Jan
22
A New Era in Social Gaming
Posted by: ibonsegura | January 22, 2011 | Comments Off on A New Era in Social Gaming
Social gaming in social networking sites has been increasing dramatically over the past two years. According to an article in e-marketer, revenues from ‘social gaming apps’ have increased up to 856M, with an expected increase to 1.32 billion by 2012.
With people spending over 2 hours a day on social media sites, it is not uncommon for users to begin playing a game whilst interacting or chatting with peers. Most games are generally offered at a low price (most apps cost around .99 c each, if not free), which allows users not to think twice when reading their peers ‘status” showing their highest scores. As their disposable income in regards to virtual spending increases, consumers are propelling the online gaming industry further, creating the necessity of owning a console to play video games obsolete.
For marketers, the opportunity arises through the use of advertising. Some companies have begun branding virtual goods, having special offers, short ads or clips that may be combined before, after or even during online play as what the article calls “digital items”.
Original gaming powerhouses such as Electronic Arts (EA), Disney and Google, have started spending hundreds of millions of dollars in social gaming. The question is whether or not, these ‘lower tier’, cheap online games will resist the console push as Microsoft, Sony and Nintendo lower their prices and integrate easier online modes to their already more sophisticated, higher graphics and much higher involvement levels video games. A great example would be Microsoft’s XBox new Kinect system which allows the player to become an individual in the virtual world without the necessity of using a controller.
For the e-marketer article click here.
Source: http://totalaccess.emarketer.com/Reports/Viewer.aspx?R=2000759
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