1）日本社交平台GREE首席执行官Yoshikazu Tanaka最近宣布，今年6月至10月份，公司在智能手机平台的销售额增长655%。

该平台第一方RPG游戏《doliland》每月虚拟商品销售额达20亿日元（约合2600万美元），这款游戏目前在日本iTunes应用商店营收榜单上名列前茅。

doliland(from serkantoto)

2）CrowdStar首席营销官Peter Relan在最近的媒体采访中表示中，Mark Pincus要实现其上周所称的Zynga付费用户将在IPO之后双倍增长需满足两个条件：Zynga每月用户增长至3亿（Facebook全球用户正逐渐接近10亿），或者当前用户付费比例提高至4%-5%。

Peter Relan(from games)

Relan称让30%的Facebook用户成为Zynga游戏玩家是完全有可能的事情，但游戏盈利方式可能会发生转变，广告将成为社交游戏的重要营收来源，因为随着时间的发展，用户付费的意愿将会越来越低，但开发商可通过广告途径创收。

他认为Zynga之前估值200亿美元有点可疑，目前的60-90亿美元显然较为合理。不过Zynga已经是美国社交游戏市场一枝独秀的开发商，只要Facebook不倒，其他公司就难以撼动Zynga的霸主地位。

3）据CE Gamers报道，Zynga即将推出一项新服务“Zynga推荐好友”（Zynga Recommended Friends），支持开发商根据玩家的游戏等级、共同好友等信息，向用户推荐游戏好友（无论对方是否已在用户Facebook好友名单中）。

zynga-recommend-neighbors(from games)

但Zynga网站主页却并未显示以上截图信息，因此目前尚不知CE Gamers究竟从何处截得此图。有观察者称该服务可能是Zynga新项目Project Z的功能。

从该截图可以看出，选择这项服务的用户允许Zynga推荐的好友访问自己的公开页面，用户也可以选择退出这项服务，但可能还是会收到Zynga推荐他人的信息。

4）据AppData数据显示，EA/Playfish热门游戏《模拟人生社交版》最近在Facebook平台的MAU已下滑至第五名，DAU则是第六名，该游戏在上周末流失20万DAU，在上周流失120万MAU。

The-Sims-Social(from anjelsyndicate.org)

而Zynga游戏《Words With Friends》在上周则因美国演员Alec Baldwin沉溺游戏拒关手机的花边新闻而大获其益，在上周新增50万DAU。

观察者认为，《模拟人生社交版》用户下滑与其内容更新程度不及Zynga游戏有关。

5）在本周MAU增长最快的Facebook游戏榜单上，Zynga游戏《Words With Friends》晋升至第二名（最近MAU为1300万），而《CastileVille》（最近MAU为3260万）仍处于领先地位。

Top Gainers This Week-Games(from AppData)

《Words With Friends》于今年8月份登陆Facebook平台，其Android和iOS版本（一次性下载及广告赞助的免费版本）含有Facebook Connect登录功能，而Facebook版本也采用了广告赞助模式，但用户可选择支付Facebok Credits或者邀请一定数量的好友跳过广告体验游戏。（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）

1）One GREE Smartphone Game Generates US$26 Million In Sales A Month [Social Games]

by Dr. Serkan Toto

GREE is apparently killing it on smartphones, specifically on the iPhone. According to a recent statement by GREE CEO Yoshikazu Tanaka, his company’s sales coming from smartphones grew by 655% from June to October.

Tanaka also mentioned one specific, very interesting data point that made heads turn even in Japan’s social gaming industry (which is used to hearing big numbers from the platform providers).

According to GREE, doliland (a first party RPG) is generating 2 billion yen per month in virtual items sales: that is US$26 million.

doliland is currently on the top position in Japan’s iTunes store for the highest-grossing apps, which is not really a surprise.（source:serkantoto）

2）Could Zynga really double its paying fans? CrowdStar’s CEO thinks so

by Joe Osborne

Sure, it’s shattered every other record out there, so why the hell not? It Girl maker CrowdStar’s CEO and OpenFeint chairman (busy guy) Peter Relan agrees when asked whether CityVille creator Zynga could truly double its paying base of players. If you remember from last week, company CEO Mark Pincus made the bold claim during a presentation to investors in Boston.

According to Relan, this could happen one of two ways: Either Zynga simply grows to engross 300 million unique monthly players (the number of Facebookers is slowly nearing 1 billion globally), or somehow get more like 4 to 5 percent of its existing players to start paying up. Even with the norm for paying players being 2 to 3 percent, this would be quite the challenge for the company, which is poised for its initial public offering this week.

“Could 30 percent [of Facebook users] play Zynga games over time? Yeah,” Relan confidently replies. “That doesn’t seem like a 60-70 percent number, right? I think [the latter] one is trickier, and not so easy. But I think that the definition of paying will change. I think advertising may become a bigger portion of their revenue, because often times when you have scale–people are not pulling out their credit cards–you can stick ads in front of them and they become monetized users in that way.”

As for whether Zynga’s current valuation of $6 to $9 billion is crazy, the CrowdStar chief’s opinion seems to have changed since Zynga first revealed it would go public. “I think the $20 billion one was a little suspect,” Relan admits. So, if it’s really in that range [between $6 and $9 billion], I don’t think it’s totally out of whack. The fact of the matter is that they are the dominant–by far–player in the US social gaming market. And that’s a position, as long as Facebook’s alive, unlikely to be challenged.”

However, Relan spoke to the famed Facebook game maker’s internal culture. “[Zynga] has got a ‘take no prisoners’ style, and that works very well as long as the performance is there.” We’ll see whether the performance is there this weekend, no doubt.（source:games）

3）Will the infamous ‘Add Me’ page be but a memory, thanks to Zynga?

by Joe Osborne

Update: Thanks to a few of our awesome readers, we’ve learned that the “Zynga Recommended Friends” feature is live. You can access it and make the change right here. However, it appears that this option is simply to opt out of features like FarmVille Friends and Building Buddies. However, Zynga game-wide recommended friends is still a possibility in the future.

Man, and we just made all of those “Add Me” pages! Fansite CE Gamers reports that Zynga will soon (or already has) roll out a feature known as “Zynga Recommended Friends.” This will allow the developer to recommend friends for you–regardless of whether they’re your Facebook friends–based on your level, mutual (in-game) friends.

In essence, this is FarmVille Friends, but across all Zynga games. CE Gamers provides the below screen shot, but it’s unclear where this image comes from exactly, as the Zynga home page does not have a log-in option that we’re aware of. And RewardVille only allows log-ins via Facebook with no customization options. Our best guess is that this is part of the upcoming Project Z initiative, which will supposedly a Zynga games network outside of Facebook … but powered by Facebook.

However, here’s the thing: According to this screen shot, Zynga friends that aren’t Facebook friends with you will have access to your public profile. That’s all well and good for those who know how to put their profile on lockdown, but what about those who don’t? And while it appears that you’ll be able to opt out of recommendations, you may still receive them from Zynga. Just think–soon, you might not have to get lost in 2,500 comment-long threads, all with the same words: Add Me!!!11!11!!!1（source:games）

4）The Sims Social stumbles behind FarmVille, Zynga Poker etc. on charts

by Joe Osborne

EA and Playfish’s flagship Facebook game took another unfortunate tumble over the weekend, falling behind the social games giant Zynga in both monthly and daily players. The Sims Social is now the fifth most played Facebook game monthly, and the sixth most played on the network daily. Now, the FarmVille maker once again holds the top five Facebook games in daily players.

The Sims Social lost 200,000 daily players over the weekend and 1.2 million monthly players over the past week. Sadly, it looks like Playfish’s most successful game to date shows no signs of stemming off its steep decline, according to AppData. In the game’s defense, last week was huge for Zynga (at least for daily players), thanks to one man: Mr. Alec Baldwin.

When the actor became rather vocal on both Twitter and The Huffington Post for his Words With Friends-fueled snafu with American Airlines, he inadvertently endorsed Zynga’s Scrabble competitor. As a result, the game welcomed 500,000 more daily players in seven days, launching it past The Sims Social. Granted, things haven’t been so hot for the social take on The Sims long before Baldwin’s blunder.

The game has been in decline for some time now, and many players chalk it up to glitches and errors that have gone unfixed. However, we chalk it up to the fact that The Sims Social hasn’t enjoyed major content updates on the scale of Zynga’s games, like FarmVille’s Winter Wonderland. However, this could be an issue of exactly that: scale. Playfish is five studios, while Zynga is 20-something at this point. Regardless, The Sims could always use cars … or how about vacation homes?（source:games）