Paying nickels and dimes to buy additional content in games isn't going away anytime soon, and, in fact, it looks like EA may be doubling down on microtransactions by announcing a new partnership with Live Gamer, which will run all of EA's "microtransaction projects" and will help "accelerate the company's online gaming strategy."
The press release doesn't mention any specific games, but just off the top of my head, this deal seems particularly relevant to EA's social gaming arm, Playfish, responsible for Pet Society and FIFA Superstars on Facebook, as well as its casual gaming portal Pogo, which has had microtransactions for a while now. EA has also started to integrate more microtransactions in its blockbuster console games as well: Madden NFL Football debuted microtransactions in the 2010 edition, Dragon Age and Dead Space (among other EA console games) also rolled out additional downloadable content.
A recent study says microtransactions will grow to $7 billion globally by 2015, so it's no surprise that Live Gamer's picking up new clients, which includes THQ and Real Networks' GameHouse. I'm sure we'll be hearing similar news from other traditional game publishers in the near future -- the success of selling virtual goods has everyone seeing dollar signs.
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Showing posts with label ea. Show all posts
Showing posts with label ea. Show all posts
Thursday, February 9, 2012
Thursday, January 5, 2012
EA, Playfish sip on Florida Orange Juice in Pet Society, Restaurant City
We can see it now: Executives from EA, Playfish and Florida's Natural Orange Juice rocking on a creaky porch in the Everglades on a Sunday morning, sipping on delicious citrus. "You know," the EA exec says to the Florida Natural suit, "this stuff would rock in our Playfish games." "Really?" the Florida Natural replies excitedly, "How about in Dragon Age 2--" "Don't push your luck." Alright, so it definitely didn't happen that way. Nonetheless, players of both Pet Society and Restaurant City will soon find items sponsored and inspired by Florida Natural Orange Juice in their respective social addictions.
"Florida's Natural recognized the opportunity to build brand preference amongst the hundreds of thousands of avid female players of Restaurant City and Pet Society," Joy Taylor, Director of Global Marketing Solutions at EA, said. "Through this collaboration we were able to enhance gameplay and deliver significant lift in awareness that Florida's Natural doesn't import its juice, which was the goal of their marketing communications."
In Restaurant City, players can give virtual cartons of Florida's Natural to their friends, while in Pet Society they can visit Florida's Natural juice stands and send their friends the good stuff. However, it appears that this promotion is slowly rolling out to players, as I've yet to see the change in either game as of this writing. Either way, Playfish is about to load up on its Vitamin C, and you're all invited. (No, not that Vitamin C!)
[Image Credit: Florida's Natural]
Have you seen this promotion appear in your game yet? What do you think of EA and Playfish's approach to branded game content?
"Florida's Natural recognized the opportunity to build brand preference amongst the hundreds of thousands of avid female players of Restaurant City and Pet Society," Joy Taylor, Director of Global Marketing Solutions at EA, said. "Through this collaboration we were able to enhance gameplay and deliver significant lift in awareness that Florida's Natural doesn't import its juice, which was the goal of their marketing communications."
In Restaurant City, players can give virtual cartons of Florida's Natural to their friends, while in Pet Society they can visit Florida's Natural juice stands and send their friends the good stuff. However, it appears that this promotion is slowly rolling out to players, as I've yet to see the change in either game as of this writing. Either way, Playfish is about to load up on its Vitamin C, and you're all invited. (No, not that Vitamin C!)
[Image Credit: Florida's Natural]
Have you seen this promotion appear in your game yet? What do you think of EA and Playfish's approach to branded game content?
Saturday, December 10, 2011
The Sims Social 'Add me' Page
Looking for new friends to play The Sims Social on Facebook with? Write 'ADD ME' in the comments below.
Note: Be sure to do ONE of the following, so other people can friend you on Facebook:
- Log in to our comments system using Facebook Connect then leave a message. [Recommended]
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- Include a link to your Facebook page in your message
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Note: Be sure to do ONE of the following, so other people can friend you on Facebook:
- Log in to our comments system using Facebook Connect then leave a message. [Recommended]
facebook connect comments
- Include a link to your Facebook page in your message
- Include the email you use on your Facebook account in your message.
Playfish makes it rain on The Sims Social players on the regular
Again, for no reason at all. On Thursday, Playfish made a fairly groundbreaking change to The Sims Social's Daily Bonus. Now, every fifth consecutive log-in into the game will result in a random amount of free SimCash. Players can win up to 10 SimCash from the new feature, again, every five days. There's no word of this being a promotion or an event--this is a permanent change.
The Playfish community team issued a forum poll to gauge the change's effectiveness, and an impressive 41 percent of 102 voters reported receiving 10 free SimCash as a result of the new Daily Bonus. That's pretty much a guaranteed 10 SimCash every three weeks. Now, we might say that Playfish and EA are doing this "for no reason at all," but sadly it's clear.
The Sims Social may be the second best performing Facebook game to CityVille with 33.4 million monthly players and 5.9 million daily players, but both of those figures have been in decline for almost a month now. In fact, according to AppData, it's only been in the past two days that the drop has leveled off and stabilized. So, you can imagine that a promotion like this is not only to keep things stabilized, but likely to bring daily player numbers back up too. Nothing says "Please come back?" like free stuff.
Are still enjoying The Sims Social? Do you think a promotion like this could work to turn monthly players into daily players again?
The Playfish community team issued a forum poll to gauge the change's effectiveness, and an impressive 41 percent of 102 voters reported receiving 10 free SimCash as a result of the new Daily Bonus. That's pretty much a guaranteed 10 SimCash every three weeks. Now, we might say that Playfish and EA are doing this "for no reason at all," but sadly it's clear.
The Sims Social may be the second best performing Facebook game to CityVille with 33.4 million monthly players and 5.9 million daily players, but both of those figures have been in decline for almost a month now. In fact, according to AppData, it's only been in the past two days that the drop has leveled off and stabilized. So, you can imagine that a promotion like this is not only to keep things stabilized, but likely to bring daily player numbers back up too. Nothing says "Please come back?" like free stuff.
Are still enjoying The Sims Social? Do you think a promotion like this could work to turn monthly players into daily players again?
Tuesday, October 11, 2011
Zynga, Playdom, EA and Bioware vets cause a Rumble with new freemium studio
While many a story has come to light recently, detailing high-level game designers jumping ship to Zynga, here's one where a fairly big gun under the big Z's umbrella has left for new pastures. To be specific, John Yoo, lead designer on CityVille, is one of a few industry veterans that have joined with Greg Richardson [pictured], of former BioWare/Pandemic fame, in the creation of a new freemium (free-to-play) game studio by the name of Rumble.
After speaking with Rick Thompson, the founder of another major social games company - Playdom - the two partnered to form Rumble. Rounding out this new package are former EA employees Mark Spenner and David O'Connor. With these big names in their camp, Richardson's goal with Rumble is to create games that are free to play (supported with paid add-ons), but lie somewhere in between the expensive world of high-end PC games and the extremely casual games represented by many Facebook titles.
According to the Wall Street Journal, Richardson has faith that this middle ground holds a lot of merit. "We saw this third hill, and we think it's the biggest of the three hills," he says. This isn't to say, though, that Facebook games are out of the picture, as Richardson confirmed that they will use the social service, but will also focus on mobile devices and PCs through the browser.
In addition to developing its own games, Rumble will publish other developer's titles. While no specific details were announced about any of Rumble's specific games (we can expect the first sometime early next year), Richardson did list many of the company's areas of inspiration, which lie anywhere from Zelda and Super Smash Bros. to Diablo and Civilization. Regardless of the game in question, he says that Rumble looks to avoid overly complex gameplay. With this many areas of inspiration, we're definitely interested in seeing what Rumble comes up with, but for now - the possibilities are endless.
Are you excited in trying out this apparent middle-ground of freemium games that aren't too challenging, but aren't too basic either? Sound off in the comments.
After speaking with Rick Thompson, the founder of another major social games company - Playdom - the two partnered to form Rumble. Rounding out this new package are former EA employees Mark Spenner and David O'Connor. With these big names in their camp, Richardson's goal with Rumble is to create games that are free to play (supported with paid add-ons), but lie somewhere in between the expensive world of high-end PC games and the extremely casual games represented by many Facebook titles.
According to the Wall Street Journal, Richardson has faith that this middle ground holds a lot of merit. "We saw this third hill, and we think it's the biggest of the three hills," he says. This isn't to say, though, that Facebook games are out of the picture, as Richardson confirmed that they will use the social service, but will also focus on mobile devices and PCs through the browser.
In addition to developing its own games, Rumble will publish other developer's titles. While no specific details were announced about any of Rumble's specific games (we can expect the first sometime early next year), Richardson did list many of the company's areas of inspiration, which lie anywhere from Zelda and Super Smash Bros. to Diablo and Civilization. Regardless of the game in question, he says that Rumble looks to avoid overly complex gameplay. With this many areas of inspiration, we're definitely interested in seeing what Rumble comes up with, but for now - the possibilities are endless.
Are you excited in trying out this apparent middle-ground of freemium games that aren't too challenging, but aren't too basic either? Sound off in the comments.
Thursday, October 6, 2011
The Sims Social: Grab your free Plumbob Hoodies while you still can!
While we knew that the Sims Social would be celebrating fans this week with a series of freebies (including Simoleons, collectibles and the like), here's a gift that tops them all - a free Plumbob Hoodie for both girl and boy Sims! For those that don't know, the Plumbob is the name of the Gem that appears over each Sims' head, and lets the owner know of their status based on its color. This particular Hoodie displays a bright green Plumbob, and it's yours for the taking, but only for a limited time.
To be clear, there are two links available to claim this Hoodie, and therefore two Hoodies available for all users: one for male Sims and one for female Sims. Even if you are fairly certain you'll never change the gender of your Sim, why not grab both? They're both absolutely free, after all. Here are the links to claim both (found on the game's Facebook fan page):
Female Sim Plumbob Hoodie
Male Sim Plumbob Hoodie
While you're on the game's fan page, make sure to grab the extra Simoleons and Hope items that are also being given away. Now's a great time to be a fan of the game, with daily giveaways like these, but we'll make sure to let you know when the more noteworthy prizes come along if you don't want to fan the page yourself.
What do you think of these Sims Plumbob Hoodies? Did you claim both, or just the one for your Sim's current gender? Let us know in the comments!
To be clear, there are two links available to claim this Hoodie, and therefore two Hoodies available for all users: one for male Sims and one for female Sims. Even if you are fairly certain you'll never change the gender of your Sim, why not grab both? They're both absolutely free, after all. Here are the links to claim both (found on the game's Facebook fan page):
Female Sim Plumbob Hoodie
Male Sim Plumbob Hoodie
While you're on the game's fan page, make sure to grab the extra Simoleons and Hope items that are also being given away. Now's a great time to be a fan of the game, with daily giveaways like these, but we'll make sure to let you know when the more noteworthy prizes come along if you don't want to fan the page yourself.
What do you think of these Sims Plumbob Hoodies? Did you claim both, or just the one for your Sim's current gender? Let us know in the comments!
Wednesday, October 5, 2011
The Sims Social maker EA wants you ... to make it lots of ad money
And unfortunately, it doesn't sound like you'll have much of a choice. EA, co-creator of Playfish's The Sims Social on Facebook (and arch nemesis to Zynga at this point), has announced EA Legend.
This is the company's new platform to provide marketers and advertisers with "campaign and audience insights across mobile, social, online and console games reaching over 300 million people worldwide," a release reads.
In other words, you're more valuable to EA than you might already know. The publisher wants to use the information you provide them inadvertently through gameplay to rope in ad and marketing deals not just through its Facebook games but all of its games. More specifically, EA said it can provide advertisers with (prepare for buzzword overload):
Key cross-platform campaign performance indicators such as impressions, clicks, unduplicated reach, demographic profiles, social media buzz, and ROI metrics.
Segmented audience insights based on demographic, psychographic, and social data.
Ability to drill down into the factors that impact campaign effectiveness including audience engagement, audience segmentation and type of creative all measured over time.
EA Legend
What's that again--psychographic data? This may all sound like something out of "1984," but it's nothing new. If you think other game creators don't do this type of stuff, then here's your wake-up call. We won't know exactly what information about us EA will provide to advertisers through Legend until it makes advertisers see green at this year's Advertising Week event in New York City on Oct. 4. And if EA keeps using words like psychographic, we may never know.
[Via All Facebook]
What do you think about this new EA Legend program? Do you think it's something worth worrying about, or is this just business as usual? Sound off in the comments. 1 Comment
This is the company's new platform to provide marketers and advertisers with "campaign and audience insights across mobile, social, online and console games reaching over 300 million people worldwide," a release reads.
In other words, you're more valuable to EA than you might already know. The publisher wants to use the information you provide them inadvertently through gameplay to rope in ad and marketing deals not just through its Facebook games but all of its games. More specifically, EA said it can provide advertisers with (prepare for buzzword overload):
Key cross-platform campaign performance indicators such as impressions, clicks, unduplicated reach, demographic profiles, social media buzz, and ROI metrics.
Segmented audience insights based on demographic, psychographic, and social data.
Ability to drill down into the factors that impact campaign effectiveness including audience engagement, audience segmentation and type of creative all measured over time.
EA Legend
What's that again--psychographic data? This may all sound like something out of "1984," but it's nothing new. If you think other game creators don't do this type of stuff, then here's your wake-up call. We won't know exactly what information about us EA will provide to advertisers through Legend until it makes advertisers see green at this year's Advertising Week event in New York City on Oct. 4. And if EA keeps using words like psychographic, we may never know.
[Via All Facebook]
What do you think about this new EA Legend program? Do you think it's something worth worrying about, or is this just business as usual? Sound off in the comments. 1 Comment
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