By Yoon Sung-won
The explosive popularity of location-based mobile game “Pokemon Go” in Korea seems to have cooled down less than a month since its release, according to the industry, Thursday.
Since its official release here Jan. 24, the mobile game has recorded over 10 million downloads at Google Play and Apple Appstore combined. The Lunar New Year holiday, which came days after the game’s release here, helped boost its popularity.
In terms of profitability, “Pokemon Go” has recorded about 8.5 billion won ($7.44 million) in sales between Jan. 24 and Feb. 12, according to the game industry.
But the number of daily active users (DAU), a key indicator of a mobile game’s popularity, started to decrease this month.
According to survey agency Nielson Korean Click, Thursday, the game’s DAU index dropped to about 5.5 million as of Feb. 6. Considering that the average DAU reached 6.5 million in the last week of January, the number is estimated to have further dropped to 5 million.
Another survey firm WiseApp said in a report that the number of weekly users of “Pokemon Go” between Feb. 6 and 12 settled at 6.43 million, down 7 percent from the previous week’s 6.95 million.
The limited user target of the game, which is based on the namesake Japanese video game franchise, has been pointed out as the reason behind the rapidly dwindling user base.
“Whereas the game has drawn nationwide attention for combining actual geographic information and augmented reality to a well-known intellectual property, Pokemon Go had its user base mainly among teenagers and those in their 20s,” a source from the game industry said. “These younger customers are highly sensitive to trends and they also tend to lose interest easily and quickly.”
“Pokemon Go” has drawn as much attention in overseas markets, such as the United States, Australia, Europe and Japan, as it has in Korea. But its popularity did not last long in those markets, either.
According to the industry, the number of users in the U.S. and Australian markets started to decrease after two months. The game lost its position as one of the top-grossing mobile games in the Japanese market.
Another industry source said, “Mobile games such as Everyone’s Marble, which used to be the most popular casual title, are starting to recover their sales records this week. This means Pokemon Go is not dominating Korean mobile game users’ attention anymore.”
On Thursday, Niantic, provider of “Pokemon Go,” said in its official blog it will provide the first major content update for the game globally this week.
The San Francisco-based company said the update will add over 80 new catchable second-generation Pokemon and introduce gender to the creatures.
There are expectations that the update will refuel the popularity of the mobile game worldwide.
The new content is based on the original “Pokemon,” which was released on Nintendo’s game console devices earlier in late 1990s. The series has a total of 801 types of Pokemon creatures through seven generations since the first generation in 1996 with 151 types of creatures.
The update will also introduce new items needed to capture and raise the creatures.
Niantic CEO John Hanke also hinted that the company will introduce deeper player-versus-player and cooperative modes as well as special events like one it ran for Valentine’s Day.