China Daily Global Edition (USA)
Virtual Reality: a goldmine in the making
Industry experts point out that sales of VR devices and games are poised for major growth in China, but problems such as prohibitive pricing and lack of content will first need to be addressed
Despite the stifling heat, hordes of gaming enthusiasts were willing to queue up to three hours in order to try out Virtual Reality (VR) devices at this year’s July 27 to 30 China Digital Entertainment Expo and Conference Show held in Shanghai, also known as China Joy.
Among the companies that showcased their VR products included industry giants HTC Vive and Sony. The latter recently released a number of games for their PlayStation VR (PSVR) devices and one of the new titles include the highly anticipated Final Fantasy 15: Monster of the Deep.
Sony also previewed four new VR games which will be distributed exclusively in the Chinese market. Most of these games will be released later this year.
According to Takehito Soeda, head of Sony China, the number of games for PSVR devices will increase significantly this year. PSVR devices, which can be connected to the company’s game consoles PlayStation 4 and PlayStation Neo, were first released in October last year.
Soeda said that reception for PSVR devices was so overwhelming that they were sold out within six months of their release in China. He added that many Chinese gaming enthusiasts took to his Weibo page to complain about the inadequate stock.
Market consulting firm iResearch pointed out that the lifting of the ban on consoles in China in 2013 has boosted the sales of game consoles and in turn spurred demand for VR headsets. The firm also expects an increasing number of Chinese players to jump on the PSVR bandwagon in the coming years.
On July 27, HTC Vive released the Vive Standalone VR headset which is exclusive to the Chinese market. Unlike most VR devices that need to be connected to a computer or smart phone in order to work, the Vive Standalone is powered by a Qualcomm SnapDragon 835 mobile platform and can be directly connected to the Viveport application store.
HTC Vive is the leader in the VR industry with a market share of 18.6 percent, according to research firm SuperData.
“China is by far the world’s largest mobile market and we believe it will soon become the number one VR market,” said Alvin Wang Graylin, the regional president of HTC Vive for China. “To that end, we have rolled out a Chinese version standalone VR device in the hope of providing the best product for Chinese users.”
Although the exact release date for the Vive Standalone was not confirmed, Graylin hinted that consumers will not have to wait long.
In addition to their VR devices, Microsoft also showcased a new console called Xbox Scorpio which the company has described to be “the most powerful console ever”.
According to Microsoft, the Xbox Scorpio is able to perform a trillion floating-point operations per second, which means players would be able to enjoy higher screen resolutions and better gaming performance while playing VR games.
“For the past two years, we have seen ups and downs in the virtual reality and augmented reality industries in China,” said Xie Enwei, general manager of Microsoft China.
“Presently, the VR industry has confronted the bottleneck in development created by factors such as expensive VR devices and lack of technological breakthroughs. What we are doing now is working with original equipment manufacturers and VR research studios to introduce more affordable devices and better quality games to consumers,” he added.
Wu Tianqi, vice president of Suzhou Snail Digital Technology, agreed with this assessment, saying that the company is also considering whether to make further investments in the development of devices and games.
At this year’s China Joy, Suzhou Snail Digital Technology released Ark Park, which is based on Ark: Survival Evolved, a highly popular game that has about 8 million players worldwide, to test the waters in the VR games sector.
In Ark Park, players find themselves in a world filled with dinosaurs and must learn how to survive through gathering resources, hunting creatures and crafting weapons.
“The development of VR hardware is still at the nascent stage, there are not enough content providers and the market lacks quality games,” said Wu. “So what we have done is to produce a VR game based on a successful IP and make some changes so that players can have a good experience.”
Globally, VR hardware including headsets, peripherals and personal computers could hit $7 billion in revenue by 2021, according to US technology researcher Digi-Capital. Internet market research firm IDC projected that China’s VR game industry will experience a boom this year and the market value of VR games would amount to 80 billion yuan ($11.91 billion) by 2020.
According to iResearch, games are a major constituent of VR application at the consumption level, outweighing VR video and broadcast. The firm predicted that VR content providers will only start to profit from 2019 when the content market is expected to improve.
By 2021, VR games content providing services will take up the majority 35 percent of the market, with its value reaching 9.6 billion yuan and video accounting for 30 percent, added iResearch.
Presently, the VR industry has confronted the bottleneck in development created by factors such as expensive VR devices and lack of technological breakthroughs.”
Xie Enwei, general manager of Microsoft China