Mobile game developer IDreamsky reaching for the clouds

Shenzhen-based iDreamsky, a game developer and publisher, is on track to become the largest mobile game publishing platform in China, said the company's senior executive on Friday.

Jeff Lyndon, iDreamsky's co-founder and executive vice-president, said the company aims to take advantage of partner developers and distribution channels to build the game publishing platform.

"We already have the largest user group in China's mobile gaming industry, which gives our company a competitive edge," Lyndon told a press conference in Beijing.

iDreamsky, which has established its leading position through publishing some of the West's best-known mobile games — such as Halfbrick's Fruit Ninja and Imangi’s Temple Run series — has a monthly active user list of more than 100 million, according to the company

Lyndon said China's mobile game market will continue its boom over the next three years with the increasing penetration of smartphones in the country, the building of fourth-generation networks and the falling prices of high-speed mobile data packages.

But he also predicted that the window for Western game developers to break into China's market is closing because of the rise of South Korean and Japanese game developers.

"The quality of (South) Korean, Japanese and Chinese mobile games has been increasing rapidly. And because of the proximity of cultures, (South) Korean and Japanese games are more suitable for the tastes of Chinese players," Lyndon said in a previous interview.

To prepare for the change, iDreamsky has already signed Cookie Run, a top game in South Korea, which has an expected release in China in the second or the third quarter of this year.

At the press conference on Friday, iDreamsky also announced a deal it inked with Smilegate, a leading game developer in South Korea, to get the rights to localize and publish the company's top games in China.