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进军手机游戏市场,Spil Games推崇HTML5技术

发布时间:2011-01-17 18:34:32 Tags:,,

在最近召开的上海Go Android会议上,许多游戏开发商和投资商纷纷看好Android平台,但Spil Games公司却绕过了Android平台的诸多技术局限,将目光转向了新兴的HTML5。

HTML5

HTML5

面向广大用户的HTML5技术

Spil Games公司旗下拥有47家游戏门户网站,可谓是世界上流量最高的休闲游戏开发公司,它的游戏生产和发行总部都在中国。

Spil公司早期开发过一款iPhone游戏,并有意进军其他手机平台,但却发现不同手机平台的技术标准不一(Android平台尤其如此),针对多款手机开发游戏十分耗时而且麻烦。不过Safari,Chrome和火狐等手机浏览器都能支持HTML5技术,所以该公司从这方面入手,重新进军手机游戏市场。

不过Spil Games的亚洲首席运营总监陈琦却指出,开发基于HTML5的游戏仍面临两大难题。首先是人才缺乏,HTML5属于新兴技术,擅长此道的人才更是少数,在中国市场就更不用说了。印度尼西亚的智能手机覆盖率根本难以满足手机游戏市场的发展需求,而澳大利亚这个主要目标市场却有超过半数的用户持有iPhone。

其二,中国的一大主流手机浏览器UCweb并不支持HTML5技术。据游戏邦了解,Spil Games在中国推出了一个手机游戏门户网站youxi.com,支持玩家在该网站上体验几款简单的休闲游戏,其中就包括备受日本用户好评的《Bubble Hit》(游戏邦注:该游戏是Mixi社交网站上的智能手机应用冠军),但Android用户可以体验的游戏数量却极其有限。

HTML5能否超越传统手机系统?

在HTML5声名鹊起的同时,也有部分人担心该技术的发展将长期落后于Android或iOS等传统手机操作系统。对此,Gartner公司副总裁尼克·琼斯(Nick Jones)也表示:

“HTML5较上一代网页技术更能兼容多种的应用形式,所以传统手机操作系统的重要性将有所降低。但传统手机平台却能通过快速的发展,在许多方面超越HTML5。因此尽管HTML5技术十分重要,但传统手机平台仍将保持一定的优势。而且传统手机平台运营商也希望它们保持这种优势。”

据游戏邦了解,Spil Games旗下的产品主要是Flash游戏,但许多手机用户根本无法体验这类游戏(超过半数用户试图用iPhone玩这些游戏,但众所周知,苹果并不支持Flash)。在这种情况下,Spil Games不得不另找出路,以适应不断加剧的手机游戏市场竞争。

当前Spil旗下所有游戏均为免费产品,因为该公司希望先积累用户基础,然后才考虑游戏营收问题,他们主要通过现有的门户网站、社交网站对手机游戏进行推广。

中国制造,世界推广

xiaoyouxi.com

xiaoyouxi.com

据游戏邦了解,Spil Games目前在中国上海设有一家工作室,另外还有一家内部游戏开发工作室Zlong Games(臻龙游戏)。其中Zlong Games可谓是中国最大的Flash工作室,每周都会出产一两款新游戏,仅去年10月该工作室的游戏访问量就超过了1亿次。

Spil Games用19中不同的语言通过47家游戏门户网站发布了多款休闲游戏。每个网站的游戏都进行了本土化处理,如游戏内容,语言和域名等。从2004年起,Spil Games还开发了以家庭,青少年和儿童为主题的游戏。该公司在中国的休闲游戏主要发布在Game.com.cn和Xiaoyouxi.com这两个网站。(本文为游戏邦/gamerboom.com编译,转载请注明来源:游戏邦)

The Go Android conference in Shanghai turned out a horde of developers and investors who are gung-ho about the native Android platform. But Spil Games is betting on a technology that largely bypasses Android OS requirements: HTML5.

Spil Games is the world’s largest casual game company by traffic across its 47 portals worldwide. It both produces and publishes in China.

Spil had earlier built an iPhone game and was perhaps considering developing apps for several different mobile operating systems, but found developing for different platforms to be challenging and time-consuming (particularly for more fractured Android standards). The Safari, Chrome, and Firefox mobile browsers all support HTML5.

Still, HMTL5 presents its own challenges. According to Spil Games Asia COO Chen Qi, the two biggest are finding talented developers since HTML5 is a relatively new technology, especially in China, and understanding market conditions. In Indonesia, smartphone adoption is insufficient to support a mobile games market while Australia, where roughly half of users are on iOS (iPhone), is a prime target.

In China, UCWeb, one of the top mobile browsers, does not yet support HMTL5. Still, Spil Games has launched a mobile games portal called youxi.cn, where users can enjoy a few simple casual games. One of those games, Bubble Hit, has done very well in Japan (#1 among smartphone apps on the Mixi social network according to Spil), where Android users otherwise have limited options.
The Lowest Common Denominator?

There’s also concern that HTML5 will always lag behind native platforms like Android OS and iOS in sophistication. In an astute analysis, Nick Jones, VP at Gartner, writes:

Native platforms will certainly become less important relative to the web platform because HTML5 supports a wider range of applications than the last-generation web. But native platforms can stay ahead by evolving faster than HTML5, and in different directions to HTML5, it’s not hard to outrun a snail driven by a committee.

So although HTML5 will be important the native platform will retain a big edge if you want to develop clever apps. And the native platform owners want it to stay that way.

Nonetheless, the current arrangement is no less of a problem for Spil Games. Most of its games are Flash, which fails for most of the mobile users who come to its site (over half try via iPhone which doesn’t support Flash at all). Spil clearly had to adopt a new standard to compete in the growing mobile games space.

For now, all of Spil’s mobile games are free. The strategy is to grow the mobile user base first, monetize later. Mobile games are being promoted primarily via Spil’s existing portals and social networks.
Made in China, Published Worldwide

Spil Games has one studio in Shanghai and an additional in-house game development studio, Zlong games. Spil Games Asia CEO Marc van der Chijs writes, “This is probably the biggest flash studio in China, with an output of 1-2 new games per week.“ That studio’s games were played over 100 million times in October.

Spil Games publishes casual games across 47 game portals in 19 languages: “Each site is fully localized for its territories, including its game content, language, and domain name. Since 2004, we’ve created game experiences for families, teens, and kids.” In China, casual games are published on Game.com.cn and Xiaoyouxi.com.(Source:techrice)


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