from Yano Research, January 2013
- 14. Extremely High Paying User Ratio -> Morgan Stanley offers more insight.
- 15. Spending Patterns -> Not much difference compared to other regions
- 16. 4 Big Reasons Why Japanese Play Social Games
- 17. The Top 5 User Demographics For Social Games
- 18. Some User Data From GREE
- 19. The Top 10 On Mobage.
- 20. The Top 10 On GREE. -‐> Note: on feature phones, GREE doesn‘t show their own Atles in the ranking.
- 21. II: 10 Key Trends In Mobile Gaming In Japan (And Asia)
- 22. Trend 1: Smartphone Revolution Source: Impress R&D
- 23. Trend 2: Shift To The App Economy
- 24. Trend 3: Rise Of The Chat Apps
- 25. Trend 3: Rise Of The Chat Apps
- 26. Trend 4: Competition In Platforms
- 27. Trend 4: Competition In Platforms Image credit: TechCrunch Japan
- 28. Trend 5: Puzzle & Dragons Hype
- 29. Trend 5: Puzzle & Dragons Hype
- 30. Trend 5: Puzzle & Dragons Hype
- 31. Trend 5: Puzzle & Dragons Hype Image credit: Social Game Info
- 32. Trend 5: Puzzle & Dragons Hype
- 33. Trend 6: Next-Gen Social Games
- 34. Trend 7: Regulation (?) • There are now payment caps for younger players on DeNA and GREE. • Real-money, off-platform trading of virtual items is still a problem. • Certain bingo/lottery-like gaming mechanics are banned. • Odds of winning are now disclosed in gacha. • JASGA has been established.
- 35. Trend 7: Regulation (?)
- 36. Trend 8: Card Battle Fatigue (?)
- 37. Trend 8: Card Battle Fatigue (?)
- 38. Trend 8: Card Battle Fatigue (?)
- 39. Trend 8: Card Battle Fatigue (?)
- 43. DeNA And GREE’s Platform Business Outside Japan Failed
- 44. DeNA And GREE’s Platform Business Outside Japan Failed • GREE International publicly acknowledged the platform (in the US) is „on ice“. • Openfeint was shut down in December 2012. • GREE‘s HTML5 platform is poised to fail, too. • Mobage offers 75 games on its English- language platform now – 20 months after launch in the US (Japan: 1,500+ games). • Mobage moved to FB and Twitter integration.
- 45. Positive Signs Exist (In The US)
- 46. Positive Signs Exist (In The US)
- 47. Difficult Situation In China • GREE is active in China with an office, a partnership with Tencent, and various investments. There seems to be no progress. • DeNA is much more active in China. It runs dozens of partnerships with handset makers, telcos and app stores. Mobage had 60 games and 5 million users in August 2012. • Both companies are very, very quiet about the Chinese market.
- 48. Difficult Situation In China
- 49. Japanese Content Does Well In SK
- 50. Outlook On Internationalization • The future will likely see both GREE and Mobage turn into content providers and publishers. People want games, devs want distribution - not platforms-inside-platforms. • DeNA in particular is running a number of titles successfully already. • GREE‘s Funzio titles are doing well. • Japan (and other markets in Asia) offer a big reservoir of excellent content providers.
- 51. Transferability Of Content Is Key "Key issue: art style and themes"
- 52. Thank you for listening! Questions?
- 53. Contact Information Twitter: @serkantoto LinkedIn: http://linkedin.com/in/serkantoto Email: serkan AT serkantoto.com