{"id":664641,"date":"2026-06-29T17:03:09","date_gmt":"2026-06-29T17:03:09","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/664641\/"},"modified":"2026-06-29T17:03:09","modified_gmt":"2026-06-29T17:03:09","slug":"pokemon-tcg-pocket-developer-dena-has-received-1-5-billion-yen-in-subsidies-sparking-debate-about-whether-the-studio-actually-needs-the-investment","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/664641\/","title":{"rendered":"Pok\u00e9mon TCG Pocket developer DeNA has received 1.5 billion yen in subsidies, sparking debate about whether the studio actually needs the investment"},"content":{"rendered":"

Pok\u00e9mon TCG Pocket<\/a> isn’t what you’d call a ‘small game’, yet the Japanese government has given developer DeNA a 1.5 billion Yen (or an eye-watering \u00a36,997,500) subsidy to help its mobile game development efforts.<\/p>\n

The news were shared by Automaton<\/a> following the announcement that Japan’s Ministry of Economy, Trade, and Industry “would provide a total of 1.5 billion yen (roughly $92.7 million USD) in subsidies to live-service game developer DeNA” as part of the IP360 program, which was created to support the development of “new domestic IPs” and boost the country’s content industry globally.<\/p>\n

Pok\u00e9mon TCG Pocket – Official Gameplay TrailerWatch on YouTube<\/a><\/p>\n

Needless to say, Pok\u00e9mon is neither new nor a tiny intellectual property in need of help. DeNA is a developer that’s not part of The Pok\u00e9mon Company, though TPC does have a 33.4% stake in DeNA Digital Production (which was rebranded as Pokemon Card D Studio<\/a> in 2024).<\/p>\n

As reported by Automaton, many Japanese users on X aren’t happy about the investment in a private company that’s doing well by all accounts. “This is what they’re doing while cutting the budgets for public museums and art galleries. If DeNA’s mobile games actually do sell, what do we gain from that? It’s just a private company gaining even more profit,” one user stated<\/a>. That’s just one example, but more people on socials<\/a> are pointing out the Japanese government is once again failing to “nurture new talents”.<\/p>\n

Meanwhile, there are some working in the Japanese games industry who say<\/a> it’s hard to get substantial development funding due to “the risk of being unable to meet their obligations if something goes wrong” when you’re a solo or small indie developer. The debate is served and far from over.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Pok\u00e9mon TCG Pocket isn’t what you’d call a ‘small game’, yet the Japanese government has given developer DeNA…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":664642,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[6],"tags":[59,86,56,54,55],"class_list":["post-664641","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-technology","tag-gb","tag-technology","tag-uk","tag-united-kingdom","tag-unitedkingdom"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/664641","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=664641"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/664641\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/664642"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=664641"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=664641"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=664641"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}