据市场调研公司Niko Partners最新报告预测，2011年中国游戏市场规模将增长21%，总营收达58亿美元。

该公司主理合伙人Lisa Cosmas Hanson表示，由中国社交游戏市场的发展程度高于预期，2010年中国在线游戏市场增长34%，营收共达48亿美元。她认为到2015年这个市场规模有可能达到111亿美元，并预测在不久的将来，中国在线游戏市场将以两位数的增长率快速发展。

她称自己曾认为中国在线游戏市场在2010年的增长率会有所减缓，但事实证明腾讯QQ和其他社交网络的人气远超她的预期。与关注中国神话和武侠题材的硬核游戏不同，这些轻量级休闲在线游戏由于其“个性化的社交特点”正吸引越来越多用户与好友进行互动。

这些游戏不但有趣，而且采用了免费模式，并提供多种类型的选择，年轻玩家是社交游戏的主力军。

Cosmas Hanson还表示，神话题材的大型多人在线游戏正面临市场需求下降的危机，这种趋势正日益明显，但《魔兽世界》的用户数量增长仍然强劲。

在2008年，中国社交游戏的营收基本为零，直到现在也仍然未能像Zynga游戏在美国一样真正占据优势。免费体验的在线游戏（游戏邦注：即免费玩游戏，付费买道具）在中国很受欢迎，但由于中美两国的经济发展水平不同，中国付费玩家的比例远低于美国，其消费水平也低于美国用户。

users in internet cafes

中国玩家基本上是在家或办公室体验社交游戏，而网吧则是硬核在线游戏玩家唱主角的天下。

由于庞大的用户规模，中国市场成就了腾讯这种市值达500亿美元的巨头公司，该市场的其他知名上市游戏企业包括盛大游戏、九城等公司。

中国市场的游戏盗版现象仍然极为普遍，盗版游戏每年下载量高达1亿次左右，约有95%的零售包装游戏是盗版产品，这也正是在线游戏在中国市场如此盛行的重要原因之一。（本文为游戏邦/gamerboom.com编译，转载请注明来源：游戏邦）

Chinese game industry to hit $5.8B in 2011 thanks to social game growth

The Chinese game industry is expected to grow 21 percent to $5.8 billion in 2011, thanks to continued growth of the social game market, according to a new report by market researcher Niko Partners.

Lisa Cosmas Hanson, managing partner at Niko Partners, said in an interview that China’s online game market grew 34 percent in 2010 to $4.8 billion. That was more than expected, since China’s social game market grew a lot faster than expected.

By 2015, the market is expected to grow to $11.1 billion, said Cosmas Hanson, who conducts exhaustive surveys in the Chinese market and has been covering Chinese games for nine years.

Cosmas Hanson said that she expects the market to grow at double digit percentage rates for the foreseeable future.

She said that she thought the growth rate for Chinese online games would slow in 2010, but didn’t realize how popular social network games on Tencent’s QQ service and other social networks would become. These games a light and casual snacks, compared to hardcore downloadable online games that focus on Chinese mythology or fantasy-role playing games. But the social games are becoming popular because there are more “personally social,” where players play them with close friends, Cosmas Hanson said.

“People are jumping on this train and it is going faster and faster,” Cosmas Hanson said. “They’re fun and free-to-play, and there are a wide variety of alternatives. Younger gamers in particular are playing social games.”

Cosmas Hanson said there is some risk of a lull in user demand for the massively multiplayer fantasy role playing games, which are becoming more predictable. But titles such as Blizzard Entertainment’s World of Warcraft have shown enormous strength.

Revenues from social games were virtually zero in 2008, but they have not risen to become a big chunk of the market in China, just as they have via Zynga’s games such as FarmVille in the U.S. In free-to-play online games (the kind that are popular in China), users play for free and pay real money for virtual goods in small amounts. On average, the percentage of people who pay for a game in China is smaller than in the U.S., and the amount of money they spend is smaller too, given the economic differences between the countries.

Cosmas Hanson said that social games are played most often in the home or office, but not so much in internet cafes, where users mostly play hardcore online games.

But China certainly has the numbers and it has enabled companies such as Tencent get a market capitalization of around $50 billion. There are a bunch of other publicly traded companies such as Shanda Games and The9 in China and the number of competitors is growing thanks to growth of the mobile and social game sectors.

Piracy of packaged games remains huge in China. There were an estimated 100 million downloads of pirated games each year, and about 95 percent of packaged games are pirated. And that is why the online games — where users have to pay in order to get access to digital goods within games — have taken off as a true and legitimate industry.（source:venturebeat）