Games are very popular among Koreans. To match their needs, various types of games were developed. However, there have been lots of problems with video games developed in South Korea. The biggest evidence is Korean games are only played within the country. It is hard to find games that catch popularity overseas. The reason behind this is excessive gambling within the games. To increase sales, the game company puts in too much of elements that require games of chance at a very low chance. Companies induce the users into purchasing game items to make themselves a profit. Such games have been a long trend in the Korean gaming industry. Of course, the companies are most to blame. However, it is hard to say the blame is all on them. It is also the player’s fault on continuously being deceived and purchasing the game items. 'Sudden Attack 2', released in late 2016, is a failed example of how excessive gambling can lead to the game’s failure. This is a good example that shows what game should not be.
However, 'Lineage 2: Revolution', even with more gambling elements, reached an unbelievable 2 billion KRW sales in just a month. This game shows that gambling elements could also lead to big success. In hope to change this awful, user-deceiving trend, I am to introduce a Korean game that succeeded without such in-game purchasing items.
Recently a Korean publisher called Bluehole developed a battle royal game called 'Playerunknown’s Battleground (PUBG)'.This game starts with one hundred players parachuting onto an island known as Erangel, scavenging for weapons and equipment to kill other players. The island’s available safe area decreases in size over time as game continues to direct surviving players into tighter areas to force encounters. The last man standing wins.
PUBG is the hottest game in the world. It set the new record of top games by current player count by 2,300,000, greatly exceeding the previous record of 1,300,000 of Dota 2. PUBG reached one hundred million dollars in sales just after 13 weeks of publishing and is also the first Korean game to sell over one thousand copies overseas. Clearly, the records PUBG set proves the game of its popularity worldwide. Most importantly, we need to focus on the fact that this is a Korean game. It could easily have said that there are no game items that needs to be purchased in order to get stronger. All one hundred players start equally, empty handed.
This works not only within our country, but all over the world. I am not saying that all Korean game companies should benchmark PUBG. They should focus on the game itself rather than coming up with more items that needs to be bought. I hope to see other Korean games excel worldwide in the near future.