According to a report recently published by typographically-challenged research firm Analysys, revenues from China's online gaming industry will reach 73.1 billion yuan ($10.7 billion) within three years. If you're one of those people who have a hard time telling whether numbers are large, let us assure you that this one is very large indeed. As a point of reference, the entire U.S. gaming industry pulled in $11.7 billion in revenues last year.
The report expects online gaming revenues for the nation to reach $3.8 billion this year -- however, it also estimates MMO market penetration to only be at 27 percent, a number it expects will increase as internet access becomes more readily available to Chinese citizens. Of course, all the internet access in the world won't bolster online gaming revenues if all the good ones keep getting shut down for no reason whatsoever.
Reader Comments (16)
Posted: Dec 8th 2009 10:11AM ZayCube said
I suppose WOW is 26,99 of those 27 percent.. am i rite???
Posted: Dec 8th 2009 10:13AM (Unverified) said
Well...there are a lot of people in China.
Posted: Dec 8th 2009 10:15AM (Unverified) said
There are a lot, but not a lot with access to online gaming. That's why this matters.
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Darth, what do you do? Are you literally sitting on Joystiq all day hitting refresh? Seriously, I am starting to worry about you.
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Darth, what do you do? Are you literally sitting on Joystiq all day hitting refresh? Seriously, I am starting to worry about you.
Posted: Dec 8th 2009 11:56AM Sidebuster said
LEAVE BRITTANY ALON... I MEAN DARTH BRADWART ALONE!! /cry
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Posted: Dec 8th 2009 10:13AM (Unverified) said
Does this include Gold Farming?
Posted: Dec 8th 2009 10:16AM (Unverified) said
Joystiq itself has reported on how lucrative gold farming is in China to the point where you can make a business out of it. I don't know what China counts as online gaming revenue, but that could figure into it.
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Posted: Dec 8th 2009 12:29PM Drakkenfyre said
Except, you know, gold can't be transferred from Chinese servers to other servers. They can still sell it to their region, tho.
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Posted: Dec 8th 2009 10:56AM chrisyz said
Wow, $11b is a ton of money... I bet Blizzard will keep trying to get WoW licensed out to China (again). The Chinese govt totally stopped the game to prevent money going to Western developers, even though NetEase got most of it.
Posted: Dec 8th 2009 1:36PM sigma8 said
3.8 billion to 11 billion in 3 years? That's pretty optimistic. If the US gaming industry (entire industry) is $11 billion right now, and our per capita GDP is $47,000 (cia world factbook), and China's per capita GDP is $6,000, I find it curious to expect their consumer gaming biz to grow so fast.
I mean, it Chinese gaming might explode in terms of install-bases, but companies can just price things at American prices and expect 2 billion people to pay them. Chinese citizens aren't going to be spending dollar money that they've never earned. Even with China's high growth rates (10% compared to less than a percent in the US), I don't see these figures skyrocketing so fast.
I mean, it Chinese gaming might explode in terms of install-bases, but companies can just price things at American prices and expect 2 billion people to pay them. Chinese citizens aren't going to be spending dollar money that they've never earned. Even with China's high growth rates (10% compared to less than a percent in the US), I don't see these figures skyrocketing so fast.
Posted: Dec 8th 2009 3:39PM Kyammi said
I absolutely agree. I would call it more than optimistic, try utterly impossible. Even the 3.8 billion number now is probably a load of bullshit (as online revenue reports almost always are). Sure, there are rich people in every country, but China doesn't have anywhere near the middle class that the US has, or even close to Europe or many other nations for that matter.
They don't charge Chinese customers American prices now, their WoW subscriber rates are cheap and hourly (not monthly or yearly).
China needs a good few decades, and probably longer before their people reach a Western standard of living.
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They don't charge Chinese customers American prices now, their WoW subscriber rates are cheap and hourly (not monthly or yearly).
China needs a good few decades, and probably longer before their people reach a Western standard of living.
Posted: Dec 8th 2009 4:54PM (Unverified) said
They'll only have 8 months to enjoy it, and then we'll all be dead anyway. lol
Posted: Dec 8th 2009 5:03PM erh said
And China's non-online game revenues are ZERO due to rampant piracy.
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