Cyberagent Financials Q3 Fy17
CyberAgent sales hit $2.4 billion but profits are still in a slump
Nothing particularly new or surprising this quarter
Fish. In. Spaaaace.
Sony ForwardWorks preps launch of its second game Sora to Umi no Aida with pre-registration campaign
Get your fishing rod and prepare to go to space
Dena X Nintendo
DeNA dedicates 10% of staff to Nintendo mobile games
DeNA and Nintendo's partnership is going "extremely well"
Featured Features
Top 5 features games developers should consider to make it big in Japan
GameRefinery’s tool identifies the most popular gameplay mechanics
Yahoo Game Plus
Yahoo Japan launches HTML5 and cloud-based browser games platform Game Plus
52 companies already signed up to provide titles for the platform
Rising Costs
Mobile game development costs in Japan have risen as high as $9 million per game
Serkan Toto looks into the rising cost of making a game
From Partner To Owner
Taptica cements position in Japan by acquiring marketing firm Adinnovation
Partnership leads to complete acquisition
Pokemon Galore
Pokemon GO players in Japan spent an average of $26 on IAPs in the game's first year
Sensor Tower ranks the top spenders in Niantic's megahit
Vaulting Ambition
What happens when global expansion goes bad: A cautionary tale from Japan
What GungHo and Mixi learned from GREE and DeNA
I Got A Fever
WonderPlanet's one-thumb puzzle-RPG Crash Fever smashes eight million downloads in just under two years
Big in-game celebration happening now
Guide To Japan
The Western mobile developer’s checklist for launching in Japan
AppLovin's Johannes Heinze dishes out some key tips
Level Up
Level-5 acquires Keiji Inafune's studio Comcept
Currently developing mobile title Dragon Colonies
Hit It For Six
Sony's mobile studio ForwardWorks preps debut game harnessing Everybody's Golf IP
Drecom Inc acting as developer on the studio's first game
Get Ready To Rumble
The Pokemon Company continues mobile push with new 3D brawler Pokéland
10,000 participants joining in on a first come, first served basis
Vision Fund
Softbank reportedly picks up $4 billion stake in Nvidia
Japanese firm acquires 4.9% of shares
Sega Financials Q4 Fy17
Sega hits $3.2 billion in revenue as profits jump 414%
Hortensia SAGA and Puyopuyo!! Quest continue to perform
Nexon Financials
Nexon posts record revenues of $657 million in Q1 FY17
Mostly from one PC game
Dena Financials Q4 Fy17
DeNA revenues hit $1.26 billion as it plots further partnerships beyond Nintendo
Super Mario Run and Fire Emblem Heroes doing well for the developer
Konami Financials Q4 Fy17
Konami generates $2 billion in sales as Yu-Gi-Oh! Duel Links surpasses 40 million downloads
Jikkyou Pawafuru Puroyakyu gets another million downloads for the quarter
Mixi Financials Q4 Fy17
Mixi sales reach $1.82 billion as Monster Strike hits record number of users in Q4 FY17
Plans $114 million investment into its entertainment business for FY18
Square Enix Financials
Square Enix sales up to $2.25 billion as Final Fantasy Brave Exvius sees global success
Mobius Final Fantasy goes unmentioned once more
Anniversary Celebrations
GungHo stems quarterly decline as Puzzle & Dragons income recovers for fifth anniversary
Number of downloads surpasses 45 million in Japan alone
The Charticle
Worldwide top grosser but never in the US top 100: Why Mixi canned Monster Strike
Is the chasm between Japanese and American tastes a bridge too far?
Strike No More
Mixi to shut down Monster Strike's English-language version on August 1st
No refunds, no transfers
Super Fire Emblem
Deconstructing Nintendo’s $300 million mobile game success
The start of something bigger?
Cyberagent Financials
CyberAgent sales grow to $1.62 billion but profits fall sharply in H1 FY17
Profits are way, way down
Gree Financials Q3 Fy17
GREE's release blitz scores sales of $142.4 million thanks to three top 50 grossing games
Has plenty more where that came from
Capcom Financials Fy17
Capcom sales up to $782.5 million as it eyes stronger mobile performance
Hoping to "break through the current situation" with big IPs
Nintendo Financials Fy17
Nintendo profits soar to $921 million as Switch sells 2.74 million units
Goes awfully quiet on its mobile games
The Revolution Spreads
Netmarble plans to release Lineage 2: Revolution in Japan and China by the end of 2017
Might have some trouble with the China launch
Disrupting The Market?
Rakuten and Blackstorm want to disrupt Japan's mobile industry with launch of HTML5 social game platform RGames
Post-app store technology outfit teams up with Japanese ecommerce giant
Midas Touch
Koei Tecmo establishes mobile-specific brand Midas
Wants its games to "shine like gold"
Switch Japan
Nintendo's Switch has sold 500,000 units in Japan
Sales are up week-on-week to 78,441 units
Of Swords And Ltv
MMO Logres of Swords and Sorcery gears up for Western launch after eight million downloads in Japan
Not huge player numbers, but an enormous LTV
Demon Wobble
Level-5 gears up for Yo-Kai Watch Wibble Wobble's European launch after hitting 10 million downloads
Shake shake, wibble wobble
Art Fantasy
Ex-Final Fantasy artists Akihiko Yoshida and Hideo Minaba on the creative process and designing for mobile
A deep discussion on how the renowned artists go about their business
Homegrown Talent
Whatever happened to Fire Emblem Heroes?
How has Nintendo’s first F2P mobile game launched?
Cygames-verse
Cygames on why the West requires an entirely different UA and marketing strategy than its native Japan
Executive Director Yuito Kimura discusses promotional activities, new games and its vision for 2017
Virtual Future
How Gumi is recovering from Western studio closures with VR investment
Masaru Ohnogi explains all at White Nights Prague
Mixi Financials Q3 Fy17
Mixi sales and profits are up as Monster Strike interest holds steady in Japan
Anime and film help promote the game
Japanese Hit
Nintendo's Fire Emblem Heroes made more than $5 million in first few days
Over one million downloads half a day after release
Dena Financials Q3 Fy16
DeNA revenues and profits fall while native mobile games vastly outperform browser for the first time
Nintendo partnership confirmed to be "mid to long-term"
Nintendo On Mobile
Nintendo considering partnerships with developers other than DeNA for future mobile games
Also talks staff size and Switch architecture
Square Enix Financials
Square Enix scores profits of $151 million but goes quiet on flagship mobile title Mobius Final Fantasy
Brave Exvius is the clear winner
Sega Financials Q3 Fy16
Sega Sammy profits and revenues up despite slowing pace of Japan's mobile games market
Existing games continuing to rake in the cash
Fired Up
Nintendo’s Japan-first approach for Fire Emblem Heroes pays off as it nets $2.9 million on its first day
Already a top grosser in the US and Japan
Gacha!
Harry Holmwood on how Western developers should implement gacha in their games
Better retention and monetisation through a desire to collect
Gungho Financials Q4 Fy16
GungHo's profits fall 36% as interest in Puzzle & Dragons wanes
Still trying to push engagement through toys and apps
Iap Inspector
How does Fire Emblem Heroes monetise?
IAPs from the players' perspective
Taptica Partnership
Taptica makes first move into Japan through Adinnovation partnership
Pushing further into the APAC region