1）据瑞典财经杂志《Dagens Industrii》报道，Rovio首席财务官Mikko Setala在最近采访中表示公司可能于2013年上市。

Rovio-IPO(from venturebeat.com)

他称Rovio正筹备2013年上市事宜，但股东尚未确认究竟是否上市。假如公司果真上市，那就有可能发生在2013年下半年。Rovio在2011年销售额为7540万欧元，所得收益为4800万欧元，观察者对Rovio公司的估值达70亿美元。

目前投资者对Rovio的最大疑虑在于，Rovio究竟只是盛极一时的奇迹还是像马里奥及米奇老鼠那种久经时间考验的品牌。

2）据venturebeat报道，开发商Phosphor Games工作室（游戏邦注：其代表作为《The Dark Meadow》）日前发布动作冒险手机游戏《Horn》预告片。该游戏将由Zynga发行并于本月登陆iOS和Android平台，采用一个开放奇幻世界，含有“10小时故事任务，外加不断上升的挑战模式”。

Horn(from digplanet.com)

该游戏取材于英国霍恩王的故事，玩家将在其中扮演年轻的铁匠学徒，带上一只大嘴庞物踏上冒险之旅，寻找惨遭浩劫的村庄，并在一路上使用剑、弩、号角等武器探索土地，打败敌人，解决谜题。

3）Telltale Games最近向iOS平台推出系列冒险游戏《The Walking Dead》，该游戏质量堪比PC和主机游戏版本，在iPhone和iPad平台售价均为4.99美元。

walking dead(from technologytell.com)

发行高级副总裁Steve Allison表示，虽然App Store有许多开发者大打价格战，并且许多人认为开发者唯一的出路就是选择免费增值模式，但他认为事实并非如此，因为手机用户看重的并非99美分的售价，而是游戏的质量与深度究竟是不是物有所值。

4）据pocketgamer报道，id Software联合创始人John Carmack在日前的QuakeCon 2012大会发言中表示，公司决定关闭专属手机游戏开发部门，并将其中核心人员调遣至《毁灭战士4》开发团队。

John Carmack(from linkrandom.blogspot.com)

他称自己很喜欢制作手机游戏，未来有可能通过多种途径重返手机游戏领域，但目前公司最主要目标是《毁灭战士4》这种AAA游戏。

Carmack承认尽管手机游戏部门已经取消，但该团队仍有一个iPhone项目尚未完工，他们可能会等到时机成熟时再推出这个项目。

5）据venturebeat报道，德国网页MMO游戏发行商Gameforge日前宣布进军移动游戏市场，将开发移动游戏并研发一个内部移动游戏引擎。

ogame(from venturebeat)

该公司已针对苹果iOS设备（iPhone、iPad和iPod Touch）、Android及Windows Phone 7设备发布三款角色扮演游戏，《Mafia Game》、《Vampire Game》和《War Game》下载量超过200万次。

Gameforge成立于2003年，在PC端已有20款MMO游戏，注册用户超过3亿，目前有600名员工，并正在招聘移动游戏开发者，计划于年底前发布10款移动游戏。

6）Glu Mobile日前公布第二季度财报显示，《Deer Hunter：Reloaded》今年6月在iPhone和iPad平台创收超过72万美元，而该游戏在iPhone应用营收榜单甚至并未跻身前35名，在iPad营收榜单则位居第23名。

App Ranking(from AppData)

《Deer Hunter：Reloaded》是该公司6月份最热门游戏，在iOS平台DAU达27.1万，日活跃用户平均收益（ARPDAU）为8.9美分。将其DAU与ARPDAU相乘可得它在iOS平台每日收益近2万4119美元，再将这一数据乘以30可得该游戏整月收益为72万3570美元。

conversion metrics(from Glu)

据此可以推测，一款稳居营收榜单前100名的iOS应用每月收益可接近75万美元。

7）据gamasutra报道，Glu Mobile近日收购IGN Entertainment旗下公司GameSpy Technology，以便扩展其跨平台移动业务。

GameSpy公司主要为开发者提供多人匹配、玩家数值、积分排行榜等社交连接功能，Glu多人手机游戏《Gun Bros》曾采用GameSpy服务。Glu表示虽然这笔收购交易短期内不会产生可观收益，但从2013年之后可能推动公司实现更大盈利 。（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）Rovio to go public in 2013?

by Tim Green

Could be a lot of angry investors.

Is there any end to the frenzy around Angry Birds? Doesn’t look like it.

After one billion downloads and an estimated $750m in revenue, the story of the world’s most famous mobile app looks set to take another twist.

Rovio’s CFO Mikko Setala told Swedish economic journal Dagens Industrii that the firm would seek a listing in 2013.

But it’s far from a certainty.

He said: “We have prepared a stock market entry for 2013. But the shareholders have not decided when or whether it would even happen.

“If we go to the stock market, it would most likely be in the second half of next year. We do not need to raise any more funds at the moment.”

This IPO speculation has arisen before, only for the story to go quiet again. And it’s not as if Rovio needs the cash after making 48 million euros on sales of 75.4 million euros in 2011.

Some observers have valued the firm at $7bn. The big question for potential investors is whether Rovio is a one hit wonder, and whether that one hit will be a perennial like Mario and Mickey Mouse or a flash in the pan like Crazy Frog.（source:mobile-ent）

2）Phosphor and Zynga throw up the Horn with upcoming action mobile game (trailer)

Evan Killham

Today, developer Phosphor Games Studio (makers of The Dark Meadow) released the latest trailer for Horn, its action-adventure title coming out for iOS and Android this month.

Horn features an open fantasy world with “10 hours of story missions, plus endlessly escalating challenge modes,” Phosphor said in its announcement. Zynga will publish the game as part of its Partners for Mobile program, which easily makes this the FarmVille developer’s most hardcore project ever.

From today’s press release:

Based loosely on the Old English tales of King Horn, you play as a young blacksmith’s apprentice who wakes up to find his village overrun by fantastic, and sometimes humorous, monsters. On your incredible adventure, you carry the loud-mouthed head of one such creature with you — a somewhat uncooperative, ill-tempered, grudgingly helpful sidekick. Along with the help of this new companion, you must use your sword, crossbow, trusty musical horn, and wits to explore the lands, defeat the enemies, and solve puzzles in your quest to undo the curse that engulfs your homeland.

Here’s hoping developer Grasshopper Manufacture doesn’t hit Zynga with a lawsuit claiming infringement upon its own games, Shadows of the Damned and Lollipop Chainsaw, both of which also feature severed heads as sidekicks.（source:venturebeat）

3）Are 99-cent gamers on iOS more myth than fact?

by Eric Caoili

“The idea of a 99-cent gamer on iOS is more myth than fact, it’s the quality and depth of each product that will drive the right price for consumers.”
- Telltale Games’ SVP of publishing Steve Allison dismisses the notion of consumers ignoring a mobile game’s quality, as they debate over whether to purchase a title priced higher than a buck.

Telltale recently released its episodic adventure game The Walking Dead to iOS devices, keeping the same level of quality seen in the praised PC and console editions, and pricing each episode at $4.99 for iPhones and iPads.

Many have decried the “race to the bottom” in terms of pricing seen with games on the App Store, and some have even said developers have little choice but to release free-to-play titles as a result, but Allison argues that’s not the case.

Telltale, though, has the advantage of working with an extremely popular license — and having a bigger marketing budget than most iOS studios — in this particular case.

For those App Store developers working without those conveniences, are 99-cent iOS gamers still a myth? Or do they see most consumers as unwilling to pay for a more expensive game regardless of its quality, forcing them to underprice their titles?（source:gamasutra）

4）id Software calls time on mobile development team

by Keith Andrew

As PC and console developers target smartphones in droves, so id Software has announced it has closed down its own dedicated mobile development team.

The admission was made by co-founder John Carmack during his QuakeCon 2012 keynote speech, with the firm having decided to carry key talent from its mobile division across to the team working on Doom 4.

Doom and gloom

“We did make the decision to close up our mobile development, which saddens me a lot, in that I love doing the mobile work – taking that time, spending a month, a year or something working on a mobile project,” said Carmack.

“I hope we get back to mobile in various ways in the future, but the big real aim is blockbuster, triple-A titles, and for id that means Doom 4, it means that we get the whole company behind that after we get Doom 3: BFG Edition out the door, essentially everybody will be focused on Doom 4 as a project.”

Interestingly, Carmack admitted that, despite the mobile team being no more, it did manage to deliver an as-of-yet unrealised iOS title before time was called.

“Unfortunately, we have a couple projects – we have an iPhone project that’s sitting in the can right now with the rest of the Doom classics stuff, but we just havent been able to push it through,” Carmack explained.

“We’re going to hold off until some appropriate time – maybe we can do it with the Doom 3: BFG stuff on there.” （source:pocketgamer）

5）Gameforge sees success with its first three mobile games

Dean Takahashi

Germany’s Gameforge has announced that it is moving into the mobile gaming market. That’s a big transition, since Gameforge is focused on hosting massively multiplayer online games for hardcore gamers on the PC. Shifting to mobile games is an increasingly common crossover strategy for many established game companies.

The Karlsruhe, Germany-based company will focus on mobile games and has developed an in-house engine for mobile games. The company has released three role-playing games for devices running Apple iOS (iPhone, iPad, and iPod Touch), Android, and Windows Phone 7. Gameforge has 20 massively multiplayer online games with more than 300 million registered players on the PC. It is late to the mobile market, which is destined to be the ground for the mother of all free-for-all battles, but it can leverage its web-based PC users as it moves into mobile.

A few weeks after the launch, the three games, Mafia Game, Vampire Game, and War Game, have been downloaded and installed more than 2 million times. They achieved top ratings and high chart rankings in the respective app stores, the company said.

For the second half of 2012, Gameforge is readying another blast of mobile games in which players can always interact with each other. The company plans to adapt a number of its online games, including Ikariam, OGame, and Gladiatus, to tablets.

These mobile games will let players access their games from either mobile devices or home computers. Gameforge is also working on a Unity 3D-based game production.

“Given the increasing extent users enjoy games on their mobile devices, it is a strategic decision for game publishers to be present in that field. Our first mobile games for smartphones were a field experiment for us to see how the game mechanics of our successful web games can be transferred particularly to smartphones. They proved to be a successful start in this rapidly growing market segment,” says Gameforge CEO Alexander Rösner. “Our goal is to give players access to our games independently from their given device. The success of our first mobile games tells us that we are on the right way into the mobile future.”

By year end, Gameforge plans to release 10 games. Next year, the mobile division is expected to generate revenues of several million euros for its larger Gameforge Group parent company.

Accordingly, the company is hiring more mobile game developers. Gameforge already has 600 employees.

The world mobile game market is expected to grow from $4 billion in sales in 2011 to $8.3 billion in 2014.

Gameforge will show off its mobile games at the Gamescom conference this month in Hamburg, Germany, Aug. 15 to Aug. 18. Gameforge was founded in 2003 by Rösner.（source:venturebeat）

6）Glu Mobile’s Deer Hunter reloaded made over $720k on iOS in June

Kathleen De Vere

Glu Mobile’s second quarter financial results prove just how much money there is to be made on iOS, even without a “top grossing” game. In June Glu’s game Deer Hunter Reloaded made over $720,000 between the iPhone and the iPad, even though the game got no higher than No. 35 on the top grossing iPhone app charts and No. 23 on the top grossing iPad app charts.

As part of its latest set of earnings slides, Glu provided its June 2012 conversion metrics for some of its English iOS apps, excluding purchases made through jailbroken or hacked devices.

Glu’s game Deer Hunter: Reloaded was its most popular app for the month, racking up 271,000 daily active users on iOS and an average revenue per daily active user (ARPDAU) of 8.9 cents. Multiplying the game’s DAU by its ARPDAU means Deer Hunter: Reloaded made approximately $24,119 dollars a day on iOS. Multiply that figure by 30 and you arrive at $723,570 for the entire month.

Deer Hunter: Reloaded’s performance on the top grossing iOS app charts in June. The red line indicated chart position on the top grossing iPad app chart, and the blue line is chart position on the top grossing iPhone app chart.

[That’s very interesting because according to our traffic tracking service AppData, during June Deer Hunter Reloaded’s highest rank on the top grossing iPhone app chart was no higher than No. 23 on the iPad.

Although its important to remember these figures don’t provide a complete picture of the title’s performance — they omit non-english speaking revenues and Android revenue altogether — they are an excellent indicator of how quickly the iOS market is growing. From Glu’s numbers we now now its possible to earn almost $750,000 a month just by having a game maintain a steady rank in the top 100 of the top grossing app charts.（source:insidemobileapps）

7） GameSpy Technology acquired by mobile game publisher Glu Mobile

by Mike Rose

Mobile game developer and publisher Glu Mobile has acquired GameSpy Technology from IGN Entertainment, as it looks to expand its cross-platform mobile business.

GameSpy offers social connectivity features for developers, including multiplayer matchmaking, player statistics and leaderboards, and has previously been integrated into one of Glu’s multiplayer mobile titles, Gun Bros.

Through this acquisition, Glu hopes to expand on the social functionality and scalable multiplayer options in its future releases.

While the company admitted that in the short-term, this acquisition won’t make a huge difference in terms of earnings, it believes that GameSpy will eventually help drive higher monetization for Glu from 2013 onwards. （source:gamasutra）