Sony Games host PS4 China today, facing challenges from Chinese players

Beijing time March 20, Bloomberg wrote that Sony Games mainframe PS4 in China today, in order to avoid the world's largest game market strict censorship, PS4 on sale only a few starting games and severely "castration" online services. In addition to the content regulation issue, Sony faces another big challenge is how to attract Chinese players who have become accustomed to playing games for free.

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Although the PS4 sold in the Chinese market is no different from Sony's version in other parts of the world, the former cannot access music, TV dramas and movies, and only six of the first games that local regulators have approved for listing. By contrast, the number of PS4 games in Japan's PlayStation Store is close to 200. Chinese players will miss the two best-selling games of "Call of Duty" and "Grand Theft Auto", according to Vgchartz.com, a well-known gaming website.

Cancellation of the host ban

After the Chinese government lifted a 14-year ban, Sony and Microsoft were finally able to re-enter the market. According to IDC, a market-research firm, the size of China's game-hosting market will reach 22 billion trillion by 2017. Still, two companies must convince a generation of players who grew up with free mobile games to buy a host that sells more than one months of disposable income for Chinese ordinary working-class.

In addition, Sony will also face Internet content control in the Chinese market, as well as government restrictions on violence, pornography and political content. Given that PS4 is increasingly using cloud-based gaming services, such as PlayStation Plus, these restrictions are also an obstacle to its opening in the Chinese market.

"The traditional game business model does not have any advantage in China and most of the players in China are playing PC games and are not used to spending 60 of dollars on a game," said Attur Goyar Atul Goyal, an analyst at Jefferies Group in Singapore. In China, digital technology represents only a future trend. Even if Sony sells 1 million PS4, we must pay attention to its paid service PlayStation plus revenue. ”

Take the game as the first

PlayStation Plus will allow players to play games online, with a charge of 10 dollars a month in the United States. PlayStation Plus will face some restrictions when it comes to China, according to Tim Tianwu, a Sony executive responsible for PS4 China's market strategy, Soeda Takehito. He declined to elaborate on the offer, and was unwilling to provide PlayStation Plus service prices.

Tim Tianwu said in a telephone interview in Shanghai: "PlayStation first is a game equipment, this is our market in China to sell PS4 when the main consideration." As social networks are popular with Chinese users, we are also considering the opportunities created by social media. Video services are a slightly more complex subject because they are tightly controlled in China. ”

PS4 officially landed in the Chinese market, coinciding with Sony's focus on selling streaming media services to its more than 50 million online active users. Last year, Sony launched a game streaming media service in the North American market PlayStation Now, charging 19.99 dollars a month. This week, it released a game-host-based pay-TV service Vue in three cities such as New York, Chicago and Philadelphia.

Grey market

Kazuo Hirai, Sony's CEO, plans to Hirai the company's profits to its highest level since 1998 by focusing on gaming, entertainment and image sensors rather than consumer electronics, and PS4 plays a crucial role.

Sony said earlier this month that PS4 sold 20.2 million units worldwide as of March 1, the best-selling game console for the current generation of players. According to Vgchartz.com, Microsoft Xbox One sold 11.6 million units, and Nintendo Wii U sold 9.3 million units.

"I would be surprised if the 2015 Xbox One and PS4 sales in mainland China add up to more than 1 million units," said Lewis Ward, director of research at IDC Gaming industry, Lewis Wade. If two companies can straighten out their relationship with China, their income in the Chinese market will reach $ billions of in five years. ”

The Chinese government's ban on games consoles has also helped to spawn a huge grey market for game hardware and software, Wade said. In the grey market, the price of 50 dollars can be bought for a few dollars, which is one reason why free games are popular with Chinese players.

Local competitors

Sony said the price of PS4 in China is 2899 yuan (about 468 U.S. dollars), PlayStation vita price of 1299 yuan. According to data released by the Chinese government, the average disposable income of Chinese urban residents is about 2400 yuan.

Microsoft became the first foreign game host to enter the Chinese market last September, and the company has not yet released its Xbox One sales figures in China. China's local manufacturers ZTE and TCL Multimedia Technology Holdings Limited have announced plans to launch game consoles.

Meanwhile, the number of games available for Chinese Xbox Players is limited, with only 10 starting games when the Xbox is officially available in the Chinese market. In a statement, Microsoft said the company and its partners would work with the Chinese government to meet regulatory requirements.

PS4 's first game in China includes Sony's self-developed game "Knack" and the "Final Fantasy" produced by Square Enix. Tim Tianwu says there are more than 10 games awaiting government approval. In order to prevent the healthy growth of young people affected, the Chinese government in 2000 began to ban the sale of game consoles. Tim Tianwu For example, in order to meet regulatory requirements, the game characters in the gun after the injection of blood, must be redesigned imaging transparent liquid.

Sony is currently working with 26 Chinese companies to develop games for the Chinese market. Tim Tianwu said: "Whether the software product line is rich, depends largely on what you can provide to users, so we intend to find appropriate integration of overseas games and Chinese game elements of the development strategy." We are starting from scratch here to nurture a game host market. ”