Nexon, NCSOFT, Netmarble pinning hopes on new games
NCSOFT's upcoming mobile role-playing game "Lineage 2M" / Courtesy of NCSOFT
By Baek Byung-yeul
Nexon, NCSOFT, Netmarble and others are set to introduce new games in an attempt to turn the tide against a host of unfavorable business conditions at home and abroad such as the World Health Organization's designation of excessive gaming as an addictive disorder, and China's continued ban on Korean games, the companies said Wednesday.
Among the list of new games slated to hit the market in the fourth quarter, gamers are eagerly looking forward to play NCSOFT's mobile role-playing “Lineage 2M,” which will be released within the October-December period.
NCSOFT started to receive pre-orders Sept. 5 and garnered more than 3 million within five days. The company also started a pre-character creation event for “Lineage 2M,” Tuesday, which allows users to create their game characters' name and job class before the launch. The promotion event ended after just two hours due to the fervent response.
Kim Taek-jin, CEO of NCSOFT, is confident of success for the new mobile game, saying, “No other games will be able to catch up to the technological level of Lineage 2M for years to come.” The company said more than 10,000 users will be able to engage in a massive scale battle simultaneously in the mobile version of the popular PC online game “Lineage 2.”
Sung Jong-hwa, an analyst at eBest Investment and Securities, said “Lineage 2M” is highly likely to become a blockbuster hit as the game is expected to garner about 7 million pre-orders before the launch. “NCSOFT didn't unveil the exact launch date of Lineage 2M, but the game is expected to hit the market in mid-November given it received pre-orders for 70 days,” Sung said.
If the new game succeeds, the market consensus on NCSOFT's 2020 performance is expected to be 2.47 trillion won ($2.1 billion) in sales and 984 billion won in operating profit, up 47 percent and 90 percent respectively year-on-year.
A poster for Nexon's upcoming mobile game "V4" / Courtesy of Nexon
Nexon, which saw its second quarter operating profit decrease by 19 percent year-on-year, is expecting a lot from its upcoming mobile role-playing game “V4.”
Park Yong-hyun, CEO of NAT Games, a development company for the new title, expressed high confidence for the success of “V4,” saying, “Users will be able to enjoy the true value of massively multiplayer online role-playing games (MMORPG) by playing V4.”
The key difference between “V4” and other role-playing games is that the Nexon game allows users to interact with others who are on different servers, while other games only enable their users to play with gamers on the same server.
To make more players engage in battles, “V4” also uses “commander mode." With this system, guild leaders can look at a map from a top-down perspective and give orders to their guild members more efficiently.
Netmarble is also scheduled to launch other new games including “Seven Knights 2” and “A3: Still Alive” in the fourth quarter.
Kakao Games, a game-developing and publishing subsidiary of internet company Kakao, is also gaining popularity with its newly launched mobile role-playing game “Legendary Moonlight Sculptor.”
Based on the same title of author Nam Hee-sung's popular fantasy novel, the game, released Oct. 10, currently ranks third on Google Play app store's sales rankings in game category.
“Moonlight Sculptor” drew gamers' attention before its release on the back of the news that XLGAMES CEO Song Jae-kyung, best known as a game developer for “Lineage,” helped produce the game.