Star Craft
5 reasons why StarCraft is extremely popular in Korea
How come so many games that are hugely popular abroad don’t succeed in Korea is a question I’ve been asked a lot. Why was Counter Strike Source’s sales halted due to licencing issues, and titles like GTA were outlawed in Korea? What is the cause of the failure of such top games from around the world to even approach StarCraft’s level of popularity in Korea?
Essentially, StarCraft might be considered Korea’s national game. Since the game’s introduction 13 years ago, Korea has developed professional leagues, professional players, broadcast games, specialised channels, and stadium-filling audiences.
- The capacity to think quickly and react quickly is a skill that many Koreans find easy to grow fascinated with, and success in such activities for competition when young is strongly promoted. A study that was undertaken revealed this. Therefore, this type of behaviour pattern may be related to something as simple as a rubix cube or a game of scrabble because back in the day, board games that required rapid thinking and reflexes were popular among Koreans. This kind of thinking is similar to StarCraft’s. It adheres to a similar mentality.
- In Starcraft, players are needed to carry out a variety of tasks at once; this may be related to the extremely old and well-liked board game baduk, where comparable quick thinking and actions were necessary. This might possibly be the cause of StarCraft’s expansion in that area. Sometimes the game is comparable to poker, where rapid thinking and reflexes are crucial. Korean Starcraft players enjoy the same level of popularity as American poker players. After everything was said and done, though, poker finals never attracted the number of spectators that pack stadiums or stay over night to acquire a good seat.
- Characters and goods associated with StarCraft are appearing all across South Korea. Only the American culture of the Star Wars Phantom Menace movie can be used to compare how this game has ingrained itself into Korean culture.
- It’s also a matter of timing; the game was first released in South Korea in the late 1990s. Exactly at this moment, South Korea’s online infrastructure began to take shape. StarCraft was installed on each of the machines in the internet cafes as they opened up around the nation. Blizzard’s programmers therefore timed it correctly.
- StarCraft’s debut in 1998 also happened to be the same year that Korea’s first esports league took place. By the turn of the century, we discovered that all the major sponsors from across the globe had gathered to support these StarCraft competitions. This was an attempt on my part to not only comprehend but also analyse the Korean SC scene and explain to you why it is so popular.
Summary
A portion of the popularity of the game in South Korea can be attributed to timing. South Korea was developing its online infrastructure and building the fastest internet in the world when Blizzard released StarCraft in the late 1990s. As online cafés proliferated, they required games. Which came first, the chicken or StarCraft? The game ended up at an increasing number of internet cafes. The game’s release took place in 1998, the same year that South Korea’s first professional gaming league was established. A few years after the game’s debut, professional players started to form teams, and major sponsors like Samsung entered the picture.
However, StarCraft’s success in South Korea was more than just coincidence. Blizzard did strike it lucky, but fortunately for players in Korea, the developer provided a fascinating title. StarCraft was and is enjoyable. The game may have been inspired by a sequence of occasions, but Korean gamers have continued to play it for generations because of the captivating experience it provides. StarCraft is currently regarded as the Monopoly or Chess of internet gaming. It’s a classic game that keeps attracting new players.