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Perfect World Co., Ltd. PWRD +1.20% is a leading online game developer and operator based in China. Perfect World primarily develops online games based on proprietary game engines and game development platforms. Perfect World's strong technology and creative game design capabilities, combined with extensive knowledge and experiences in the online game market, enable it to frequently and promptly introduce popular games designed to cater changing customer preferences and market trends. Perfect World's current portfolio of self-developed online games includes massively multiplayer online role playing games ("MMORPGs"): "Perfect World," "Legend of Martial Arts," "Perfect World II," "Zhu Xian," "Chi Bi," "Pocketpet Journey West," "Battle of the Immortals," "Fantasy Zhu Xian," "Forsaken World," "Dragon Excalibur," "Empire of the Immortals" and "Heaven Sword and Dragon Saber;" an online casual game: "Hot Dance Party;" and a number of web games and social networking games. While a substantial portion of the revenues are generated in China, Perfect World operates its games in North America, Europe and Japan through its own subsidiaries. Perfect World's games have also been licensed to leading game operators in a number of countries and regions in Asia, Latin America, Australia, New Zealand, and the Russian Federation and other Russian speaking territories. Perfect World plans to continue to explore new and innovative business models and remains deeply committed to maximizing shareholder value over time.

This book examines China "s creative economy "and how television, animation, advertising, design, publishing and digital games are reshaping traditional understanding of culture. Since the 1950s China has endeavoured to catch-up with advanced Western economies. Made in China " is one approach to global competitiveness. But a focus on manufacturing and productivity is impeding innovation. China imports creativity and worries about its cultural exports deficit ". In the cultural sector Chinese audiences are attracted to Korean, Taiwanese, and Japanese culture, as well as Hollywood cinema. This book provides a fresh look looks at China "s move up the global value chain. It argues that while government and (most) citizens would prefer to associate with the nationalistic, but unrealized created in China " brand, widespread structural reforms are necessary to release creative potential. Innovation policy in China has recently acknowledged these problems. It considers how new ways of managing cultural assets can renovate largely non-competitive Chinese cultural industries. Together with a history of cultural commerce in China, the book details developments in new creative industries and provides the international context for creative cluster policy in Beijing and Shanghai.

Henry Jenkins at Authors@Google(video) Henry Jenkins"s pioneering work in the early 1990s promoted the idea that fans are among the most active, creative, critically engaged, and socially connected consumers of popular culture and that they represent the vanguard of a new relationship with mass media. Though marginal and largely invisible to the general public at the time, today, media producers and advertisers, not to mention researchers and fans, take for granted the idea that the success of a media franchise depends on fan investments and participation. Bringing together the highlights of a decade and a half of groundbreaking research into the cultural life of media consumers, Fans, Bloggers, and Gamerstakes readers from Jenkins's progressive early work defending fan culture against those who would marginalize or stigmatize it, through to his more recent work, combating moral panic and defending Goths and gamers in the wake of the Columbine shootings. Starting with an interview on the current state of fan studies, this volume maps the core theoretical and methodological issues in Fan Studies. It goes on to chart the growth of participatory culture on the web, take up blogging as perhaps the most powerful illustration of how consumer participation impacts mainstream media, and debate the public policy implications surrounding participation and intellectual property.

In China's Internet market, if you consider making your platform open right from the beginning, some may appreciate your efforts, but you risk not getting invited to the ball. Pirate culture is the mainstream on the Chinese web. An enterprise has to identify with this culture to survive. Some firms accumulate their users and brand name in the name of cooperation with others, but will quickly burn the bridge once they have passed over. Nevertheless, China's environment and the rules of the game are improving. User consciousness and a sounder legal system will all help to establish a better environment in the Chinese Internet sphere. 

China Online Gaming Market to Reach RMB57.7B in 2012: China's online gaming market size will reach RMB 57.7 billion in this year, according to a report out last month by Beijing-based market researcher AnalysysInternational, up 20.7% from last year, while webpage games will account for RMB 7.882 billion. Another report conducted by 17173.com, the gaming portal of Sohu, has found that more than 96% of gamers are willing to pay for online games. China Mobile Gaming Market Size: According to a report by AnalysysInternational, China mobile gaming market size stood at RMB 370 million in the fourth quarter of last year with 30.28 million mobile gamers. The market is picking up as the result of proliferation of smartphones and emergence of attractive mobile games.

The China expansion is an attempt to put more pressure on Blizzard, but it is a pretty big undertaking. Buttler said that Shanda was his first choice for launching the game in China, where government rules require foreign online game publishers to partner with a domestic Chinese game company.

According to figures from the China Internet Centre, nearly £1.2bn of make- believe currencies were traded in China in 2008 and the number of gamers who play to earn and trade credits are on the rise. It is estimated that 80 per cent of all gold farmers are in China and with the largest internet population in the world there are thought to be 100,000 full-time gold farmers in the country.

Shanda Games, China's third largest online developer, has revealed that it plans to roll out titles to Chinese content portals and social networks over the next year, expanding its presence in social gaming. This is an excerpt from the full story. Log in or register for free to read the whole article.

The computer game industry is clearly growing in the direction of multiplayer, online games. Understanding the demands of games on IP (Internet Protocol) networks is essential for ISP (Internet Service Provider) engineers to develop appropriate IP services. Correspondingly, knowledge of the underlying network's capabilities is vital for game developers. Networking and Online Games concisely draws together and illustrates the overlapping and interacting technical concerns of these sectors. The text explains the principles behind modern multiplayer communication systems and the techniques underlying contemporary networked games. The traffic patterns that modern games impose on networks, and how network performance and service level limitations impact on game designers and player experiences, are covered in-depth, giving the reader the knowledge necessary to develop better gaming products and network services. Examples of real-world multiplayer online games illustrate the theory throughout. Networking and Online Games: Provides a comprehensive, cutting-edge guide to the development and service provision needs of online, networked games. Contrasts the considerations of ISPs (e.g. predicting traffic loads) with those of game developers (e.g. sources of lag/jitter), clarifying coinciding requirements. Explains how different technologies such as cable, ADSL (Asymmetric Digital Subscriber Line) and wireless, etc., affect online game-play experience, and how different game styles impose varying traffic dynamics and requirements on the network. Discusses future directions brought by emerging technologies such as UMTS (Universal Mobile Telephone Service), GPRS (General Packet Radio Service), Wireless LANs, IP service Quality, and NAPT/NAT (Network Address Port Translation/Network Address Translation) Illustrates the concepts using high-level examples of existing multiplayer online games (such as Quake III Arena, Wolfenstein Enemy Territory, and Half-Life 2). Networking

The popular Postmortem column in Game Developer magazine features firsthand accounts of how some of the most important and successful games of recent years have been made. This book offers the opportunity to harvest this expertise with one volume. The editor has organized the articles by theme and added previously unpublished analysis to reveal successful management techniques. Readers learn how superstars of the game industry like Peter Molyneux and Warren Spector have dealt with the development challenges such as managing complexity, software and game design issues, schedule challenges, and changing staff needs. Postmortems from Game Developer enhances your project management skills by showcasing projects from start to finish with candid, thorough, and specific accounts of the good and bad decisions made along the way.

Yesterday, we took a look at the growing comfort consumers, specifically gamers, have with purchasing virtual goods and currency on the Web and mobile devices. Virtual goods are becoming a booming market thanks to the growing maturity of gaming platforms, free-to-play models and the profusion of mobile devices. Today, international investment firm Digi-Capital published its in-depth review of the global gaming space, giving us a sense of the size, breadth, and activity of the very international gaming market last year that is contributing to the changing behavior around virtual commerce - as well as a glimpse into what we can expect from the industry over the course of 2012.

Tencent's Weibo service boasts more than 250 million members.  To give some comparison, Facebook just announced it is seeing 60 million users interacting with its apps each month, leaving Tencent's figures to show just how developed China's Web space is. Tencent Weibo and Sina Weibo both have integrated games services and, with mobile a key Internet access point for many in China and Asia, a mobile games platform has the potential to succeed there.

NetDragon's choice of where to list 91 Ltd may be affected by the different valuations Chinese technology companies attract in New York and Hong Kong. Valuations appear to be significantly higher in Hong Kong, according to a Bloomberg News report late last year. The report gave the example of Perfect World Co, China's fourth-biggest online games operator, which at the time was trading at 3.9 times its estimated earnings in New York, while smaller NetDragon Websoft was valued at 13 times in Hong Kong.

Mobile games enable senior citizens to play games which effectively alleviates their perception of loneliness and isolation. This reinvigorates their vitality by helping them reconnect with the world that they, in many cases, have reluctantly retired from. What was once strictly a youthful domain is now becoming theirs as well. Playing such games also gives the elderly the confidence to better exploit the new possibilities and life experiences facilitated by the prevalence of new information and communication technology.

The Taiwanese company has suffered falling revenues and increasing losses in recent quarters, which it has attributed to audience shifts from online gaming to mobile.

China had 513 million Internet users at the end of last year, according to data from the government-sponsored China Internet Network Information Center.

"Over the past six years, EVE Online has attracted a large and enthusiastic player base in mainland China," said Jon Horddal. "Our partnership with TianCity brings the potential for explosive new growth in the Chinese market. We will work together to give Chinese players new opportunities to make their fortunes, create their legends and forge their own destinies along with legions of fellow gamers in the universe of EVE Online."

Offering online games, entertainment and lifestyle services to QQ users, while keeping the basic messaging service free, has helped Tencent boost revenue. Games accounted for more than half of the company's third-quarter revenue of 7.5 billion yuan.

League of Legends continued its World Tour series this week with a look at its massive Chinese community. The Chinese beta was launched in July 2011, and by the end of the year, LoL had become "one of the fastest growing games released by a foreign game studio in the past three years." In addition to strong cosplay and craft communities, China boasts many of the game's best competitive players. In the IntelEM Global Challenge in Guangzhou, Chinese team World Elite dominated the North American favourite Counter Logic Gaming, and all three Chinese teams went on to participate in the IntelEM World Championship.