Archive for the ‘Analysis & Editorial’ Category

Content MVNO Helio still negative

July 21st, 2006 by Arjan Olsder Posted in Analysis & Editorial | No Comments »

Helio, the would be competitor for Amp’d Mobile in the US is estimated to still take huge losses according to MoCoNews. Earthlink announced it’s shares in Helio made a $ 13.3 Mln loss. With SK Telecom on the other end of the VC, the loss is expected at $ 20 Mln. Total loss would be between $75 Mln and $ 85 Mln for the full year.

US Top 10 Publishers: May

July 17th, 2006 by Arjan Olsder Posted in Analysis & Editorial | No Comments »

M:Metrics announced their top 10 publishers for May 2006. Leading in the market is EA Mobile who swallows an amazing 32.2% of the market, followed by Gameloft at only 8.9%. Third place goes to Glu at 7.8% followed by Hands-On at the fourth spot with a 7.2% market share. Fifth is Namco at 6.3 followed by Oasys, Iplay, Konami, Gosub 60 and last in line is SkyZone.

Dutch gamers are 40% female

July 17th, 2006 by Arjan Olsder Posted in Analysis & Editorial | No Comments »

Hotspot Retail announced their research into the Dutch gamers. Okay, I have to say this article is not focused to much at mobile gamers, but still it’s interesting to see that under the console gamers, the average age is 26 and 40% of them are female. With our more recent post from Telephia showing within mobile games, 65% female density, we might see a turnover on console as well the coming years or at least a 50/50 situation.

EU Mobile Games Market, a view from the US

July 13th, 2006 by Arjan Olsder Posted in Analysis & Editorial | No Comments »

We can divide the global mobile games market in three main area’s. The US, Asia and the EU. In most publications we read and write about on the net, the US is the main point of focus. When my friend Steve Palley visited Amsterdam, between the drinks, we discussed a lot about the differences whereas the US market seems more basic. Steve has written an extensive story at Gamasutra about the differences which is a must read for anyone that is going to sell their games across oceans.

Women turn out to be our primary consumer

June 29th, 2006 by Arjan Olsder Posted in Analysis & Editorial | 6 Comments »

In their most recent report, Telephia announced that after years of male dominance, women finally take the lead when it comes to purchasing mobile games. According to their U.S. focused study, the women take up 65% of the mobile games revenue. The main focus for female mobile game players is the puzzle and strategy categories. In total, Telephia reported there is only one category that receives more attention from men than women and that’s the action and adventure one. These numbers are in total contradiction to reports published in the past years where women where clearly the minority in the mobile game consumer market. Also it shows that just like the normal gaming market, girls are interested in normal and casual games meaning their focus is not really aimed at girl themes ones.

Asia makes 38% of the downloads

June 26th, 2006 by Arjan Olsder Posted in Analysis & Editorial | No Comments »

Juniper Research announced the Asia Pacific region is and will remain the biggest in the total number of downloads in the mobile games area. Juniper expects the worldwide sales for this year to pass the $ 3 billion mark and expect a growth to $17.5 billion by 2011.

The Asia pacific is leading the revenues by generating 38% of them. The main driver for this would be the low price level per mobile game. The numbers two and three in the list in respective order are Europe, 31% and North America with 22%.

Ashu Mathura on mobile advergaming; free games anyone?

August 9th, 2004 by Ashu Mathura Posted in Ad Funded Gaming, Analysis & Editorial | 6 Comments »

Can we convince consumers to pay money for advertisement driven games?

The business of video games for mobile phones must be one of the most dynamic and fast paced industries in the world today. New phones are hitting the shelves faster and faster. Phones are becoming more and more powerful by the month. Innovative technologies like 3D and multiplayer games are pushed into the hands of end consumers. Mobile game development studios are working on steroids to develop better, bigger and more complex video games (and yes, we at Overloaded are very proud that our latest game “Xyanide” has received The Mobile Gaming Award: “This is one of the best games for mobile phones so far” by Midlet Review). But in the midst of this all a new trend is emerging; free mobile video games.

In today’s world end consumers are bombarded with hundreds of marketing messages each hour. Finding ways to connect to end consumers and create awareness is becoming increasingly critical and more difficult for high profile brands like Coca-Cola, Suzuki, BMW and Heineken. Traditional mass marketing (TV / radio / print) campaigns seem to have less effect every year and consumer preferences are even more difficult to predict and influence.

Clever brand marketers are finding in mobile games a new way to reach the young people who are ever more stubbornly ignoring their sales pitches. As more consumers have game capable mobile phones, the potential for advergaming and thus free sponsored games is huge.

For brand marketers there could be a number of good reasons to deploy a sponsored mobile game. First and most obvious is to create awareness for a brand. Second is to introduce a (new) product or service in a way that involves and entertains the consumer and interacts with the actual product. Third is to educate consumers in an entertaining way about the product features and way of usage. Any combination of these reasons is also possible.

Creating awareness for a brand sounds easier than it actually is. Consumers are not easily fooled and today it is simply not enough to recreate Frogger or Pac-Man and simply put your logo on top of it. Coca-Cola for example is by no means linked to Tetris or Arkanoid and consumers will simply have a negative experience if brands chose to do so. Creativity and understanding the brand values become very relevant skills for game development studios to understand and apply.

Currently many mobile games released are focused on console gamers or at least are inspired on console games. Think about the Ubisoft, Atari, Sega, Namco, Capcom and Microsoft games that are heavily pushed by operators worldwide. In contrast, brand marketers are focussing on the casual gamers instead. Casual gamers tend to like games that are quick to learn and have a relative short playtime per game, typical 5

Elliot de la Valiere on the rise of the Russian machines

August 5th, 2004 by Ashu Mathura Posted in Analysis & Editorial, Trends | 3 Comments »

Today more and more companies chose to oursource their (mobile) game development to other countries in the world. Typically Russia, China and India come to mind. Also at Overloaded I get a lot of emails (daily) from companies offering these services. Recently Elliot de la Valiere send me his views and insights on what is happening and gave me permission to share this with the rest of the world. Have fun reading it, Ashu

U.S. and Japanese game publishers, (who fund and distribute video games) are dominating the world’s market of gaming consumers, which now stands at around $14 billion in sales. California game developers are currently the major producers of the games. 30% of all of this money currently goes to Electronic Arts, the world’s biggest game publisher and the video game maker behind popular games such as Harry Potter and the Sims.

However, outsourcing of video-game production is starting to be done in places like China, India, and Russia & Ukraine. The part of a video game that is easiest to outsource is the art.
The part of the development process that is the most difficult to outsource, or to offshore,
is the actual programming and design of the interaction and characters in the game; these tend to be done in-house because they require frequent and dynamic specification adjustment, which requires close supervision.

Electronic Arts, is still not using any foreign game development firms, but Activision (U.S. #2) is already starting to consider Russian game development firms, and the French game publisher Ubi Soft has opened two studios for developing games in China.

The main players have confusing arrangements in the gaming industry. Usually independent game development firms work together with a game publisher (example Epic Games & id Software). While the game publisher funds, markets and distributes the final game. But often game publishers vertically integrate, by buying or creating their own development firms, and work as one unit.

Example 1, Electronic Arts, a game publisher, purchased Criterion Software Group, the UK-based game developer of Burnout driving game.

Example 2, Microsoft is a game publisher, who also owns the Bungie game development firm, and funds, develops and markets the game Halo. (Ditto for Sega’s Sonic Team and Infogrames, which own game development firms.)

Lastly, some independent game development firms also act as game publishers for their own games. Blizzard Entertainment is a game developer that also internally finances the marketing and distribution of its games without having to work with big publishers like Infogrames or Electronic Arts.

Russian and Ukrainian game development firms are starting to emerge onto the world market. Two of the most successful Russian firms are Akella(developed “Sea Dogs” the “Pirates of the Caribbean”/for Disney) and Nival Interactive, (created the World War II strategy game “Blitzkrieg.”) Both sold hundreds of thousands of copies in Europe and North America.

Other Russian game development firms are:
– Turbine Entertainment /Middle Earth Online, which created Orcs.
– K-D LAB, which developed the strategy game “Perimeter”, which was, in turn, marketed and distributed by 1C, winning “Best PC Game” and “Best Game Design” at the 2004 Russian Game Developers Conference.
– Lesta Studio, which developed “The Entente: World War I Battlefields”.
– Target, which developed “Battle Mages”.
– Ukrainian development firm, GSC Game World, created “STALKER: Shadow of Chernobyl”.

Russian game development firms promote and sell their games to foreign game publishers, such as Activision. But they also sell their games to Russian game publishers, such as 1C, which is Russia’s #1 game publisher and Buka Entertainment.

Another Russian game development firm, PlayMobile, specialises in mobile gaming. PlayMobile makes games for Nokia and Siemens mobile phones.

Some Russian game development firms are not happy about being forced to work only through game publishers if they want to get their game out to the retail stores. Earlier this year, the game development firm, Gaijin Entertainment, based in Moscow, developed “Flight of Fantasy,” and won an award for best game without a publisher.

By Elliot de la Valiere
Owner of Dutch-Based La Valiere Systems