专业人士认为，新兴科技公司将引领游戏行业的变革，使其运营模式转向数字下载渠道，并通过向成功的社交游戏公司取经以获得进一步发展。

本周在都柏林举办的游戏行业大会将重点讲座游戏行业的变化及其未来发展潜力，通过回顾游戏媒介在过去五年中的转变，探索未来五年可能影响这一行业的重要趋势和技术。

游戏行业格局在最近几年确实发生了不少变化，几乎没有人可以预见社交游戏的兴起，但这种新兴游戏确实为开发商创造了打破传统运营模式的大量机遇。

Mustard Corporation（游戏邦注：该公司专为游戏创建故事情节及其他内容）联合创始人Marek Walton表示，整个游戏设计和开发过程已发生一种需要不断重新定义的无形巨变，尽管如此我们还是得时时探索灵活应对这一变化的策略。

这种变化不只是发生在游戏领域，在最近几年，用户已形成了通过数字下载渠道获取音乐、书籍或视频内容的消费习惯。但实体媒介行业也不会就此消声匿迹，还是有不少巨头公司乐于保持现状。

但无论这些知名企业有何对策，它们都无法回避这种变化。它们的应对手段并不只是简单增加数字销售渠道，并继续维持一手交钱，一手交货的销售模式。

游戏运营博客Gamesbrief创始人Nicholas Lovell的看法是，”从初级层面来看，假如你不再发售实体包装游戏产品，你就可以省下零售环节的包装和制造成本，但这并不等同于转变运营模式。这只能说我们还是在做过去的事情，只是成本更为低廉了。但运营成功的公司将把网络和数字渠道看成是一个如何将免费内容发放给更多用户的首要考虑途径，实现这种做法后，它们的下一步就是找到从其中一些用户身上赚钱的方法。这是一种完全不同的概念，它意味着每一名用户对你的价值都有所不同，有些价值很低，有些则价值惊人。”

top-ten-facebook-games-2010

在这一点上，社交游戏公司的做法最为典型。据Facebook最近统计数据显示，约40%的用户每个月至少在该网站玩一款游戏。

Walton认为社交游戏领域充满大量淘金机遇，“许多人都乐于谈论视频游戏的暴利特征，并称开发游戏实际上比制作电影更赚钱。但由于游戏行业转向了数字渠道，所以有些游戏领域的收益已开始缩水，例如实体包装游戏的销量就处于下滑趋势，社交游戏营收却正在不断攀升。”

游戏市场不少新晋选手的精明运营模式，的确很值得大型游戏公司学习和借鉴，但即使是先进的数字渠道，也还是会遭到大型传统游戏公司和零售商的抵触，因为它们正是现存运营模式的既得利益者。

在Lovell看来，“它们已经习惯了这种过去一直很管用的运营模式，但我不认为这种模式还会持续奏效，有一些公司还会从中获得生存空间，但这仅限于少数公司。”

传统游戏公司在一定程度上得改变对自己产品及其价值的看法，找到产品对用户的利益点，用户对游戏的付费意愿，而不只是单纯依赖针对内容获取渠道收费的运营模式。

Entropia-virtual-space-station

Walton称他觉得现在的游戏玩家想法很“古怪”，有点难以捉摸，玩家对游戏价值的定义很让人好奇，他举了一个极端的例子来说明这一点，在线游戏《Entropia》的虚拟太空站在几年前的售价曾高达10万美元，后来又售出了63.5万美元的天价。而较为普遍的例子就是《魔兽世界》中的游戏道具转手交易。

假如传统游戏也能挖掘这一市场潜力，它们就有望使其运营模式更具灵活性和生命力。

不过索尼娱乐在线网络最近被黑的消息，很有可能让用户更为谨慎地对待数字下载渠道。索尼最近承认PlayStation Network和Qriocity服务的7700万用户数据资料被黑客窃取，虽然用户的信用卡信息已被加密，但据该公司所称，用户姓名、帐单地址、出生日期和其他重要的隐私信息却并没有设置这道防线。

但Lovell称他不认为此事会对整个行业形成重大打击，但它可能会严重损害索尼的品牌形象，“我认为它只是一种减速而不是彻底脱轨，它可能会影响游戏行业向数字渠道转型的进程，因为用户从此会更为谨慎地将信用卡或个人信息上传到不同系统中。信用号帐号在黑市交易中非常廉价，但个人姓名、出生日期、父母姓名等完整的个人资料却很有价值，因为这些信息对任何人来说都更为重要。我认为人人都很在乎信用卡，也非常容易更换信用卡，但更改姓名、出生日期却并非易事，这些信息如果误入犯罪分子之手，后果不堪设想 。”

问题的关键就在于，数字下载渠道的便利性究竟能否成功说服用户改变消费行为，重塑大型公司调整发展策略。（本文为游戏邦/gamerboom.com编译，转载请注明来源：游戏邦）

Why social network firms are way ahead of the game

A conference next week will try to find out what the future holds for the gaming industry

NEW TECHNOLOGY companies will lead the way in transforming the games industry, driving the shift to digital downloads for gaming and learning from successful social gaming companies, experts have said.

The change in the industry and its future potential will be discussed at a conference in Dublin next week.

The Mash conference will look at the change in media over the past five years, and try to identify the trends and technologies that will influence the coming five years.

The games industry has seen much change in recent years. Few would have predicted the growth of social gaming, but it has become enormously successful and offers developers the chance to break out of traditional business models.

“The whole universe of games design and games development is a massive shifting amorphous one that really requires constant definition, but also we really need to explore how we need to be flexible about that,” says Marek Walton, co founder of the Mustard Corporation, which creates storylines and other content for games.

And it’s not just in gaming. In the past few years, consumers have become accustomed to digital downloads, whether it is for music, books or video. However, the physical media industry has not yet disappeared, with several parties interested in keeping the status quo.

But it seems more change is coming, whether the established companies like it or not. It’s not just about shifting to digital distribution and continuing to charge large amounts of money for titles on a once-off basis.

“At a basic level if you don’t need to ship discs then you save money in retailer packaging and manufacturing. But that’s not changing business models. That’s simply saying we can do what we used to do, just a little bit cheaper,” explains Nicholas Lovell, founder of Gamesbrief, a blog covering the business of games.

“The successful companies will start looking at the internet and digital distribution as a way first of all of asking how they can get content for free into the hands of as many people as possible, and then, having done that, how they can charge some of those people enough money to make it cost-effective to have made the content in the first place. That’s a very different way of thinking. It means instead of every customer being of roughly the same value to you, some are very little and others are worth enormous amounts.”

Social gaming firms are obviously doing something right. According to Facebook’s last count, some 40 per cent of members play at least one game on the site every month.

There is a great deal of money to be made in the social gaming arena, Walton says.

“There’s always a lot of talk about how video games are making a great deal of money and people often wheel out the fact that games make more money than movies these days. However, in some areas it’s contracting – because of the shift to digital, for example,” he says.

“Boxed product sales, for example, are on the decrease. Social gaming revenue, however, is on the increase. There’s a lesson to explore about distribution and also where to be putting your money and development funds.”

There is much for businesses to learn from new firms entering the market, many of which are more nimble and find it easier to adapt to change than their larger, more established rivals.

But even the movement towards digital distribution is facing resistance on a number of fronts, from both big companies and retailers, both of whom benefit from retaining the current business model.

“They have a business model that has historically worked. I don’t think it’s going to continue working,” Lovell says. “There will be some space for a few companies but nowhere near as many as there were.”

Companies will have to change how they view their product and its value to a certain extent, finding out what is of value to consumers and how much they are willing to pay for it, rather than relying simply on charging for access to content.

Walton works on the idea that gamers, to a certain extent, are “weird”.

“One of the things that fascinates me is what gamers put value in,” he says. He cites the extreme example of a virtual space station for online game Entropia, which sold for $100,000 several years ago. It subsequently sold for $635,000. Less extreme would be games such as World of Warcraft, where game items change hands for cash.

If businesses can tap into this, they could adapt their business model to something more flexible and up to date.

However, the recent breach at Sony’s online networks may cause consumers to pause for thought before opting for digital downloads in future. The company recently admitted that details of its 77 million customers on its PlayStation Network and Qriocity services may have been accessed in a data breach. Although credit card details were encrypted, Sony said data such as name, billing address, date of birth and other important security questions were not.

However, Lovell does not think this will spell bad news for the industry as a whole, although it may be damaging to the Sony brand. “I think it’s a speed bump, it’s not a derailment. It may well slow down some of the pace of moving to digital distribution as consumers are a little bit more nervous about putting their credit cards or personal details on to different systems,” he said.

“Credit cards are actually very cheap on the black market. A full profile – your name, address date of birth, parents’ names, mother’s maiden name – that’s worth a lot more because there’s a lot more you can do with it.

“I think a lot of people have been very focused on the credit card, which are the easiest thing to change. You can’t change your name, date of birth or mother’s maiden name. Once it’s out in the criminal fraternity, it’s hard to get it back.”

The question is if the benefits of digital downloads will be able to persuade both consumers and the larger firms that it is worth changing their behaviour.（source:irishtimes）