泥中蟠龍's Game愛歌 _ Hunger for new challenge

泥中蟠龍's Game愛歌

[A love song for games of the dragon waiting for an opportunity]

 

Hunger for new challenge

 

November.12.2013

Recently I received an investment offer for, what is called, a 'run style' game. I found nothing special except just a little bit of differences from another running games while I was playing game. I suddenly felt hunger for new challenge at that time. Looking at lots of mobile games newly released, there are too many running games and TCG (Trading card game) or CCG (Collectible card game). Is good to place too much disproportionate emphasis on the specific genres? I'd like to talk about it this time.

The future of the mobile gaming industry is uncertain. There are not only the external factors but also internal factors. Where is the unclear future coming from? It has many different causes. Some of reasons are quantitative and the others are qualitative. I can list the factors as many as I write a thesis on. But the reason why I mentioned about the market, market uncertainty is partially responsible for the circumstances. When the market is uncertain, game developers definitely want their products to generate steady sales. Game makers inevitably prefer a particular genre which is already guaranteed to make a certain amount of money.

But I want to talk about another story here. Is it possible to make steady figures with the specific genre of game which would assure a certain amount of money? I don't agree with that. Because the games don't meet the expectations of users. In spite of lots of constantly-released games, common games are certainly one of biggest factors to lower expectations of consumers about the newly released games. Mobile games have evolved quantitatively in the 21st century. And there have been plenty of fine games in the center of it. They are a large number of old feature phone games and newest smartphone games as well which people, who have only a little interest in the gaming, have heard of the names. For example, there are good games like Bungeoppang Tycoon by Com2uS; the first instance of tycoon games, Hulk by Com2uS; the action game which is still very much talked about among developers, Nom by Gamevil; the most typical one button game, Rule the Sky by JCE; the game which contributed to promoting social network games, Wind Runner by Wemade; the beginning of the craze over running games. Unfortunately, they were the basis for making many other games that are similar. There is a saying, "Imitation precedes creation." And benchmarks are also needed to make good games. Imitation with deep thought and consideration definitely create something entirely new. But imitation without effort and preparation is just an poor remake. Game users no longer look forward to bland names like “OOpang or OOrun". The games, which are already familiar with and never exceed players' expectations, give customers only a little satisfaction. This enables a vicious cycle in the circumstances where the insecure market induces developers to make similar games, and further, the scissors-and-paste games aggravate the market. An industry remaining stagnant is inevitability moving backward as it says, "Stagnant water is bound to corrupt." Now it's time to do something new to break the vicious cycle. Brand-new games following the aforementioned masterpieces consistently need to be released. The vicious circle won't be broken out of unless developers rise to new challenge. Because they cannot continuously come up to users' expectations with only external factors.

There is a saying that "the butterfly effect" which means that the sensitive dependence on initial conditions in which a small change in one state of a deterministic nonlinear system can result in large differences in a later state. Every single challenge of developers now will have a huge influence on development of the mobile gaming industry later. They should see many foreign developers making entirely-new games full of new challenges. And they must compete in the highly volatile market by creating more individual and witty games. In order to do so, I would like to stress again that we need to stop making uniform games and should explore new possibilities. 

※ This is from Kyunghyang Games column by 泥中蟠龍 since September 2013.

   (http://www.khgames.co.kr)

    Translation by Kim Ki-hui

泥中蟠龍's Game愛歌 _ My frank advice to lazy government is honesty

泥中蟠龍's Game愛歌

[A love song for games of the dragon waiting for an opportunity]

 

My frank advice to lazy government is honesty

 

October.25.2013

Recently controversy rages in the gaming industry when a member of the National Assembly, who I don't even want to know the name of him, labeled game as one of big four addictions and insisted that it should be gotten rid of with drug and gambling. There also has been a policy on restricting hours of use for teens over recent years. Official purposes of the impolicy are said to guarantee teens' sleeping hours, study hours, and prevent bullying at school.

I'd like to ask them pushing the bill before bringing up theoretical problems like that a close correlation between gaming and school violence or video game addiction has not been clearly verified. Can we anticipate the results of significantly reduced gaming addicts and increased sleeping hours and study hours if the government's drive is backed by various regulations of the gaming. Are they sure? If they don't, public cannot help but to be suspicious about sincerity of remarks from the Assemblyman, officials of the Ministry of Gender Equality and Family and Ministry of Health and Welfare.

Laws and legal system are built on purposes of the legislation or enforcement making the people to believe that they comply with the purposes. However, without looking at some statistics, typical workers and middle and high school students in Korea generally aren't capable of spending more than 2-3 hours to play a game except for hours of sleep. It's approximately similar to housewives' TV series watching time. Something is said now that "Aggressors of school violence are usually enjoy gaming. Therefore gaming is especially responsible for the violence." or "A large number of alcoholics and drug addicts have been played a game for an age. So they easily can be another addicts." is against 'the mistake of hasty generalization' or ‘A proposition and the converse of the proposition is not the same.’, the fundamentals of logic and mathematics, which people completed the regular curriculum can definitely understand. Daily patterns of typical addicts or aggressors of school violence are not ordinary and they spend much time enjoy cultural contents like gaming. There is a high possibility of higher than average rates of TV viewing, smoking, and drinking than average people.

 

Overindulgence in something needs to be controled. I agree with that. But It can be solved by developing self-control and endurance of users and teenagers through strengthening the education that builds their character and improving social environment where they can get rid of their stress by engaging in leisure activity not by laws and system. The government's policy to strongly regulate the gaming never solve current problems. It is not much different from a society where games are no more can make game addicts keep their life normal. It is not only machiavellianism but also Legalism, control of people by strict adherence to the law. Character education for teenagers lies with the parents and the teachers and humanity education for members of a society is a responsibility for the society. Agreeing to regulation-only systems is administrative opportunism and parental convenience. Are you going to blame on the government with an issue of child's personality?

I'd like to stress this again. Don't discourage responsible and self-sacrificing workers in the gaming industry denouncing them that they make goods like drug on the absurd basis of "The prohibition law can help drastically reduce alcohol consumption." and be honest if you want to be lazy government or parents.

※ This is from Kyunghyang Games column by 泥中蟠龍 since September 2013.

   (http://www.khgames.co.kr)

    Translation by Kim Ki-hui

泥中蟠龍's Game愛歌 _ Ah! Com2uS

泥中蟠龍's Game愛歌

[A love song for games of the dragon waiting for an opportunity]

 

Ah! Com2uS

 

October.16.2013

I went to Busan International Film Festival recently. I had a chance to see a number of good movies and meet with Jummy Wang Yu, once a famous action star, as well. But I especially want to talk about a shocking news that I heard on Oct. 4. It was that Gamevil announced acquisition of Com2uS whose rival has competed with more than 10 years for first place in the mobile gaming industry.

The two firms are first generation mobile game companies established in 1998 and 2000 respectively and they have been business rivals and associates. It may be meaningless to give my opinion about the results and of the acquisition. Many articles already includes each predictions and I don't feel like mentioning about it.

I started working in mobile gaming areas in 2001. The two companies were my longtime role model. Screen color of cell phone was black and white when I entered the field. GVM, Go Version Manager, was used in a poor mobile game making environment where the total limited capacity for program, image files, and sound files was just 64KB in total, less than the average one page of Word. Reducing the size of the game was one of the best technology at the moment. Animation and design with 1-2 frames per every second couldn't contribute to making a game near perfect. Colorful images weren't allowed until production environment enabling 128KB game in 2002. Looking at character motion in games, I was thrilled in the presence of the environment where 4 frames per second was possible. There was even an advertising phrase 'A blockbuster game with over 1MB is coming.' when a game over 1MB of capacity was released for the first time. Considering color and capacity of mobile games nowadays, it seems as if ages had passed since then compared to only ten years ago.

I said too much about it because I feel very sad to say goodbye. I have seen Com2uS for more than 10 years waiting for a new work each time and I used to inform customer center by e-mail whenever I found bugs. I guess I have played Com2uS games more than 2000 hours at least. Of course, Com2uS won't disappear right away under new ownership. However, the company with newly renovated key executives won't what they used to be. It's definitely not the same one which made games I enjoyed playing, for example, Phone Go-Stop; in the bathroom, Pro Baseball; in the bus; and Bungeoppang Tycoon; before go to bed. I feel sad like a baseball fan who hear the news of his/her favorite baseball player's retirement.

I know I can't fix it. And the whole takeover process will go smoothly. There is only one thing that I expect is Com2uS, which impressed and entertained the users a lot, will not be faded into history.

※ This is from Kyunghyang Games column by 泥中蟠龍 since September 2013.

   (http://www.khgames.co.kr)

    Translation by Kim Ki-hui