There's an increasing number of social gaming platforms for iPhone, and it's become quite a tug of war as to which one will ultimately win out and become the primary social tool for game developers.
OpenFeint was one of the first to attempt to craft the coveted 'Xbox Live for the iPhone', and has been the favourite for industry dominance. And now, with the announcement that Japans largest mobile social network and mobile virtual goods economy, DeNA, has selected OpenFeint for its smartphone market entry strategy and a multi-million dollar 20 per cent stake investment in Aurora Feint, the platform is likely to reach new levels of market penetration.
We are delighted to partner with OpenFeint which is the clear market leader in its category, says Tomoko Namba, CEO of DeNA. We look forward to a long term partnership which will bring the synergy of our experience in operating large mobile social networks, and the experience of OpenFeint in operating a large social gaming platform in the smartphone market.
At the end of September, over 200 iPhone games were making use of OpenFeint, which scored serious acclaim when mobile giant Digital Chocolate announced it would become its social platform of choice.
Following the announcement that DeNA has taken a stake in OpenFeint, its long time development partner Hudson Soft has become the first Japanese game company to adopt OpenFeint and will be integrating the platform into its Christmas line-up, including its popular Bomberman franchise.
"We believe that OpenFeint is an extremely powerful social networking solution in the ever-changing iPhone market. We are planning to release several games which utilize this beneficial tool to the fullest extent," said Masato Shibata, Corporate Officer of Hudson Soft.
All in all, these events further solidify OpenFeint's leading position in the smartphone social gaming market, and will undoubtedly encourage a lot more companies to integrate the system into their products.
DeNA is a major player in the mobile, social networking and gaming space said Peter Relan, Chairman and founding investor of Aurora Feint. Their investment and partnership positions the OpenFeint platform for long term stability and dominance in the smartphone market, and the Hudson relationship is just a small demonstration of the strength of the DeNA partnership.
