TechCrunch -
GREE,
the $5.9 billion Japanese mobile gaming company making a big push in
international markets, debuted its first-ever title designed by U.S.
talent for Western audiences today.
Taking the evergreen zombie theme that has fueled countless mobile
gaming hits, GREE’s game “Zombie Jombie” is designed from the
perspective of zombies who must battle humans.
In the game, players
become a “Jombie,” which has the power to raise and control zombies.
It’s a trading card game where players must build a deck of cards
representing different zombies to compete with friends. They can battle
each other, bosses, or do quests in different U.S. cities.
This game is a big test for GREE. Compared to U.S. gaming companies like Zynga,
the company is almost absurdly profitable. GREE has triple the profit margins that Zynga does.
(Crazy.) The company
made 12.7 billion yen ($152.7 million) on 41.5 billion yen ($497.8 million) in revenue in the last quarter alone. And those numbers were about triple what they were a year earlier. Zynga
in contrast did $37.2 million in net income excluding a massive, one-time charge related to its IPO on $311.2 million in revenue in the same period.
The question is: can it grow outside of its home market of Japan?
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