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2011年手机游戏论坛7个值得关注的话题

发布时间:2011-01-29 16:56:07 Tags:,,,,

日前在伦敦举办的第八届手机游戏论坛上,各路开发商齐聚一堂,针对业内的热点话题展开了广泛讨论,以下是游戏邦根据pocketgamer的报道,总结出的本届论坛最值得关注的六个现象:

Doodle-Jump-mobile-game

Doodle-Jump-mobile-game

1. 不同游戏领域的文化冲突

先从大的方面说起,手机游戏是整个游戏行业中最先面临数字发行渠道挑战的部门。

在这个领域中,智能手机的代名词就是应用软件和应用商店,它意味着开发商不需要发行商也能自立更生。它的发行渠道更有创新性,让用户轻松实现与好友的互动,但同时也降低了价格门槛,分散了不同手机平台之间的技术标准和社交范围。

尽管存在种种问题(游戏邦注:主要是技术性和运营上的问题),它的创新性和灵活的运营方式,却影响了整个游戏行业。因此,尽管传统的掌机/零售游戏市场规模比手机游戏大10倍,但未来究竟谁主沉浮还没有定论。

有人认为,即使手机及便携式设备上的内容尝试进军传统游戏市场,也仍然无法超越掌握大量资源、品牌和高质量内容的传统游戏市场。

而与之相反的观点是,传统游戏公司的影响力已经今非昔比,在技术创新和资金灵活性上也不如纯数字发行渠道的iOS游戏领域。

2.争取还是培养高消费用户?

据游戏邦了解,在拉斯维加斯,鲸鱼是指挥金如土的人,比如一个礼拜中就输掉数百万美元的赌客。在免费游戏领域,鲸鱼就是指那些很舍得为虚拟商品买单的玩家,在一款游戏中的消费就高达100美元。

当然,就像赌场一样,开发商也最喜欢做鲸鱼玩家的生意,所以行业顾问经常建议开发商在游戏中提供一些个性化的虚拟商品,投其所好,满足他们的需求。

但是随着越来越多免费游戏的诞生,问题就来了:如何吸引更多的鲸鱼玩家,这类高消费用户的数量是不是很有限?

悲观者认为,大量免费游戏的诞生,会让开发商如赌场老板一样竞相争取有限的鲸鱼玩家,但乐观者却认为鲸鱼玩家完全可以靠培养而得;每个下载99美分游戏的玩家都有成为鲸鱼的潜力,他们可能接下去就会购买5美元、10美元、20美元或者50美元的虚拟商品。

3.Java平台已死的说法是夸大其辞

如果向Gameloft和EA之类的发行商,以及Glu, Connect2Media, Digital Chocolate和HandyGames等公司了解情况,你就会清楚地发现通过运营商渠道销售简单的Java手机游戏,仍然是手机游戏行业不可或缺的一环,Java游戏的营收仍然很可观。

这绝不是开玩笑,如果说像《Doodle Jump》、《Flight Control》之类的99美分iOS游戏,以更简单的格版本销售,反而卖出了3到5倍的价钱,那么开发商可真得注意了。

当然,在北美和西欧,就安装基础和手机年销量来说,智能手机仍独占鳌头。但未来几年Java内容在手机业务中仍将发挥重要的作用,这一点却是无可争议的事实,这也为精明的开发商提供了又一线商机。

4.苹果和Android不可相提并论

就像老师曾经教过的一样,虽然含有“凤梨”含有“梨”字,但凤梨并不是一种梨。

如果把苹果iOS和三星bada、微软Window Phone 7,也许还有英特尔/诺基亚的MeeGo拿来作比较,可能还符合情理一些。而Android是一个开放性的平台,它的设计主要考虑手机和平板电脑制造商的利益,而非游戏开发商的利益。

所以如果你想面向Android平台开发游戏,就需要先集中解决一揽子的不同技术标准问题,如果不这么做,那就只好继续为苹果乔布斯唱赞歌了,总之不要再抱怨Android平台的问题了。

5.手机社交游戏平台缺乏“社交性”

在本届论坛上,连手机游戏社交平台OpenFeint和Scoreloop都不得不承认,它们其实还无法建立像Facebook和Twitter那样可以将用户与好友紧紧相连的社交网络。当然,ngmoco当时如果在场的话,也有可能会说自己旗下的Plus+在这一点上就做得比其他平台更好,但人人都看得出来,它最多也只是做得更好一点点而已。

据游戏邦了解,这是整个手机游戏领域面临的共同问题,由于手机平台的多样性,分散了用户在真实生活和虚拟世界的好友;即使Facebook推出统一的手机API,实行单一注册帐号也无济于事。

除非Facebook成为世界上唯一的社交游戏平台,并深深植入每一部手机中,否则这将会是一直困扰这个行业的一大问题。不解决这个问题,手机游戏的ARPU(每用户平均收益)就永远无法实现预期目标。

不过这对有些公司来说倒是个绝好的机遇——索尼、微软或者某个手机地理定位服务公司,可以从中找到切入点,以创新方式为用户的现实好友和随机玩伴创造一种新的互动游戏体验。

只有到那时,用户和其他的游戏玩家才有可能成为永远的好朋友。

6. 尴尬的安装付费模式

就像黄色书籍储藏处或者NRA会员卡一样,文明社会中多数成人都有一些秘密,但他们绝不会公开承认。

安装付费模式也是属于这一类;言下之意就是面对App Store实行的精英制度,开发商对于自己新发布的游戏质量并没有多大信心,又或者他们对于这样一个事实感到羞愧:如果能让游戏跻身排行榜前列,他们宁愿花钱买用户。

事实上,这并不是什么高招,但积少成多总会见到效果,《Doodle Jump》的开发商就曾使用过这个方法。

7.“比较优势”成热词

CCA(Comparative Competitive Advantage)一词是本届论坛热议的话题,它对开发商的重要性不言而喻,不同开发商有不同的情况。(本文为游戏邦/gamerboom.com编译,转载请注明来源:游戏邦)

Seven things we’re going to ponder following Mobile Games Forum 2011

I can’t say the eighth Mobile Games Forum was the best ever incarnation of the conference because I’ve only been to three of them.

However, I’d be surprised if the line up of speakers has been more distinguished, or the subjects covered as wide or intertwined.

So after two days of solid live-ish blogging, meeting with old friends, introductions to new, and not a lot of sleep, here are seven subjects I’m going to think to about some more as we entered the frantic spring event period that’s bookmarked by Mobile World Congress (14-17 February) and the Games Developers Conference (28 February to 4 March).

1. Clash of civilisations

Let’s start with something big. The mobile games industry is the first part of the games industry to be fully exposed to the pressures of digital distribution.

Smartphones mean apps and app stores. It means developers don’t need publishers. It releases creativity, collapsing the friction of purchase into a melting pot with new compulsion loops, and easy access to friends, while throwing up the barriers of price paucity, and fragmented devices and social graph.

Yet for all these problems (mainly technical and monetary), the innovation and business flexibility generated is now the prevailing model for the entire games industry. Hence, despite the traditional console/retail market being currently worth ten times the value of the mobile industry, which will win?

One argument is that the resources, brands and production quality of the console world will overcome the nascent attempts of mobile and portable companies to build up their content into the console world.

The contrasting argument is despite two years of opportunity, console companies have demonstrated little inclination, let alone the technical prowess or financial acumen to take full advantage of the pure digital distribution play of the iOS sector.

2. Hunt or create the whales?

In Las Vegas, a whale is a high roller who’s happy to drop (and lose) millions in a single weekend’s gambling. Modified for the freemium games sector, a whale is the description of a player who’s prepared to spend large amounts of money on virtual items; anything up to $100 per game.

Of course, as with casinos, whales are great for business, with consultants advising developers to ensure their games can provide the necessary options in terms of exclusive customisation items that will satisfy their desires.

Yet as more freemium games are released, the stark question is, how do you attract more whales to your game, and is there a limited supply of them?

Pessimists think the explosion in freemium games will see developers, like casino owners, competing to gain the patronage of the small number of available whales, while optimists think whales

can be created; every player converted to by 99c download, one step further down the slope that will convert them to subsequent $5, $10, $20 or $50 purchases.

3. Rumours of Java’s death have been greatly exaggerated

It’s been clear for anyone talking to publishers such as Gameloft and EA, not to mention the likes of Glu, Connect2Media, Digital Chocolate and HandyGames, the much maligned business of selling simple Java games via carrier decks remains the bedrock of the mobile business, at least when it comes to revenues.

Certainly not sexy, but when 99c iOS games such as Doodle Jump and Flight Control are being sold at three to five times the price in a simpler form, you have to sit up and take notice.

Of course, in North America and western Europe, smartphones are taking over in terms of install base and annual handset sales, but the fact is Java content will remain an important part of the mobile business for years to come.

It’s another opportunity for the shrewd developer.

4. If you’re looking for an apples-to-apples comparison, don’t compare Apple and Android

The temptation is certainly there but as your linguistics teacher should have told you, a pineapple isn’t an apple even though it contains some of the same letters.

Hence correct comparisons to Apple’s iOS include Samsung’s bada, Microsoft’s Window Phone 7, and (maybe) Intel/Nokia’s MeeGo. Android, however, is an open platform and one fundamentally designed for the benefit of handset and tablet manufacturers, not content developers.

So if you want to develop for Android, grow a pair and deal with the various fragmentation issues. If not, remain in a state of high-pitched grace and sing arias to Steve Jobs for the rest of your life, but please stop bitching.

5. Broken social scene

Conferences provide occasional gems of honesty. One at Mobile Games Forum saw social networks OpenFeint and Scoreloop confessing (between the lines) that they were yet to build out a coherent way of linking you to your friends other than using web frameworks such as Facebook and Twitter. Absent ngmoco might argue its Plus+ network is better, but if so, it’s a marginal improvement at best.

This is a problem for the whole mobile gaming space, which fragments the network of real-life and virtual friends thanks to its multiple devices; something not even Facebook’s focus on mobile APIs and single sign-ons can’t stickyplaster over.

Unless Facebook becomes the only social platform in the world and deeply integrated into every handset, it’s a problem that we’re just have to deal with.

It’s a massive issue for the mobile freemium sector however, which is unlikely to gain its predicted ARPU numbers without solving this.

Still, it also provides an interesting opportunity for someone – Sony, Microsoft or perhaps one of the location-based mobiles services – to solve in an innovative manner that creates a new category of friendliness somewhere inbetween real-life and random avatar playmates.

Until that time though, me and player1245663 will remain bff.

6. Paid-for installs are everyone’s dirty little secret

Like a porn stash, a ziplock of Bolivian march powder for the weekend or a NRA membership card, there are some vices in which most adults partake, but won’t confess in polite society.

Paid-for installs seem to fall into a similar category; the implication being either developers aren’t confident in their new release’s quality working within the meritocracy of the app store, or they’re genuinely shamed by the fact they are buying users, if only to get a short term chart boost.

Fact is, it’s not a silver bullet but every little addition to the armory helps and Doodle Jump developer Lima Sky uses them.

7. What’s your Comparative Competitive Advantage?

CCA is the most important acronym you’ll hear this year. And I should know. I’ve just invented it. Wonder what it means?

You can read all our coverage from the excellent Mobile Games Forum 2011 here.(Source:Pocketgamer)


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