Each weekend we’ll be rounding up a selection of the most interesting articles related to mobile and the games industry at large.
This week includes an interview with the CEO of the fast-growing voice app for gamers Discord, an analysis of King's performance post-Candy Crush Saga, a look at why Monster Strike failed in North America, and the surprising profile of idle clicker gamers.
See an article you think we should share? Email PocketGamer.biz Craig Chapple at craig.chapple@steelmedia.co.uk to add it to our weekly round-up.
This startup is solving a huge problem for over 45 million video gamers, and it's growing like crazy
"Above all, Citron says that Discord is born of his personal love of video games — he could have walked away with his money earlier in his career, but he didn't. Now, he says, Discord is here for the long haul, and doesn't rule out the possibility of an IPO if that's what it takes to keep it a strong company."
"King is facing ever fiercer competition within the casual games segment as their competitors are not only fast-following Saga games but also innovating on gameplay and monetization features. There’s a risk that if this trend continues for the next few years, King will start playing catchup with its competitors instead of staying ahead of the competition like they’ve done successfully for years now."
Why Monster Strike failed in North America
"Games-as-a-service is a model that thrives on player trust. People are willing to put money into these games because they trust that the game won’t suddenly and radically change overnight into something they no longer enjoy. Mixi learned this the hard way with a decision that, in the eyes of many players, doomed the English version of Monster Strike by alienating its player base and destroying the trust that the company had spent over a year building."
The surprising profile of idle clicker gamers
"It slowly dawned on us that Idle Clickers attract core gamers (especially core RPG gamers) because they cleanly isolate the power progression and accumulation mechanics from the typical trappings of triple-A RPGs. These are the gamers who enjoy the leveling up and power accumulation in RPGs, but less interested in big-action combat or elaborate fantasy settings that often come bundled together in an RPG."
Level With Me: level design in Half-Life 1
Focal Point: How can indie devs make money from VR?
"If you’re looking to make a game or app looking to make returns on sales then you should approach it with a good business head. Do a P&L, don't spend too much, have realistic sales expectation, go broad on platforms and look into getting grants or publisher funding to get you over the line."
Ubisoft CEO talks huge potential of China, Vivendi threat, Xbox One X, and more
"First, you can't ignore 500 million players, and second what I like very much in China is that because it is a new business all the partners we meet with are young. They want to do new things. They want to try to work with your IPs but also with new types of experiences and gameplay and so on. It's the beginning of the industry."
How a Syrian refugee's story became a JRPG
"Being Syrian in the last seven years has been an unbearable burden," he says, speaking to me by email. "People acknowledge the war, but we felt pretty much left alone for a long time, with so many nations closing their borders. 'What have we done to this world?' was always a question that came up. I feel like people don't know enough about us, who we are, why we had to leave Syria, and that's why I decided to to make something where I can speak for my people and let everyone knows how it feels to be Syrian."
