在世界经济危机期间，Big Fish休闲游戏公司2009年总收入高达1亿美元。同比2005年，公司的年收入虽然仅为860万美元，但获得集资近8000万美元。2010年，据预计Big Fish的年收入将达到1亿3000万美元。通常来说，这一天文数字足以令Big Fish登上《纽约时报》头条，但今时不同往日，Zynga公司的横空出世改变了游戏市场局面。

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今年，社交游戏开发公司Zynga预计的年收入将突破5亿美元。此外，加上其最近发布的社交游戏CityVille和今年采取的各种全球拓展策略，相信该公司的未来发展绝对更加光明。

然而，休闲游戏公司Big Fish Game表示并不羡慕Zynga。在对Dean Takahashi的访问中，Big Fish公司首席执行官Jeremy Lewis表示自己的目标是注重发展休闲游戏和下载市场，他乐于见到Zynga携手Facebook勇闯社交领域。

目前，休闲游戏公司Big Fish主要关注以下两大趋势：

1，休闲游戏下载的主要用户人群（Baby Boomer一代）在美国和西欧市场最多，但就增长速度而言则次于南美和亚洲市场。

2，社交网站Facebook吸引了大量人群进入游戏领域。而当这部分人群厌倦社交游戏时，他们可能涌向休闲类下载游戏。

休闲游戏公司Big Fish和GameHouse, WildTangent, iPlay等休闲游戏下载网站都希望将自己打造成全球社交游戏“退役者”的最终目的地，希望玩家在厌倦社交游戏，放弃Facebook社交网站之后会尝试某些休闲游戏体验。

对此，Dean表示，“如果社交和手机游戏的增长要以牺牲休闲游戏为代价，那么Big Fish就麻烦了。然而Lewis（Big Fish CEO）坚信越来越多的人开始关注游戏，整个游戏市场还未呈现饱和状态。”

从Zynga旗下游戏玩家的数量可证明Facebook和社交游戏的确呈现上升趋势。然而，问题是Facebook究竟是从其他游戏市场偷取玩家，还是能促进整体游戏市场的壮大？

如果游戏市场还未饱和，那么不论Zynga，Big Fish等游戏公司专注与社交，下载还是iOS游戏，它们都能有空间继续发展成长。（本文为游戏邦/gamerboom.com编译，转载请注明来源：游戏邦）

What if you are a casual game company that earned $100 million in 2009, compared to $8.6 million in 2005 and that you have raised $80 million, all during a huge worldwide recession?

As part of the PR push around their international expansion into a total of 10 localized markets, Big Fish has revealed more details than ever before about their revenue numbers, even hinting that they could earn $130 million in revenues in 2010 (Forbes).

Normally, this would be New York Times headline territory, but these are not normal times, and it’s all because of a company called Zynga.

Zynga has been very open about it’s numbers. Zynga is projected to earn $500 million this year on social games. That’s $500 million, and with the upcoming launch of CityVille and their own global expansion, the actual number may end up much higher.

Yet, Big Fish Games does not have Zynga envy. In an interview with Dean Takahashi at Venture Beat, CEO Jeremy Lewis reveals his goal is to focus on casual games and the downloads market and let Zynga fight for social and deal with Facebook, who still controls the distribution.

Big Fish is betting on two trends:

* The baby boomer audience that casual game downloads appeals to, is growing to be the top demographic in the US and Western Europe (but not the fast growing South American and Asian markets, it should be noted).

* Facebook is exposing millions of people to playing games. As a portion of these people get bored of social games, they will gravitate to casual download games.

The goal of Big Fish Games and other casual game download sites like GameHouse, WildTangent, iPlay, and the like, is to position themselves as the destination globally as these new gamers get bored of social games and leave Facebook to try out other casual game experiences, such as downloads.

Dean has an interesting quote:

“If social and mobile game growth comes at the expense of casual downloadable games, Big Fish is in trouble. But [Big Fish Games CEO] Lewis believes that the popularity of games is expanding and that the environment is not yet a zero-sum game.”

Facebook and social games are definitely growing as evidenced by Zynga’s numbers. The question is whether Facebook is stealing gamers from other markets (downloads) or making the pie bigger for all?

If casual is not a zero-sum game, there is more than enough room for Zynga, Big Fish Games, and a number of other game companies to succeed in the casual games market regardless of whether they focus on social, download, iOS games, or all of the above. （Source：gamezebo）