China video games making big gains on global entertainment stage

Genshin Impact is one of the successful examples of how Chinese gaming companies are making big gains on the global stage, leading to broad optimism from industry experts and insiders on their future growth in overseas markets. — China Daily

BEIJING: According to a report recently released by social media platform X – formerly known as Twitter – Genshin Impact, a role-playing video game produced by Shanghai-based developer miHoYo, topped the global gaming buzz charts in 2022 and the number of tweets and users involved in discussing the game took first place on buzz charts in many countries.

X analysed a large number of tweets posted from May 2022 to this April to summarise the most mentioned games on its platform across the world.

Genshin Impact is one of the successful examples of how Chinese gaming companies are making big gains on the global stage, leading to broad optimism from industry experts and insiders on their future growth in overseas markets.

Wang Wei, general manager of AppsFlyer Greater China, said its most recent survey shows that gaming is a highly representative industry for China’s overseas businesses. AppsFlyer is an Israeli mobile marketing analytics company.

“Over the past four years, mobile games steadily took up 64.9% of all the Chinese apps going overseas,” Wang said on the sidelines of the 20th China Digital Entertainment Expo and Conference, or ChinaJoy, which concluded on July 31 in Shanghai.AppsFlyer said the fast-growing global gaming market is expected to reach US$268bil by 2025 and China is certain to take a huge share.

“Considering the uncertainties in the approval of licences for new game titles at home, and the larger overseas markets with predictable growth, we believe that global expansion will be increasingly essential for Chinese gaming companies,” Wang said.

In recent years, leading Chinese gaming corporates, including Tencent, Perfect World and Netease, have already been expanding in the vast overseas market.

Tower of Fantasy, Perfect World’s mobile game unveiled overseas last August, has topped the list of the most downloaded free games in the iOS App Store in nearly 40 countries and regions. The game is also set to hit the Play Station platform next month.

“China has become a bellwether in the global gaming industry,” said Lu Xiaoyin, co-CEO and president of Perfect World. —China Daily/ANN