By Dr. Serkan Toto – On Japan's Game Industry
Back in November 2012, mega-popular Korean chat app KakaoTalk opened its gaming platform inside the Japanese version, starting with three Android titles (Anipang, Tap Tap Blitz, and Puzzle Zoo Zoo). Today operator Kakao Japan, which is 50% owned by Yahoo Japan, expanded said platform to iOS and...
Just a few weeks after Namco Bandai went public saying they have 30 million, Konami is now boasting a total of 35 million registered users across all of their social games. The company reported 10 million users in September 2011 and 20 million in April 2012. Konami revealed that Dragon Collection...
GREE is surely in need of hit titles at the moment. While I don’t think that city-building sim Animal Days will become an evergreen, things are different with a third-party title that has been just unveiled (for GREE only). Users in Japan can now pre-register for “One Piece –...
NHN Japan is continuing to turn its super-popular messenger app LINE into a platform (or portal) for mobile content of any kind. After games, a set of social networking features, horoscopes, a greeting card app, a drawing app, and a camera app, coupons, an in-app virtual world, and content for...
GREE has released Animal Days, a city-building simulation with a very high cute factor, on Android (available in English or Japanese). As the title suggests, the goal is to “build a delightful town with cheerfully funny animals”, not human beings as usual. GREE says that the initial...
Japan’s top platform-free smartphone game Puzzle & Dragons is running from one record to the other: the puzzle/RPG hybrid boasts a staggering 7 million registered users across iOS and Android now. GungHo says the number was actually reached on January 18, just a few days after announcing 6...
By Dr. Serkan Toto – On Japan's Game Industry