Shift Up DownIt's not just Japan: NC Soft, Nexon and Shift Up down as market anxieties rout the games industryAs markets opened in South Korea, the video game industry was hit. Hard.Image credit: Shift Up News by Connor Makar Staff Writer Published on April 7, 2025 The South Korean stock market took a serious blow as markets opened this morning, and as the trading day came to a close - around an hour ago as of writing - it's clear the video game industry hasn't been spared from significant loss in stock value. Companies like Nexon, Shift Up, NC Soft and more have all been hit.This comes following a wave of US tariffs across all products from various countries. South Korea must now deal with a 25% tariff, making it more expensive for US companies and individuals to import goods from South Korea. However for the video game sector the wider impact on global tech imports into America, and the speculated cost increase for hardware these games are played on, may be a larger factor.To see this content please enable targeting cookies. Some of the largest South Korean video game companies have seen stocks decrease sharply as of writing, including:Nexon | -5.20%NCSoft | -7.25%Kakao Games | -3.79%Netmarble | -5.04%Pearl Abyss | -7.66%Com2uS | -4.96%ShiftUp | -5.44%This comes at a time when the South Korean video game market was doing rather well! Not only was the mobile sector continuing to grow thanks in part due to popular games like Godess of Victory: Nikke, but also there was a real desire to expand into the AAA console/PC space, a movement kicked off by releases like Stellar Blade and Lies of P. So this really couldn't have come at a worse time for those developers looking to expand into larger, more costly types of video games.Whether or not this downward trend continues is up in the air at the moment, but it's something we're seeing across the industry worldwide, including Japan which ended its first trading day post-trading with serious loses in the gaming sector as well. But, if there is a recession in America and beyond, how big of an impact will that have on the South Korean video game market is the big question. Games like Godess of Victory Nikke, heavy on microtransactions, may very well suffer in an economy where people have less to spend on luxuries. Or maybe its free-to-play model will carry it through to safety.Time will tell whether the South Korean video game industry's stock will recover in the coming weeks, but given ongoing trade tensions, it's looking like a rough period for the short term at least.