Gaming Culture in Korea… why are Korean PC rooms always packed with late night gamers?

From the professional gaming matches broadcast on television to the domination of Mass Media Online Role Playing Games, Korean pop culture is heavily influenced by the world of gaming. Some fun statistics about the game industry of Korea states the following: The Korea Creative Content Agency has provided the following facts about the game industry in South Korea:

My life for Ire!

• The total South Korean game market is worth $9.16 billion
• Top two countries that are importing Korean games include China (38.2 percent) and Japan (27.4 percent)
• The average South Korean plays more than one hour of games per day
• Online dominates gaming platforms with more than 43.9 percent of the overall gaming market
• Role playing is the most played genre of game for South Koreans

As foreigners see the gaming culture in South Korea, they will have noted several differences in the trends and patterns of the Korean gaming industry; both in the consumer’s side and the producer’s side. First of all, the main demographics of Korean gamers is the same as in anywhere else in the world ; teenage boys. Although the trend of female and older gamers have been uprising since the last decade, gamers in Korea as still predominantly teenage boys. If you are interested in the the culture of Korean gaming, you will have noticed that not many Koreans play on home consoles like the U.S. or other European countries. Most Korean gamers thus, prefer to play with others via the internet, in a form of social networking entertainment, rather than racking a console and a individual story based game by themselves.