班加罗尔（俗称印度的“硅谷”）见证了当今社交游戏势不可挡的发展趋势。作为印度社交游戏产业的发展中心，班加罗尔以其较低的准入门槛（意指便捷的手机和网络设施），提供给当地年轻人一个较为活跃的平台，帮助他们更好地扩展朋友交际圈。

按照社交游戏专业人士所述，随着社交网站的发展，用户花费于这些网站的时间越来越多，社交游戏的趣味性以及交互性的娱乐价值定位和粘性，是推动这个市场进一步扩大的重要因素。

FarmVille(from ibnlive.com)

Zapak.com（游戏邦注：印度最大且发展最快的门户网站）产品开发副总裁Deepak Abbot（同时他也是一名活跃的社交游戏玩家）称：“全世界有5亿多名社交游戏玩家，而单单在印度，就有超过1000万的Facebook用户（占印度Facebook用户人数的一半以上）在玩社交游戏。

Ibibo.com的产品及运营部门总裁Rahul Razdan表示：“今天，我们正在使用一种全新的媒介进行交流，即社交游戏。如今社交游戏正在扮演一种小型社交网络的角色，并且可以作为那些社交网络活跃用户进行对话交流的‘开胃菜’”。

根据Razdan所述，在社交网站上，只有10%的用户真正在进行活跃的社交生活，即在网上更新自己的照片和内容等。

而社交游戏的情况却明显不同。在社交游戏中，玩家可以单纯地进行游戏，并自行决定对好友的游戏进程作出评价或回应，而不需要像在普通社交网站中因为无话可说或者没有照片更新而烦恼。

Razdan补充道：“根据统计，女性玩家更青睐于猜字游戏（共占55%）。”令人惊讶的是，在排灯节夜晚甚至有30%的女性在Ibibo网站上玩《Teen Pati》（一种纸牌游戏）等游戏。“社交游戏玩家的年龄范围从18岁到34。而在印度，社交游戏玩家的平均年龄则低于全世界社交游戏玩家的平均年龄。”

“在印度，女性用户占Facebook以及网络用户总数的30%，而这一比例同样也适用于社交游戏领域。而且因为社交游戏的操作几乎不需要任何技巧，所以对于女性用户具有极大的吸引力。”

同时社交游戏的魅力还表现在，它让年轻人能够拥有（虚拟的）汽车，农场，能够操作黑手党，发行货物，制造虚拟货币并带头进行一些复杂的虚拟行动。

Razdan表示，对于日益发展的印度社交游戏市场来说，如何制作符合印度用户“口味”的社交游戏内容是一大挑战。就像意大利黑手党来到印度也许就不具备任何吸引力了，反倒是孟买帮派更能够吸引印度玩家的注意。所以针对于印度市场的游戏必须融入更多印度当地的题材。

Abbot说道：“只有更加关注于印度用户，并按照他们的娱乐需求提供适当的游戏内容，印度的社交游戏才能取得更好的发展。”目前在印度仅有五六家主流社交游戏公司，但在全世界却有100多家社交游戏工作室，但随着这一市场的继续发展，“将会有更多游戏工作室陆续进入这个领域。”

为了能从这个不断发展的市场中获取更大的利益，一些开发者开始在游戏中添加一些新元素，以保证游戏的吸引力。Ibibo尝试说服一些名人体验他们的游戏。Razdan说道：“如果玩家在游戏中发现自己正在与Mallika Sherawat（游戏邦注：印度女演员）一起玩游戏，并在她的街道上停放自己的车辆，那么对于他们来说这将是一次很有趣的游戏体验吧。”

Razdan认为，尽管明星宣传手段刚刚在印度市场“试行”，但是却具有很大的推动作用。

社交游戏可以说是名人与粉丝进一步互动的平台，并且能够帮助这些名人吸引到更多粉丝。Razdan说道：“一旦名人们看到了社交游戏这一神奇的效应，社交游戏的用户粘性将得到很大保障。”

专业人士认为，板球游戏也是社交游戏平台中一活跃因子，即透过这一平台，玩家可以把现实中看球赛的激动情绪转变成游戏中的虚拟体验。例如在举办印度板球超级联赛（IPL）拍卖会的同时，也在游戏中设置“购买虚拟板球队”的游戏机制。

Abbot表示：“如果能够在IPL或者世界杯期间制作或发行一款以板球为主题的社交游戏，那么这款游戏将取得意想不到的成功。但是这些游戏却不可能取代现实中板球比赛的乐趣。因为对于板球迷来说，玩板球游戏只是他们用于消遣的一种方式而已。”

社交游戏同样也在尝试着提供给玩家一种基于游戏的“真实”体验。Razdan说道：“一些开发者想要基于社交游戏创造出一种‘真实’的游戏体验，而打破传统电视媒介给用户带来的刻板概念，并获得更多的用户。Ibibo正是为这些开发者量身定做的一大平台。在这种基于游戏的‘真实’体验中，单一的用户体验都是与其他用户联系在一起的。而且这种体验也获得了用户的积极反应。”

通过广告赞助，品牌植入以及贩售虚拟商品，社交游戏也给广大开发者提供了一个有利可图的平台。社交游戏平台具有极大发展潜力以复制主流媒介所获得的成就。尽管还有一些印度用户仍执着于免费在线游戏，但是越来越多印度用户已能够接受为游戏付费的趋势了。

如今，社交游戏领域已经相当规范。很多开发者也表示，任何声称为安全性考虑而添加的制约措施都会引起很多不必要的麻烦。他们认为社交游戏领域只有通过开发者的自律，才能保持这个市场的持续发展势头。

专业人士表明，社交游戏必须具有一些内在的激励机制或者特殊的功能，才会让玩家愿意重复回访游戏。

目前当地的社交游戏玩家主要是那些在校友网中拥有良好人际关系圈的英语用户，为了增加游戏玩家数量，开发者应想法设计出那些缺乏广泛人际圈的用户也能获得乐趣的游戏。

Abbot说道：“德里、孟买拥有印度最庞大的用户规模，其次就是金奈（印度的第四大城市）和海得拉巴（印度南部一城市）（游戏邦注：这与印度的互联网普及率成正比）。社交游戏在一线及二线城市的中的渗透率取决于这座城市的Facebook普及率，但目前Facebook在印度的普及率仍然比较低。”

游戏邦注：原文发表于2011年2月7日，所涉事件及数据以当时为准。（本文为游戏邦/gamerboom.com编译，如需转载请联系：游戏邦）

Indians getting hooked to social gaming

Bangalore: The social gaming landscape in the country is witnessing a growth momentum due to easy access to mobile and Internet facilities which is offering youths exciting platforms for expanding their circle of friends.

The growth of social networks sites, the time spent by users on them, the high entertainment value proposition and opportunity to engage in fun and casual interaction with friends, was fuelling the social gaming market, say social gaming experts.

“Worldwide over 500 million play social games. In India more than 10 million (over 50 per cent) of Facebook users play social games”, says Deepak Abbot, Vice President-Product, Zapak.com, one of the leading social gaming players.

“Today conversations have found a new medium of interaction – Social Gaming. Social games now act as mini social networks. They have now become the conversation starters among two people active on the network,” says Rahul Razdan, President, Products & Operations, Ibibo web.

According to Razdan, on a social network site, only 10 per cent are really active posting their pictures or providing updates on social life.

But a social gaming format works differently. Here, a user can simply play a game, make a comment and respond to their friend’s moves and take active part without really bothering about whether they had something awesome to say or post pictures, as would be required in a social network site.

It creates reasons for interaction with every action of a player demanding a counter reaction. “It is an inclusive traction”, he said.

Gaming in India though dominated by men, has a sizeable women gaming population as well. Games that favour aesthetic expressions, building and growing a farm found favour with women, while games relating to mafia, violence and hard core action saw men gravitate toward them.

“The statistics were skewed towards women (55 per cent) when it came to word games”, he said. Surprisingly a game like Teen Pati (a game of cards) on Ibibo actually saw 30 per cent of women playing the game on Diwali night, said Rahul.

“The age profile of social gamers is usually 18-34″, said Abbot. “The Indian social gamer is a bit younger than the average international gamer”, he said.

“Women constitute 30 per cent of the Facebook and Internet users in India, the same per cent can also be assumed in the social gaming space. As the games are more related to building, collaborating and managing these games appeal to women too. There is hardly any skill required to play social games, therefore, gender is not an issue”, said Abbot.

Social games are also a kind of a power booster as they allow youngsters to virtually own cars or a farm, operate a mafia, issue challans, generate virtual money and also spearhead a complex virtual action-packed operation.

The challenge in growing the social gaming market for India lies in creating content that has an Indian flavour, says Razdan. An Italian mafia is not everyone’s cup of tea here, but an underworld Mumbai gang would find more takers, so would games related to Indian topics.

“Growth will come by focusing on Indian audience and giving them games which suit their entertainment taste”, says Abbot. Currently, there were around five to six players in this space in India and globally, there were over 100 studios. But going forward, he says, “There will be many more gaming studios entering the scene”.

Keen on cashing on the growing market, players are adding new elements to keep the excitement factor going. Ibibo had roped in celebrities to play games. “A gamer would find it exciting when it is Mallika Sherawat he is playing a game with and to know he has parked a car on her street during the game”, says Razdan.

Though still nascent in the Indian market, the evangelisation of the celebrity gaming factor is expected to pick momentum, he feels.

The social gaming platform could be an added avenue for celebrities to interact with fans and add to numbers. “Once the celebrity sees the magic, we are sure such engagements on the social gaming platform would grow”, he said.

Cricket, the experts opine, also holds huge potential in the social gaming platform. The euphoria could be translated from the real to the virtual world. “Buying a virtual cricket team” on lines of real time IPL auction, could trigger excitement.

“Social Games around cricket can get popular which are built around and released around IPL and the World Cup. However we don t see these games replacing the physical popularity of cricket. For cricket fans it would be another way to engage with their favourite past time”, said Abbot.

Social gaming has also entered the realm of reality based games. “Ibibo has also created a platform for all those who want to showcase their talent by developing reality based social games which are breaking the stereotypical concept prevalent in the TV and reaching to a wider audience. Such reality based game shows where an individual is judged by the user population and rated has found a good response” said Razdan.

Social games also offer a revenue platform through advertisement and brand building and sale of virtual goods. The social gaming platform holds a huge potential in terms of replicating the success in the mainstream media. The number of Indians ready to pay for the games has begun to increase, though several still opt for free online games.

Currently the social gaming space is fairly regulated. The players say that any additional layers of security in trying to regulate the content could spell trouble. They say the space must be self regulated to keep the momentum going.

Going forward, social gaming players need to ensure that the games should hold some inherent incentives and features that would get a social gamer keep coming back, said experts.

Currently, the gaming population largely includes English speaking users with a robust friend network in terms of an alumni network. To increase the number of gamers, players would have to devise games where those lacking such robust friend network could still play.

“Delhi, Mumbai have the greatest number of gamers, followed by Bangalore, Chennai and Hyderabad. (This is proportional to the Internet penetration in India.) Social gaming picking up in tier one and two cities depends on the penetration of Facebook in these cities, which is currently low”, says Abbot. （source:ibnlive）