VietNamNet Bridge – Domestic enterprises need to be encouraged to produce online games, especially educational games, said Le Manh Ha, Deputy Mayor of HCM City.

Ha officially expressed his viewpoint about the games production industry at the meeting held to collect the opinions for the new decree, to replace the currently valid legal document on online game management several days ago.

Ha has suggested that no need to grant licenses to new domestically made games, just need to verify the content of the games. Meanwhile, foreign made games must obtain licenses to be circulated on the Vietnamese market.

Vietnamese games don’t need to be licensed

Ha said that he has been insisting on the viewpoint that it is necessary to encourage domestic enterprises to make online games. However, the enterprises must produce the games with healthy content and educational games to serve people, especially children.

The statement of Ha has stirred up the public at this “sensitive moment”, when the licensing to online games has been halted for a long time. Meanwhile, experts still argue about the advantages and disadvantages of online games, and about whether to prohibit online games to exist on the Vietnamese market.

Ha believes that no need to force domestic enterprises to waste their time by forcing them to follow complicated procedures to get licenses from management agencies. The games need to be marketed just after they have content checked to be sure that the content is suitable to the Vietnamese people.

However, Ha said that it is necessary to maintain the licensing mechanism for foreign games, in order to prevent the violent games from hitting the market.

Of course, Ha’s viewpoint has been applauded by games producers. Many of them have new online games, but they cannot launch them into the market at this moment, because no license will be licensed now.

An official from the Ministry of Information and Telecommunication, the state management agency which has the right to license online games in Vietnam, said he thinks that it would better to encourage domestic enterprises to produce games, but it’s still necessary to maintain the licensing mechanism. In order to market a product, the distributor needs to submit necessary documents relating to the games to management agencies, where the scenario and the content of the game will be examined.

Splitting Internet and games agents?

Ha has also proposed to split Internet agents and online game agents, saying that Internet agents just need to make business registration, while they do not need to get licenses. Meanwhile, online games should be considered a kind of conditional business, therefore, game agents must obtain licenses to operate.

As for online games, Ha said, enterprises must take the responsibility of keeping management over game agents. They need to apply technical measures to control the agents, including the measures to limit the service providing hours, to ensure the technical conditions and the content of the games.

However, commenting about the proposal, experts say that it is very difficult to split Internet agents and online game agents. Both Internet agents and game agents have Internet connections, and when people come to the agents, it is unfeasible to prohibit them to play games or access websites.

Moreover, nearly all Internet agents now provide online games, while gamers are the main clients of the agents, who are the main source of income of the Internet agents.

The experts believe that it would be better to set up detailed regulations for Internet agents in terms of the locations, operation scale, operation hours, so that clients can play games in the most convenient atmosphere.

Niko Partners, a market analysis firm has released the 2011 report on the South East Asian online game market, showing that the revenue of the market reaches 474 million dollars in 2011. Especially, Vietnam proves to be the market with the highest turnover in the region.

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