Hanjamaru won the first prize at the “KGC Awards”

• The Business category award is one among the five new award categories established this year by the Korea Game Conference (KGC).
• Game business model’s horizons are being broadened by a new benefits structure linking on- and off-line material.

Innovative Chinese characters practicing system Hanjamaru (http://www.hanjamaru.com/), which NHN (Director: Sangheon Kim) provides service for, received the highest award in the Business category at the “KGC Awards”, a game developers’ festival which was held on the 9th of October.

“Innovation” was selected as the main theme for the 9th edition of the KGC Awards. For the first time this year, the award ceremony was split into 5 categories in order to award a variety of new technologies and original ideas:
- Game design
- Graphics
- Programming
- Business
- Open tracks

This time, Hanjamaru was awarded, jointly with “Audition English”, in KGC Awards’ Business category, among a selection of games about to be put up for sale, and presenting a creative and epoch-making public marketing plan for a brand new revenue model.

The award received by Hanjamaru acknowledges that its unique brand new revenue system, which merchandises offline teaching material linked to an online game, had opened new horizons for game business model.

Hanjamaru’s developing company Eduflo’s director Seongwoo Kim commented this award by saying that “because Hanjamaru had to define not only development but also business model, it was an extremely challenging task. The fact that we have a workbook team, which does not exist in other companies, is also a result of this concern. Korea’s game industry is ruled by a business model based on item purchase. I hope this award will be the signal that a new business model is born.”

Besides, since its early stage, Hanjamaru has been under the observation of both a scholar in Chinese pedagogy from SungKyunKwan University and a scholar in educational psychology from Harvard University. It has also received support from the Ministry of Culture and Tourism, been officially awarded at the Ministry of Education’s Edutainment Competitive Exhibition, been ranked as “best game of the month” last June, and been receiving the best content’s prize far and wide.

(The original article in Korean can be seen here.)