Naver Webtoon signs MOU with Google Play, Kocca to make games

From left: Naver Webtoon’s CEO Kim Jun-koo, Google Korea’s country director Kim Kyoung-hoon and Kocca’s president Jo Hyun-rae [NAVER WEBTOON]

Naver Webtoon said Wednesday that it signed a memorandum of understanding (MOU) with Google Play and the Korea Creative Content Agency (Kocca) regarding a project titled “Global Webtoon Games.”

A ceremony was held the same day at Naver Webtoon’s office in Pangyo, Gyeonggi, which the platform’s CEO Kim Jun-koo, Google Korea’s country director Kim Kyoung-hoon and Kocca’s president Jo Hyun-rae attended.

The partnership will focus on fostering small to medium sized local game developers that are deemed to have potential. It will also support the use of Naver Webtoon’s intellectual property (IP) to create games and export them abroad.

Five game developers that will partake in Global Webtoon Games will be scouted from March.

Eight webtoons that have been chosen to have their IP utilized are “Noblesse” by Son Je-ho and Lee Kwang-su, “Pigpen” by Kim Carn-by and Cheon Beom-sick, “Lessa” by Pogo, “The Sound of Your Heart” by Cho Seok, “The Boy of Death” (translated) by Ryu, “Spirit Fingers” by Han Kyoung-chal, “A Good Day to be a Dog” by Lee Hey and “Lookism” by Pak Tae-jun.

All of the above, except for “The Boy of Death,” are available in English on Webtoon.

Google Play will handle the global marketing for the game developers. Kocca will offer funds to help support the developers in creating the games and promote the games after their release.

The games are expected to officially launch toward the end of 2023.

This project comes after Naver Webtoon dropped “Yumi’s Cells the Puzzle” in August last year, based on the hit webtoon series “Yumi’s Cells” by Lee Dong-geon. The game has a rating of 4.5 out of 5 on both Google Play and Apple’s App Store.

“We have taken on this project in order to support Naver Webtoon’s IP-based games and help them become successful overseas,” Naver Webtoon CEO Kim said. “We hope that this will provide new opportunities to local game developers. Furthermore, we hope the webtoon and game industries will be able to coexist to become the leading content industry in Korea.”

BY SHIN MIN-HEE [shin.minhee@joongang.co.kr]