Konami to enter the Chinese market

TOKYO--Konami said today that it intends to expand into the Chinese market. The company's first foray will be with a localized version of World Soccer Winning Eleven 7 for the PlayStation 2. The company plans in releasing additional titles in order to establish a serious presence.

The Chinese version of World Soccer will use the Simplified Chinese character set in the in-game text and packaging. A playable demo of the game will be shown between January 16 and 18 at http://www.chinajoy.net/ChinaJoy, a digital entertainment exhibition sponsored by numerous Chinese government agencies.

Konami chose the soccer game as the first title for release in China due to the sport's popularity worldwide, China notwithstanding. The World Soccer franchise has sold 14 million copies worldwide to date. The series has already been released in other parts of Asia, including Hong Kong, Taiwan, and Korea.

Konami's move comes only two weeks after Sony released its PlayStation 2 console in China. While Sony had originally planned to release the console on December 20 in five cities, that date was pushed back and the cities reduced to two for unexplained reasons.