Asia’s largest game exhibition, ChinaJoy. ChinaJoy, which was held in Shanghai, China from July 28th to 31st, ended successfully with 338,000 visitors, almost the same level as before the corona crisis.
That’s what the official and media have announced, but was it really so?
As ChinaJoy’s official media partner, SQOOL has been watching ChinaJoy for 8 years, but we have a different impression from the reported situation.
I would like to thank ChinaJoy for connecting the Chinese game industry and the world for many years, and I would like to express my frank impressions in this article.
Participants from Japan are affected by the suspension of VISA exemption
Participation from Japan in ChinaJoy was originally not that many.
I started participating in ChinaJoy in 2016, but at first there weren’t many Japanese people, so I was mixed in with a Taiwanese group. I felt that it was a pity that there were few Japanese people compared to the scale of ChinaJoy.
This year, the VISA exemption for traveling from Japan to China has been suspended, so it is necessary to obtain a VISA, and an invitation letter from a Chinese company is required to obtain a business VISA. The hurdles were high, and participation from Japan was limited.
Even so, there seemed to be dozens of participants from Japan, including groups living in China, and an after party was held for Japanese people.
that? few people?
The last ChinaJoy I was able to participate in from Japan was in 2019 before the corona disaster. According to the official announcement, the number of visitors to ChinaJoy 2019 is about 365,000. On the other hand, the official number of visitors to ChinaJoy2023 was 338,000. It is a number that can be said to be a great fight as an event after the corona misfortune.
Due to the spread of the new coronavirus, ChinaJoy was held in 2020 and 2021, but it was mostly limited to participation from within China, and in 2022, the offline event was abandoned and was held online.
After that, it was ChinaJoy2023, but my first impression was,
“Huh? There are few people even though it’s ChinaJoy”
Speaking of ChinaJoy, the image of a vast venue filled with many visitors, people, people, people, but this year it was not like that.
I had heard in advance that B2C tickets were sold out the day before, so I imagined the crowd to be about the same as before the corona crisis, but it seems to be different.
There are clearly few people outside the venue.
A typhoon was just approaching Shanghai, and although it didn’t hit directly, the weather was bad, and I think that had an effect.
However, even so, I was able to enter the crowded subway without much trouble this year. It was quiet.
For BtoB, the venue was limited to two booths, and I felt that it was difficult to acquire exhibitors.
When I asked a friend who runs a game business in China,
Chinese companies are not currently in a good economic situation, and many companies are thinking about cutting costs.
is what they said. Similar impressions were also heard from multiple Chinese game officials.
In China, the recession atmosphere that started from real estate has spread to the IT industry and the game industry, and the unemployment rate is actually rising in the game industry, and the number of engineers looking for jobs is increasing. is.
This business sentiment must have had a considerable impact on ChinaJoy this time.
Exhibits from overseas may have been influenced by China’s tightening of regulations on the domestic game market. Or is China riding the trend of global events shifting from offline to online?
Off-site advertising
A little strange thing that bothered me was that I couldn’t find any advertisements for the game at the nearest subway station or outside the venue. I didn’t see a single ad as far as I could confirm.
As of 2019, outdoor advertising was gradually decreasing. This could be attributed to a shift to online advertising. However, the absence of advertisements outside the venue this year is quite extreme, and I wondered if there were some restrictions on game advertisements, so I asked several people involved in Chinese games,
There are advertisements at other stations, etc., and I have not heard that there are restrictions. Either the game company was simply limiting its budget, or the venue didn’t solicit advertisements.
is what they said.
China is tightening regulations on games, so maybe you wanted to hold it secretly without advertising outside?
There was also an industry insider.
In any case, there were no advertisements around the venue this year that were gorgeously posted before the corona disaster.
State of BtoC
Overall, ChinaJoy felt like there weren’t many people, but BtoC had a decent number of people, and it was a good situation to say that it was lively. However, compared to before, I felt that there was still no enthusiasm to that extent.
I think the reason for this is the aforementioned economic sentiment in China and the bad weather during the exhibition, but my Chinese gaming friends told me about the CCG Expo held in Shanghai just before ChinaJoy (July 13th). to 16th) and Bilibili World (July 21st to 23rd).
Many of the young game fans participated in CCG Expo and Bilibili World, and several people in the Chinese game industry commented that they may have been overwhelmed by the number of visitors.
However, as I mentioned at the beginning, considering that B2C tickets are sold out in advance, it may be that the management has limited the number of tickets, partly because the corona pandemic is over.
On the other hand, there seems to be a lot of ChinaJoy B2C tickets on the internet flea market in China, and although the number of tickets resold is unknown, there is a possibility that the tickets were not distributed correctly by so-called resellers. .
In any case, I felt that the boundless enthusiasm and vitality from the ChinaJoy venue, which I had felt until 2019, had somewhat diminished this year.
ChinaJoy is still an important event
If you ask me if ChinaJoy is in decline, my answer is a definite no.
Celebrating its 20th anniversary, ChinaJoy has undoubtedly been pulling it from the dawn of the Chinese game industry and game market.
ChinaJoy’s fair management stance is the reason why small media such as SQOOL are treated as official. I think it was prescient.
After actually going to the ChinaJoy venue this year and interacting with public relations staff, other people involved in the operation, and reporters in the press room, I am convinced that ChinaJoy’s philosophy still continues today.
We welcome the participation of media from overseas, and there are no restrictions on the information we send, pressure on the content, or requests. Rather, it seems that they are grateful that the foreign media are discussing ChinaJoy from various perspectives.
Chinese games are now coming out with quality that surpasses Japan in some parts. Their ability is almost the same as Japan, and there are some genres that exceed Japan.
In addition, there are many Chinese gamers who are fans of Japanese games, and instead of illegal downloads like before, they purchased games properly from stores, and the profits have become huge for the Japanese game industry.
Up to this point, continuous efforts in China such as ChinaJoy have been of great significance.
ChinaJoy seems to have cooled down a bit this year, but I hear that it’s getting a lot more exciting compared to 2020 and 2021, when there was no participation from overseas.
Hopefully next year, the relationship between Japan and China will improve further, visa exemption for travel from Japan will be resumed, and many Japanese will be able to participate in ChinaJoy.
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