1.
Steam once again breaks its record for concurrent users in Cyberpunk 2077 and Counter-Strike: Global Offensive’s newest DLC.
The launch of Cyberpunk 2077 has broken a number of records, including PC game sales. A not-so-surprising benefactor for Cyberpunk 2077’s success has been Steam, which set a record of its own. Steam logged its most concurrent users ever, peaking at around 24.8 million users around 10:10 a.m. ET on Saturday. Cyberpunk 2077’s success alone didn’t help Steam reach those numbers, though, and there’s an opportunity for the record to be broken within a week.
Two key games are driving Steam’s numbers up this weekend. Cyberpunk 2077 is one of them, as the new RPG from CD Projekt Red is insanely popular for a single-player game and its launch weekend is going to have its highest numbers, well over a million at its peak today. A second game is peaking over a million users today, as Counter-Strike: Global Offensive’s newest DLC is live, driving players back to see the added content. This combined effort, as well as general holiday gaming excitement, has helped Steam rise.
2.
EA, one of the world’s biggest computer games developers, acquires Codemasters,a UK racing game specialist for $1.2 billion.
This is a surprising development in the ongoing story around Codemasters acquisition, with Take-Two Interactive having led the process until recently. That bid was significantly lower, however, valuing Codemasters at around $870 million.
3.
Sony, Microsoft, and Nintendo, who among them effectively control the entirety of the console gaming market, have announced a shared set of safety guidelines for how they’ll moderate and police their online platforms.
“Protecting players online requires a multidisciplinary approach,”the statement, which was posted simultaneously by the three companies, reads.“One that combines the benefits of advanced technology, a supportive community, and skilled human oversight.”
The principles have been published as increasing numbers of games, like Fortnite, Rocket League, and Apex Legends, are offering crossplay among the different platforms, allowing gamers to play together regardless of which hardware they’re using. However, the feature could cause problems if each platform’s rules are enforced differently. The new principles should help each console manufacturer follow similar approaches to keeping players safe.
4.
US-based games platform ，Roblox has delayed its initial public offering until 2021.
As reported by Reuters, Roblox has made the decision so that it can work with its advisors to maximise investor relations. Moreover, following the success of Airbnb and DoorDash Inc, the firm will hope to see an increased IPO pricing.
However, the company will now go public early next year, via a listing on the New York Stock Exchange.
5.
On December 15, 37 Interactive Entertainment and AG E-sports Club (hereinafter referred to as “AG”) held a signing ceremony in Guangzhou. The two parties announced that 37 Interactive Entertainment has completed a strategic investment of tens of millions in AG E-sports Club.
As the leading e-sports club in China, AG was founded in 1999 and became a professional e-sports club in 2009. Its business covers e-sports-related events and activities participation, skills training for e-sports talents, and provision of content required by e-sports. In August 2020, AG completed a series A financing of tens of millions of yuan led by Ruili Cultural Fund and followed by Shanghai Xintou.
6.
At the China Game Industry Annual Conference held recently, Zhang Yijun, the first vice chairman of the China Music and Digital Association, released the group standard of “Online Game Age Reminder”.
The standard is mainly composed of three parts. Among them, the age-appropriate reminder is based on three different ages: green 8+, blue 12+, and yellow 16+. This set of standards does not introduce commonly used foreign classifications like 18+. The reason is that it is easy to cause ambiguity.
This means that China’s game classification standards have been officially announced.
7. The 2020 China Game Industry Report Released
In 2020, the number of gamers in China has exceeded 660 million, and the actual sales revenue of Chinese game market is 278.687 billion yuan, a year-on-year increase of 20.71%, and the growth rate will increase by 13.05% year-on-year. The scale of “games going overseas” was further expanded. The actual sales revenue of independently developed games overseas was US$15.450 billion, a year-on-year increase of 33.25%, and the growth rate increased by 12.3 percentage points year-on-year. The internationalization degree was further improved.
8.
The mobile version of Human Fall Flat released in China on 17th December, soaring straight to the number one spots on both iOS and Android just hours after launch.
The game sold over 100,000 units on TapTap within 30 minutes of launch and is on track to break 700,000 units within its first day.
“This launch has reaffirmed our confidence in China’s premium mobile games market,” said Curve Digital chairman Stuart Dinsey.
9.
“League of Legends” mobile game has been downloaded 12 million times since its launch, and revenue has exceeded 10 million US dollars.
After being launched in Japan, South Korea, and Southeast Asia on October 27, the highly anticipated “League of Legends” mobile game landed on app stores in Taiwan, Vietnam, Oceania, Europe, and Middle East and North Africa on December 8 and 10. Sensor Tower store intelligence platform shows that as of December 16, the game has been downloaded 12.5 million times in the global App Store and Google Play, attracting $10.5 million.
10,
Worldwide consumer spending hit $112 billion this year across both Google Play and the App Store, according to data provided by App Annie.
The staggering figure represents an increase of 25 per cent year-on-year. Moreover, Japan, the UK and the US were among the top markets to drive growth on iOS.
Meanwhile, app and games downloads are set to hit 130 billion before the end of 2020, across the App Store and Google Play. Overall, installs have grown 10 per cent year-on-year, though downloads on Android devices outnumbered those of iOS by 160 per cent.
