Archive for February, 2009

Newer Entries »

fatfoogoo at Casual Connect 2009 Hamburg

Tuesday, February 3rd, 2009

fatfoogoo CEO Martin Herdina and SVP of Business Development and Sales Clive Jefferies will be in attendance at this years upcoming Casual Connect event being held in Hamburg, Germany February 10-12.

Casual Connect is the educational/meet up component of The Casual Gaming Association, an international trade association for casual gaming professionals.  The 2009 season kicks off in Hamburg this year, followed by Seattle’s event, 21-23 July, and culminating in Kyiv, Russia 21-23 October.

In an industry with over 200 million estimated players worldwide, totaling $2.25 billion in revenues in 2007, the Casual Connect events are THE premier event for all major players in the casual gaming space.  It’s also the hot spot to meet new and upcoming faces, learn more about existing and emerging technologies, and sample the best the industry has to offer.

While both Martin and Clive are heavily scheduled during these 3 days, they’re always up for a great chat about what fatfoogoo can do for you and the casual games community.  Contact them directly at martin(at)fatfoogoo.com and/or clive(at)fatfoogoo.com to set up a meeting.

Tags: , , , , , , ,
Posted in company news, fatfoogoo | No Comments »

 

SOE Prez John Smedley on microtransactions

Tuesday, February 3rd, 2009

We’ve both talked and read a lot about John Smedley over the years, and the Sony Online Entertainment President is rapidly becoming an outspoken voice in the microtransaction field.  Our friends over at Virtual Goods News recently had an outstanding Q&A with John, revealing some insight and thoughts, along with where Sony is headed with microtransactions.

John is credited as being one of the many people responsible for the current state of the MMORPG genre, thanks to his work on the original EverQuest.  In 2007 as President of SOE, he announced that the company would begin looking at and pursuing an interest in this up and coming business model known as microtransactions.

“We’ve been intrigued watching the Asian free-to-play model for awhile and got interested in that. The sales data we get out of the Denver studio is just shocking. People have money to spend and they want to spend it on something cool.”

John’ quick to point out the differences between the free-to-play, microtransaction supported business model, and microtransactions as an additional revenue stream.

“I think a lot of people are wondering if StationCash signals that we’ll make EverQuest and EverQuest II free-to-play, and that’s not correct,” says Smedley. “The reason for the StationCash store is very simple. It’s an additional revenue stream that gives customers something they want. The evidence of that is the sales numbers we’re seeing.”

Beating the critics to the punch, Smedley also comments on one of the most common complaints heard from gamers: microtransactions create an unfair game balance between those that have disposable income and little time, vs. those that have a great deal of time vs. little cash.

“So, we did some surveys of our players at FanFare 2008 – we got criticized for this – but we wanted to talk to our hardest-core fans and hardest critics. We got feedback that was very strongly “Yeah, as long as you don’t sell power, I’d give it a try.” We thought that the time was right.”

Speaking to SOE’s flagship microtransactions title ‘FreeRealms’, Smedley comments,

“FreeRealms has a StationCash store built right into it. The items include potions, outfits, pets. It’s designed with microtransactions from the ground up.”

And again addressing the ‘pay to pwn’ theory, it looks like there’s an option to buy ‘power’, but Smedley doesn’t see it this way,

“I wouldn’t call it power. We’re selling convenience. There will be some items there that you can buy. It’s primarily a microtransaction game, but it’s selling health potions and things like that.”

Over the past few months there’ve been rumblings about the anticipated upcoming spy based title ‘The Agency’ featuring microtransactions.  John sets the record straight with a simple “We’re not sure yet”,

“We haven’t made any announcements yet, but that’s because we haven’t made up our minds yet. It’s skill-based, so we can’t sell anything that confers player advantage. What that specifically means, I don’t know yet. We’re still experimenting.”

Looking forward, John is asked where he sees SOE in five years’ time.  Not surprisingly, he doesn’t see microtransactions becoming a core business model for SOE, but rather an additional revenue stream,

“I think we’re going to continue to expand virtual goods as part of our business, but it won’t be the core of our business. You’ll see it in new titles to different extents where appropriate.”

When asked his opinion on where the MMO scene in general will be in the next five years and where virtual goods factor into it, he comments,

“I think it is slowly but surely making its way in. It’s coming into everyday normal, MMOs. It’s just an ancillary revenue stream, a convenience for players, and I think people will gradually get used to it provided companies are careful with how they integrate it. I think over time it’s going to become a mainstream thing.”

To read the entire interview, be sure to visit Virtual Goods News.

Reblog this post [with Zemanta]

Tags: , , , , , , , ,
Posted in industry news | No Comments »

 

Free-to-play Maple Story ranks among top moneymaking MMO’s of 2008.

Monday, February 2nd, 2009

DFC Intelligence is gearing up to publish a comprehensive study of MMO worlds next month, according to GigaOm.  Wagner James Au got a special preview of the report and shares some initial estimates.

DFC’s David Cole says that the 2008 numbers are on the “very conservative” side, indicating that the 2008 numbers are still being crunched, and more exact numbers will be reflected in the February 16th reports.  “We indicate ranges because these numbers are estimates for 2008 based on where we think these products will end up,” said Cole.  And while the numbers are still being tallied, Cole estimates that the rankings should stay more or less the same, with “maybe a slot here or there” changing.

And while it shouldn’t come as a shock that the Blizzard powerhouse World of Warcraft takes the number one spot, Cole believes that if viewed from a pure profit margin, WoW wouldn’t be taking home the gold.  Asian MMO’s, which are traditionally developed at far lower budgets, have a much higher profit margin.  “Profit margin on Asian games is incredibly high,” says Cole, noting that Asian MMOs charge on or around 5-6 cents per hour with prepaid usage cards, a business model that has yet to proliferate the western gaming market.

What’s interesting to note in this projected report is the high ranking of Nexon’s free-to-play Maple Story (supported by microtransactions, prepaid cards, and international licensing), and the catalogue of Shanda’s games (Virtual item sales, prepaid cards, and freemium subscriptions).

1. World of Warcraft, launched 2004
Genre/Platform: Western MMORPG; client install with 3D graphics
Revenue sources: Monthly subscription, retails sales, prepaid cards (in Asia)
DFC estimated 2008 revenue: $500 million-plus

2. Fantasy Westward Journey, launched 2004
Genre/Platform: Asian MMORPG, client install with 2.5D graphics
Revenue sources: Prepaid cards
DFC estimated 2008 revenue: $150-$500 million

3. Maple Story, launched 2003
Genre/Platform: Asian MMORPG for kids, client install with 2D graphics
Revenue sources: Microtransactions, prepaid cards, international licensing
DFC estimated 2008 revenue: $150-$500 million

4. Shanda (company, includes Legend of Mir and World of Legend series), launched 2003
Genre/Platform: Asian MMORPG, client install with 2.5 graphics
Revenue sources: Prepaid cards, virtual item sales, freemium subscriptions
DFC estimated 2008 revenue: $150-$500 million

5. Lineage I and Lineage II , launched 1998 and 2003
Genre/Platform: Asian MMORPG, client install with 2.5 graphics (Lineage) and 3D graphics (Lineage II)
Revenue sources: Subscription, prepaid cards
DFC estimated 2008 revenue: $150-$500 million

6. Runescape
Genre/Platform: Western MMORPG for kids, web-based with 2.5D graphics
Revenue sources: Premium subscription, prepaid cards, real-world advertising
DFC estimated 2008 revenue: $50-$150 million

7. Club Penguin, launched 2006
Genre/Platform: Virtual world for kids, web-based 2.5D graphics
Revenue sources: Premium subscriptions, prepaid game cards
DFC estimated 2008 revenue: $50-$150 million

8. Lord of the Ring Online
Genre/Platform: Western MMORPG, client install with 3D graphics
Revenue sources: Subscription, retail sales
DFC estimated 2008 revenue: $50-$150 million

9. Warhammer Online
Genre/Platform: Western MMORPG, client install with 3D graphics
Revenue sources: Subscription, retail sales
DFC estimated 2008 revenue: $50-$150 million

10. Age of Conan
Genre/Platform: Western MMORPG, client install with 3D graphics
Revenue sources: Subscription, retail sales
DFC estimated 2008 revenue: $50-$150 million

Wagner continues his conversation with Cole around the most popular, in terms of active players, MMO of 2008.  To answer this question, we’ve got to go even a bit further out on the speculation branch, but Cole points out that Fantasy Westward Journey registered 2-3 million concurrent players back in August.  And although Warcraft likes to beat it’s own drum regarding their estimated 11 million+ players, “You’re lucky to get 5-10 percent [of them] playing at the same time,” says Cole.  Minho Kim, developer of Maple Story said in December that the title has 87+ million registrations, but wouldn’t comment on how many of these registered users were/are active monthly users.  Joost van Dreunen from DFC’ estimates the number to be more in the 13 – 17.4 million regular Maple Story players, roughly 15-20 percent of Kim’s estimation.

Cole admits that this year’s list looks remarkably similar to the 2007 list with Conan and Warhammer being released in 2008.  And while only 2 of the top 10 contain some type of microtransaction support, I’d estimate that this list might look very different one year from now with a number of highly anticipated (think Free Realms and Battlefield Heroes) free-to-plays coming online in ’09.

Tags: , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , ,
Posted in industry news | 1 Comment »

 
Newer Entries »