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每日观察:关注中文游戏在ios美国营收榜的强劲表现(2.10)

发布时间:2012-02-10 14:35:30 Tags:,,,

1. Keith Smith在谈到社交游戏和游戏化在用户效能上的异同时认为,最大的三个特征是用户的努力使为了赢取最终的奖励、用户会为了某些激励因素持续回访以及用户会及时分享他们所得的成效。社交游戏在这方面运用保障了游戏用户的回访频度和分享频度,后者同时促成了游戏的病毒化传播;而游戏化则将它转化为用户可以期盼的优惠因素,并且这个优惠因素贯穿了商业的品牌效能。

Keith Smith from socialtimes.com

Keith Smith from socialtimes.com

2. 据All Facebook的消息,即将在情人节登陆Facebook的Angry Birds提前透露了一些游戏视频和截图,从视频上看Facebook版的Angry Birds将会融入一些基本的交互特征,允许用户和好友进行游戏对抗或者做一些成就排行比较,并且每关卡都会角逐出金银铜前三的皇冠奖。

Angry Birds Facebook from allfacebook.com

Angry Birds Facebook from allfacebook.com

3. 据Techcrunch消息,苹果可能在3月份的第一个礼拜发布新版的ipad3,据称在整体性能上将优于上一版ipad2。

上一年苹果发布ipad2也差不多在这个时间点。

4. 据Read Write Web的消息称Double Fine在Kickstarter的小额融资行为在第一天就融到了100万美元,并且仍然处在快速的上升状态(距离截止时间还有1个月时间)。之前的成功案例是Elevation iPhone Dock,后者在不到两个月的时间融到了100万美元,相比之下,Double Fine的受追捧堪称神奇。

Double Fine screen from readwriteweb.com

Double Fine screen from readwriteweb.com

小额融资行为,对投资者而言不会涉及到游戏的所有权问题,甚至能否收回成本都是一个未知数,但这种模式为小额资本流转和开发者的资金汇集需求打造了一个专门的通道。

5. 据Inside Mobile Apps的消息称澳大利亚3D动画特效公司Cybertime在完成近10年的电视和电影特效服务后,第一次进入了游戏领域,推出ios全新的3D游戏Crazy Hedgy。目前这款游戏在iphone和ipad付费榜应用中分别100名和200名左右。

Crazy Hedgy from insidemobileapps.com

Crazy Hedgy from insidemobileapps.com

6. 据Gamasutra的消息称Zynga和玩具制造商孩之宝达成了基于Zynga游戏品牌的合作协议,根据这些授权协议,孩之宝将基于Farmville、Cityville或者Words With Friends等相关IP进行产品研发,预计将于2012年秋进入市场。

7. Zynga波士顿总经理Nabeel Hyatt离开Zynga体系加盟了Spark Capital,早前Nabeel Hyatt和Conduit Labs的并购一起进入了Zynga体系,并推出了游戏Adventure World。

indiana jones adventure world from blog.games.com

indiana jones adventure world from blog.games.com

据波士顿环球报的说法,Nabeel Hyatt目前的位置由前皮克斯动画总监和Adventure World产品主管Fareed Mosavat取代。

目前,Adventure World的月活跃用户为580万,日活跃用户为79万。

8. Wedbush分析师Michael Pachter在Zynga发布上一季度财报(10月到12月)以前预估认为Zynga上一季度的营收在3亿3500万美元以上。在去年7月到9月之间,Zynga的极度营收为3亿600万美元。

按照APPDATA的数据显示,目前Zynga的MAU为2.43亿,而DAU为0.57亿(特别是DAU数据处在强力回升状态),旗下用户数据表现最好的应用仍然是Cityville,而Farmville和Texas HoldEm Poker仍然是Zynga的常青树。

9. Inside Social Apps 2012关于手机游戏策略的几个观点:其一是跨平台策略,玩家在Facebook上体验了某款好的游戏,他们可能就设想能够在不能进行PC上网的时候也能在手机上体验游戏;其二是营销将成为游戏获取用户的关键要素,渠道也将更加广泛;其三是尽管HTML5具有革命性的意义,但是在当前环境下仍然只有理论冲击力;其四,在当前的应用环境下,想要胜出就需要提供高质量的用户体验,给玩家提供超级的娱乐效果。

10. 最近国产中文手机网游/社交游戏在美国榜表现强劲,其中掌上三国位居美国营收榜的第七位,胡莱三国位居美国榜营收的第八位,神仙道位居美国营收榜第188位。

app store snap from pocketgamer.biz

app store snap from pocketgamer.biz

尽管我们知道这些游戏在中国区营收榜表现强劲,比如胡莱三国位居中国营收榜第一位,掌上三国位居中国营收榜第五位,神仙道位居第六位,二战风云位居第七位。但是美国地区是ios营收的指标,按照App Annie的数据,美国占据了全球营收的40%以上,能进入美国营收榜前十就意味着更为可观的营收。

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. Often the terms “social games” and “gamification” are used interchangeably, but in actuality they’re very different animals. While it’s true that gamification borrows its game mechanics from social gaming, there are many real-world situations where it makes more sense to apply gamification instead of building an entire game. First, let’s take a look at a definition of each concept:

Social games are built on a social media platform like Facebook or Google+. Casual in nature, they can be picked up or dropped at a moment’s notice and are designed to engage the player’s social network of friends. Games like CityVille, Hidden Chronicles, and Words with Friends are popular examples.

Gamification is the process of using game mechanics in a non-game context. This can be anything from health and fitness, to employee motivation, to simply engaging customers that use your website or app. Two popular examples of gamification include Foursquare and Mint.com.
How they’re alike

Before I talk about the differences between social games and gamification, let’s discuss their similarities.
Players win achievements

You don’t need to play CityVille for very long to see it’s centered around achievements. As you play, you’re constantly earning points, virtual currency, and leveling up. And don’t forget the long-term achievements like becoming the mayor of your town or building a bakery and a post office.

Like CityVille, gamification offers rewards for desired behavior. This can be anything from winning a virtual trophy for achieving a financial or health goal to earning points and virtual currency for viewing and sharing content on a website.
Players keep coming back

Social games have certain mechanisms to keep players coming back again and again. With Words with Friends, your friends can challenge you to a new game. In CityVille, you need to keep returning to make sure your crops don’t wither and to collect money from your businesses.

Gamification is also good at maintaining user loyalty because it uses the same game mechanics to draw users back again and again. For example, if you’re using a gamified app like Fleetly, you’ll want to continually return to the app to track your fitness stats and see your progress on the leaderboards.
Players share and recruit

One of the reasons social gaming is so successful is that recruitment is built directly into the game. As you play, you’re constantly asked to share your achievements or to ask friends for help.

Gamification taps into the player’s social network as well. With Dropbox, if you invite a friend to the service and they sign up, you’re both rewarded with additional storage space.

How they’re different

So you can see how social gaming and gamification are similar, but gamification adds value beyond entertainment and can be used to make a difference in the real world. Here are a few examples:
Achieve personal goals

Gamification can be used to motivate and drive important life changes and healthy habits in those who use it. Once example is HealthMonth (and now Budge), a site dedicated to helping you set and meet your healthy lifestyle goals. It uses game mechanics like points and badges to motivate you and the support of your social network to keep you on track.

Nike+ helps you achieve your fitness goals by using game mechanics like cheering and tagging. During your run, you will hear a cheer every time a Facebook friend clicks the Like button on your run post. You can even tag a friend and send trash talk directly to their home screen until they complete their run and tag someone else (probably you).
Build brand awareness and engagement

While marketing and advertising are still important ways to get the word out about your business, gamification can also be used to engage customers with your brand or website. Recently, at the DellWorld conference Dell used the concept of Journeys to guide participants around the conference and to learn about new technologies. They then used the data collected from the Journeys to follow up with customers and offer them access to experts in their area of interest.

Another example is Savannah Morning News, an online newspaper that takes readers on guided quests around the site to expose them to new content and reward them for sharing with their social network.
Protect the environment

One emerging trend is using gamification to monitor your energy use and compare it to your friends and neighbors. With apps like SimpleEnergy you can compete with your friends to see who can save the most energy while earning points and badges. This essentially turns energy conservation into a fun and easy way to pass the time.

There are even gamification programs built into cars like the Chevy Volt that help you save gas and battery power with a simple game that motivates you drive more efficiently.
Motivate employees

While still a relatively new way to use gamification, a few companies like NextJump are implementing health gamification systems to encourage employees to stay happy and healthy. Employees compete with one another in attendance-based activities, eventually earning health points that can be applied to their corporateperks account.

Other gamification systems engage workers in their daily tasks. This might be call center software that encourages employees to keep calls short and collect customer data, or it could be a check out program like the Target cashier game that measures checkout speed and awards points and levels.

So you can see that social games and gamification are similar in many ways and different in others. While social games are a lot of fun to play and pass the time, they’re just that. Entertainment. With gamification, there are so many real-world tasks that can be made a lot more fun. And what I’ve mentioned here is only the tip of the iceberg, there are a host of real-world uses for gamification that have yet to be discovered.(Source:socialtimes

2. Two of the most notorious time-wasters will be set up with each other on Valentine’s Day, as Angry Birds will launch on Facebook, and developer Rovio previewed some of its features.

Angry Birds for Facebook will include social features, allowing players to compete against their friends, boast about their scores, and earn gold, silver, or bronze crowns for achieving the top three scores at any of the game’s levels.

The Facebook version of the game will also feature the following power-ups.(Source:allfacebook

3. Shocking news of the day: Apple is preparing to announce the iPad 3. Crazy news, I know. That announcement, if AllThingsD is to be believed, should come in the first week of March. The next-gen tablet itself is reportedly an upgraded version of the iPad 2, featuring a dual-core CPU and a higher-resolution display. But then again, that’s to be expected. Of course the iPad 3 will have better specs than the year-old iPad 2.

Apple announced the iPad 2 in the same timeframe last year. Steve Jobs made a surprise return from medical leave to deliver the announcement. It was sadly the last Jobsnote. There’s no word who will take the stage and announce the iPad 3, though.

If this rumor doesn’t pan out, it’s still a safe bet that the iPad 3 announcement is right around the corner. Apple generally sends invites out two weeks in advance so the announcement could still happen this month.(Source:techcrunch

4. Late last night Jane McGonigal, the most respected authority in the world of gamification, Tweeted that she’d pitched in to support the creation of a new point and click adventure game from respected game development shop Double Fine. That was the first trickle I saw of what quickly became a flood of support for the Double Fine Adventure project on Kickstarter.

Long popular for their work building games with major studios, the Double Fine team decided they wanted to self-produce and document the creation of an old-fashioned point and click adventure game. They are probably just a few hours away from breaking $1 million raised from backers on Kickstarter, they are already the new record holders for the fastest to raise so much and to receive backing from so many individual funders. Update: Adding tens of thousands of dollars every 15 minutes, the project just passed $1m.

“[This] is kind of a big deal,” wrote game journalist Jim Squires at Gamezebo this morning.

“Not just for Double Fine, but for Kickstarter and the industry as a whole. Can you imagine what the gaming world would look like if big developers like this could raise the funds needed to get to market without a publisher? Sure it’s worked for indies, but we’re talking Tim Schaefer here. Between Tim and Ron Gilbert (also now with Double Fine), these are the people that defined the LucasArts era of adventure games.”

In other words, this is a case of the famous getting more famous on a new platform – directly with their own fame instead of with a traditional publisher’s help. The same was true of LunaTik, the previous Kickstarter champ. Cool stories, but the democratization of fundraising thus deserves to be understood with a grain of salt.

Game blog Joystiq reported:

“‘I can confirm that there’s not been a project that has raised as much as this one in such a short timeframe,’ [a Kickstarter] spokesperson revealed. Kickstarter says it does not keep a running tally finalized projects, but its listing of ‘Most Funded’ ventures shows a number of concepts that came close to the one million dollar mark, since 2009.

“The Kickstarter spokesperson also confirmed that Double Fine’s project ‘now has more backers than any other project on the site.’ The current total of backers sits at over 17,000.” [It's now up to 25k+](Source:readwriteweb

5. Crazy Hedgy is a new 3D platform game for iOS devices from Austrian 3D animation and effects company Cybertime. After ten years of working on film and TV, Crazy Hedgy marks the studio’s first attempt to break into games.

Crazy Hedgy stars the titular hedgehog in his quest to get to the bottom of some unexplained happenings in the land of Green Hedges. Along the way, Hedgy will find himself confronted with deep chasms, narrow walkways, springy trampolines and the unwanted attention of the Spankos.

The concept of a 3D platform game starring a hedgehog sounds very similar to Sega’s Sonic The Hedgehog franchise on paper, but in execution the game is actually closer to another Sega title: Super Monkey Ball. By tilting the device forwards, backwards, left and right, players can guide Hedgy around the game’s 3D environments, collecting gems and coins and making his way to the exit at the far end of each level’s gauntlet of obstacles.

Tapping the right side of the screen causes Hedgy to jump — a notable change from Super Monkey Ball’s mechanics, where the characters could not jump unless they were thrown off a ramp at high speed — while tapping the left side causes Hedgy to attack with a punch. Hedgy unlocks a variety of special abilities throughout the course of the game by purchasing them from the in-game shop using collected gems. These include a grab attack, which allows players to pick up and throw objects, and numerous other moves which make getting around and dealing with enemies significantly easier. Each move can also be upgraded several times if the player has enough gems to spare.

The game comes in two flavors — a free Lite version which allows players to run through the tutorial and a subsequent level to get the feel of the game, and a full version where players unlock access to the levels through play. The two are presented as separate apps — there is no means of unlocking the full version via in-app purchase from within the Lite version. In fact, there are no in-app purchases in either version — not even the facility for players to purchase the game’s virtual currency and unlock levels early. However, the game does offer the facility for players to earn considerably more gems after completing a level by posting their score to Facebook or Twitter. Cybertime is doubtless hoping for a degree of viral marketing through this particular channel, especially as the rewards for posting to social networks are so great.(Source:insidemobileapps

6. FarmVille developer Zynga and toy maker Hasbro have partnered up to develop a new line of toys and games based on the social game developer’s most popular brands.

With this new agreement, Hasbro has the license to create a wide range of new products based on FarmVille, CityVille, Words With Friends, and more — it even has the right to develop co-branded merchandize featuring both Hasbro and Zynga IP. The two companies hope to debut the first of these products in Fall 2012.

In another recent game-related deal, Hasbro’s Battleship board game will serve as the inspiration for a new first person shooter from Activision, which will tie into the this May’s Universal Pictures film of the same name.(Source: gamasutra

7. Cue that piano jam from The Incredible Hulk. The Boston Globe and Mass High Tech report that Zynga Boston GM Nabeel Hyatt has left the Zynga subsidiary studio to become a partner at investment firm Spark Capital. Hyatt oversaw the studio’s (formerly Conduit Labs), development of Adventure World, Zynga’s first game to receive a complete branding overhaul with Indiana Jones.

“The office is still strong and growing,” Hyatt told Boston Globe via e-mail, “with a solid success with ‘Adventure World’ and some other projects underway.” According to The Boston Globe, former Pixar animation director and Adventure World product lead Fareed Mosavat has replaced Hyatt as general manager of Cambridge-based Zynga Boston.

Adventure World currently sits at 5.8 million monthly and 790,000 daily players, according to AppData, and hardly one of Zynga’s eighth most popular with nearly 10 million fewer monthly players than Empires & Allies. Unfortunately, the game has seen a steady decline since receiving the branding makeover.(Source:blog.games

8. Wedbush analyst Michael Pachter has estimated that Zynga’s revenues last quarter (ending December) reached $335 million or higher, ahead of the social game developer’s fourth quarter financial report next Tuesday.

Pachter said that result would beat previous sales estimates of $301 million, and was driven mainly by significant user growth on Facebook, as well as revenue growth from the company’s rapidly expanding mobile business.

That revenue is also a significant jump from the $306 million it reported for the July to September period, as the company was preparing to launch its IPO. Its profits during that period had fallen by nearly 54 percent year-over-year to $12.5 million.

The analyst said the total monthly active user count across all of Zynga’s Facebook games grew by 17 percent from 183 million in the third quarter (number adjusted to account for Facebook’s recent changes in its user-counting methodology) to 215 million at the end of December.

He added that Zynga increased its daily active user numbers on mobile platforms tenfold from November 1, 2010 to September 30, 2011, and predicted that growth continued into the fourth quarter, pointing to the popularity of Words with Friends and Hanging with Friends in particular.

Pachter also said the company is “well-positioned for long-term growth” and will continue to grow its revenues in 2012 thanks to late 2011 releases (e.g. CastleVille), Hidden Chronicles’ strong launch in January, and continued growth in the mobile space.

Other analysts have previously forecasted similar success for the company, such as Baird Equity’s Colin Sebastian, who said that “2012 could shape up to be a harvest year for Zynga” due to efforts to strengthen its platform, infrastructure and game development in 2011.

Zynga currently has 243 million monthly active users across all of its games on Facebook, according to AppData. Pachter expects the developer to maintain a 240 million average during its first quarter (ending March), which would be an 11 percent increase over the previous quarter.(Source:gamasutra

9. The evolution of mobile gaming dominated discussions on day one of the Inside Social Apps conference currently underway in San Francisco.

Twice the size of 2011′s event, it saw execs from some of the top Facebook developers including Kabam’s Kevin Chou and Playdom’s John Spinale, discussing the shift toward mobile platforms.

Here are our top take-aways.

Think connected, cross-platform gaming

More than ever, a gaming experience must expand and extend to fit the many ways people live, play, and stay connected. If the audience likes your game on Facebook, they will also want to play it on mobile.

More than rich graphics or awesome effects, your social game must be social and that means accessible. If it doesn’t run on your friend’s device, it does you no good.

Burst campaigns are going away

Being in the top 25 on the App Store is no longer the most important method of discovery for mobile games.

Effective marketing is taking a more traditional route, with companies focusing on reaching a qualified audience using tactics such as partnerships, PR, and cross promotions.

HTML5 still not ready for prime time

Although HTML5 is evolving, it doesn’t have enough features for mobile developers to invest heavily in the technology. The consensus it that it will be at least 2013 before HTML5 makes mobile development easier and faster.

Branding the App

Companies and brands are looking to the mobile space to reach and interact with audiences in new and exciting ways. Dynamic lifestyle brands such as those in the entertainment and travel sector are best suited for the platform.

Key for developers wanting to tap into this opportunity is to use metrics to show potential companies proven ways to drive engagement.

Make it fun

With more competition and better analytics, developers need to take their time to create quality experiences. The days of the big mobile launch are over.

The new strategy is to start small and build slow, testing every step of the way. It’s all about finding the fun sweet spot that creates an emotional experience audiences want to play and pay for.(Source:pocketgamer

10. With the App Store in the grip of what has quickly become a number of scandals – Clonegate, bot farms and claims apps can steal users’ address books – there couldn’t have been a worse time for a previous offender to make a reappearance.

Back in December, PG.biz reported on alleged App Store scammer Chinese studio Hoolai Games, which managed to storm the UK’s top grossing charts with a freemium release delivered entirely in Chinese.

The game’s user reviews were full of claims of fraud, with some suggesting they’d never downloaded the app, or paid for any of the title’s in-app purchases (IAPs) – the most expensive of which came in at a weighty £69.99.

Now, the same app has made the trip across the Atlantic to the US, making an equally unannounced appearance at #3 in the App Store’s top grossing chart.

Repeat offender

As before, the game is coupled by a whole host of negative reviews – many claiming they never download the app or approved any IAPs.

“Several in-app purchases posted, but not requested,” reads one. “Scam, thieves. Shut them down.”

“This thing made several in app purchases for me which I haven’t started to create an account for,” reads another.

Apple never commented when the game original sneaked into the UK’s top grossing chart – climbing at high as #3 in the end – though it was claimed keystroke loggers preying on users with jailbroken devices were to blame.

Others suggested a batch of user login details had been stolen, with downloads and purchases made via the desktop version of iTunes and delivered to handsets without permission via iCloud.

Misery loves company

The prospect of mass user account theft will be weighing heavy on the minds of those at Apple right now.

Wang Tilan of alleged bot farm site TopDealApps has recently claimed to have amassed the login details of over 200,000 iTunes accounts in the US – albeit through legitimate means – raising inevitable questions regarding the state of App Store security.

Hoolai Games isn’t the only Chinese developer currently gracing the higher echelons of the top grossing chart in the US, however.

Another game, also delivered entirely in Chinese by Shanghai MUHE, peaked at #11, again with user reviews accusing the app of hacking their details and making purchases without their permission.(Source:pocketgamer


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