DeNA and Ngmoco really want the Mobage platform to succeed in the states and elsewhere. And who can blame them: Mobile is the proverbial final frontier for games companies. This must be why Ngmoco just announced that it has hired former Mattel marketing executive Michael Staskin to oversee the company's marketing push for Mobage, DeNA's mobile social gaming network for Android devices (and soon iPhone and iPad).
Staskin most recently served as VP of marketing and communications at Milan, Italy-based gaming and lottery company Sisal SpA. At Ngmoco he will "lead all global marketing and communications efforts for the company," according to a release, and that includes things like advertising, public relations and customer acquistion. In layman's terms, it's Staskin's job to get more mobile gamers to use Mobage.
"ngmoco is poised to forever change the way people interact with content on their mobile devices," new Ngmoco CMO Staskin said in a release. "I'm excited to introduce consumers around the world to Mobage, a new way to consume, share and experience mobile entertainment."
A report by JP Morgan in Tokyo, via Serkan Toto, said there have been between 50,000 and 100,000 installs of the Mobage app for Android devices, calling that number "extremely small." So yeah, DeNA and Ngmoco could certainly use a guy like Staskin to get more players on their mobile social gaming platform. And with developers like Grasshopper Manufacture and Atakama Labs on board, perhaps Mobage has yet to "arrive."
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Showing posts with label dena. Show all posts
Showing posts with label dena. Show all posts
Tuesday, January 10, 2012
Find free Android games through OpenFeint's Game Channel app
Gree and OpenFeint just opened fire on DeNA and Ngmoco's Mobage network for Android. DeNA's primary competitors abroad just announced that Game Channel has arrived on Android devices. Known on iOS devices as OpenFeint's mobile games discovery platform, Game Channel offers Android gamers a way to discover new games to play, namely free-to-play games.
Through Game Channel, OpenFeint will display games to users such as the Featured Game and Free Game of the Day, which the company says will include free in-game items, too. As for curation, OpenFeint will recognize notable free games under its Free Games That Rock category, and highlight game personally recommended by the company within Feint's Featured Picks.
The Game Channel app will also recommend games based on the seasons and other themes like holidays. Players will get to access their profiles and other social features right from within Game Channel, and OpenFeint will recommend new releases. This news comes just as OpenFeint finds itself with a new CEO, former Gree exec Naoki Aoyagi, and a new director of developer relations, Sarah Thompson.
Gree and DeNA have begun to battle for mobile social gaming supremacy vicariously through their strategic acquisitions, OpenFeint and Ngmoco, respectively. While Ngmoco is reportedly seeking more users to bolster its rather small number of Mobage users, OpenFeint reports welcoming 128 million players across all platforms. But it's also important to note the amount of developer support DeNA and Ngmoco have garnered recently. And now Zynga is heavy into mobile gaming--oy vey.
Through Game Channel, OpenFeint will display games to users such as the Featured Game and Free Game of the Day, which the company says will include free in-game items, too. As for curation, OpenFeint will recognize notable free games under its Free Games That Rock category, and highlight game personally recommended by the company within Feint's Featured Picks.
The Game Channel app will also recommend games based on the seasons and other themes like holidays. Players will get to access their profiles and other social features right from within Game Channel, and OpenFeint will recommend new releases. This news comes just as OpenFeint finds itself with a new CEO, former Gree exec Naoki Aoyagi, and a new director of developer relations, Sarah Thompson.
Gree and DeNA have begun to battle for mobile social gaming supremacy vicariously through their strategic acquisitions, OpenFeint and Ngmoco, respectively. While Ngmoco is reportedly seeking more users to bolster its rather small number of Mobage users, OpenFeint reports welcoming 128 million players across all platforms. But it's also important to note the amount of developer support DeNA and Ngmoco have garnered recently. And now Zynga is heavy into mobile gaming--oy vey.
Tuesday, December 27, 2011
DeNA partners with Docomo, prepares for Japanese social game coup
DeNA, the massive Japanese mobile social game company, has taken another step toward its imminent invasion of the western world of social games in a partnership with Docomo. You know, the company that bought American mobile game developer Ngmoco for over $400 million last year? That massive company.
Docomo is a Japanese phone manufacturer that will link its 6 million smartphone and feature phone users in Japan with DeNA's Mobage social gaming platform through i-mode. The oddly-named feature is found on all Docomo phones, and it will provide users a direct link to DeNA's list of games by as early as May.
Not to mention that a dedicated Mobage application will be pre-installed into several Docomo phones sometime in the future. According to a statement, Docomoco users will have exclusive early access to new content and easier billing for micro-transactions. Of course, the two plan to bring the model to Europe and the rest of Asia through mobile phone operators and game developers.
However, we're going to assume that if this strategy does well in Europe, DeNA will stake its claim in the US as well. Whether this is enough to combat Zynga has yet to be seen, but know that the Far East has burst onto the scene with guns a' blazin'.
[Image Credit: Random Acts of Media]
Do you think DeNA has a chance of getting into the Western world of social gaming? How will Zynga fare against the Eastern juggernaut, if it gets that far?
Docomo is a Japanese phone manufacturer that will link its 6 million smartphone and feature phone users in Japan with DeNA's Mobage social gaming platform through i-mode. The oddly-named feature is found on all Docomo phones, and it will provide users a direct link to DeNA's list of games by as early as May.
Not to mention that a dedicated Mobage application will be pre-installed into several Docomo phones sometime in the future. According to a statement, Docomoco users will have exclusive early access to new content and easier billing for micro-transactions. Of course, the two plan to bring the model to Europe and the rest of Asia through mobile phone operators and game developers.
However, we're going to assume that if this strategy does well in Europe, DeNA will stake its claim in the US as well. Whether this is enough to combat Zynga has yet to be seen, but know that the Far East has burst onto the scene with guns a' blazin'.
[Image Credit: Random Acts of Media]
Do you think DeNA has a chance of getting into the Western world of social gaming? How will Zynga fare against the Eastern juggernaut, if it gets that far?
Friday, December 23, 2011
Former Playdom exec joins OpenFeint to help in Japanese Invasion
And another falls. Yet another executive from one of social gaming's biggest companies, Playdom, has left for a competitor. This time it's Ethan Fassett, an executive producer for Playdom who is now headed to OpenFeint, a mobile games network that enjoys 90 million players, as SVP of Product, VentureBeat reports.
The Burlingham, Calif.-based mobile games platform hired Fassett to help its clients create free-to-play games using the OpenFeint network--purchased by Japanese network Gree earlier this year--on both Android and iOS devices. He'll do this by leading development on new social networking features and distribution channels to support the freebie games, according to VentureBeat.
"We're very excited to bring on Ethan, whose expertise in free-to-play games and social communities will drive product strategy and shape the evolution of the network," OpenFeint CEO Jason Citron said. "Ethan truly understands social games, the social networks they need to be successful, and the tools game developers need to properly engage and monetize their players."
Executives from major gaming companies like Playdom and EA have been leaving for potentially more lucrative ventures in the social and mobile gaming arenas. And as these two companies appear to be in a lull (though, Playdom did just launch a new ESPN-branded game), publishers from the Far East encroach on the globe, throwing around millions. DeNA and its Mobage network are competing with both Zynga and Gree for dominance in the mobile games market, and the latter just got another shot in the arm.
[Image Credit: VentureBeat]
How do you think OpenFeint and Gree play in the growing war for the mobile games market? Will Playdom and EA be able to compete as Zynga and its opponents in Japan grow exponentially?
The Burlingham, Calif.-based mobile games platform hired Fassett to help its clients create free-to-play games using the OpenFeint network--purchased by Japanese network Gree earlier this year--on both Android and iOS devices. He'll do this by leading development on new social networking features and distribution channels to support the freebie games, according to VentureBeat.
"We're very excited to bring on Ethan, whose expertise in free-to-play games and social communities will drive product strategy and shape the evolution of the network," OpenFeint CEO Jason Citron said. "Ethan truly understands social games, the social networks they need to be successful, and the tools game developers need to properly engage and monetize their players."
Executives from major gaming companies like Playdom and EA have been leaving for potentially more lucrative ventures in the social and mobile gaming arenas. And as these two companies appear to be in a lull (though, Playdom did just launch a new ESPN-branded game), publishers from the Far East encroach on the globe, throwing around millions. DeNA and its Mobage network are competing with both Zynga and Gree for dominance in the mobile games market, and the latter just got another shot in the arm.
[Image Credit: VentureBeat]
How do you think OpenFeint and Gree play in the growing war for the mobile games market? Will Playdom and EA be able to compete as Zynga and its opponents in Japan grow exponentially?
Monday, December 12, 2011
Namco Bandai, DeNA to tell a social tale with Tales of Kizna for Mobage
Namco Bandai has as bad a case of sequelitis with its Tales series that Square Enix has with its Final Fantasy franchise. Marking the 14th (seriously) game in the series, the publisher announced that Tales of Kizna will launch on DeNA's Mobage. Slated to release only on Japan's version of the popular mobile social game network, KLab Ltd is handling the game's creation.
The Tales series of Namco RPGs (role-playing games) always takes on a heavy Japanese anime aesthetic with real-time combat and deep, twisting plots, but Tales of Kizna will have players battle enemies cooperatively using character cards. And since the game will feature characters spanning the entirety of the franchise, we're expecting a much lighter story this time.
Players, as with most social games, will have the option to join guilds and form parties to do battle with one another. On paper at least, the game sounds a whole lot like a mobile Mafia Wars, but with a card game as its combat system. Tales of Kizna is due out on Japan's Mobage network this November, and Japanese fans of the series can pre-register for the game right now.
We imagine this game marks the start of Namco Bandai's joint venture with the social gaming giant, BDNA Inc. DeNA has reportedly had trouble gaining a foothold in the U.S. and abroad with its Android version of Mobage. But to help move that along (as its main competitor, Gree, gets a move on with OpenFeint), the company has reigned in some big time developers. For one, No More Heroes maker Grasshopper Manufacture looks to bring the bloodiest social game to date to Mobage in Japan and abroad.
[Via Gamasutra]
Do you think such a niche RPG will do well on DeNA's Mobage network? Do you wish DeNA and its competitors would bring such games stateside and elsewhere?
The Tales series of Namco RPGs (role-playing games) always takes on a heavy Japanese anime aesthetic with real-time combat and deep, twisting plots, but Tales of Kizna will have players battle enemies cooperatively using character cards. And since the game will feature characters spanning the entirety of the franchise, we're expecting a much lighter story this time.
Players, as with most social games, will have the option to join guilds and form parties to do battle with one another. On paper at least, the game sounds a whole lot like a mobile Mafia Wars, but with a card game as its combat system. Tales of Kizna is due out on Japan's Mobage network this November, and Japanese fans of the series can pre-register for the game right now.
We imagine this game marks the start of Namco Bandai's joint venture with the social gaming giant, BDNA Inc. DeNA has reportedly had trouble gaining a foothold in the U.S. and abroad with its Android version of Mobage. But to help move that along (as its main competitor, Gree, gets a move on with OpenFeint), the company has reigned in some big time developers. For one, No More Heroes maker Grasshopper Manufacture looks to bring the bloodiest social game to date to Mobage in Japan and abroad.
[Via Gamasutra]
Do you think such a niche RPG will do well on DeNA's Mobage network? Do you wish DeNA and its competitors would bring such games stateside and elsewhere?
Tuesday, October 11, 2011
No More Heroes creator to spit out three more Mobage social games
And only one of which will actually involve grasshoppers. Grasshopper Manufacture, the Japanese developer responsible for stylish, gory hardcore games like No More Heroes, revealed just before the Tokyo Game Show that it will release three mobile social games through the now-global Mobage network, Kotaku reports.
The first game to be released internationally under this new deal between the developer and DeNA, which runs the Mobage network with recent acquisition ngmoco, is Frog Minutes. The game already released in Japan back in March, so this will likely just be a localized version for Mobage on Android phones in the U.S. and abroad.
In Frog Minutes, players disturb parts of a forest scene to stir up various insects and feed them to frogs. The more quickly players do this, the higher their score will climb, it seems. Ribbeting, isn't it? (Sorry, couldn't resist.) Not much was revealed about Grasshopper Manufacture's other two Mobage projects other than their titles: Humans vs Zombies and Alien Busters.
The developer plans to show more of those games at a later date, according to Kotaku. Grasshopper Manufacture is placing big bets on social games with a mobile social version of No More Heroes, which designer Suda 51 said he hopes it will be bloodiest social game around.
While it's interesting to see a Japanese developer known for taking risks with unique games major consoles that (unfortunately) sell poorly hop into the low-risk, high-profit world of social gaming, it wasn't hard to see this one coming. And considering the effect social games has had on traditional American developers, we doubt this is the last news like this we'll hear from Japan.
Are you excited to see Grasshopper Manufacture go full-bore into social gaming? What other Japanese developers do you expect to see enter the space? Sound off in the comments. Add Comment
The first game to be released internationally under this new deal between the developer and DeNA, which runs the Mobage network with recent acquisition ngmoco, is Frog Minutes. The game already released in Japan back in March, so this will likely just be a localized version for Mobage on Android phones in the U.S. and abroad.
In Frog Minutes, players disturb parts of a forest scene to stir up various insects and feed them to frogs. The more quickly players do this, the higher their score will climb, it seems. Ribbeting, isn't it? (Sorry, couldn't resist.) Not much was revealed about Grasshopper Manufacture's other two Mobage projects other than their titles: Humans vs Zombies and Alien Busters.
The developer plans to show more of those games at a later date, according to Kotaku. Grasshopper Manufacture is placing big bets on social games with a mobile social version of No More Heroes, which designer Suda 51 said he hopes it will be bloodiest social game around.
While it's interesting to see a Japanese developer known for taking risks with unique games major consoles that (unfortunately) sell poorly hop into the low-risk, high-profit world of social gaming, it wasn't hard to see this one coming. And considering the effect social games has had on traditional American developers, we doubt this is the last news like this we'll hear from Japan.
Are you excited to see Grasshopper Manufacture go full-bore into social gaming? What other Japanese developers do you expect to see enter the space? Sound off in the comments. Add Comment
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