China recently issued publishing licenses to 89 online games, the sixth batch this year, and that brings the cumulative games approved in the first half of the year to 549, including 522 domestic games and 27 imported games. The figure exceeded the total number of 512 games for the whole 2022.
Assuming the trend continues, about 1,000 to 1,100 online games are expected to be approved this year, and there is a chance that one to two more batches of imported games will be added, bringing the total number of imported games to about 100, Citi Research said in a note.
High-quality games from Tencent, NetEase, Lilith, Bilibili, 37, G-Bits, CMGE, Youzu, Kingsoft and Kingnet are being approved and the approval of Tencent’s “Honor of Kings: Dawn” and NetEase’s “Where Winds Meet” is expected to further enrich their product channels, it said.
In particular, “Justice Mobile”, which will be released on June 30, has already recorded 44 million pre-registrations, which means that there may be good initial momentum after the launch of the game.