Entertainment
Mary Kom’s superhero avatar on TV soon
New Delhi: The life journey of Olympian M.C. Mary Kom, showcased on the silver screen through the film “Mary Kom”, delivered a powerful punch. Now, the boxer is set to invade the small screen as a female superhero via an animation TV series called “Mary Kom Jr”.
The boxer has signed up a licensing deal with ScreenYug Creations Pvt Ltd, a creative studio based out of Pune, for India’s first girl superhero animation series. ScreenYug and Aditya Horizons will produce the series together, read a statement.
Mary Kom’s story of carving a name for herself in global boxing ring circuit has been inspiring, and with the series, Mary Kom plans to motivate girls to follow their dreams.
“I think it is time to take more responsibility for the girl child. I want girls to be confident and strong,” she said in a statement.
The animation series will also bring in a flavour of self-defence, and the boxer feels it is necessary to spread awareness.
“Parents are usually not keen on fighting games for their girl child, but with all the crime going around, their eyes are now open and this will help,” she said.
“Mary Kom Jr” is being produced by Ashish S. Kulkarni, and his team including Vikram Veturi (director), Sudip Banerjee and Aditya Bakshi (concept and story directors), JV Varaprasad (editor and music director), Rajesh Bhosale (line production) and anand pandey (production architect).
Kulkarni emphasised that though the story will be based on Mary Kom with Manipur in focus, they plan to include other characters for universal appeal.
“It is true that we are creating India’s first girl superhero animated series, which will be based on India’s own super sportstar Mary Kom. While we have a Manipuri tinge by capturing the fiction life of a young Mary Kom while in school, we will have other characters with a more neutral tone in order to appeal to the global audience,” Kulkarni said.
This licensing agreement will entitle Mary Kom to get royalties from the global sales of animation series, any merchandise, story books, e-books, games, comics and online distribution in the future.
ScreenYug Creations is currently working on the development of first-of-its-kind animation series on “War Heroes of India” and “Amazing Kids” apart from “Mary Kom Jr”.
Entertainment
Casino Days Reveal Internal Data on Most Popular Smartphones
International online casino Casino Days has published a report sharing their internal data on what types and brands of devices are used to play on the platform by users from the South Asian region.
Such aggregate data analyses allow the operator to optimise their website for the brands and models of devices people are actually using.
The insights gained through the research also help Casino Days tailor their services based on the better understanding of their clients and their needs.
Desktops and Tablets Lose the Battle vs Mobile
The primary data samples analysed by Casino Days reveal that mobile connections dominate the market in South Asia and are responsible for a whopping 96.6% of gaming sessions, while computers and tablets have negligible shares of 2.9% and 0.5% respectively.
The authors of the study point out that historically, playing online casino was exclusively done on computers, and attribute thе major shift to mobile that has unfolded over time to the wide spread of cheaper smartphones and mobile data plans in South Asia.
“Some of the reasons behind this massive difference in device type are affordability, technical advantages, as well as cheaper and more obtainable internet plans for mobiles than those for computers,” the researchers comment.
Xiaomi and Vivo Outperform Samsung, Apple Way Down in Rankings
Chinese brands Xiaomi and Vivo were used by 21.9% and 20.79% of Casino Days players from South Asia respectively, and together with the positioned in third place with a 18.1% share South Korean brand Samsung dominate the market among real money gamers in the region.
Cupertino, California-based Apple is way down in seventh with a user share of just 2.29%, overshadowed by Chinese brands Realme (11.43%), OPPO (11.23%), and OnePlus (4.07%).
Huawei is at the very bottom of the chart with a tiny share just below the single percent mark, trailing behind mobile devices by Motorola, Google, and Infinix.
The data on actual phone usage provided by Casino Days, even though limited to the gaming parts of the population of South Asia, paints a different picture from global statistics on smartphone shipments by vendors.
Apple and Samsung have been sharing the worldwide lead for over a decade, while current regional leader Xiaomi secured their third position globally just a couple of years ago.
Striking Android Dominance among South Asian Real Money Gaming Communities
The shifted market share patterns of the world’s top smartphone brands in South Asia observed by the Casino Days research paper reveal a striking dominance of Android devices at the expense of iOS-powered phones.
On the global level, Android enjoys a comfortable lead with a sizable 68.79% share which grows to nearly 79% when we look at the whole continent of Asia. The data on South Asian real money gaming communities suggests that Android’s dominance grows even higher and is north of the 90% mark.
Among the major factors behind these figures, the authors of the study point to the relative affordability of and greater availability of Android devices in the region, especially when manufactured locally in countries like India and Vietnam.
“And, with influencers and tech reviews putting emphasis on Android devices, the choice of mobile phone brand and OS becomes easy; Android has a much wider range of products and caters to the Asian online casino market in ways that Apple can’t due to technical limitations,” the researchers add.
The far better integration achieved by Google Pay compared to its counterpart Apple Pay has also played a crucial role in shaping the existing smartphone market trends.
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