China Unicom and Apple announced on Friday their multi-year deal to launch the iPhone later this year.

The launch of the iPhone in China may be a game-changer for the mobile games segment, one in which it is difficult to make money, particularly in China. Perhaps with the launch of iPhone a broader range of mobile phone games will reach a broader range of users. In fact, they can be likened to the SNS games that have welcomed many new gamers to the market in recent months. It should be a boon for China's game market revenue (though admittedly Niko does not track that segment as of yet).

Perhaps China's video game industry needs an advocate with the might of the ESA, since the regulatory landscape continues to be the biggest barrier to entry and even success for game companies both foreign and domestic, for example the delay in approval for NetEase to commercially operate World of Warcraft.

Along with Sony's price cut for the PS3, Microsoft will be cutting the cost of their high-end Xbox 360 by $100.

Who knows, by the time that China's regulators rescind the prohibition on the sale of game consoles, in place for 9 years now, hardware prices of the consoles may actually fall to a level that Chinese gamers could afford. Moreover, the online game service model that will likely need to be employed (rather than exclusively packaged software) might even allow the console segment to attain profitability in China.