Asian Tech Press (July 27) -- The number of video game users in China has now reached a record high of 668 million, a government-run gaming association said on Thursday.

Zhang Yijun, head of the Game Publishing Committee of the China Audio-video and Digital Publishing Association (CADPA), briefed on the development of Chinese game industry in the first half of this year at the China Digital Entertainment Congress (CDEC) in Shanghai today.

During January-June period, the actual sales revenue of China's domestic game market was 144.263 billion yuan ($20.204 billion), down 2.39% year-on-year, Zhang said.

And he said the revenue was up 22.2% compared to the second half of last year, a clear sign of market rebound.

In addition, as of June, the number of Chinese video gamers amounted to 668 million, despite a 0.35% year-on-year increase, reaching a new high point in history.

According to Zhang, in the first half of the year, the U.S., Japan and South Korea remained the main overseas markets for Chinese mobile games, accounting for 31.77%, 19.65% and 8.50% respectively.

And Germany, the United Kingdom, France collectively accounting for nearly 10%, emerging markets from the Middle East, Latin America, Southeast Asia and other overseas areas continue to maintain upward momentum.

"Against the backdrop of an overall downturn in the global video game market, China's game industry is gradually getting out of the trough and showing an upward trend," Zhang said at the meeting, "and in the face of a challenging second half of the year, it is still necessary to boost the industry's confidence."

Over the past two years, the Chinese government has stepped up regulation of the video game industry in response to the issue of children's addiction to games.

As part of the regulatory action, Chinese authorities stopped approving new games for nearly eight months between 2021 and 2022.

On Wednesday, China's National Press and Publication Administration (NPPA) issued its latest batch of video game licences, allowing 88 new mobile and PC games to launch in July.