Mike Breslin explains why Glu is ready for the smartphone era
Given Mike Breslin has already worked for more firms in the games industry in his 15 years in the business than many people manage in their entire careers, his move to Glu earlier this week was perhaps not an altogether surprising one.
The publisher has also been in flux of late, key executives going and now coming as part of a wider restructuring over the course of the past two years.
We caught up with Glu's new VP of marketing to find out why he thinks the company is now set for smartphone success.
Pocket Gamer: Why did you want to take the job at Glu?
Mike Breslin: It's definitely an exciting time for Glu and the mobile gaming industry as a whole.
With the proliferation of the smartphone and the mass market reach of persistent social game features and connectivity making their way into the mobile gaming space, developing top quality games supported by world class production, execution and marketing is of paramount importance.
Glu is positioned extremely well to take advantage of this new persistent, smartphone driven market.
I believe my 15 plus years in the video games industry and 6 plus years experience in the mobile gaming industry will bring a seasoned games marketing point of view to Glu, while underscoring what is an already collaborative and team focused environment.
Glu has had some troubled times so what do you think is different about the company now?
Glu has transformed from a legacy mobile-centric games company to a smartphone-centric games company.
Having learned from its previous slow move to iPhone, Glu has really embraced the smartphone market in 2010 and continues to launch high quality, top-selling games like World Series of Poker: Holdem Legend, Deer Hunter and Super KO Boxing 2 on iPhone, iPad and Android.
Glu has also made several key hires recently to bolster our infrastructure, connectivity, analytics and social capabilities. With the bulk of our roadmap still to come in Q3/Q4 2010, look out for more great games from Glu.
What challenges do you foresee in the months and years ahead?
Continuing to educate consumers on the quality and availability of games for their mobile devices is still a major goal and challenge.
We, as a mobile games industry, need to grow our market share and further educate the masses on how and where to purchase and download mobile games.
Additionally, achieving measurable results with the new in-game ad models is going to be a challenge this year as there is nothing to really set precedent with or use as a baseline. If mobile gaming is still the Wild Wild West, mobile advertising has to be that ominous alley that we must explore.
Thanks to Mike for his time.