Additional Coverage

For more GDC 2010 presentations and information, be sure to check out…

• Metagame Design by Mary Jo Kim
• Building A Virtual World: Lean Startup Style by Eric Ries
• The State Of The Social Gaming Industry by Justin Smith
• GDC 2010: Scaling the summits of gameplay – Coverage roundup by CNET
• Social Games in China – The New Import/Export Business! by James Gwertzman
• Will Wright’s Perspectives On Play – Recap of the “The Sims” creator’s surprise GDC talk
• Console Game Makers Take Lessons From Social Games At GDC 2010 by The Social Times

The following aren’t GDC 2010, per se, but they do provide some interesting background into the Chinese social game “Happy Farm” and its dramatic impact on (and reflection of) modern Chinese culture. Fascinating reading…

• China’s growing addiction: online farming games
• Hurry! Time to “steal vegetables”
• Stealing veggies online a harmful game that undermines values
• ‘Happy Farms’ Game Destroys Chinese Jobs, Relationships
• Happy Farm Online Game Spawns Real-Life Farming in China

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In 2009, a total of around $600.5 million was raised by game startups — that’s down 36% from the year previous, but is still a Lot Of Money. And venture capitalists remain bullish on the future of game funding.

How do you get a piece of that action? What’s it like to work with a venture capital firm? What do VCs look for in an investment?

The MIT Enterprise Forum’s New England Games SiG and the New England Venture Capital Association co-hosted an event last night titled “A Meeting Of The Minds: Game Companies And The VCs That Fund Them” to help answer those questions. Here’s my summary…

Who Led Last Night’s Discussion?

On the game company side…

• Jim Crowley (CEO of Turbine)
• Nabeel Hyatt (CEO of Conduit Labs)
• Rob Seaver (CEO of Vivox)

On the VC side…

• Alex Finkelstein (Spark Capital)
• Dayna Grayson (North Bridge Venture Partners)
• Austin Westerling (Charles River Ventures)

Wade Roush of Xconomy moderated the event.

Why Are VCs Interested In Games?

Traditionally, games has been considered a hit-driven business. VCs are not normally interested in hit-driven businesses. So, why are they interested in games?

According to the panel, their interest stems from two exciting trends:

• Games –and game mechanics — are at the heart of what’s happening now in the economy, in the culture, online, everywhere
• Differentiated distribution networks that bring customer acquisition costs down to nil

Those two trends, coupled with passionate and intellectually honest entrepreneurs, create opportunities for a successful sale or IPO, which is ultimately what VCs are after.

What Kind Of Games Are VCs Interested In?

PC and console games do not interest VCs. Based on what was said last night, they aren’t actually interested in any particular game genre, either.

Instead, they’re interested in (and have invested in)…

• Gaming infrastructure – examples: Vivox (voice chat for games); LiveGamer (virtual goods); OfferPal (virtual currency monetization)
• Games that solve meaningful problems – example: 8d World (teaches English language through gaming)
• Those who can produce games quickly and cheaply, evaluate results, gain traction – example: OMGpop
• Non-game applications that borrow game dynamics to create a more compelling experience – example: foursquare
• Social games — which, Grayson noted, aren’t “social” as much as viral and reduce acquisition costs dramatically

What Do VCs Look For In A Business?

• Intellectual honesty, passion, and realism
• Have you identified a significant and under-served segment?
• Do you have a strategy for serving this segment in a unique, compelling, and defensible way?
• Do you have traction already? Have you started to build the product and acquire customers?
• Is there a realistic chance for a significant exit through IPO or acquisition? “Significant” last night was defined as $100 million or more.

What Should Entrepreneurs Look For In VCs?

Find someone…

• you’re personally compatible with
• who understands your business
• and has solid credentials and references

You’re going to be working very closely with this person for 5-7 years, so you need to be comfortable with them on a personal and professional level.

How To Attract & Work With VCs?

• Understand they’re investing in a business, not a game
• Don’t oversell; realistically explain the pros/cons of the business
• Know your P&L, your roadmap & milestones, your cost structure
• Do your research: Know the VC you’re selling to!
• Iterate your presentation to make it stronger each time you present

More Insights

For more insights in 140 characters or less be sure to check out Twitter coverage of the event at hashtag #VCGameOn

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Listen now:

Show Notes For This Episode

• Video: E3 2009 Shadow Complex Trailer HD
• Video: Inside Gaming 2009 Comic Con Interview: Shadow Complex
• MetaCritic: Shadow Complex
• Video: Authors@Google: Dev Patnaik
• Wired To Care (Official Site)

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Subscribe to the feed to receive future updates; follow me on Twitter to keep the discussion going and/or tell me how to properly conduct a podcast, because I’m flying by the seat of my pants with this.

PMMPC: The Podcast Available Wherever Fine Podcasts Are Available

• iTunes
• Feedburner
• Podcast Pickle

The game is very rewarding–but can also be brutally, frustratingly difficult. Just like being a product manager.

In honor of the newly-released Castlevania: The Adventure ReBirth, here are the three key product management lessons I’ve learned from playing Castlevania games…

Look For Problems You Can Whip Profitably

Defeating monsters in Castlevania brings you money and experience points which translate into making you a tougher opponent with an increased variety of weapons available. But don’t bite off more than you can chew, or that next monster will kill you dead.

As a Product Manager, it’s easy to get carried away by the excitement of feature brainstorming and “what-if” scenarios. You need to stay focused, and attack problems the market has that your company is ideally suited to address. Don’t bite off more than you can chew.

Get In Close Enough To Whip, But Not Close Enough To Be Hit

Generally, Castlevania monsters fall into two camps: Those trying to get close enough to strike you before you can hit them, and those who keep their distance while chucking projectiles at you. That balancing act is a core element of Castlevania gameplay and can be incredibly, frustratingly difficult–but feels so gratifying once you’ve accomplished it.

To be an effective Product Manager, you must be able to balance the short term and the long term, and think about both simultaneously. A delicate balancing act, easy to mistime, but essential to launching the right product at the right time to the right market.

Plan For Alternate Endings

Many Castlevania games feature alternate endings, and your decisions in the game determine which ending you see. Did you leave the vampire sisters to suffer in Castlevania: Portrait of Ruin? Then you missed out on Portrait of Ruin’s “good ending” in your rush to beat the game.

As a Product Manager, you need to pay attention–to the market, to trends, and to people internally–and think about what you’re witnessing. If you don’t, you run the risk of missing opportunities, small and large, and potentially damaging your own reputation.

Many times, PMs lead through sheer force of will rather than real, vested authority, and a great way to ensure people fail to value you is for you to fail to value them.

Bonus Content!

The trailer for the new Castlevania : Lords of Shadow coming to XBox 360 and PS3 in 2010. (Yes, that’s Patrick Steward narrating!)

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Rating Last Year’s Predictions

#1 – Casual Games Will Prove Their Mettle
A+. The casual gaming companies that made big headlines in ’09 — Tapulous, Playfish, Zynga, and Nintendo, among others — had solid products and diverse revenue streams. As predicted, those who cleaved too tightly to their tried and true made headlines of a different stripe.

#2 – The End Of DRM As We Know It
D-. Did we learn from 2008′s Spore debacle? Maybe. Not really. 2D Boy (World of Goo) came out against DRM in casual games. EA claims Sims 3 lost $9m to piracy. Valve claims to have made DRM obsolete. In other words: Same old, same old.

#3 – Underpricing Of iPhone Game Apps Will Continue
A+ (unfortunately). The race to the bottom continues. At least one casual games developer raised its prices by 13x in protest to complaints about their puzzle game’s $2.99 pricetag being too high.

#4 – The Rise Of Online Game Shows
B+. The second season of 1 vs. 100 debuted on Xbox Live. My own business was profitable. Not everyone fared so well: PlayCafe closed their doors, and Microsoft powered down Jellyfish. Amuso retired its user-generated game shows but moves ahead with trivia for prizes.

#5 – Turbulent Times Will Spark Innovation
A. Savvy game makers focused on low-friction offerings that satisfied value-minded consumers and encouraged self-distribution. That’s part of the secret sauce behind EA’s acquisition of Playfish, and part of the reason Kongregate launched the Konduit Application Platform.

Not too shabby, overall. Now, let’s look into… The Future!

Trends & Predictions For 2010

#1 – Product Differentiation
Remember when Bejeweled spawned the “match three” genre? We’re there now with casual games on Facebook: Many similar titles relying on the same mechanics and experience. In 2010, as Facebook evolves and its growth slows and its members become more savvy… look for innovation in gameplay, marketing, and monetization. The $600.5 million raised by casual game companies this year should help.

#2 – Sales Of Virtual Goods Skyrocket
Revenue from the sale of digital content in games will surpass $1 billion by the end of 2009, thanks to an expanding population of casual gamers and the increasing sophistication of casual games. That’s 2x the revenue generated in 2008. Now that Apple is allowing free iPhone apps to charge for add-on content, look for sales to climb higher in 2010 and margins to stay fat.

#3 – Flash-Based Development Booms
With near-total browser penetration, “comeback” isn’t quite the right word. However, with new opportunities for monetization and distribution, and the debut of Flash CS5′s Packager for iPhone that enables ActionScript 3 projects to run as native iPhone apps, the future looks brighter for Flash-based development than ever.

#4 – Rhythm-Based Games Sales Decline
Pre-orders for DJ Hero were weak, and actual sales were “modest” in November. The Beatles: Rock Band fell short of initial sales predictions, and sales for the Guitar Hero 5 bundle (game plus peripherals) were down 50% year over year. Look for that trend to continue as consumers realize they have way too many fake musical instruments in their homes. However, in-game song purchases will take off.

#5 – East Meets West, Returns Favor
This will work three ways: 1) Western developers will step up their efforts to enter the booming Chinese casual games market; 2) Eastern investors will make big bets on American mobile and social gaming infrastructure; and 3) Western consumers will start to mimic Japan’s infatuation with mobile games, opening up new opportunities for casual gaming and monetization.

What Do YOU Think?

Lightspeed Ventures, Morgan Stanley and ReadWriteWeb have some broader predictions for 2010. What do you see coming next in casual games, mobile, or consumer technology in general?

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I’m particularly interested in the idea of meta gaming, and how that could be applied to businesses outside of gaming to drive engagement and reap benefits…

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Tomorrow: We’ll pull back the curtain to look at lessons learned from the development and release of this game.

WALTHAM, MA – May 4, 2009 – Money can’t buy happiness. But it can buy ninja assassins. Or, in this case, ninja assassins for your iPhone and iPod Touch.

Gamesville.com is pleased to announce their first iPhone/iPod game: Ninja Rally. The game is available at the iTunes App Store and can be previewed at: http://www.ninjarally.com

Two rival schools of ninjas are under attack–and bad blood prevents either side from seeing the true threat. In the midst of it all, true love blossoms between a boy and a girl from the rival schools. Can their forbidden love save the day? Or is doom inescapable?

Game play is simple but fun: Send your ninjas across the battlefield to assault your opponent’s base or to defend against incoming attacks. The longer you can keep your team following the leader, the larger the Ninja Rally effect–and the more damage attacks will inflict.

Ninja Rally includes single-player, multi-player over local wireless, global high scores, and a fully-fleshed out story mode with multiple endings.

About Gamesville.com

Gamesville.com is the world’s premiere game show site (the site’s slogan is “Wasting your time since 1996″). Dedicated to fun, easy-to-use interactive entertainment, Gamesville.com offers free massively-multiplayer game shows that pay winners a multitude of cash and merchandise prizes. Gamesville.com is home to such popular (proprietary) game shows as The Bingo Zone®, CatchUp CoverAll™, and Magic 21 Jackpot™. And now, ninjas for your iPhone and iPod Touch. For more information visit www.gamesville.com.

#1 – Casual Games Will Prove Their Mettle
After 9/11 and the dotcom crash, the Dow Jones Industrial Average dropped 22% … but video game revenue climbed 43%. With that, and the maxim that inexpensive entertainment booms during hard times, it’s no wonder that many think casual games will prove recession proof. Will all casual game providers make it through the crunch? Probably not; no one’s invincible. The casual game providers who do survive will have–besides interesting products–a diversified mix of revenue streams.

#2 – The End Of DRM As We Know It
The industry will learn from the Spore debacle. Rather than risk consumer backlash, alternatives will be sought that focus on a game’s strengths and make the legal version of the game more valuable than the pirated version. Online components–such as a solid authentication system that does not interfere with a customer’s right to enjoy the game (think, Valve’s STEAM)–will be the beginning.

#3 – Underpricing Of iPhone Game Apps Will Continue
In the race to cash in on the iPhone goldrush, app providers–including game developers–are trying to grab market share by slashing prices at an hysterical rate. Many are in danger of pricing themselves out of existence. While I hope developers start to understand that lowering prices actually decreases the value of their products in the eyes of consumers, there’s no indication that anyone (including Apple) is trying to rectify the situation.

#4 – The Rise Of Online Game Shows
Game shows and reality TV shows are big business offline–and they’re hitting their stride online. Established players, such as my own site, Gamesville.com, are launching new game shows for free cash prizes every few months. Newcomers PlayCafe and Amuso focus on user-generated game shows, and a Newton, MA, entrepreneur just launched his own “televised” online game show. Microsoft acquired shopping-oriented game show site Jellyfish in 2007, and plans to launch “programmatic, highly concurrent social interactive games” (eg, “game shows“) in 2009. The online game show space is heating up, and will only get hotter.

#5 – Turbulent Times Will Spark Innovation
Some analysts believe that hard economic times will stifle innovation in games. I disagree. Sure, companies may feel the need to batten down the hatches but other industries have demonstrated that cutting back on R&D during down times is not necessarily good business sense. To survive, game makers need products that satisfy value-minded consumers; they also need to continue introducing and executing new concepts and ideas–otherwise, it truly is game over.

Take a look back at the year that was: Check out the top trends in casual games in 2008…

Additional Resources

• Joel Brodie: Recession? What Recession?
• iPhone Application Price Points And Business Models
• Online Game Economies Weathering Real-World Financial Blizzard
• Consumer Internet Predictions For 2009

If you enjoyed this post, please leave a comment or subscribe to the feed to receive future updates automatically. You can also follow me on Twitter.

Today, we’re looking at the top five trends in casual gaming in 2008…

#1 – The PC Is The Gaming Platform Of Choice
Numerous people have been claiming “The PC is Dead!” for years. Guess what? Playing games on the PC remains strong: Nearly three-out-of-four gamers (73%) use computers to play, while just over half (53%) use game consoles.

#2 – Draconian DRM Rears Its Ugly Head
Because of its DRM scheme, EA’s Spore went from one of the most “eagerly anticipated” casual games of the year, to the most pirated game of the year, to the poster child for the death of PC gaming.

#3 – The iPhone Goldrush Begins
Over half of the best-selling iPhone Apps of 2008 were games. Small development teams are generating significant revenue off iPhone apps, so expect many more games to come.

#4 – The Rise Of Social Games
Social games are casual games that leverage players’ social graphs to find new ways to interact with friends and family on social networks. Facebook, of course, led the way thanks to third-party titles like Scrabulous, among many others. But with Facebook’s redesign, social games appear to take a backseat to other features.

#5 – Almost Everyone’s A Gamer Now
Nearly all American teens (97%), and more than half of adults age 18+ (53%) play video games, according to research from the Pew Internet Project. Even more impressive: About one-in-five adults (21%) plays video games every day.

Next time we’ll look at predictions for casual games in 2009!

What trends did you see in 2008? What’s coming up for 2009?

Additional Resources

• Casual Games May Be Recession-Proof; Companies Report Record Revenues, and Some Surprising Trends
• Gamasutra’s Top 20 Trends of 2008
• Casual Gaming Year In Review, 2008
• How Casual Game Startups Can Survive Recession
• Causal Games Are Recession-Proof

If you enjoyed this post, please leave a comment or subscribe to the feed to receive future updates automatically. You can also follow me on Twitter.

Facebook CEO Mark Zuckerberg once remarked that, “A lot of companies get grouped as social networking. Lots are dating sites, or media sites or sites for community. But our mission is helping people understand the world around them.” Some might think that’s just green, marketing fluff. Maybe it is. But there’s also something very appealing about that idea in terms of games.

The community benefits of online games are recognized by medical professionals: No matter where gamers live, they love the ability to meet other people from around the world. It’s that option, that unique ability for real-time social interaction, that enhances the game experience, making it more than just a game.

Of course, you might be hard-pressed to argue that any game is going to help anyone understand their place in the world — and that’s fine. Is it silly to think of Peggle as the new Da Vinci Code? Maybe. However, I think the opportunity exists in the play space.

Sometimes, it’s conversation via in-game chat. That’s where you meet people, hear their viewpoints, learn something about their part of the world. We see that all the time in massively multiplayer game shows such as Bingo Zone or group chat in single-player games on Pogo.

Sometimes, the game itself is overt about its socially conscious intent. For example, Peace Maker and Future Flow let you know, up front, that these games are about our world and what’s happening to it.

HopeLab’s Remission is credited with helping many cancer patients better understand the disease, and at least one with actually defeating leukemia. Games are also useful in pain management and can potentially help people with acute depression and Attention Deficit Disorder.

At their most basic, productivity games such as Diner Dash can help people feel like they’re exerting some control over their lives where they otherwise may not have any.

Real life might be complex and tedious at times, with rules being broken left and right. Games provide structure — rules that can’t be broken — and tasks that can be completed. There’s something very satisfying about that, something that perhaps cannot always be achieved in reality. And maybe that therapeutic nature helps people deal with their real lives just a little bit better.

Someone once remarked that, “The game of life is like the game of boomerangs — deeds and words return to us sooner or later with astounding accuracy.” Good thing casual games can also help with alertness, contentment and hand-eye coordination. (Thanks, Peggle!)

Christopher Cummings, author of The Left Click, is senior product manager for Gamesville.com, where thousands of people compete daily in free, massively multiplayer games to win real cash prizes. You can join the Gamesville group on Facebook or follow them on Twitter.

This editorial originally appeared at
http://www.dailygame.net/news/archives/008221.php