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And this is exactly why I'm predicting a crash in the mobile games market. People are going to figure out sooner or later that they're being exploited and not a

And this is exactly why I'm predicting a crash in the mobile games market. People are going to figure out sooner or later that they're being exploited and not actually having much fun and the whole house of cards is going to come tumbling down. It's actually worse than that because games make up the bulk of the app stores' revenue. Zynga was just the bellwether here.

joering2 14y ago
No, I would rather say as app games market evolve, the developers are moving to where the money is being made: on inapp purchases. Now, while most app games users will not like this idea and do not like in app purchases-based games, to the developers the 1 or 10 or whatever % of those who make purchases counts the most, and those are the ones who they will target their products to. I wouldnt say it will crash the mobile games market; I would rather say the ratio of all the games designed in ".99 cents" a pop scheme will be on rapid decline...
- bluedanieru 14y ago
  And you don't think game developers targeting the 10% of the players who, frankly, have a problem, while the other 90% are left with nothing at all, describes exactly a collapse of the mobile gaming market? It's not as though games need to stop being made or that everyone has to lose money for that to happen. Look at this article and it's plain: it's nothing but talk about how developers are going to monetize next - nothing, not a single sentence, about how to improve the state of the art. The biggest challenge for mobile game developers is that the platform just really isn't all the great for making good, fun games that people will want to actually pay for. And all the brainpower is going into monetization strategies rather than innovating on that platform. Like games on Facebook, mobile is good for making games that separate from their money people with addictive or compulsive personalities. Little else. I fucking love video games. Console and PC. My Steam account is worth many thousands of dollars by now. I haven't paid for a game on mobile in over a year (and I haven't been downloading any of this free garbage to make up for it, either), and I don't miss it. I read on the train instead. I don't think I'm atypical.
dmix 14y ago
> people are going to figure out sooner or later that they're being exploited and not actually having much fun The same could be said for Casino's, if the visitors looked at it rationally. But humans often don't make decisions rationally. Especially when it comes to entertainment and escape from reality.
- madh 14y ago
  Yes! Mobile game companies are essentially casinos (and receive most of their revenue from whales).
- Jd 14y ago
  I think mobile/social games are going to get much bigger for just this reason. Casino's have been playing the human psychology game of trading ring-ding-ding and related human excitement for centuries with astonishing success. Even though they've been seen as a menace to humanity, they've nonetheless been able to been able to use every trick in the book to expand their physical presence and market impact. However, there are huge limitations to casinos: they are limited by regulation; they are limited to physical infrastructure; they have limited space that the customer has to come to. Quite obviously, none of this exists for the online world. This is the incredible success story of Zynga. They've managed to build a giant online casino and call it a game, and get the execs of Google and Facebook licking their heels. This is a market sector that will not simply expand. It will explode.
  - alttab 14y ago
    Disagree. The addiction and draw of a casino is MONEY. Not "ding ding ding". Pay to play games eventually offer dismissing reward. Every time you step into a casino you could win big. There is no incentive for these types of mobile games. "one more roll" simply doesn't apply long term. I agree there will be a correction in mobile gaming. At least I hope to see these vapid "games" get kicked in the nuts a little.
    - Jd 14y ago
      I'm not sure that I want to share more complete thoughts on this subject, as it could easily be used to develop the next generation of money-sucking social games, but here's a partial response. Casinos offer a variety of different games, which have different appeal to different types of their clientele. There are lottery type games, in which there is a faint hope of a extraordinary windfall, which appeal to people who want money without working for it (i.e. people in debt). There are games in which there is a large degree of control and which the winner emerges because of his/her psychological prowess which appeals to the serious gamer (i.e. professional poker players). And then there are the run of the mill ring-ding-ding games, which appeal both to the idea of winning money, the suspense of the spinning wheel, and various other attention keeping mechanisms. Social games have the ability to emulate virtually all of these. Although ostensibly buy-in is limited to virtual money that can never be removed from the game, there is nothing stopping large markets to grow around virtual items that can be traded (as happened with Ultima, EQ, SL, Eve, etc.). The clutch here is that the "fun" of the experience in both cases largely revolves around ideas of advancement, social enhancement of the idea of advancement, and (potentially) some real world tie-in. Actually, in many respects the social game is far more advanced than the casino already, insofar as it offers the idea of advancement which is potentially not tied to money (i.e. leveling up), but which can also be tied to money if people want it to be. The problem of this right now is the fact that virtual currency cannot be liberated, but as soon as that problem is solved the casino will be an obsolete institution, soon to be extinct.
pjmlp 14y ago
This is the reason some studios are now betting on the Vita has they hope that there they are safe from this trend.
TillE 14y ago
F2P is probably a bubble waiting to burst, a short term trend, but I don't think high-quality mobile games have too much to worry about. There'll always be a market for great games at a fair price.
zerostar07 14y ago
I read it as "People are going to figure out sooner or later that strippers exploit them and not actually going all the way with them and the whole strip bar is going to go down. " I actually think social games are here to stay, just like old card games.
njharman 14y ago
Has that happened to EQ, WoW, or other MMOs? They have same model of addition / exploitation.

joering2 14y ago

No, I would rather say as app games market evolve, the developers are moving to where the money is being made: on inapp purchases. Now, while most app games users will not like this idea and do not like in app purchases-based games, to the developers the 1 or 10 or whatever % of those who make purchases counts the most, and those are the ones who they will target their products to. I wouldnt say it will crash the mobile games market; I would rather say the ratio of all the games designed in ".99 cents" a pop scheme will be on rapid decline...

bluedanieru 14y ago
And you don't think game developers targeting the 10% of the players who, frankly, have a problem, while the other 90% are left with nothing at all, describes exactly a collapse of the mobile gaming market? It's not as though games need to stop being made or that everyone has to lose money for that to happen. Look at this article and it's plain: it's nothing but talk about how developers are going to monetize next - nothing, not a single sentence, about how to improve the state of the art. The biggest challenge for mobile game developers is that the platform just really isn't all the great for making good, fun games that people will want to actually pay for. And all the brainpower is going into monetization strategies rather than innovating on that platform. Like games on Facebook, mobile is good for making games that separate from their money people with addictive or compulsive personalities. Little else. I fucking love video games. Console and PC. My Steam account is worth many thousands of dollars by now. I haven't paid for a game on mobile in over a year (and I haven't been downloading any of this free garbage to make up for it, either), and I don't miss it. I read on the train instead. I don't think I'm atypical.

dmix 14y ago

> people are going to figure out sooner or later that they're being exploited and not actually having much fun The same could be said for Casino's, if the visitors looked at it rationally. But humans often don't make decisions rationally. Especially when it comes to entertainment and escape from reality.

madh 14y ago
Yes! Mobile game companies are essentially casinos (and receive most of their revenue from whales).
Jd 14y ago
I think mobile/social games are going to get much bigger for just this reason. Casino's have been playing the human psychology game of trading ring-ding-ding and related human excitement for centuries with astonishing success. Even though they've been seen as a menace to humanity, they've nonetheless been able to been able to use every trick in the book to expand their physical presence and market impact. However, there are huge limitations to casinos: they are limited by regulation; they are limited to physical infrastructure; they have limited space that the customer has to come to. Quite obviously, none of this exists for the online world. This is the incredible success story of Zynga. They've managed to build a giant online casino and call it a game, and get the execs of Google and Facebook licking their heels. This is a market sector that will not simply expand. It will explode.
- alttab 14y ago
  Disagree. The addiction and draw of a casino is MONEY. Not "ding ding ding". Pay to play games eventually offer dismissing reward. Every time you step into a casino you could win big. There is no incentive for these types of mobile games. "one more roll" simply doesn't apply long term. I agree there will be a correction in mobile gaming. At least I hope to see these vapid "games" get kicked in the nuts a little.
  - Jd 14y ago
    I'm not sure that I want to share more complete thoughts on this subject, as it could easily be used to develop the next generation of money-sucking social games, but here's a partial response. Casinos offer a variety of different games, which have different appeal to different types of their clientele. There are lottery type games, in which there is a faint hope of a extraordinary windfall, which appeal to people who want money without working for it (i.e. people in debt). There are games in which there is a large degree of control and which the winner emerges because of his/her psychological prowess which appeals to the serious gamer (i.e. professional poker players). And then there are the run of the mill ring-ding-ding games, which appeal both to the idea of winning money, the suspense of the spinning wheel, and various other attention keeping mechanisms. Social games have the ability to emulate virtually all of these. Although ostensibly buy-in is limited to virtual money that can never be removed from the game, there is nothing stopping large markets to grow around virtual items that can be traded (as happened with Ultima, EQ, SL, Eve, etc.). The clutch here is that the "fun" of the experience in both cases largely revolves around ideas of advancement, social enhancement of the idea of advancement, and (potentially) some real world tie-in. Actually, in many respects the social game is far more advanced than the casino already, insofar as it offers the idea of advancement which is potentially not tied to money (i.e. leveling up), but which can also be tied to money if people want it to be. The problem of this right now is the fact that virtual currency cannot be liberated, but as soon as that problem is solved the casino will be an obsolete institution, soon to be extinct.

pjmlp 14y ago

This is the reason some studios are now betting on the Vita has they hope that there they are safe from this trend.

TillE 14y ago

F2P is probably a bubble waiting to burst, a short term trend, but I don't think high-quality mobile games have too much to worry about. There'll always be a market for great games at a fair price.

zerostar07 14y ago

I read it as "People are going to figure out sooner or later that strippers exploit them and not actually going all the way with them and the whole strip bar is going to go down. " I actually think social games are here to stay, just like old card games.

njharman 14y ago

Has that happened to EQ, WoW, or other MMOs? They have same model of addition / exploitation.