A new focal point of console lovers
October 26th, 2005 Jun Sok Huhh Posted in news |
Comparing to online markets, console or hand-held markets in Korea appear trivial. Before official launches of PS2 in 2002, console gaming had been actually illegal. All the hardware and software were smuggled from Japan by small brokers. But, there have been not a small number of console lovers, who are more hardcore or orthodoxy attitudes towards computer games. Actually, many of Korean online gamers came from nowhere. PC-Bangs, Starcraft, and Lineage might be mothers of today’s flouring online gaming.(I’ll post another article about this sudden and unexpected birth of Korean online gaming)
PSP is also one of favorite items for console lovers of Korea. The absolutely most popular console game in Korea is Winning Eleven(Pro Evolution Soccer) series. Recently, PSP version(Winning Eleven 9 Ubiquitous) of the game with network playable feature was imported(now, Japanese games can be directly and legally imported without modifying Japanese language). As you knew well, the best part of the game is head-to-head match with the other player. But, how can you find your opponent easily? With PSP, handy network plays are generally limited within a certain area of physical space.
I saw many posts in Ruliweb, the largest console gaming fan site of Korea, that gamers had enjoyed playing network matches of Winning Eleven in subway trains. Getting on subway, turning the game on, and searching your opponent with PSP. After a sweat and bloody match, some of players greeted each other in person, and chatted about their plays. Subway gets emerging as the focal point of Winning lovers. According to posts, it was not so difficult to find their opponents. It looks a nice mixture of traditional console gaming with online-specific plays.
October 30th, 2005 at 3:07 am
That’s fascinating! I totally forgot that Korea once had laws about Japanese culture and products!
BTW, how long has the console gaming culture been extant in the Korean scene? Were there any attempts to create a local console? What sort of trends can be found in the gaming culture?
October 30th, 2005 at 6:48 am
the penetration of Japanese culture in many respect has been done for about 30 years. It is somewhat paradox that many youth in Korea hate Japan or some of Japanese people but love their cultural products like videogames, anime, pop songs, etc.
To my view, the historical changes of Korean gaming is a sort of ups and downs. Before online gaming, gaming has been one of underground culture confined to a handful of geeks. During these times, state policies on gaming had been concentrated on stirict regulation because most of officials and politicians had saw games as harmful activities. The the advent of Starcraft, Lineage changed everything about gaming. After that, computer gaming that was mainly regarded as online forms rose as a mainstream culture of youth in Korea. Policy orientation was also turned around dramatically, from regulation to promotion. Console gaming also gained much more popularity than before, but it is still the culture of minority in gaming.
As far as I know, some companies tried to build local console, but they were all conceptual, not anything real had been revealed. But, GP32, developed by Gamepark(http://www.gamepark.co.kr/) might be the first one in the history of local console. Some other companies which have more name-recognition are preparing local handheld console. Recently, there are some hype on hand-held gaming. I strongly doubt that such a many local console would survive with respect to the market size of Korea. Maybe, China might be their startegic target for these new consoles, but it is not so promising in sense of business.
October 30th, 2005 at 11:35 am
Hmmm.. I think I need to add some information about Korean console game scene. As many Japanese companies Korean companies made ‘pong-clone’ game machines in early 80’s. And some big companies (ex. ‘Samsung’, ‘Hyundai’) had the license to make consoles from Japanese companies. I think the difference of the volume of two markets (in Korea and in Japan) was not big in that time.
But Korean government decided their policy to promote the PC industry in middle of 80’s. And then every company withdrew their resource from the console game industry. And they also gave up the original personal computer policy and choose the IBM-compatible PC policy.
Since then, Korean console game market went into the unofficial market (mainly depended on the smuggling market from Japan).
Thinking about that policy in these days, the policy has two sides. For console market, it was the terrible thing that destroyed the foundation of console game industry. But for all of Korean IT industry, it is followed the policy to promote the Internet industry, so gave the amazing results.
July 15th, 2007 at 7:16 am
It continues to impress me how gaming systems allow, others who would not otherwise meet, to play a game and then seek each other out and strike up a conversation. I know many others who do this on the subway, train and bus.