Redfinger | The Top 10 News of South Korea Gaming Industry in 2022
In 2022, there will be a series of important news in the Korean gaming industry, which has attracted worldwide attention. Many players in the gaming industry have made a lot of analysis on these news.
#1: Nexon Founder Jung-Ju Kim Dies Aged 54
On March 1, 2022, NXC, the shareholding company of Nexon, the largest game company in South Korea, confirmed that Jung-Ju Kim, the founder of Nexon, died in Hawaii on February 28 at the age of 54. South Korean Internet, gaming industry organizations, and even Nexon’s competitor NCSoft expressed their condolences.
#2: Wemade’s Crypto Token Wemix Delisted
On November 24, the core crypto token of Wemade blockchain game platform was required to be delisted by DAXA, a Korean digital asset exchange advisory institution. It is worth noting that the Digital Asset Exchange Alliance (DAXA) was jointly established by five Korean exchanges, including Upbit, Bithumb, Korbit, Coinone and Gopax, to prevent the next Terra incident.
The reason is that the issuance information released by Wemix is seriously inaccurate, the information provided to investors is insufficient, and the data submitted is incorrect. Although Wemade immediately counterattacked, on December 7, the Korean court chose to stand on the side of the exchange party, and WEMIX was delisted from the Korean Exchange at 3 p.m. on December 8 as planned.
After receiving the delisting notice, Wemix, which had previously traded at about 2200 won, plummeted by more than 70% and closed at 600 won. Worse, when the delisting was confirmed on December 7, the price fell to 200 won.
#3: Amendments to Game Industry Act Unapproved
Before the 13th President of South Korea, Yoon Suk yeol, takes office, game companies must fully disclose probability information so that the public can directly monitor unfair behavior. In the past year, this has been one of the main topics discussed in the Korean gaming industry.
On December 20, the Ministry of Culture, Sports and Tourism of the Republic of Korea held a relevant meeting to consider the amendment to the Game Law requiring the disclosure of probability information. However, the bill failed to pass.
#4: Kakao Games Sued by Uma Musume Pretty Derby Players
As the most popular anime game in South Korea this summer, Uma Muse Pretty Derby, an agent of Kakao Games, caused outrage among South Korean players two months after the game was launched because of the delay in determining the new PvP event “Championships”.
Even on the morning of August 29, in Chengnan City, Gyeonggi do (province), South Korea, Korean costume players of “Uma Musume Pretty Derby” also hired a carriage to parade in the street, with a 1-star rating chart of “Uma Musume Pretty Derby” hanging on the body, and the words “irresponsible company”, “ignoring Korean users”, “differential treatment with Japan” and so on, mocking and mocking.
After the incident, Kakao’s share price plunged three times in a month, down 12.8%. Kakao Games officials also had to send the head of Kakao Games Business Department and five other company executives in September to communicate face to face with a group of players represented by 7 players, 4 assistants and 1 lawyer to discuss relevant issues.
#5: G-STAR Game Industry Show Returned at Full Scale
On November 17, the Global Game Expo “Game Show and Trade, All Round 2022” (G-Star) was opened in Busan Convention and Exhibition Center to show the past, present and future of the video gaming industry. It is estimated that more than 987 companies from 43 countries came to the exhibition.
The event also attracted more than 180000 viewers, which is not as good as 240000 people attending G-Star 2019. However, this figure is six times that of 2021 participating in G-Star.
#6: Game Industry’s Influence Ignored by South Korea’s MCST
On July 21, the Ministry of Culture, Sports and Tourism of South Korea completely ignored the global influence of the Korean gaming industry and made no mention of the gaming industry and its revitalization. This is obviously different from Yoon Suk yeol’s attitude of supporting the gaming industry during the election.
#7: Tencent Joins Korea Association of Game Industry
In July of this year, Tencent and miHoYo formally submitted their applications to the Korean gaming industry Association (K-GAMES) to become members of the community. According to insiders, the entity names submitted by the two companies are Tencent Korea and Cognisphere Korea respectively.
After deliberation by the Steering Committee and the Board of Directors of the Association, Tencent Korea’s application for membership of the Board of Directors was approved. Therefore, Tencent officially joined the Korean gaming industry Association and became one of its four directors.
#8: Neowiz’s Pinocchio’s Lies Enjoys Great Performance
Pinocchio’s Lies, the soul like action RPG game that won the title of “the most anticipated PS game” at the Cologne Game Show in 2022, is undoubtedly a bright dark horse. In addition, the game also won the “Best Action Adventure Game” and “Best Role Playing Game”.
In terms of game playing method, it is similar to the soul game Bloodborne, which is expected to be launched on Steam, PS4/5 and Xbox Series/One platforms in 2023, and Xbox game Pass will be released for the first time.
#9: Blue Archive Aged-rated Event
At the beginning of October, secondary games such as Blue Archive and FGO (FGO) recently announced that they would redesign the age rating of games in South Korea to meet regulatory requirements. Nexon, the developer of Blue Archive, even announced in a community on October 4 that the age rating of the game in South Korea would be directly raised to 18 years old or above in the near future.
#10: Controversy over Game Firm’s Youtuber Marketing
In July this year, a Youtuber who was sponsored by NCsoft to produce content related to Lineage W said that some videos on his channel related to Lineage 2M (not marked as sponsorship or advertising) actually received financial support from NCsoft.
After this time, it immediately caused dissatisfaction among Lineage 2M players. Even because the MMO games of “Lineage Like” tend to have organizations similar to trade unions, and the more people and activities such organizations exist, the more gains players get and the stronger players’ strength will be. Therefore, some Korean players think that the anchor account should not compete with ordinary players, because the difference in influence between the two is completely unequal.
In fact, South Korean players also invited trucks to parade in the street. On September 30, 381 Lineage 2M users also entrusted Busan Law Firm to file a lawsuit against NCsoft, claiming 100000 won for each person. However, due to the impact of the mobile game event of “Uma Musume Pretty Derby” at that time, this event received limited attention.
Of course, there are a lot of news about the Korean gaming industry. These are the ten most influential events. We will not list them all in this article.
