作者：Dean Takahashi

手机游戏为数众多，要找到适合的内容绝非易事。但Facebook称自己已找到在手机游戏平台（如iPhone和Android）立足的生存策略。通过提高游戏的曝光度，此社交网络公司确信自己能够在手机领域获得一席之地。

Facebook的8.45亿用户有一半（游戏邦注：约4.25亿）是手机用户。手机平台的Facebook应用让用户能够同好友进行联系，互相分享图片。但在Facebook平台经理Gareth Davis看来，这一应用也是提高游戏曝光度的绝佳渠道。

gareth davis from venturebeat.com

Davis日前在旧金山Game Developers Conference大会的演讲上表示，“我们的目标是帮助用户寻找应用。我们有6000万用户通过手机平台搜寻应用和游戏。我们致力于推动平台（包括桌面和手机平台）游戏的发展。”

Facebook手机平台发布于2009年，随后不断得到完善，陆续添加社交渠道、网页付费功能及系列新推广功能。Facebook应用既有手机网页版本，也有适应各手机设备的本地模式。其最新功能包括：本地链接，在此开发者能够将其在Facebook的流量导入本地应用中，再来就是全球各运营商的便捷付费系统，包括AT&T、Verizon、T-Mobile、Vodafone、Softbank、KDDI、Orange和Telefonica，此机制很快就会问世。公司的手机游戏开发合作伙伴包括Zynga、Electronic Arts、Wooga、Glu和Storm 8。Facebook应用目前运作于2500部手机设备。

Davis表示，Facebook主要通过在平台的各版面分享游戏内容，每月向Wooga的《Diamond Dash》引进200万用户。

Davis表示，“我们帮助用户挖掘游戏内容。他们会进行点击，这会将他们带入游戏中，或者若你不是既有用户，系统就会将你带到App Store的游戏页面中。”

首先的Facebook登陆操作采用的是单点登陆模式，系统会验证用户身份，将他们链接至自己的桌面Facebook帐号。然后开发者的游戏就会向用户的好友及消息动态发送消息，这些信息可以在搜索栏获得。游戏还可以发送游戏通知和请求，这些信息可以在书签、Open Graph和Timeline中获得。用户看到这些信息后会进行点击，然后就进入应用主页面。

Davis表示，“只要玩家下载应用，我们就能够创建书签，这可以在搜索栏中找到。”

例如，你可以在游戏中引入这样的功能：在用户的活动消息（activity feed）中发布操作信息，例如在《Words With Friends》中组出一个单词。其他玩家会看到相关消息，然后点击游戏。你还可以通过Facebook的分析方法评估游戏内容，提高用户粘性和创收水平。

在Davis看来，开发者应该在免费游戏（玩家通常免费体验游戏，付费购买虚拟商品）中采用零售推销方式。这意味着，你要运用诸如此类的策略：既有低至1美元的商品，也有高达200美元，只有“鲸鱼玩家”或高创收玩家才会购买的装饰道具。

下面是Davis给出的几点建议：

1. 在收藏夹和搜索栏中采用单点登陆模式。若用户已通过手机登陆Facebook，确保他们能够轻松通过一次点击登陆你的应用。

2. 统一应用ID。统一游戏在各平台的Facebook ID，方便用户进行跨平台体验。这样，用户就能够同好友一起体验同款游戏（游戏邦注：无论他们是基于网页、桌面，还是手机设备）。

3. 通过Open Graph发布内容。将引人注目的游戏操作内容发送至Open Graph，例如游戏分数和成就。通过“玩家打败好友”及“玩家胜出”之类的内容满足玩家额庆祝和炫耀愿望，通过Timeline和News Feed获得更深层次的推广。

4. 请求。通过请求渠道实现用户间的邀请和交易活动，例如赠送礼物及变更消息通知。请求渠道会自动通过Facebook应用在iOS发布通知消息。

5. 运用所有社交渠道。充分利用所有社交渠道，包括请求和书签，这样你就能够通过各种渠道获得最大限度的曝光。

6. 促进本地推广的深层链接。确定是否运用本地链接，这能够将你的所有消息动态及请求通知发送至App Store或Marketplace的游戏中。实现此操作只需通过更新游戏在Facebook的设置。你还可以采用深层链接支持，这样玩家点击游戏消息后就会进入具体的游戏内容中，例如组合的具体单词。

7. 社交设计。让你的应用变得真正具有社交性，这样玩家就能够发现自己的好友，同他们一起体验内容，相互较量。社交功能能让游戏呈现玩家的个人色彩，满足玩家同好友共同体验游戏的愿望，促使他们沉浸其中，还能通过Facebook社交渠道让游戏获得更快速的传播。

（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）

Facebook’s tips for getting your mobile game noticed

By Dean Takahashi

Mobile games are so plentiful that discovering the right one has become a nightmare. But Facebook believes that it has a solution in layering its own social network on mobile gaming platforms such as the iPhone and Android. By making games more discoverable, the social network believes it can justify its existence in the mobile world.

Half of Facebook’s 845 million users — roughly 425 million people – are mobile users. Facebook’s app on mobile lets those people connect with friends and share photos. But the app has also turned into a great way to get games noticed, said Gareth Davis, platform manager at Facebook.

“Our goal is to help consumers find your app,” said Davis in a talk at the Game Developers Conference in San Francisco today. “We have 60 million people discovering apps and games on mobile. We are committed to games on the platform, both desktop and mobile.”

The Facebook mobile platform launched in 2009 and has been evolving ever since, adding social channels, web payments, and a variety of new distribution features. The Facebook app is available either as a mobile web app or a native application on various mobile devices. Among the latest features: native linking, where a developer can direct traffic from Facebook to a native app and an easy payment system with the world’s carriers — AT&T, Verizon, T-Mobile, Vodafone, Softbank, KDDI, Orange, and Telefonica — that’s rolling out soon. Mobile partners among game makers include Zynga, Electronic Arts, Wooga, Glu, Storm 8, and others. And Facebook’s app works on 2,500 mobile devices.

Davis said that Facebook sends 2 million people a month to Wooga’s Diamond Dash, largely by sharing game content to Facebook’s various features.

“We surface the game for users,” Davis said. “They click on that and it takes them to the game or, if you are not an existing user, to the game in the App Store.”

The first part of embracing Facebook is using its single sign-on system that authenticates a user’s identity and links him or her back to their Facebook account on the desktop. Then the developer’s game can send information out to a user’s friends, the user’s news feed, and be found in search. It can send out game notifications, requests, and be found through bookmarks, Open Graph, and Timeline. People see it and they click through to the app.

“As soon as the player uses an app, we create a bookmark, which you can search and find,” Davis said.

You can, for instance, include a feature in your game that posts activities, such as playing a word in Zynga’s Words With Friends, to a user’s activity feed. Other players can see it and click into the game. You can use analytics from Facebook to measure everything inside the game to improve engagement and monetization.

In free-to-play games, where users play for free and pay real money for virtual goods, Davis said developers should use retail-grade merchandising. That means you should use tricks like having something cheap for a $1 purchase in the store as well as things that are expensive, such as a $200 decorative item that only “whales,” or high-monetizing players, will buy.

Here’s Davis’s full list of tips:

1. Add login with single sign on for bookmark and search. Make it easy for people to sign on to your app in one click if they’re already logged into Facebook on their phone.

2. Single app ID. Use the same Facebook app ID for your games on all platforms to make it easy for users to play across platforms. When you do this, people can play with their friends in the same game no matter if they’re on the web, desktop, or a mobile device.

3. Publish via Open Graph. Publish compelling game actions to Open Graph, such as game scores and achievements. Use “player beat friend” and “player won” stories to allow players to celebrate and brag, and get greater distribution through Timeline and News Feed.

4. Requests. Use the Request channel for user-to-user invites and exchanges like gifting and turn notifications. The Request channel automatically triggers a notification on iOS through the Facebook app.

5. Use all social channels. Use all the social channels (https://developers.facebook.com/docs/channels/) available to you, including requests and bookmarks, so you get maximum distribution from all channels.

6. Native, deep Linking for native distribution. Decide if you want to take advantage of native linking, which will drive all feed stories and request notifications to your game in the App Store or Marketplace. This is done via a simple update to your game settings on Facebook. You can also implement deep linking support so that clicking on a game story takes the player to a specific piece of game content, such as the specific word played.

7. Social design. Build your app to be social from the ground up so people can find, play, and compete with their friends. Social features will personalize the game for the user, keep them engaged through play with their friends, and help your game spread faster through Facebook social channels.（Source：venturebeat）