The opening ceremony of the 6th International Digital Content Expo was held in Beijing on Thursday, October 23, 2008. [Photo: CRIENGLISH.com]

China's 6th International Digital Content Expo opened Thursday in Beijing. At the expo, the interactive entertainment section has thus far attracted the largest crowds. Insiders acknowledged that the industry seeing strong development despite the current financial crisis.

Many of the country's leading interactive entertainment companies took part in this year's digital content expo, like Shanghai-based Shanda and Fujian-based NetDragon Websoft. Contrary to some other Chinese industries, which have been affected by the ongoing global financial crisis, the interactive entertainment industry has been running smoothly, with game development, capital circulation and even mergers and acquisitions all progressing soundly.

Shen Guoding, vice president of the Shanghai-based The9 Information Technology Company, said many interactive entertainment companies have sufficient capital reserves to survive the crisis.

"We have rich capital flows for research and development of new products, as well as marketing promotions and customer service. We are also doing some venture investments, but we have been very cautious and we constantly adjust our evaluations.

Although the financial crisis has been ravaging many industries across the world, it has so far been okay within China's interactive entertainment industry."

China's interactive entertainment companies mainly focus on the domestic market, which has so far helped them avoid the negative influence of the financial crisis.

Li Wei, an assistant marketing manager with The9, said the size of the domestic market is another advantage.

"We own a huge number of players here in the domestic market. Companies in this industry have been trying out many means of attracting new customers, so we are also holding interesting activities to increase our attractiveness. Our company recently held a charity concert where we collected money from our players to support earthquake victims in Sichuan. We want to bring our customers something meaningful."

Gu Jianbin, public relations director with the Shanghai-based Giant Interactive Group, pointed out that China's online game companies have maintained vital development during this period because they have also worked hard on innovation.

"Online game products are, first of all, cultural products. Many local game companies were established during the past three to four years, and they've contributed large efforts in exploring their own products. South Korean game products occupied around 70 percent of the Chinese market share four years ago. Now, more than 70 percent of products in China are produced by local companies."

During the expo, many gamers said they enjoy playing online games because they can attain joy by spending only a small amount of money. Zhang Limou, an actor, is one of them.

"I feel really exhausted after an entire day's work. But I can quickly refresh myself when I get online and play games. As there is so much pressure and so many setbacks in real life, I can gain some self-confidence by playing online games."

Shen Guoding says that the online game industry could even profit from the crisis.

"As it costs little to play online games, more people could turn to games for entertainment as they cut costs on other highly-expensive entertainment."

Many large interactive entertainment companies said they would use this opportunity to expand their businesses, as small and medium-sized companies are more susceptible to the financial crisis.

Gu Jianbin said: "it could be a sort of opportunity for us, if we can invest properly on this occasion. We may acquire some excellent projects for much lower costs."

The Digital Content Expo will last four days, through this Sunday.