It’s been a busy year for Crunchyroll this 2024 with all the cool new additions to Crunchyroll Game Vault rolling in, and even more to come before the year ends. We covered the recent launch of Lord of Nazarick, for instance, and just what it is that makes it well worth your time.
But what else should you expect from this subscription service? Terry Li, Executive Vice President of Emerging Business, Crunchyroll & General Manager of Crunchyroll Games, shares insights with us and more!
With the most recent launch of Lord of Nazarick, we’re buzzing with excitement about what else Crunchyroll has in store for us. Would you mind talking a little bit about Crunchyroll’s ambitions on the app in general?
For Crunchyroll, it’s important to publish quality titles for our members and all fans alike, so we actively pursue a subscription model with Crunchyroll Game Vault and free-to-play publishing. Lord of Nazarick – a turn-based RPG based on the OVERLORD anime streaming on Crunchyroll – is our latest free-to-play game available on iOS and Android devices. So far, the response has been incredible with the title garnering a 4.8 and 4.7 on the App Store and Google Play respectively.
One of our key goals in the free-to-play space is to further integrate the Crunchyroll membership into our titles to enhance the player experience. Lord of Nazarick is the first title to fully implement Crunchyroll Login, allowing users to log in with their Crunchyroll membership to unlock exclusive rewards like daily in-game currency and a battle pass.
Lord of Nazarick is also a key component in making Crunchyoll the best place to experience OVERLORD across gaming, anime and collectibles. To celebrate the launch, every season of the OVERLORD is available to watch for free with ads and all merchandise on the Crunchyroll Store is 10% off. All these activations are leading up to OVERLORD: The Sacred Kingdom hitting theatres in the United States, Canada and select international territories beginning November 8th.
Is there a specific goal to hit a certain number of planned games by the end of the year?
Regarding Crunchyroll Game Vault – our curated library of premium mobile titles for Crunchyroll’s Mega and Ultimate Fan members worldwide – we announced that we would have more than 35 titles by the end of the year.
In October, we launched our 26th Game Vault title. November is looking just as exciting with the upcoming Moonstone Island launching by the end of the month alongside several other titles I can’t share just yet.
I noticed that a lot of the games on the service are currently adaptations of anime titles as well – is this a deliberate decision to be players’ go-to service for anime-related games? If not, is there any particular criteria on the kind of games Crunchyroll wants to launch on the service?
From the start, our goal was to ensure Crunchyroll Game Vault’s library felt at home on the platform, simultaneously expanding our audience’s experience with their favourite series or fitting in aesthetically. For that reason, we set out to thoughtfully curate the library to be anime and anime-adjacent – we achieved this goal.
Right now, Crunchyroll fans can watch every season of the fan-favorite cyberpunk anime PSYCHO-PASS and then continue their experience with the visual novel PSYCHO-PASS: Mandatory Happiness which launched on Game Vault in October. This trend continues when the visual novel STEINS;GATE launches later this fall.
Beyond anime titles are games like River City Girls and the upcoming River City Girls 2. Being entries in the Japanese beat-em-up series Kunio-kun, both are heavily influenced by the medium with anime-inspired character designs and manga-like cutscenes.
Even titles further removed from what people traditionally call “anime” are rooted in a certain Japanese aesthetic. For example, Victory Heat Rally is a great modernization of the super scaler racing titles that once filled Japanese arcades in the 1980s.
What do you think sets Crunchyroll Game Vault apart from other game subscriptions?
There are many reasons why Crunchyroll Game Vault is a compelling offer, but I’d like to focus on two key points.
Firstly, Game Vault is an incredible value offer as it is tied to the Crunchyroll Premium membership which includes the largest dedicated library of anime in the world – over 50,000 episodes and films amounting to 25,000 hours of anime.
Secondly, it’s really in the curation. As explained, Game Vault is an incredibly focused library designed to appeal to anime fans, but it’s also curated to maintain a certain quality level in terms of gameplay experience and features.
Generally speaking, most Game Vault titles include controller support for a better gameplay experience. More specifically, we re-launched great titles like Crypt of the Necrodancer, bringing its unreleased content such as multiplayer to the mobile for the first time.
Any future plans we should all be excited about in the coming year?
Over the past year, Crunchyroll has seen major success with the subscription and free-to-play models – the latter differentiates our gaming strategy from other streamers.
In 2025, you are likely to see Crunchyroll continue to publish titles in both spaces with new titles launching monthly.
