Games on Facebook
I just read a really interesting interview with a guy at Facebook who helps developers get their games onto Facebook.
I remember when there weren’t many games on facebook but since then it’s really exploded. Now it’s very cluttered like iPhone, but the top games get HUGE numbers of players (3-8 million monthly players) due to the fact that Facebook now has 150 million members!
Also a while back the revenue model wasn’t clear but now it seems that people are monetising their games mainly via a) advertising and b) micro-transactions. I’m wondering if the ad-driven model will see a slump due to the economic situation. Certainly if you make a good game there is evidence that players can spend a considerable amount of money on micro-transactions, so that seems a more sensible model to me.
Like Casual games Facebook games are becoming bigger and more complex and are costing more to make. Many big players (please excuse pun) are entering the arena so it seems like the days of one-man bands having big successes could be nearing an end (the same may happen on iPhone soon too). Any time there is a new platform it seems that Indies can get in there quickly and make good money at the beginning but soon it fills up with too much crap and then the biggest and best (and most expensive) titles win. But I guess that’s natural in an emerging market – it’s just business.
