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Zenith Optimedia
andrew reeves
Christophe Eymery
Phil Zohrab
weetchus
More companies buy into the social gaming space
- November 2009 - EA games acquires Playfish for approximately US$300 million. This would provide them with a robust gaming app library such as Pet Society and Restaurant City across platforms such as Facebook, myspace, Bebo, Android, and iPhone.
- May 2010 - Zynga (Farmville, Mafia Wars) and Facebook negotiate strategic terms on "facebook credits" as a form of currency across their suite of games. They have settled on a 5 year agreement.
- July 2010 - Google invests US$100 million in Zynga
- July 2010 - Disney acquires Playdom for approximately US$563 million, the largest amount of money paid so far for a social gaming company.
- August 2010 - Google buys Slide for just over US$200 million.
This is not surprising, given the above figures from eMarketer. Social gaming revenues are quickly becoming a big blip on the profitability radar. It rose from just US$76 million in 2008 to US$639 million the year after. Revenues for 2010 are expected to grow by 29%. Advertisers are definitely realising this huge growth in the social gaming space; advertising spend in social games could top US$220 million globally this year.
Barclays launches a free money management game aimed at teens
Barclays bank in the UK launched a viral online money management game a few days ago, called 56 Sage Street.
Aimed at a younger audience, the game focuses on challenging the player by offering various in game jobs. Players then progress through their 'career', improve their reputation and appearance, and eventually get the better paid jobs. However, players need to make careful decisions, as there is an opportunity cost when declining one job in lieu of another. Thieves and loan sharks will also attempt to trick the player into giving away their hard earned money. The world in 56 Sage Street is complex for what it is, offering over 100 interactive hot spots for the player to explore.
56 Sage Street draws on proven formulas for gameplay, siphoning features from these successful games
- The Sims User interface is very similar to actual gameplay in The Sims.
- Foursquare Unlocking certain achievements, and being able to share it with friends via social media.
- Guitar Hero Keyboard is used to play a guitar hero style mini game in certain levels.
Users don't have to create a new username and password in order to play the game. The whole signing up process is streamlined by using one's Facebook login details.
Game milestones can then also be shared via Facebook, and also Twitter.
So, how much would this game have cost to develop? An estimated £200,000.
Gaming and Brand Experience
Gamers are defined by the games they play. For example, the DOTA brand identity is so strong that people who play DOTA call themselves “DOTA players” rather than Warcraft 3 gamers.
Blizzard (publisher of Warcraft, and World of Warcraft) traditionally had a hands off approach when it comes to maintaining their communities and user created mods. DOTA got so popular that the creators of this Warcraft 3 mod went on to independently develop League of Legends, which consequently won the IGN Gamer’s choice award 2009. This resulted in loss of revenue, gaming audience and branding opportunities for Blizzard.
Despite this, WoW is still more popular than DOTA due to the following reasons:
WoW facilitates the social experience a lot better than DOTA.
This is the crux of why WoW is a lot more successful than DOTA. Although all online gaming is inherently social, the DOTA gamer is largely a player who games as an individual within a team. There is a lack of shared interests apart from the goal of defeating the other team’s Ancients. The WoW gamer, however, truly plays as part of a guild, where members have different responsibilities and a strong idea of what is appropriate behavior and what is not. In addition, the very nature of gaming on WoW is social. People meet new friends, and catch up with old ones while completing quests and trading items during an auction. To a certain extent, DOTA is not able to provide that environment.
For WoW, the actual online experience defines the brand.
This is the most influential interaction a gamer has with the brand, and also sets up user expectations for all other interactions. The ceasing of user generated maps, items and hacked goods on WoW help contribute to a consistent brand message to users. This in turn will generate a huge demand for publisher created content, as demonstrated by the phenomenal sales of the WoW expansion pack Wrath of the Lich King. On the other hand, due to the lack of regular new content on WoW, content on the expansion pack was expended within a couple of days with quite a number of guilds. Despite this, WoW gamers still game regularly and identify themselves as WoW gamers because their experiences online contributes to their emotional currency and brand experience.
