泥中蟠龍's Game愛歌
[A love song for games of the dragon waiting for an opportunity]
The Exodus in the gaming industry
November.26.2013
It was at this time two years ago. Nexon, the best video game publisher in Korea, went public on the Tokyo Stock Exchange on December 14, 2011 and Nexon Korea Corporation became one of its subsidiaries. Now Nexon is seen as a Japanese company rather than a Korean company. 'The stroke of genius' of Kim Jung-ju, the chairman and CEO of NXC Corporation, is much talked about nowadays, and the atmosphere in the gaming industry is self-deprecation.
I've got a chance to visit "G-STAR 2013" recently. It's not merely the biggest game exhibition in Korea but the international trade show for computer and video games industry which a lot of famous foreign game makers take part in. The event has become bigger every year, but it was looked be less splendid this year. As a lot of large-scale gaming firms gave up to join in, many booths were filled with local governments and even law firms. I was heard of an unexpected news in such a situation. In 'Korean German Business Seminar for the Games industry', Germany made great offers free office and software and 100,000 euros per a game project to a startup-to-be which will set up a NRW(North Rhine-Westphalia)-based corporation. And it also stated that the German government don't see video games highly addictive and companies will be on the inside track to enter overseas markets because there are no regulations for game development in Germany.
We have read an article where there are some concerns over the issue of overseas relocation of a local firm whenever chairman of the conglomerate is under investigation by the public prosecutors' office and the business circumstance is worsened. But I've never read about an article where the high-value added gaming companies which get 20-40 percent of net income, in comparison with 10 percent or less of net profit of many domestic firms including conglomerates, relocate their firms to overseas.
There's a saying, "Hollowing Out". It is the deterioration of a country's manufacturing sector due to rising costs in developed nations when producers look to less-developed countries to set up low-cost manufacturing facilities in hopes of reducing costs and these developed nations are being "hollowed out". Digital content industry is high value-added and the gaming industry is located at the very end of it. Which industrial fields in Korea achieve world first or second in the area? Korean Gaming industry ranks number one or two in the world and is among the best in the world. The government's policies about game regulation running against time are very much disappointing. In the remarks about South Korea's Game Addiction Law of Michael Morhaime, the founder of Blizzard Entertainment, who is widely considered to be upgrading a game to an art, I think the law is embarrassing for the country.
Last year I saw that a lot of game developers wanted to release 18+ games by rating systems of GRAC (Game Rating and Administration Committee) to circumvent the minor-related regulations. If the new law is passed, gaming employees have nowhere else to go. As with the nation's largest game publisher Nexon moved its head office to Japan, there is also the possibility of the next Nexon. Korean game companies between America and Japan; the current big players, and China; the new emerging force to catch up with them, may leave for some countries in Europe or Southeast Asia where the governments have done a lot of work to boost the gaming industry. Remembering now a few years later, I don't want to write a column about the gaming industry compared to some light industries have been closed.
※ This is from Kyunghyang Games column by 泥中蟠龍 since September 2013.
(http://www.khgames.co.kr)
Translation by Kim Ki-hui
