(VNF) - Trading Card Game (TCG) appeared for the first time in Japan and has now becomes popular in many countries. In Vietnam, the game was introduced for the first time at the Japan Sakura (Cherry Blossom) Festival 2016 and attracted special attention from Vietnamese youth because of its uniqueness and attractiveness.

In recent years, as the game market has become saturated, customers are smarter and more concerned about the selection of a healthy recreational and less expensive pastime for their children, and Japanese games with creativeness and high educational value are chosen by many Vietnamese people. Of these, TCG are highly interest because the game helps children develop their thinking and heighten creativeness.

During the two-day Cherry Blossom Festival 2016, a booth of Japan’s famous TCG designer and developer Wedge Holdings Company attracted the participation of more than 4,000 visitors. Sometimes, the company closed their booth due to a large number of participants. Many youth visited the booth to try and play TCG, while some of them were already familiar with this game.

Ms Huong, an employee of FPT Telecommunications Joint-Stock Company who was invited to the booth to instruct Vietnamese youth to experience this game, said while TCG is not age-specific, it is strongly developed among the country’s youth community, especially among those under 18 years old, due to the popularity of Manga story and Anime film in recent time. They were interested in this game thanks to its uniqueness and tactics. Some publishers also visited the booth to study this game with an interest in setting up cooperation plans for its distribution in the near future.

The mother of Vu Hoang Anh Dung, who is nine years old and a student of Phan Chu Trinh Secondary School, said she liked the scientific education methods of Japanese mothers, especially the way they combined education with sport and entertaining, from Origami paper folding to the tactical game which helped children exercise their patience, ingenuity and thinking ability.

Le Minh Hoang, 10 years old, a student of Ngoc Khanh Secondary School, said he liked Dragon Balls story so much that he felt excited with the tactical game, while Vu ThanhTrung, 19 years old, shared that TCG was not as complicated as magic game and playing this game reminded him of the childhood.

Explaining the reason numerous Vietnamese young people like TCG, Miharu Tsuchiya, a representative of Showa Holdings (the parent company of Wedge Holdings) said they felt highly enthusiastic for Bandai’s newly-released game due to the effect of the famous Dragon Balls story.

Managing Director of Wedge Holdings Tatsuya Konoshita said he was surprised about the attention of Vietnamese youth to this game. TCG was popular in many countries and it gained a Guinness record with 22 billion of published cards. However, in Vietnam, the company just introduced this game in the framework of the Vietnam-Japan Cultural Exchange Festival in order to help young people study about Japanese culture, as well as assist TCG producers to survey the Vietnamese market.

“Currently, the company has not planned to distribute the tactical game in Vietnam. But in the near future, we will survey the distribution plan in the market to respond the belief of young people,” he added.

Vietnam has not had any company officially licensed to distribute products of Japanese game companies. Customers mainly buy the products through handling or Chinese fake products. Hopefully, TCG will soon be distributed in Vietnam, helping the country’s youth have another channel to select good sporting products from Japan./.

VNF