Korean game companies are expected to target North American and European console market.

Korea`s major game companies are accelerating their efforts to penetrate the North American and European markets with a `two-track` strategy that develops a single intellectual property (IP) game as a PC online game and console game version.

According to industry sources on August 28, Nexon recently released its online game "LowBreakers" on the North American market as a PC online console game version, and NCsoft, Pearl Abys, Blue Hall are going to hit the European market.

Meanwhile, the domestic mobile and online games market is already saturated, and in order to achieve sustainable growth, North America and Europe, which are the world`s largest gaming markets, are essential. Especially, consoles (gaming machines; PlayStation, XBox Won, etc.) in the game market are main target.

The North American and European console game market amounted to USD 39.1 billion (about KRW 44 trillion, based on the Korea Creative Content Agency 2016 forecast), which accounts for 52% of the total game market in the region (US $ 75.6 billion, about 85 trillion won).

Especially, in the case of China, which is the world`s No. 1 game market (about KRW 30 trillion in 2016 and 24.5% of the global game market), the uncertainty of the Korean-Chinese conflict situation due to the deployment of high-altitude missile defense system The importance of the North American and European markets is becoming more evident.

An industry expert said, "No matter how big the Chinese game market is, at present, it is like the `rice cake` to our game companies." The game companies that want to find hope in North America and Europe.”

Major Korean game companies have already hit the door of North American and European console game market with big game IPs that have already been developed as PC version and proved to be popular.

Earlier, Nexon released its global fighting game "Lowbreakers" (developer Bobskiy Productions), which can be used as a PC online console game version, on the global market (excluding Asia), including the region. The console version is available in PlayStation (PS) 4, PS4 Pro.

Meanwhile, NCsoft is preparing a console version of its billboard online game "Blade & Soul" through its US subsidiary. The company`s development direction is to make all development projects that have been classified as online multi-access role playing games (MMORPGs) run on both console and PC platforms.

Pearl Abys has debuted the console version of the MMORPG at GameScom, Europe`s largest game show in Cologne, Germany. PC online version The Black Desert started domestic service in December 2014, and it was launched in 100 countries including 7 regions including Japan, Russia, North America, Europe and South America, and accumulated cumulative sales of KRW 340 billion (as of July).

Especially, overseas sales account for 75% of sales, with sales in North America and Europe accounting for 31.3%.

Blue Hall is preparing to release the Xbox version of `Player Unicorn Battleground` (total fighting), which was released in March as early access (paid test version) version of the game platform `Steam` operated by North American game company valve. Microsoft plans to distribute it directly. The game is currently in the pipeline, surpassing the 8 million units sold.

Sonnori, on the other hand, also released the PS4 version and the PC version (Steam) of the horror game `White Day` on the 22nd and 23rd respectively. The game, titled `White Day: The School Labyrinth`, is the latest in the White Day series,


By Kim Soo Yeon newsnews @


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