Negotiating Online Computer Games in East Asia: Manufacturing Asian MMORPGs and Marketing ‘Asianness’

Abstract

In the past decade, online computer games have proliferated throughout the East Asian region. A key feature of this gaming context is the relationship between the distinctive use of regional aesthetic and narrative forms in game content, and the parallel growth in regionally focused marketing and distribution initiatives. Thus, intra-Asian games design and marketing play to notions of perceived cultural proximity within the region. Most Asian-designed online games are principally marketed within East Asia; and only a few, such as Lineage (1998) and Ragnarok Online (2002), have been distributed outside the region. The fact that these exported games have not been as commercially successful in North American and European territories underscores the primacy of a contextual analysis of Asian-designed games.