A recent survey indicates that most Chinese electronic game players have confidence in China's homebred games, according to a report in the Beijing Morning Post.
According to the ChinaJoy survey, done by the Post and the Kingsoft company, 78 percent of those surveyed believed there was a good future for domestically-made games, 16 percent were not sure and 6 percent considered it a bleak one.
According to the Post's analysis, the critical problems rest with Chinese developers' imagination and creativity and few players doubt the research and development ability of domestic software programmers.
The survey was done among 915 players, 80 percent male, 77 percent aged 18 to 25 and 71 percent college students, which is believed to have covered all main player groups. Of all the players, half are over-one-year-old Internet surfers and 27 percent had been avid Internet users for over three years.
Better living standards and education have made computers a household necessity in the past years. Four-fifths of the surveyed players said they use family computers as game platforms, compared with one-fifth of families possessing video game equipment, a style prevailing overseas.
Problems with both hardware and software have caused this, the paper said.
The survey revealed that one-tenth of the surveyed enjoy three types of game platforms: computers and video equipment.
Single computer and network games both win over 67 percent players, compared with video games 40 percent and portable computer games one-fifth.
"Role-playing" games are the most attractive. According to the survey, more than 55 percent of the players said they love them for their well-designed plots and personality of the roles.
Fifty-four percent of the players get games via the Internet, 45 percent via general media and 40 percent via professional media. Over 70 percent of the players go to franchised software shops, some to roadside bookstalls, compared with 18 percent via Internet order and 3 percent via post.
(Xinhua News Agency February 4, 2004)
