Currently, China is the No.1 game country in the world. China’s mobile game market had experienced the exploration period of 2009-2011. After the start-up period of 2012-2013, it has entered a rapid development since 2014, and go steadily in 2015. In 2016. The annual demographic dividend had gradually disappeared, and the game market growth had begun to slow down. Now China’s game market has gradually shifted from the incremental market to the stock market. The competition in the whole industry has also intensified. The mass disappearing of small-medium game developers is becoming reality. Cooperation and symbiosis will become the normal in the market. So, for Chinese game developers, how to survive become an challenge.
Mobile games becoming main force globally
According to Statista‘s analysis, the mobile game market market reach $57 billion in 2018.
With the popularity of smart phones and the continuous upgrading of mobile phone hardware, mobile games have gradually become the main force of the game industry. At present, the mobile game industry is in a rapid growth. According to Statista’s data, in 2019, global mobile phone market revenues, revenue of Tecent Mobile Games is 185.36 million dollar in 2019 so far, 99.33 million dollar of NetEase Games in the second.
The mobile industry, is the fastest growing segment of the gaming industry. Mobile games are attractive to both the general public and professional players. Starting in 2017, mobile games will become the market segment with the most revenue and games.
According to the Statista report, the mobile contents market value in Asia reach 46.1 billion US dollar in 2019 and expecting to reach 49.6 US dollar in 2020. While in Europe, in 2019, the total mobile contents market value is 8.2 billion dollar and expecting to be 9.1 billion dollar in 2020.
In addition, mobile games are driving the development of e-sports at an unprecedented rate. Mobile e-sports is both ornamental and confrontational while being ornamental, satisfying the general needs of different users, and has a wide range of potential audiences. For game developers, with the increasingly fierce competition in the conventional mobile game market, in order to make breakthroughs in the potential market, it has become their new goal to tap into the blue ocean segment of heavy competitive mobile games.
The speed about how a mobile esports game enters market depends on the country and region. China and Southeast Asia are more enthusiastic about hosting game competitions and events, so it may be faster than other regions. 24 games of the Android Top 100 game and the 19 games in the Apple Top 100 game have already held related events or tournaments in China, indicating how fast mobile gambling is accepted in fast mobile priority countries.
Comparison of profitability of types of mobile devices：According to Statista report, the mobile gaming revenue in NA had huge different: The revenue of smart phones and tablet is 5440 million, of which smart phone occupied 1830 million.
Why?
First of all, the barrier to entry is different. A typical console game or PC game can cost millions of dollars and years of research and development, while mobile games have a relatively low barrier to entry and can be created in a matter of hours. As of the beginning of 2016, more than 800,000 mobile games have been launched in the App Store. In addition, many new mobile games are launched every day. The total number of games on the console and PC side is only 17,000.
Secondly, business models are different. The main sales model of mobile games is “free + value-added service”, which means that the game can be downloaded for free, but in the process of the game, in order to get a richer game experience, players need to pay a certain fee to purchase goods and value-added services. , clothing, props, etc. However, players can also spend dozens of hours playing mobile games without paying a penny. Therefore, the business model of mobile games determines that the average player’s consumption is lower. However, market data suggests that such players are rare, usually accounting for less than 3%.
In addition, in terms of revenue, the rise of mobile games will not take away most of the revenue of game consoles and PC games, because each platform targets different end users. Mobile games are mainly used to send pieces of spare time, while PC and game consoles gamers generally have much available time.
Research shows that, the top 20 mobile game publishers occupy 80% of the gaming industry’s total revenue, and the remaining 20% are generated by thousands of small game developers. The most profitable games generate five times the revenue of the fifth game, and ten times the tenth game.
At present, the competition in the Chinese game market is becoming more and more fierce. The number of new game is increasing and the quality is getting higher. How to stand out from the fierce competition in the game industry?
One of the most effective ways is to expand the market globally and localize the game to meet the needs of local gamers.
In 2015, the Chinese game market achieved sales revenue of 140.7 billion yuan, while overseas market sales revenue was 5.31 billion yuan, accounting for only 4%. Nowadays, whether it is a large enterprise or a small team, the demand for distributing game to overseas market is growing stronger. The wave of globalization is coming, but where are the growth opportunities in the global market?
After analyzing the global game market to understand which countries have higher game market revenues. The data shows that the top 20 countries in the global game market, count as89.8% of the total gaming industry revenue. They use 16 different languages, which means that if a game is translated locally in these 16 languages, it will help game developers reach nearly 90% of the world’s players. Most players prefer to play games in their own language. This is why Apple has different app stores in most countries.
Another effective way is to always listen to local gamers. By which you can understand deeply about what they need.
Last but not the least: get familiar with local policies and cultural practices. Respecting the policies and cultural norms of different countries is of the utmost importance, usually including history, national policy and religion. Government policies also require special attention. For example, countries have different grading systems for players of different ages. They are usually controlled by national agencies, such as ESRB (Entertainment Software Rating Board) in the US and Canada, PEGI (Pan-European Game Information Organization) in Europe, ACB (Australian Rating Board) in Australia, and CERO (Computer Entertainment Rating Organization) in Japan.
In the future, the mobile game market will be a global market, and it is also the market with the most ambiguous borders, the fastest information flow and the simplest cooperation mode in the game industry.
