Posts Tagged ‘ea games’

Runes of Magic brings in AAA tier illustrator and concept artist Eva Widermann

Thursday, May 21st, 2009

evaRemember last week when the news broke that Frogster’s free-to-play title Runes of Magic had recently surpassed the 1 million registered user mark?  How about that partnership with BitRaider for North American players to get them up and running within a matter of minutes?  Remember how I predicted that Frogster and Runes are running at 1000 miles per hour, and could very well give both Maple Story and WoW a run for their money?  Well, I’d love to think that Frogster was listening to me personally, as they’ve recently announced that they’ve secured the services of top illustrator and concept artist Eva Widermann.  She’s charged primarily with shaping the future of game elements.  Another way to read that is, ‘she’s been hired to make the game look wicked!’

One of the common complaints we still hear about F2P titles is their rather drab, if not copy cat graphics and color palettes of other highly successful MMORPG’s (can you say WoW?).  The folks at Frogster have obviously recognized this complaint and have decided to step up to the plate and nip it in the bud, as they further continue to refine the title for Western Markets.

If the name Eva Widermann doesn’t jump right out at you, chances are her artwork already has at some point in the past.  With an extensive resume, she’s worked with some of the biggest hitters in the industry, including NC Soft, EA Games, Wizards of the Coast (Dungeons & Dragons), and Peter Jackson Games.  She splits her time between Karlsruhe, Germany and Cork, Ireland, consistently working on concept art and illustration work.

“For a long while things have looked rather bleak for concept art in Germany and I belong to the majority of illustrators who have seized their opportunities mainly abroad. And so I’m all the more delighted about the cooperation with Frogster and the up-coming projects.” Says Eva
Her first concept piece is show below, and is already in the works via production house Runewalker.  This new art will soon be implemented into Taborea.

runesofmagic_evawidermann_concept_art

“We are continuing to work consistently to tailor Runes of Magic to western markets. Eva’s superb concepts help us in going a long way to bringing this precept into reality.” Said an evidently pleased Andreas Weidenhaupt, Chief Licensing Officer of Frogster Interactive Pictures AG and CEO of Frogster Online Gaming GmbH.

Again, if Frogster’s breakneck speed at reaching 1 million users wasn’t enough to make you sit up and take notice, perhaps bringing in a top level concept artist, as well as the companies unwavering commitment to reaching AAA tier status with a free-to-play title might just do the trick.

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EA takes itself not-so-seriously and introduces microtransactions to real-world golf

Tuesday, February 24th, 2009

You’ve simply got to love it when one of the biggest names in gaming decides to throw all caution to the wind, and host a charity golf tournament – with microtransactions included.

Apparently this is the brainchild of EA CEO Rich Hilleman who sought to use design elements from Korean microtransaction based games in a real world golf tourney.  All players were allowed to purchase special abilities each round.  Some would help them improve their score, while others would damage opposing teams  (see pricing chart below).  Prices range from $1 to toss a beach ball at another player and moving another players ball one club length from the hole, to $10 which allowed players the ability to kick another players ball into a water hazard (take THAT Mr. Perry).


Image courtesy of MTV

EA Partner’s GM David DeMartini joked that the event was actually a test.  “So if microtransactions catch on here at the golf course today then it’s likely they will in the real world.”

And while EA smartly applied the microtransaction theme to a good cause, there’s also a timely message contained in this exercise.  Bob Wallace, principal at Strategic Alternative says, “The industry has been interested in microtransactions since the arcades.”  He thinks that although the model originated primarily in Asia, North America and Europe are prime to reap the benefits of microtransaction based pricing, “Because, you actually get what you pay for.”

DeMartini echos Wallace’s sentiments, “”I think we’re certainly headed in that way with more of the mid-session games, some of the free games…I think it’s going to be much more of a free-play microtransaction model.”

When asked about the market shift, Wallace predicts “Five years or less”.  He says that the two models (subscription and microtransaction) will coexist for a time (aren’t we already at this phase?), but that microtransactions will gain ground, “I think it has a lot of appeal to mass market gamers.”

All proceeds from EA’s microtransaction charity golf tournament will be donated to the Randy Pausch Scholarship Fund, part of which may be used to help fund the education of future game developers.  If you’re unfamiliar with who Randy Pausch is, clear 10 minutes from your schedule and watch.

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View the full 1 hour 16 minute version here.

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Disney’s free-to-play Pixie Hollow drives online growth

Tuesday, February 17th, 2009

Along with launching DisneyXD last week, the big mouse also announced that recent ComScore data reveals that Disney Games takes third place among all online gaming destinations with 13.4M visitors in December 2008, a 13% increase yoy.  Reaching one further, ComScore’s January 2009 data sees Disney leapfrogging EA Games and grabbing the number 2 spot.

Disney’s not-so-secret ingredient?  Their free-to-play, virtual world Pixie Hollow.  According to Virtualworldsnews.com, a Disney representative explains the surge in traffic as, “largely driven by our virtual worlds, and specifically by the popularity of the new Disney Fairies Pixie hollow virtual world.”

And while Disney’s corporate policy dictates that no concrete numbers could be released, the rep also adds that Club Penguin has been a consistent driver for Disney, “but that the recent spike in Fairies traffic helped boost Disney last month.”

These numbers might seem large and impressive, but keep in mind that back in October Senior Vice President of Disney Online Steve Parkis stated, “More than 7 and a half million Fairies have already been created and, until now, have been all dressed up with no place to go. Now, in Pixie Hollow, Fairies can join their friends, take flight and live their very own Fairy adventures.”

To this end, it’s fair to say that Disney did they due diligence in ‘pre-loading’ the site with over 7.5M players that were ready and waiting for the magical world of Pixie Hollow to roll out the welcome mat.

The game itself is free-to-play, but similar to Disney’s Club Penguin, players may buy into a $5.99/month membership fee that gives them exclusive access to a number of game features.  Also noteworthy is Disney’s ‘real-world’ tie-ins to the online virtual world.  When played in the real-world, the companies’ Clickables Fairy collection rewards players with a number of special content unlocks that allow them to add unique clothing, accessories, and décor to their virtual world collection.

Disney may have taken the number two spot in online gaming destinations, but not all is well at Disney’s Interactive Studios.  Earlier this month in an earnings call, DIS made it quite clear that they’re in a similar bind as a number of other games publishers: falling prices.  Disney CFO Tom Staggs says that DIS sold more units last quarter, but ended up with less coinage in the bank due to, “a competitive and difficult market put pressure on pricing.”

Despite recent DIS layoffs, Staggs says that Disney expects to “continue to invest in… videogames, websites and virtual worlds.”

Given the problem facing the folks at DIS, combined with the massive growth in their free-to-play Pixie Hollow, I’d be interested in the revenue numbers Disney’s virtual world product sales are generating.  Is it time for Disney to seriously rethink how they’re monetizing the online and/or gaming space?

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EA to feature Downloadable Micro transaction Soundtracks

Thursday, July 10th, 2008

EA’s chief music executive, Steve Schnur gave a definitive timeline on downloadable music content for EA in an interview with Stephen Totilo from mutiplayerblog.com yesteday.

In the interview Totilo spoke to Schnur regarding EA’s popular football game, “Madden”.  The idea behind the microtransaction song sales is that the player shouldn’t be locked into hearing the same soundtrack over and over, but rather be presented with a variety of options all available for download.  Totilo also notes that EA is already doing this in “Rock Band” on a weekly basis, so why not non-rhythm based games as well?

Schnur is quoted as saying, “You’re going to see it in 2009”.  “By ‘Madden 10’ gamers can expect some of the “broader-based” EA games (not just any music titles) to be able to “continually recommend” new music that can be downloaded to enhance a soundtrack”.

EA’s industry clout certainly gives it an advantage in bringing new music to users that may not already own the content and import via custom tracks features.

While fatfoogoo is not specifically tailored to delivering downloadable music content, it is something that we could certainly tailor to a number of individual game developers.  With our unparalleled industry experience and flexible system, customizing a system for music instead of character upgrades for example would be an easy conversion.

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ION Game Conference in Seattle: redefining online

Tuesday, May 27th, 2008

ION Game Conference in Seattle: redefining online

Under the motto “Redefining Online”, the Annual ION Game Conference took place in Seattle, WA ion between the 13th and 15th of May. The global gaming industry converged at ION to discuss the future of Online Gaming, exchange news, and set new goals for the coming years. Besides industry titans from both the US and Asia such as EA Games, Bigpoint, Crytek, and Epik; fatfoogoo was one of the few European companies present. We were here not only to represent Fatfoogoo, but also to get a view of the newest developments in online gaming. How these developments look, and where they will be taking the next generation of Online Gaming, we proudly present to you here:

Free Games with downloadable content and additional services

The first Trend that’s abuzz in the industry is the increasing alternatives to drive revenue generation. Publishers will sooner or later move further and further away from costly subscription fees and expensive stand alone games, and more in the direction of a “Free to play” platform, i.e. the game is free to download and play, but it’s also self financing by additional downloadable content, services, and micro-transactions between player to player or publisher to player. An excellent example of this concept would be South Korean publishers Nexon, who with Court Rider and Maple Story have banked over $230M in turnover, or German publisher Bigpoint whom already have over 10 million users. On average 8%-30% of these users have already, or will in the future pay for additional functionality and levels.

Outsourcing

The second trend amongst game publishers deals with competition in the global market and the often negative feelings/opinions associated with outsourcing. In order to spend more time in developing games, publishers are increasingly relying on third technologies; game engines, sound creation tools, and/or micro transactions (the selling and/or trading of objects, items and services within a game), between players or between publishers and players. The time and money saved with outsourcing should be reinvested in the core components of manufacturer; game development. There’s already a prime example of a masterful use of outsourcing in Epik’s Unreal 3. Unreal 3′s engines are pretty much the same as any 3D shooter, but they employ various sound engines from the Dolby Engineering labs, or micro-transactions from operators like fatfoogoo. The already existing cooperation with second and third line suppliers of engines and services should be worked out in the future. At it’s essence this will free up game publishers to do what they do best: Develop and publish games.

The merging of (suppossed) opposites

The third trend focuses on the fusion of the various different pieces of Social Networking and Gaming. The border between PC and Console, virtual worlds, games and personal net applications, mobile and casual games is becoming more and more blurred each day and should interoperate with each other – technically, functionally and economically. The platforms will be open to each other, and offer the end users several different levels of interaction. Nevertheless, the challenge for this kind of openness in technology lies not only in the tech sector, but the judicial as well. Copyright and tax laws vary from state to state, country to country. The challenge of a functional multinational system is a priority not only for software and hardware manufacturers, but for politicians as well.

Final Thoughts

Final thoughts and personal observations from Martin Herdina, our foogoo on the ground at ION:

A letter from America

Martin HerdinaBeing back in Europe the jetlag still doesn’t allow me much sleep at night but – and what’s a lot more relevant – I am looking back to a super exciting week at fatfoogoo.

Listening to the industry legends from EA, THQ and NCSoft talk about micro-transactions as the future revenue model for online gaming and to the success stories around Nexon’s “Cartrider” in Korea ($ 250M p.a.) has been extremely interesting and demonstrated once again that fatfoogoo is serving exactly the right market segment at exactly the right time.

Apart from these business aspects I met a full crowd of great people from the US gaming industry, enjoyed some super cool US Ska music at night (check out http://www.myspace.com/dealsgonebad) and was successful at avoiding all business-development meetings taking place in one of Seattle’s strip clubs.

Best,
Martin

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