As development costs rise and hits become harder to predict, South Korean game companies are turning to proven intellectual property to reduce release risk. Rather than building new worlds and characters from scratch, they are adapting web novels and webtoons that already have readers and fandoms to secure early users and ease marketing burdens. Nexon, Netmarble and Kakao Games are preparing new titles based on such IP, though the industry says strong execution still determines success.

NHN is stepping up growth strategy centred on its artificial intelligence GPU business, planning to expand data centres and the latest GPU infrastructure and win overseas customers. It reported second-quarter revenue of 757.9 billion won and operating profit of 57.9 billion won, both record quarterly highs. NHN Cloud’s AI GPU business drove results, with cloud revenue up 85.3 percent. The company is also focusing game development on Japan and expanding payments into stablecoin settlement infrastructure.