Sony just announced MENA Hero Project (Middle East/North Africa)

[Impulse]

Hopefully Japan.

Japan doesn't make sense because it arguably has the most mature dev scene in the world. A dev scene that literally restarted video games as a pastime after the video game crash of the 80's.

I'd argue that Korea should probably be next on the list, but even that is kind of a stretch tbh (and might not be easy considering Japan-Korea history isn't good).

 

[Danja]

Japan doesn't make sense because it arguably has the most mature dev scene in the world. A dev scene that literally restarted video games as a pastime after the video game crash of the 80's.

I'd argue that Korea should probably be next on the list, but even that is kind of a stretch tbh (and might not be easy considering Japan-Korea history isn't good).

They've already cut deals in Korea right before Jim Ryan left, I guess maybe next year we'll probably start hearing about what exactly is in the pipeline.

 

[Yurinka]

I'd argue that Korea should probably be next on the list, but even that is kind of a stretch tbh (and might not be easy considering Japan-Korea history isn't good).

They've already cut deals in Korea right before Jim Ryan left, I guess maybe next year we'll probably start hearing about what exactly is in the pipeline.

These Hero Project initiatives seems more to address regions where the gaming revenue and userbase is growing a lot but consoles represent a small percentage of that, and is a place where also there are no big console games coming from there, but there's some local gamedev scene with cheap salaries. So they are emerging markets for gaming and specially console -and particularly PS- with high potential, particularly for cheap investments as in the Hero Project.

Sony wants to rise their console popularity there getting visibility in the country by supporting small local teams to make local console games.

Japan and Korea (plus NA or the main EU countries) already have an estabilshed and robust gamedev scene with access to incubators, funding, etc. and market including console, so for them instead of doing a Hero Project makes more sense to sign deals with local key players.

As I remember Sony already has deals signed by Jimbo with most of the main Korean devs like Nexon, NC Soft, Pearl Abyss, Neowiz, Shift Up (plus Com2uS was rumored). I assume in some cases to get mobile (+maybe PC) adaptations of the Sony IPs or console exclusives or marketing deals in others. Or in some rare case like Stellar Blade to get a 2nd party game. There's only Netmarble, Smilegate and Krafton as big Korean companies left, who may be too busy or not interested on partnering with Sony, or maybe Sony doesn't see fit.

After getting China, India and MENA the logical step following that pattern is LATAM. After that they could also do a SEA branch since there are a few SEA countries with a lot of growth or size at least in mobile gaming downloads like Indonesia, Phillippines, Vietnam, Malaysia or Singapore plus also some decent dev team (support, mobile, indie...).

 

[Would_you_kindly]

Like it or not we're talking about geography because business, politics or whatever geographical regions are obviously based in geography. Israel is in Middle East / Western Asia for them too.

In terms of business sometimes they use EMEA (Europe, Middle East and Africa) as region too. That includes Europe and Israel, but also all the other arab, muslim and Asian or African countries of that region too.

There are jews / in some cases zionists who play a key role in the economy / banking system / hedge funds / some top companies in different areas etc. of Europe and USA, so in many areas Israel is an ally for them. And when in 1948 Israel was created it was populated with colonizer jews mostly from Europe. But that doesn't make Israel being in North America or Europe, it's still in Asia / the Middle East.

I'm crap with geography but isn't Egypt counted as Africa & Israel is next to Egypt lol

 

[anonpuffs]

I'm crap with geography but isn't Egypt counted as Africa & Israel is next to Egypt lol

sounds like you're not that crap with geography

 

[Would_you_kindly]

sounds like you're not that crap with geography

I am , I always assumed Egypt was the middle east until I found out it's actually in Africa lol

 

[Gediminas]

I am , I always assumed Egypt was the middle east until I found out it's actually in Africa lol

North Africa. Israel is middle east, but sometimes added to europe, as sports.

 

[Yurinka]

I'm crap with geography but isn't Egypt counted as Africa & Israel is next to Egypt lol

The border between Africa and Asia is in Egypt, it's the Suez canal (a very important artificial "river" that connects the Mediterranean Sea and the Red Sea, so most ships that go from China or Japan to Europe and viceversa use it).

Meaning, almost all the land of Egypt is in Africa (pink) while a small part of Egypt is in Asia (green), the Sinai peninsula, which is next to Israel/Palestine.

North Africa. Israel is middle east, but sometimes added to europe, as sports.

Israel is never added to Europe, it's an Asian country in the Middle East. See the explanation in the previous page.

 

[quest4441]

In singapore and hong kong you will find the most talented people of any given industry, its honestly hilarious that ubisoft of all companies has a studio there. The programmers in singapore would run circles around the chumps from california, Helps that the culture and society is highly disciplined.

 

[Gediminas]

Israel is never added to Europe, it's an Asian country in the Middle East. See the explanation in the previous page.

you are wrong

Final standings of the FIBA EuroBasket 2022

The official website of FIBA EuroBasket 2022.

www.fiba.basketball

https://eurovision.tv/country/israel

Israel | European Qualifiers

Visit UEFA.com to find out how Israel are doing in the European Qualifiers, including latest match news, stats, squad list and news updates.

www.uefa.com

 

[Say1nMan]

China Hero Project
India Hero Project
And now MENA Project

Sony knows how to make partnerships.

PlayStation with their mindshare continuing to spread its outreach further than ever meanwhile over on the other side Phil and company are scaling back and eliminating Xbox marketing in these very same regions.

 

[Yurinka]

you are wrong

Final standings of the FIBA EuroBasket 2022

The official website of FIBA EuroBasket 2022.

www.fiba.basketball

https://eurovision.tv/country/israel

Israel | European Qualifiers

Visit UEFA.com to find out how Israel are doing in the European Qualifiers, including latest match news, stats, squad list and news updates.

www.uefa.com

I'm right. Israel is in Asia and there's no debate about it.

They are also in the song contest Eurovision, as happens with countries like Australia. But that doesn't mean Israel and Australia are European. They are just guests countries to the competitions.

In some competitions they go with Europe because everybody hates them in the Middle East / MENA / West Asia, because of what Israel have been doing to them during the decades that this country existed.

Europe instead don't care about if Israel, USA or whoever kills even millions of people in distant countries as long as long as they pay/bribe well enough the European politicians, banking system and mass media. They are used to run colonies, and as long as the mass media doesn't talk about these topics people won't know anything about it and will welcome there.

 

[YeezyDude]

The path to expansion has always been developing markets, not PC. In fact, PC support pretty much undermines everything.

Agreed 1000 %... This is indeed what Sony needs to do and good stuff will come for sure!

 

[Vertigo]

…

Dude thought Egypt wasn’t in Africa.

I think that just made me depressed.

 

[Yurinka]

Regarding a potential future SEA (South East Asia) Hero Project, here's a recent article about the SEA gaming market and particularly Malaysia that Niko sent to their customer's newsletter:
https://nikopartners.com/malaysias-role-in-southeast-asias-games-industry-growth/

 

[YeezyDude]

Regarding a potential future SEA (South East Asia) Hero Project, here's an article about the SEA gaming market and particularly Malaysia:
https://nikopartners.com/malaysias-role-in-southeast-asias-games-industry-growth/

That would be very good... I can't wait for it!

 

[Yurinka]

That would be very good... I can't wait for it!

I knew that some SEA countries had a ton of players on mobile and that it's an emerging/growing market, but I didn't know they're around 300M players.

This is definetively something to have into consideration for the future, specially for future F2P games developed not only for mobile or PC, but particularly for those like Sony who may want to increase there the console market. They could do it with mobile+PC+console F2P games (competitive, if in this region love eSports that much as the article says).

Similar to what they did to grow in China partnering with Genshin Impact or ZZZ with mobile+PC+console local gatcha F2P.

 

[Shmunter]

This is how you build AAA avoiding the wests exorbitant costs and sales depressing political correctness

 

[Systemshock2023]

I think it's about building studios outside of the tired regions the gaming industry has catered to since the 80s.

Getting more people into gaming, whether console or PC has more to do with government related matters: many of those regions believe in big government, trade restrictions, taxing up the arse and archaic imports substitution industrialization.

 

[YeezyDude]

I knew that some SEA countries had a ton of players on mobile and that it's an emerging/growing market, but I didn't know they're around 300M players.

This is definetively something to have into consideration for the future, specially for future F2P games developed not only for mobile or PC, but particularly for those like Sony who may want to increase there the console market. They could do it with mobile+PC+console F2P games (competitive, if in this region love eSports that much as the article says).

Similar to what they did to grow in China partnering with Genshin Impact or ZZZ with mobile+PC+console local gatcha F2P.

Exactly... But the thing I want out of this is a lot of awesome single-player games too so I hope Sony will focus more on that and then some F2P/MP games and not the other way around hopefully!