Japan's Pokelabo released social game apps for iOS for global markets

It's time to compare the artwork of the global market and Japanese market!

Japanese social game developer Pokelabo -They were purchased for about 150 million USD by GREE in October, 2012- and Aeria Games released a global version of  their iOS social game apps "Unmei no Guardian Battle(Destined Guardian Battle)". The named "Immortalis".

"Unmei no Guardian Battle" is J-style card battle social game. We collect various Guardian -almost beautiful woman- and organize a deck and fight.

A characteristic of this is that a real-time battle is held frequently. It is received by Japanese users, and this got 200,000 users from release in 20 days.

When this is localized for a global market, it becomes in this way.

This was released in 100 countries. The game rule is the same, but the language support is English. Which artwork do you like?

LINE broke through 100 million users, and Snoop Dogg enjoys LINE

Today is a memorable day for the Japanese IT industry. Because messaging apps LINE of NHN Japan broke through 100 million users.

They achieved this in only 1 and a half years. Japanese IT services has not succeeded in this way until now in a global market. Besides, they grow up faster than Twitter, Facebook and Instagram.



LINE is popular in East Asia, Southeast Asia, Middle East, South America and Spain. They aim at North America and the European market from now on.

Then,  a American Hip Hop artist enjoys LINE very much. The person is Snoop Dogg. He has begun to use LINE from November of the last year. And he posts funny photos to fans frequently.

:D:D:D:D:D
He seems to like LINE and LINE Camera!:D And he just released official LINE stamp. It's free of charge!

The user of the artist like him will big help of North America market advance of LINE.

Now, Robots run a marathon in Osaka

Bipedal walking robot marathon "Robomarafull vol.3" is held in Osaka, Japan in January 17 - 20.

The rule of this event is simple. Within 72 hours of the time limit, robots aims at the completion of 42.195km. The course of one lap of 75 meters is prepared for in a stadium and the robots run 563 laps in this and compete for time. Time of the champions of the last year is 45 hours 48 minutes 07 seconds.

The sponsor of this event is the Osaka government. This event is held as urgent job creation business. However, it is not the employment of the event staff. The true purpose is upbringing of the robot developer. The event is broadcasted in Ustream.

Japanese technopop group Denki Groove made their figure with 3D printer

Japanese technopop group Denki Groove releases a new album "Ningen to Doubutsu(A human being and animal)" on February 27. Such photo is placed in it.

These are the figure that reproduced them.

These were made in OMOTE 3D SHASHIN KAN which opened in Tokyo, Omotesando until January 14. There was the world's first "3D photo booth". The guest scanned oneself with 3D scanner and was able to make whole body figure of full color. It became the big topic and popular. And it was placed in many overseas media.

See Also:
http://www.dezeen.com/2012/11/23/omote-3d-printing-photo-booth-shashinkan-by-party/

Now, 3D printer becomes the topic in Japan, but it is not yet common. However, the popularity may rise by a famous musician having used it.

LINE Camera broke through 20 million downloading

NHN Japan announced that camera apps for smartphone "LINE Camera" broke through 20 million downloading.

"LINE camera" is camera apps linking popular messaging application LINE. We decorate photo and can post in LINE. This was released on April 12, 2012 and it broke through 20 million downloading from release in about 10 months. According to NHN Japan, it is popular in Japan, Taiwan, Hong Kong, Macao, Thailand, Malaysia, Brunei, Singapore, Indonesia, Kuwait, Qatar, Saudi Arabia, Vietnam, Nepal. So LINE Camera links with the social networking except LINE such as Twitter, Facebook, mixi, Sina Weibo, Renren, me2day and Cyworld.

Of course I like LINE Camera, too. It has many functions and useful. We can use 22 filters, various writing brushes, and frame and stamp more than 100. Furthermore, it has function that puts some photo together to make collage.

This resembles J-style photo booth "Purikura". Therefore it seem to be supported by women.

Game arcade prize of LINE characters

I wrote an post of Nameko yesterday. However, there are popular characters like Nameko in Japan. These are characters of messaging apps LINE.

These were displayed in the recommended section of the game arcade with Hello Kitty and Rilakkuma.

These are prizes of the crane game. Cute mascot stuffed toy and a cushion!

Furthermore, they are popular as capsule Toy(Gacha).

These are a sticker and mini-figure.

Now, they are loved like characters of anime, comics and other Fancy character.

Nameko came to Oomagari, Akita!

Today, I went to huge shopping mall AEON Oomagari to meet Nameko.

I already wrote it several times about Nameko(Please search "Nameko" in this blog). His popularity is still crazy in Japan. Therefore the suit which reproduced him goes on a trip to the all over Japan.

KAWAII!!
Akita is the very poor country. First, I was skeptical about popularity of Nameko in Akita. However, it was imaginary fears.

Many people equalled a long line to photograph a souvenir photo with Nameko.

Nameko is drawn on the signboard of the shop. The staff of this shop is good at an illustration! :)

Furthermore, there was a crane game of Nameko in the game arcade, and this was extreme popularity, too. 1 time of crane game is 100 yen(about 1.1USD). Because too many people played this, the stuffed toys of Nameko have run low immediately. I played this, too, but unfortunately I have failed :(

Ninjas began delivery service in Japan

Japanese IT startup NABARU started ninja delivery service.

If you use a ninja to the present to a business partner and a customer? It will become the big impact. If a ninja appears in an event and the party? It will be wonderful surprise. If a ninja appears in the birthday party of kids with a present? It will become the good memory.

NABARU has 3 ninjas now.   However, unfortunately this service is only Japan. Support areas are Tokyo, Kanagawa and Chiba. Originally the ninja was a spy and an assassin. However, they do not undertake it by this service and we can't ask them for the works about the crime.

I think that they should go abroad.

See Also:
You Can Now Rent Ninja in Japan. They’re Not Deadly.

DeNA renew a logo and enters the social music service

Today, DeNA announced their new logo.

They change a name and the logo of service brands to this sequentially. In addition, ngmoco:) becomes "DeNA San Francisco". According to them, the new logo expresses "Delight" and "Impact the world". These seem to be important keywords of DeNA.

Furthermore, they start social music service "Groovy" for smartphones by the end of this year. According to them, Groovy is the service that combined a social networking function with a music player function. 24 labels have already cooperated with DeNA, and 1 million number or more are offered at the service start.

Japanese Social Game Developer Cygames Has Over 20 Million Users

Japanese game developer Cygames announced that they got more than 20 million registered users.

They say, "We are companies making the contents that are a high quality"

Of course, J-Style card social game "Rage of Bahamut" to have pulled it. Cygames was established as a subsidiary of CyberAgent in May, 2011. And they released Rage of Bahamut in Mobage in September, 2011, and it made a hit immediately. It is still ranked the high rank of Mobage's popularity ranking. And they run not only its Japanese ver. but also English ver., Korean ver. and Chinese ver. The totals of Rage of Bahamut users of the world are more than 10 million. In other words, half of 20 million registered users which they have are Rage of Bahamut users.

They cite cool artwork as the factor of the hit of Rage of Bahamut.

They are not much J-Style. However, they are different from the overseas fantasy art, too. They fuse with both good extract. In addition, they published an art book of Rage of Bahamut in Japan.

Social Networking Service of Buddharupa "butu-comi"

Buddharupa(Statue of Buddhism) regained popularity again recently in Japan. Besides, its lover increases to not only elderly people but also youths.   The figure maker releases cool action-figures of the Statue of Buddhism.

via http://www.kaiyodo.co.jp/revoltech/takeya.html

Staffs of publishing company Kamakura Shinsho opened the Social Networking Service for such Statue of Buddhism lovers "butu-comi".

We can log in in Twitter ID.

Of course this has functions of the general Social Networking Service. Furthermore, we can watch Statue of Buddhism popularity ranking and treasured statue exhibition schedule. There are a lot of precious Statue of Buddhism shown every dozens of years. If the schedules are shared beforehand by many people, it may help tourism industry.

Furthermore, we can buy How-to kit of the sculpture(It is popular to handcraft Statue of Buddhism by oneself in Japan) and statues of famous Buddhist altar shop.

List of Japanese social game platforms

Yesterday, I wrote that Japan had 23 social game platforms now. This post is those list.

FC2 GAME(Start: Unknown)
I don't know when this began. This is a mobile social game platform of FC2 providing various Web Service. A lot of porno social games are included in the games. Of course they are adult only.

d Game(Start: December, 2012)
It's a mobile social game platform of Japanese phone company NTT DoCoMo. Only DoCoMo mobile users are available.

Bushimo(Start: December, 2012)
It's a social game platform for smartphones of Japanese Treading card and game maker Bushiroad. All games are released as a native apps.

Mobcast(Start: November, 2012)
This is a mobile social game platform specialized in sports.

Gesoten(Start: July, 2012)
It's a social game platform for PCs which a Japanese GMO group runs.

LINE GAME(Start: July, 2012)
The explanation will be already unnecessary. It's a game platform of Japanese popular messaging apps LINE. Especially, "LINE POP" is  popular, and it broke through 10M download.

Ameba(Start: June, 2012)
Ameba is the social networking service that a CyberAgent runs. It has blog service of the biggest in Japan "Ameblo" and popular virtual world "Ameba Pigg". In addition to them, they began the social game platform for smartphones more.

Yamada Game(Start: June, 2012)
Household appliance general merchandising store Yamada Denki began the offer of the social game for membership site for mobile.

moeG(Start: May, 2012)
This may be Japanese-style service. It is the mobile social game platform of the porn specialty. Furthermore, the porn avatar is available. Of course this is adult only.

TSUTAYA.com kiwi(Start: March, 2012)
Major video rental chain TSUTAYA started the offer of the social game in a membership site for mobile.

BLobby(Start: March, 2012)
This is Japanese-style service, too. It's a mobile social game platform for women, and dating sim and BL games are contributed. What BL? BL is abbreviation of "Boys Love". The details is here.

entag!(Start: January, 2012)
Originally, this was one of the social networking service for mobile. However, they performed a renewal for smartphones and made it open.

DMM(Start: January, 2012)
DMM is VoD service and video rental company, but they are known mainly in porn video. They began a social game platform for mobile, As a matter of course, the most of the game are adult only.

Colopl(Start: August, 2011)
Colopl is first Japanese geolocation mobile social game that started on 2003, but the mobile social game platform started, too. All the games that a third party developed are geolocation mobile social games.

WAKUWAKU Mail(Start: May, 2011)
Originally WAKUWAKU Mail was a dating  messaging service. However, they became the social networking service for mobile and made it open more.

NICONICO Appli(Start: December, 2010)
This is a social game platform for PCs of popular video sharing site NICONICO DOUGA. Users can play a game while watching video.

pixiv mobile(Start: November, 2010)
This is a social game platform of the popular illustration social networking service pixiv mobile ver. This is available only in futurephone for the moment.

Yahoo! Mobage(Start: September, 2010)
This is a social game platform for PCs which Yahoo! Japan and DeNA run jointly.

Hangame(Start: July, 2010)
Hangame was the well-established online game portal site which NHN Japan ran, but transformed myself into a social game platform. By the way, NHN Japan runs LINE GAME, too. How will these be discriminated in future?

aima(Start: July, 2010)
aima is unique service. They bring a social game platform into various sites.

GREE(Start: June, 2010)
The explanation will be already unnecessary. However, unexpectedly CEO Yoshikazu Tanaka said in CEDEC 2009, "GREE does not accept the games of the third party. Because quality control is not possible in ourself." Flexibility is necessary for a leader.

Mobage(Start: January, 2010)
The explanation will be already unnecessary, too. Originally Mobage was game portal site for futurephones. The origin of the title is "Mobile(Mobairu) and Game(Gemu)". However, themselves developed all games before becoming the social game platform.

mixi(Start: April, 2009)
mixi became the social game platform for the first time in Japan. However, unfortunately it was overtaken by Mobage and GREE. Where would they take the wrong way?

There is big characteristic on a Japanese social game platform. Those most support mobile. Furthermore, most of those are specialized in mobile. Only Yahoo! Mobage, NICONICO Appli and Gesoten do not do mobile support at all(But it may be said that Yahoo! Mobage is a PC ver. of Mobage). In Japan, it becomes the common sense to play the social game in mobile. However, it is too a red ocean. Of these, how many will it be the number of to survive 3 years later?

Japanese new social game platform for smartphones "Bushimo"

In Japan, anyone wants to become a platformer. Now, Japan has 23 social game platforms. At last, major phone company NTT DoCoMo opened social game platform for smartphones "d Game" last month.

It is Bushimo to be interesting in them. It's a social game platform for smartphones that Bushiroad started last month.

The user's registration is possible only from a smartphone. Bushimo users can use avatar, chat, friend registration and timeline.

Each social games are released as a native apps.

Renai Replay(Love Replay)

Daishissou! Milky Holmes Turbo(Great Scamper Milky Holmes Turbo)

Milky Daifugou(Grand Millionaire)

Bound Monsters

Bushiroad is known as a company of the trading cards. However interestingly, Bushimo does not have the J-style card social game for the moment. It is Renai Replay now to make a hit most. This broke through 300,000 downloading from release in 10 days.



This is Dating Sim using drawing technology "Live 2D".

See Also:
2D or not 2D, that is no problem

Users come back for school days and can simulate ideal love with girl students. The graphic of Live 2D creates a sense of reality such as 3D as 2D anime. Furthermore, characters talk by a full voice. It may resemble LOVEPLUS of KONAMI. However, the touch pen is unnecessary in Renai Replay and the update is carried out frequently and Free to Play. Bushimo makes use of characteristics of the game for smartphones very well.

By the way, Do you want to see the list of 23 Japanese social game platforms? I write it in next post :)