As I reached the venue for ChinaJoy 2014, my first target was head right to the booth of Korean developer Pearl Abyss, whose upcoming free-to-play game Black Desert is making waves around the world. I posted a few quick questions to Mr Brian Oh, Director of Overseas Business, to find out more.
Me: Obviously the gaming community is in shock at the announcement of Korean giant Daum Communications being the publisher of Black Desert for North America and Europe. Could you tell me more about the deal?
Brian: I understand the shock of the community, but after much evaluation, we felt that the deal with Daum Communications is right, given how much support they have given us since the Korean deal was signed.
Me: Will there be any possible delays, given that Daum Communications is not an established company in the western market?
Brian: I am not sure what Daum will do, since I do not question their operations, but I do understand that Daum is looking to set up a new games business team and hiring veterans from the western region to operate the new games platform.
Daum recently merged with Kakao, Korea’s biggest mobile gaming platform as well (cinderboy note: I guess Brian is hinting that Daum has all the products to make sure the Western platform launches smoothly)
Me: Since Daum still neeeds time to set up a team, is there a concern that Black Desert will be pushed further backwards for a western launch?
Brian: Working with Daum, I know that they make decisions and work fast, hence there is no worry at the moment.
Me: How about translation? Is Black Desert being translated now internally?
Brian: We have a partially translated version for Chinese, and we are translating the game into English internally. We might get other companies to do part of the translations, but overall we are controlling the core translation.
Me: How is the China server going along?
Brian: *Smiles* We are speaking to several companies, and there is no confirmation yet. (cinderboy note: I was informed that Brian was actually over at a Big 5 publisher in the morning)
Me: When is Closed Beta 3 and what new features can we expect?
Brian: Closed Beta 3 will happen around late August or early September, and the item dye system will be added.
Me: Is IP block being planned?
Brian: Yes, we do plan to restrict IP base on region.
Me: What about a Southeast Asia server?
Brian: We are definitely interested, and will look forward going over. Which publisher is the best from the community?
Me: All publishers are bad according to the community *Brian laughs*. But *top secret* is actually a better one.
