Sony confident of Korean console market

By Yoon Sung-won

BUSAN ― Sony Computer Entertainment Korea (SCEK) President Kawauchi Shiro pledged to release more localized games to meet Korean game fans’ expectations.

During G-Star 2014, the nation’s largest game show held at BEXCO in Busan from Thursday through Sunday, the SCEK president said the company will act more aggressively to raise the popularity of console games amid the rapid changes in the Korean game market.

“Mobile games in the Korean market have seen a rapid expansion in recent years and we believe there are significant number of gamers who have turned to console games to seek unique entertainment such as intensive scenarios and a greater level of immersion,” Kawauchi said during an interview with The Korea Times at the SCEK exhibition booth at G-Star 2014, Thursday.

The company participated in the business-to-customer sector of this year’s G-Star show and had the largest exhibition booth in its history.

Whereas console games have enjoyed stable popularity in overseas markets such as Japan and North America, they had less presence in Korea, which has been called “the tomb of console games.” Hit hard by the surging popularity of PC-based online and mobile games, console devices including SCEK’s Play Station 3 failed to expand the market here.

However, Play Station 4, the fourth sequel to one of the world’s most sought-after console game devices launched here in December last year, has started to change this. The company said more than 10 million units of Play Station 4 were sold worldwide by August. This is the fastest pace of sales among the Play Station series.

An estimated 60,000 units have been sold in the Korean market alone.

The president said the company will publish more Korean-translated games in the local market.

“We acknowledged that many Korean gamers may not enjoy the storylines of global hits due to language difference,” he said. “I believe there is a strong potential in the Korean market, despite console games being relatively small here. For this reason, we will localize 100 percent of games published by SCEK and actively persuade other third-party publishers to translated titles into Korean.”

For the last eight years he has worked in the Asian market, Kawauchi said he believed localization is the key to share an entertaining experience with more gamers, which will consequently lead to market expansion.

“Localization is a must for markets such as Korea and China, even though it will mean more cost,” he said.

The president also said the company has faith in the virtual reality (VR) technology as the future of the gaming industry.

“The VR devices such as Sony’s head-mount display Morpheus, provide a far more immersive user experiences to gamers. Many game companies are confident they are the next-generation of game machines that will lead the growth of game content in the future.”

Concerning possible cooperation with Samsung Electronics or Oculus VR, which have recently worked with each other to develop a device named “Gear VR,” the president said, “Cooperation and share of experience with large enterprises are under progress and will expand collaboration with researchers about how to share a platform and provide content through the technology.”

The president added that he anticipates more market opportunities in its cloud-based game streaming service dubbed “PlayStation Now.”

“Korea has world-class network infrastructure and both providers and users of services are now familiar with the high-speed network,” he said. “The service, which already has had a successfully launch in the United States in August, will receive a good response here.”