Its first significant move has been the release of Zumba Dance in July 2013 for iPad, Kindle Fire and Android tablets.
Part of its portfolio based around the Latin fitness routine, the game uses a tablet's forward-facing camera to enable motion controls, as with Microsoft's Kinect camera.
We caught up with Majesco's general manager of mobile, Stephen Saiz, to find out more about the game, and the company's wider approach to mobile.
Pocket Gamer: Since we last spoke, Majesco has released Zumba Dance. What was your goal in bringing that game to tablets?
Stephen Saiz: There were a few goals with Zumba Dance. First to establish a new category for motion-based dance games on mobile devices.
The second was to expand the reach of our Zumba gaming fanbase and third was to introduce completely new users to Zumba Fitness. Thankfully, we met all three goals since launching last month.
How much research did you do in terms of checking the audience cross-over from the console game to tablet?
We did a fair amount of research before kicking off production as well as throughout the development process. We knew there would be a high percentage of cross-over due to high tablet penetration, but not in a negative way.
Zumba Dance was always meant to be a companion to the overall Zumba Fitness program and not to be a full replacement to the live class experience.
We identified a need for portability when people couldn't get to a live class or were away from home to play on their console helping alleviate any concerns of cannibalization.
How technically difficult was it to get the motion tracking technology working?
There are a few companies who claimed to have motion tech working and we spent a lot of time assessing each one prior to moving forward with our developer, BreakFirst. Its Pocket Moves tech was the most accurate and responsive for our needs.
Once we prototyped it for a dance environment, the more confident we felt that we could reproduce a Kinect-like experience on any device with a front-facing camera.
You went for a paid app ($4.99) with IAP. Was that approach successful? Do you think you could turn Zumba into a full free-to-play title?
We're happy with the performance so far. On iOS, we reached #1 in the Health and Fitness category in 65 countries and the Top 5 in Overall Paid in 15.
With the current title, we've seen a tremendous amount of enthusiasm for new content and are experiencing strong conversion on our additional song packs. With the right process for onboarding new routines, I definitely think we could pull off a successful F2P title in the future.
Zumba Dance's performance on the US App Store paid charts - via apptrace
What were the platform differences you found in terms of audience reaction across iPad, Amazon and Android?
The audience reaction has been overwhelmingly positive on all three platforms.
The loudest criticism has been from people wanting Zumba Dance on their phones, in addition to tablets, so we're planning for this now.
More generally, Majesco has now released half a dozen mobile games. What's your feeling for the mobile market, and how will Majesco look to take advantage of its existing brands going forward?
We're tremendously excited for the future of mobile both in terms of revenue growth and rapid improvement of devices.
We're slowly growing our small, but highly experienced mobile team, and will continue building out our roadmap by blending both internal/original IP with established external brands.
How you think mobile fits with your portable gaming strategy, notably for Nintendo handhelds?
In mobile, we're definitely keeping an eye on the improvement going on with the 3DS eShop, in particular as more F2P games are being released.
This won't really affect anything the company does on the retail side of the business. We currently view them as complementary as there are markets for both platforms to coexist.
Do you think you're restricted given that many of your games are designed for kids and teens, which is a market that's harder to market to and monetise on mobile?
Not necessarily. There are plenty of successful games where those demographics make up a significant portion of the players.
And while they may monetize less, if you have a great game, they drive significant word of mouth helping drive organic downloads.
Any news on Cooking Mama and NBA Baller Beats coming to mobile?
We're continuously assessing our catalogue of titles to explore what makes sense for mobile. Stay tuned...
Thanks to Stephen for his time.
