South Korea, home to the world's most sophisticated online games, is preparing an assault on North America, Japan and Europe, setting the stage for an international scrum in an industry poised to nearly triple in value in the coming years, according to a Reuters report.
The Reuters report said South Korea only recently began allowing sales of video game consoles that are so popular in Japan and the West.
As a result, all of the country's gaming efforts have gone into online games that offer open-ended stories set in virtual universes that can support tens of thousands of players, the report said.
The Reuters report said with domestic growth opportunities crimped by a relatively small and saturated market, South Korea's leading game makers, NCsoft and Webzen, are looking abroad.
NCsoft is already a contender in wealthy and comparatively red-tape-free Western markets with massively multiplayer online games (MMOG) titles, but it has yet to have a cross-over hit with a home-grown game.
'MMOGs are still a relatively niche segment of the North American video games market, but I believe they have the potential to be as big here as in Asia,' Cindy Armstrong, Webzen America CEO was quoted as saying.
Thus far, the only title to crush international barriers in the fragmented industry is 'World of Warcraft,' the record-shattering online game from Blizzard Entertainment, the report said.
The global market for online game subscriptions, downloads and advertising is forecast to grow to $13 billion in 2011 from $3.4 billion in 2005, according to research firm DFC Intelligence.