Tag Archives | Gaming

Facebook, Zynga Buddy Up For an Internet Eon

Posted by Jared Newman on May 18, 2010 at 8:06 pm

It doesn’t surprise me at all that Facebook and Zynga have made amends.

A week ago, the respective giants of social networking and social gaming were at odds over of Facebook Credits, a form of online currency. Facebook wants 30 percent of all Facebook Credits revenue from developers, and Zynga, whose hit games Farmville and Mafia Wars rely mainly on virtual item purchases for revenue, was understandably miffed.

But because Farmville needs the daily traffic Zynga creates, and Zynga desperately needs Facebook’s existing social network, the companies worked out their differences. Facebook keeps its 30 percent cut, but sweetened the deal for Zynga with undisclosed perks.

What does surprise me is how long Facebook and Zynga agreed to stay together: Five years. Given the pace technology and the Internet have moved and continue to move, a half decade is, for lack of a better term, a ridiculously long time. Instead of breaking out the crystal ball, let’s put this in perspective by looking back.

Five years ago:

Zynga didn’t exist.
Facebook was still limited to college students.
MySpace was the king of social networking as the 5th most-viewed website in the United States (now 12th to Facebook’s 2nd)
News Corp. had not yet acquired MySpace (that happened in July 2005).
World of Warcraft, the gold standard for online game addiction before Farmville, was not even a year old.
Second Life was still blowing up. The virtual city’s population hadn’t yet topped 1 million, and Anshe Chung hadn’t yet earned $1 million selling virtual real estate. This trend story hadn’t been written.
Monthly rentals were a dominant business model for mobile phone games. (If Farmville is playable on Android 2.2 phones, it won’t cost a penny.)
To my knowledge, there was no concerted effort to kill Adobe Flash.

A lot can change in five years. Any bets on whether Facebook and Zynga will still be together in 2015?

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Nintendo and Heart Association Team Up, Fall Short

Posted by Jared Newman on May 17, 2010 at 7:17 pm

The American Heart Association just gave Nintendo an encouraging slap on the rear by endorsing the Wii and a couple of games.

It’s a great development for Nintendo. The AHA will stick a stamp of approval on two of Nintendo’s in-house titles, Wii Sports Resort and Wii Fit Plus, along with the console itself. The association will also showcase the Wii at “Find a Start! Heart Walk” events around the country. You can’t buy marketing like that (Update: Actually, you can. ABC News reports that Nintendo paid $1.5 million for a three-year endorsement).

The AHA’s gains from the partnership are more ambiguous. Exposure? The appearance of being on the cutting edge of fitness? Neither motivation would trouble me if the association were doing more than just declaring Nintendo to be its star player.

If I were an executive at Electronic Arts, I’d be livid. Last year, the publisher released EA Sports Active, a game specifically designed for exercise, unlike Nintendo’s fun-oriented Wii Sports Resort and Wii Fit Plus. Beyond EA, there are plenty of other third-party games with an eye towards fitness, such as The Biggest Loser, Jillian Michaels Fitness Ultimatum and Just Dance. Where’s the AHA stamp of approval for those titles? For that matter, should the AHA still pledge allegiance to Nintendo when Microsoft and Sony release their own motion controllers?

The AHA could be doing so much more with the active play concept. It could rate individual games based on the difficulty of their workouts. It could give advice on how to make the most of each exercise game. Heck, if the group really had some ambition, it could create an online metagame for people to share and track their progress through multiple AHA-approved titles.

As it stands, the partnership between Nintendo and the AHA is a gimmick whose value barely exceeds the bullet points on the back of game boxes. Once the Wii Fit Plus gets stowed away in a dusty corner, with no endorsed products to replace it, the stamp of approval is meaningless.

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Oh No, Not RollerCoaster Tycoon: The Movie

Posted by Jared Newman on May 13, 2010 at 10:30 pm

Hollywood continues to find inspiration in plotless video games, with Sony Pictures Animation picking up the film rights to RollerCoaster Tycoon.

According to the Hollywood Reporter, the film will be a mix of CGI and live action. What the storyline will entail is unknown, because the game itself has none. Like many simulation games, RollerCoaster Tycoon is about building and maintaining the best infrastructure possible — in this case, amusement parks — not interacting with characters.

So let’s count off game-based movies whose plots are a mystery. I previously wrote about Universal’s plans to make a movie based on the arcade classic Asteroids. Since then, Warner has negotiated with Taito to make a Space Invaders film and is working on a Spy Hunter movie, and Fox is trying to get the rights to Missile Command. None of these games have more than one line of narrative or any iconic characters.

Ostensibly, the studios are interested in these movies because they’re low-risk. The utter lack of plot affords a blank canvas for generic spy drama, space opera or family fun, and the recognizable video game franchises automatically raise the profile of the films (Case in point: I wouldn’t be writing about any of them if they had nothing to do with video games).

But maybe these films are risky business after all. There’s no past experience to draw on here, as these are not traditional game-to-movie adaptations where the narrative is set and fan interest is a given. The studios are seeking production rights and starting development with no guarantee that people are going to buy the concept. It’s entirely possible that people will recognize these films as hollow attempts to capitalize on nostalgia and brand recognition, but no one knows, because no one’s tried.

So the question is, who goes first? I’m sure all the studios are anxious to see whether plundering plotless video games was a good idea after all.

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3 Ways Google Can Fast-Track Android Gaming

Posted by Jared Newman on May 12, 2010 at 5:17 pm

Google’s not making a big deal of it yet, but there are signs the company is interested in video games. Last month, Google hired games industry veteran Mark DeLoura to be its “Developer Advocate” for games, and acquired game and widget developer LabPixies. On Tuesday, TechCrunch spotted a Google job posting for “Product Management Leader, Games.”

I can only speculate what Google is planning, but a push to make Android a more prominent gaming platform is long overdue. Here are a few ways Google can make it happen:

Copy Apple, straight-up: Games are the dominant type of app on the iPhone and iPad, and Apple has taken the hint. Come OS 4, the iPhone will unify its games with Game Center, a layer of social networking and matchmaking features akin to Xbox Live. That’s a good step for any games platform to take, so why not Google?

Forget “Developer Advocate,” hire a “Gamer Advocate”: As long as Google’s mimicking Apple, one way the folks in Mountain View can do better is to hire a community manager, someone who can put a public face on Google’s gaming efforts and organize special events and giveaways. These gamer-developer liaisons are all the rage among the big publishers and console makers, and given the culture in Cupertino, there’s no way Apple’s going to do this.

Make Flash Gaming a Priority: Whether you loved or hated Steve Jobs’ “Thoughts on Flash,” there’s no denying that Flash was not designed for the touch screen. That’s not such a problem for video or other content that uses simple clicking, but gamers are going to want access to Kongregate, Miniclip and other Flash game sites. Keyboard and rollover input figure prominently into Flash games, so Google would be wise to find a solution.

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EA Sports to Used Game Buyers: Pay Up

Posted by Jared Newman on May 11, 2010 at 9:03 am

Electronic Arts is getting ever more desperate to cripple the used video game industry, requiring a one-time access code to play its sports games online.

Starting with Tiger Woods PGA Tour 11, players will need an “Online Pass” to enjoy the game over Xbox Live or the Playstation Network. These passes are included with new copies of the game, but used buyers will have to purchase another pass for $10. All EA Sports games for Xbox 360 and PS3 will require an online pass from now on.

Sony did something similar with SOCOM: U.S. Navy SEALs Fireteam Bravo 3, including a voucher for online play in the retail packaging and charging $20 for replacement vouchers. Sony said it was only trying to stop piracy, but EA doesn’t hide its disdain for used game sales. “We want to reserve EA SPORTS online services for people who pay EA to access them,” the company said in an Online Pass FAQ page.

EA previously experimented with innocuous ways to encourage new games sales. New buyers of Dragon Age: Origins and Mass Effect 2, for example, received free bonus content that used buyers had to purchase separately. Online Pass promises bonus features for new game buyers as well, but it takes the idea one giant leap further by withholding a core part of the game.

The writing’s on the wall: Gradually, publishers will begin locking up more of what’s on the game disc until there’s no advantage to buying used. It started with bonus content, now it’s multiplayer, and pretty soon it’ll be the whole game. EA’s justification for Online Pass — that it deserves to be paid — really applies to all game development, so you’re kidding yourself if you think the trend stops at online sports games. Want to play the final chapter of your second-hand first-person shooter? There’s an access code for that.

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Sorry Zynga, Farmville Needs Facebook

Posted by Jared Newman on May 9, 2010 at 11:42 pm

There’s apparently some drama happening between Facebook and Zynga, maker of the wildly popular social games Farmville, Cafe World and Mafia Wars.

The beef is primarily about Facebook forcing game developers to use Facebook Credits for in-game purchases, says TechCrunch’s anonymous sources. Facebook takes a 30 percent cut of all Credits transactions, and Zynga makes a lot of money by selling items that speed people’s progress through the game. You can see why there’s tension.

In case things go from bad to worse, Zynga’s reportedly preparing its own social gaming site, and is prepared to leave Facebook completely.

I agree with CNet’s Daniel Terdiman that both sites need each other. Facebook relies on Zynga for daily traffic — as of December more than 26 million people played Farmville every day — and Zynga uses Facebook as the primary platform for all those users. Moving them would not be easy.

Still, Zynga depends more on Facebook than vice versa because of the very nature of its games. Farmville’s biggest critics note that the game is not fun, per se, but it’s addictive. In a fascinating essay on what’s wrong with this game, SUNY Buffalo professor A. J. Patrick Liszkiewicz explains:

The secret to Farmville’s popularity is neither gameplay nor aesthetics. Farmville is popular because in [sic] entangles users in a web of social obligations. When users log into Facebook, they are reminded that their neighbors have sent them gifts, posted bonuses on their walls, and helped with each others’ farms. In turn, they are obligated to return the courtesies.

Without Facebook, Zynga loses this crucial layer of interaction between friends, the meta-game that makes Farmville worth playing. Zynga Live could try and replicate it, but it’ll never be as tightly woven as Facebook’s existing network.

If Zynga leaves Facebook completely, as the company has reportedly threatened, it would be suicide. Farmville is not a good enough game to stand on its own. It needs the social structure of Facebook more than Facebook needs Zynga in particular. After all, there’s no shortage of imitators who would love to take Farmville’s place atop the app charts.

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Xbox 360 USB Stick Honors the Tradition of Overpriced Storage

Posted by Jared Newman on May 6, 2010 at 7:36 pm

Well, of course the official Xbox 360 USB stick from SanDisk is outrageously priced, at $35 for 8 GB and $70 for 16 GB. That’s roughly double what you’d pay for comparable SanDisk drives, sans Xbox branding.

Microsoft started allowing external storage on the Xbox 360 last month. Although any flash drive or hard drive will do, Microsoft promised its own solution was forthcoming, and pretty much everyone assumed correctly that it wouldn’t be cheap.

In exchange for the hefty markup, you get a month of Xbox Live Gold (an $8 value) and plug-and-play support, which means you don’t have to format the drive using the console’s interface. I’d take the money.

But don’t blame Microsoft for thinking its brand name commands a premium. This is an industry tradition that predates the current console generation.

For instance, NewEgg sells a two-pack of 8 MB memory cards for the Playstation 2 for $34. A single, $30 card from Intec holds four times the data of both official cards combined. When I was in high school, I remember getting a similar deal on Nintendo 64 memory, with a third-party memory pack that cost roughly the same as the official model, but with four times the capacity.

Console makers aren’t the only ones who charge more than they should for storage. A 4 GB SanDisk Memory Stick Pro Duo for the PSP costs $35 at GameStop. The same exact product is $24 on Amazon and $19 on NewEgg. GameStop also plans to charge an extra $5 for the 8 GB Xbox 360 USB stick.

If you’re reading this blog, I have a feeling you’re tech-savvy enough to shop around and avoid the games industry’s storage shenanigans. Microsoft did good by allowing non-proprietary memory on the Xbox 360, but the availability of cheap USB sticks highlights the silliness of charging high premiums for branding.

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Indies Band Together For More Pay-What-You-Want

Posted by Jared Newman on May 5, 2010 at 6:11 pm

For a short time, you can get five computer games for a dollar, or $10, or $100 if you wish.

A group of independent game developers are selling the “Humble Indie Bundle” until Tuesday, May 11, allowing buyers to set their own price on the five-game package. The bundle includes World of Goo, Gish, Lugaru HD, Aquaria and Penumbra Overture. All games are available for Windows, Mac or Linux, and are DRM-free.

There’s also a charitable angle: Buyers can allocate all, part or none of their purchase to the Electronic Frontier Foundation and Child’s Play.

Radiohead popularized the pay-as-you-wish model with their 2007 album “In Rainbows,” released as downloadable MP3s before the CD launched. It was a successful experiment, as the band made more money before “In Rainbows” went to hard copy than they made in total for their previous album, “Hail to the Thief.”

Last October, World of Goo developer 2D Boy tried the idea themselves. The combination of media exposure and love for the game resulted in more than $100,000 earned. 2D Boy also surveyed buyers, and most said their contribution was all they could afford, or that they liked the pay-as-you-wish model and wanted to support it.

The folks behind “Humble Indie Bundle” are sharing statistics in real-time. So far, the developers have raised more than $300,000, with an average contribution of just under $8. One anonymous benefactor spent $500 for the bundle, whose actual value is $80. Another fun statistic: The number of Mac and Linux buyers are roughly equal, and about half the number of Windows buyers.

I don’t think you’ll find any consumers who don’t like pay as you wish, as long as it works for the seller. All these games are more than a year old, so the bundle seems like a great way for developers to build up cash and attention for their next indie undertakings.

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InstantAction Streams PC Games, Right on Your Blog

Posted by Jared Newman on April 30, 2010 at 6:35 pm

Embedding audio and video across the Web is pretty simple thanks to sites like YouTube, Vimeo and others, but embedded computer games? It’s complicated, and yet InstantAction has found a way.

The service, which launched today, allows blogs and other Web sites to post full-length PC games right into the browser. I’m not talking about Flash games, either; InstantAction supports any programming language or engine that can run on a Windows PC.

The first game to work with InstantAction is The Secret of Monkey Island: Special Edition. Regretfully, I’m not able to get the game embedded in our setup here — how embarrassing! — but here’s the game running in Facebook, on Kotaku and on Joystiq.

When you start loading a game in InstantAction, it downloads data in chunks, giving you the most necessary bits first and filling in the rest as you play. Games run in a Web browser, and appear to be streaming, but they rely on the computer’s hardware to do the heavy lifting. In that sense, InstantAction is quite different than the upcoming OnLive, which processes all the graphics on its own servers and sends compressed audio and video to the player. If you’re worried about being shackled to a Web connection, InstantAction Community Manager Ian Tornay wrote in a comment on Joystiq that an offline client is in the works.

Monkey Island lets you play for 20 minutes before you’re asked to pay for the full version, and I expect other games to follow a similar model. The idea is to get players into the game without bothersome downloads and installations.

Things didn’t go so smoothly in my test of Monkey Island, as I had to first install the latest versions of DirectX and Java in order to play, and I’d like to see how the system handles beefier games, like the previously-demonstrated Tribes and Assassin’s Creed. Still, the concept is intriguing: If watching a video online is as simple as clicking a button, the same should be true for playing computer games.

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