As we come to the end of 2013, it's time to look back at the events that dominated the last 12 months in mobile gaming.
We've asked the industry's great and good to give their take on the last year, as well as predicting the trends that will come to pass in 2014.
Matteo Conti is from Kemco (Kotobuki Solution)'s mobile business department. In the past year, the Japanese publisher adopted an aggressive schedule of releasing one new JRPG per month.
Pocket Gamer: What do you think was the most significant event for the mobile games industry in 2013?
Matteo Conti: That in Japan, the mainstream shifted from social (browser) games to native games.
Since we have only been releasing native RPGs, it was a significant shift of the market in our favor.
What was the most significant event for your company?
We could finally release an RPG with 3D graphics.
It was not easy to realize this until this year, since our company had to pass through a transition period from the feature phone quality to the smartphone high quality games.
What was your favorite mobile game of the year?
Speaking of Kemco games, RPG Alphadia Genesis was the biggest release of the year, though at this moment it's still available only in Japan. However, we hope to expand the big news to overseas by the first quarter of next year.
LINE Pokopang caught our attention this year with its simple user interface and competitive social
What do you predict will be the most important trends in 2014?
Games with a high, console-quality level. Mobile gaming market is growing faster than any of us could image, and mobile devices have become technically much powerful that they can now support 3D graphics easily.
Therefore it's obvious there will be more and more developers who will make the most of the device potentiality.
What's your New Year's resolution and what resolution would you enforce on the industry?
This year was very important for us to gain attention from RPG fans around the world.
Now that we could get a certain fame between the core-fans, by releasing one new title each month, we need to expand our RPGs among ordinary users and ensure more exposure.
This means we will have to reconsider a new selling model, thats to say, we may need to challenge free-to-play again.
In regards to the industry, as mentioned in my previous answer, as mobile devices grow in their potential, the industry will definitely have to follow their fast-expanding limits, and create games of a much higher quality.
