作者：Jim Squires

我不久前突然想到Chillingo这家游戏公司时，内心一阵难过。至少在我眼中，Chillingo曾经是游戏质量的代名词。曾几何时，只要Chillingo的游戏出现在App Store中，那就是一件让人欣喜的好事。但是随着这家公司知名度似乎已经超过了游戏质量。这是一场关于质量与数量的较量，或者更精确地来讲，比起质量，他们现在更加看重游戏数量了。

细数Chillingo所发行的所有iOS游戏，以及旗下Clickgamer.com上包括简化版和HD版本，以及那些已经被移除的游戏，他们推向App Store的游戏数量为481款。这着实是个让人惊讶的数量。就算是Gameloft发行的游戏总量也只有255款，而Chillingo母公司EA才180款。换个说法，Chillingo发行的游戏数量甚至超过于Gameloft和EA之和。

当然了，如果你身处于游戏产业，也许你不会对这个数据感到惊讶。我几乎每个星期都会收到告知Chillingo推出新游戏的邮件，事实上，假如我没收到这种邮件，我很可能会先打电话问谷歌我的Gmail邮箱是不是出问题了，然后才会联系Chillingo。

看到这里，你明白我的意思了吗？Chillingo发行的游戏真多。

chillingo_games(from appadvice)

但是它过去却不是这样做的。就像《愤怒的小鸟》和《割绳子》之所以能够大放异彩是因为它们并未迷失在Chillingo发布的其他大量游戏之中。因此它们才有机会崭露头角，从而也让Chillingo成了高质量游戏的标志。但是现在，Chillingo的游戏却很难“游出海洋爬向沙滩”了。

以《Dream Track Nation》或者《Quiz Climber》为例。这是两款非常优秀的游戏，如果处理得当，它们便能够双双成为App Store的常青树。但由于与Chillingo的其他游戏扎推发行，现在它们就只能够埋没于Chillingo众多游戏发行清单里了。《Quiz Climber》甚至都不再提供下载服务了。

但是这并不是意味着Chillingo游戏已经挤不进前10名榜单了。像《Contre Jour》，《DrawRace 2》以及《Feed Me Oil》都证明了自己的实力；但是现在对Chillingo这种资深发行商来说，比起我们所期望的筛选高质量游戏的运营模式，他们更倾向于“一下子发行无数游戏，并观察哪一款游戏最有潜力”这种模式。

我并不是说Chillingo的游戏不好，作为一名游戏编辑，我们必须确保自己能够第一时间了解Chillingo发行的游戏，因为我们必须知道他们所发行的游戏是否值得我们对此进行报道。但现在却并非如此。

相比之下，现在有许多小型游戏发行商每年都会发行少数几款iOS游戏，但是他们每次的行动却都是值得我们进一步观察和报道。以游戏发行商Crescent Moon Games为例。他们在App Store中只有6款游戏，分别是《Pocket RPG》，《Gears》，《Aralon: Sword and Shadow》，《Rimelands: Hammer of Thor》，《Deadlock: Online》以及《Siegecraft》。我们对这6款游戏都进行了评价。因为我们知道无论游戏好坏，发行商都为其设定了一套标准，让我们能够轻松地判别它们的价值。每当Crescent Moon即将发行一款游戏之前我们总是充满了期待，认为这将会是一款优秀的游戏。因为我们知道，作为开发商，他们不仅需要与发行商合作创造出游戏的价值，同时他们也希望能够借此赚钱，所以他们会多花点时间去思考如何才能制作出好游戏。

这么做是否只是一种无用功？但是不管怎样，这都是这些公司努力去获取成功而做出的努力，并且也是像Crescent Moon Games这种小公司希望营造出的一种氛围。

也许你会认为我是在对Chillingo挑刺，但是不可否认的是他们在这方面的表现最为明显。但是其他大品牌如EA也犯了相同的错误。例如《Trivial Pursuit》是一款大制作的游戏，但是你们有多少人知道他们上周在iPad上发行了《Trivial Pursuit: Master Edition》？知道的人肯定很少吧。另外，当Halfbrick在发行上两款游戏《水果忍者：穿靴子的猫》以及《火箭飞人》时。又有多少人知晓呢？相信多数人都听说了这个消息。

我们很难忽视的一个现实是，数量并不是导致开发者失去名誉的唯一原因。即使你的游戏拥有特色，但是如果它们不够优秀，不能博得玩家的好感，那么当你再发行一款新游戏时，玩家们也不会想主动尝试游戏了。手机社交游戏中有许多很典型的例子。就像是美国手机游戏公司Gameview Studios因为曾经不称职地发行了一些游戏，从而很难能够再留住玩家的注意力了。Capcom旗下工作室Beeline studio发行了一些大热游戏，如《Smurfs’ Village》以及《Monster Pet Shop》等，这让我们加倍关注他们今后的游戏发行动向。

但是话说回来，Gameview的《Tap Fish 2》最近又取得了不错的成绩。所以这意味着什么？

如果你在一个月之内就发行了5-10款新游戏，那么大众将会误认你只是一家游戏工厂。也许你每年会发行一些有利可图的游戏，可是一旦你的某一款游戏让公众感到反感，那必将对你的其它游戏以及你的名誉造成不好的影响，所以千万要对此加以警惕。我们真希望今天的那些小型游戏发行商能够尽可能地守住自己良好的声誉。（本文为游戏邦/gamerboom.com编译，拒绝任何不保留版权的转载，如需转载请联系：游戏邦）

Monday Morning Quarterback: Do smaller publishers have more credibility on the App Store?

By Jim Squires

I was thinking about Chillingo the other day, and I couldn’t help but feel a little sad. Chillingo, at least in my eyes, used to be a name that was synonymous with quality. There was a time when every game that they launched in the App Store was an event. But as they grew bigger and became more popular, it seems like they’ve outgrown that quality reputation that pushed them to the top in the first place. And it’s all about quantity versus quality – or more accurately, quantity versus the perception of quality.

When you combine all of the iOS releases of Chillingo and their Clickgamer.com brand, including lite versions and HD versions, as well as any games that have since been removed, the total number of downloads they’ve made available on the App Store is 481. That’s a staggering amount. To give you some perspective, Gameloft has only 255. And Chillingo’s parent company, Electronic Arts, has only 180. So to put it another way, that’s more than EA and Gameloft combined.

Of course, if you’re in the industry, these numbers probably don’t come as much of a shock. Not a week goes by where I don’t get an email letting me know about another two or three new Chillingo-published games that have hit the App Store. In fact if I didn’t get that e-mail, I’d probably be on the phone with Google to tell them my gmail is broken long before I contacted Chillingo.

Are you getting the picture yet? Chillingo releases a lot of games.

But it didn’t always used to be this way. Games like Angry Birds and Cut the Rope had a chance to shine because, when they were released, they weren’t lost in a sea of other releases from the same publisher. They had a chance to stand out, letting that Chillingo mark of quality shine. Now it’s simply too easy for a great game to get lost in the shuffle.

Just look at a game like Dream Track Nation, or even Quiz Climber. These are well-polished titles that, if handled differently, might have stood a chance of becoming perennial App Store favourites. But since they were lost in the shuffle, they’ve become little more than footnotes in Chillingo’s lengthy release calendar. Heck – Quiz Climber isn’t even available for download anymore.

That’s not to say that Chillingo releases don’t manage to crack the top 10. Games like Contre Jour, DrawRace 2, and Feed Me Oil have all proven that their games can still bring in the big bucks – but in releasing so many games, big publishers like Chillingo seem to be more in the “let’s throw a thousand games at the wall and see what sticks” business than in the business or curating great games, which is exactly what we’d hope a publisher would do.

I’m not saying that Chillingo games aren’t good – I’d argue quite the contrary, in fact. But there was a time when, as an editor, I made sure that we covered every Chillingo release because I knew in advance that simply being published by Chillingo made it worthy of coverage. That simply isn’t the case anymore.

By contrast, there are some smaller publishers out there that only put out a handful of iOS games each year, and every time they do, we know it will be worthy of a closer look. Take Crescent Moon Games, for example. As of this writing, they only have six games on the App Store: Pocket RPG, Gears, Aralon: Sword and Shadow, Rimelands: Hammer of Thor, Deadlock: Online, and Siegecraft. We’ve reviewed all six. Why? Because we know that, whether the games themselves turn out good or bad, there’s a certain standard they’ve set as a publisher that makes it easy to decide to cover them. We go into a Crescent Moon release with the expectation that it will be good. We know that, as a publisher, they’re not simply partnering with a developer to slap a label on the virtual box and hope to cash in – they’re taking the time to make sure they’re putting out the best possible products.

Do some of these games turn out to be duds? Sure. But that doesn’t mean that every possible effort to make them a success wasn’t made – and that’s the vibe a smaller company like Crescent Moon Games gives off.

It may feel like I’m picking on Chillingo unfairly here, but it’s simply that they’re the most visible offender. Other big brands like EA are guilty of it too. For example, Trivial Pursuit is a huge franchise, yet how many of you knew that the all new Trivial Pursuit: Master Edition hit the iPad last week? I’d bet none. On the flipside, how many of you knew about the last two releases from Halfbrick when they hit, Fruit: Ninja: Puss in Boots and Jetpack Joyride? All of you? Exactly.

And it would be hard to ignore the fact that quantity isn’t the only problem that can cause a developer to lose credibility. Even if you’re releases aren’t all that common, if your games aren’t good, nobody is going to get excited when you put a new one out. Social mobile gaming provides some great examples of this. Gameview Studios, for example, have turned out sub-par release after sub-par release, making it hard for them to stay on anybody’s radar. Capcom’s Beeline studio, however, has published top notch titles like Smurfs’ Village and Monster Pet Shop, making it an easy choice for us to want to keep an eye on whatever they’re working on next. (and right now, it’s a neat little game featuring Charlie Brown!)

But then again, Gameview’s Tap Fish 2 has been doing well in the charts for weeks now. So what do we know?

When you’re slamming out five or ten games a month, it’s hard for the public perception to see your brand as anything more than factory. It may be profitable to churn out dozens of games every year, but once you hit a certain point, it starts to do some damage to your reputation – warranted or not.

Let’s just hope some of the great small publishers of today don’t outgrow their good reputations too.（source:gamezebo）