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Everything you need to know this week about the games market in Asia
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Every week, our analysts review dozens of news sources, from multiple countries, in multiple languages. From this, we give you the stories that are most important, and the analysis to tell you why.
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Niko Partners at GamesBeat
On Tuesday Sept 16th Niko Partners' own Michele Maguire was the moderator for a fireside chat with Jeff Lyndon, co-founder of iDreamSky, at the GamesBeat conference in San Francisco in a track called "Why China has become the hottest games market."
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The Xbox One in China
Chinese consumers are gearing up for the upcoming launch of Xbox One. Microsoft says it will provide a 2-year limited warranty, 30-day return policy for any reason, 24/7 online customer service, and easy to use instructions for new console users.
In a survey reported in 17173.com, consumers are most worried about the ability to return the product if they do not like it. They care most about the fact that they will be allowed to return it in 30 days if it is not satisfactory for any reason.
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Vietnamese Smartphone Owners
Last week it was reported that 36 percent of Vietnam's population owns a smarpthone. Last year, it was 20 percent. If that strong growth sustains, the country will surpass 50 percent by next year.
In November Niko will publish our 2014 Southeast Asian Games Market Regional Report with country chapters on six countries in SEA including Vietnam, and we anticipate looking more closely at the mobile gaming environment there and elsewhere. Our 2013 report on the topic also covered mobile gaming behavior in each country based on a widespread gamer survey, and games rankings provided in partnership with App Annie.
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Walking Lane for Phone Addicts in China
We are reprinting this human interest story from Engadget as it shows how attracted to mobile phone use the Chinese consumers have become. A separate lane for walking while using a mobile phone??
"Some places have lanes for bicycles, others for motorcycles, but there's a place in mainland China that boasts a different type of lane altogether: one for phone addicts glued to their screens. According to a Chinese publication, the cellphone lane above was spotted along a place called Foreigner Street in Chongqing city, one of the five major cities in the country. The sidewalk was most likely painted on for everyone's safety, because, hey, if there's distracted driving, there's also distracted walking, as perfectly demonstrated by the woman in this video. If the idea sounds familiar, it's because the National Geographic did something similar back in July as an experiment. The society stenciled "NO CELLPHONES" on one-half of a DC sidewalk and "CELLPHONES: WALK IN THIS LANE AT YOUR OWN RISK" on the other half. The result? Well, among other things, they found that the people actually glued to their phones didn't even notice the markings at all. Typical."
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ABOUT NIKO
Niko News is just one part of the strategy and expertise offered by Niko Partners to help our clients better understand and successfully navigate the thriving games markets of China and Southeast Asia.
Niko Partners is the leading provider of market intelligence, custom research, and consulting services focused on the games industries in China and Southeast Asia. Since 2003 we have provided critical information to the world's leading game publishers, developers, hardware makers, and game service providers as well as to government policymakers, trade associations, and institutional investors.
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