As part of Gamevil’s funding program Companion, the mobile game publisher has invested in Relax Games, a new studio start-up led by industry veterans, including former NCSoft developers.
“Participating in Gamevil’s start-up support program has instilled confidence through its strong development and publishing know-how,” said Relax Games’ Il Seung Lee. “The investment will not only strengthen the quality of our games but provide a good measure on how developers and publishers can collaborate together.”
Gamevil USA’s president Kyu Lee said recently that smaller companies need to team up with larger ones because the cost of user acquisition is rising. “You need a larger user base to start off,” Lee is quoted as saying. “The quality bar is also rising. There are bigger development budgets. The gambling companies are coming in. There are fewer indie success stories.”
According the company, Gamevil works with over 70 game studios to publish their games on a variety of mobile platforms, including leading mobile messaging platforms Kakao in Korea and Line in Japan. Gamevil also claims over 300 million downloads in Korea, Japan and the US since the company’s founding in 2000, and published 46 games with revenues of US$70 million in 2012.
