June Casuality Seattle: A Conference for Casual Game Developers, Publishers and Distributors 1 Don’t Roll Over Brian Robbins Director of Games, Game Trust, Inc. Chair, IGDA Casual Games SIG
June Casuality Seattle: A Conference for Casual Game Developers, Publishers and Distributors 2
June Casuality Seattle: A Conference for Casual Game Developers, Publishers and Distributors 3 We Have a Problem
June Casuality Seattle: A Conference for Casual Game Developers, Publishers and Distributors 4 The economics of casual games suck for developers
June Casuality Seattle: A Conference for Casual Game Developers, Publishers and Distributors 5 Economics Consumer Pays$20 Portal Takes$14 Other costs$2 Developer Gets$4 Developer nets 20% Retailer nets 70%
June Casuality Seattle: A Conference for Casual Game Developers, Publishers and Distributors 6 What does the portal do? They provide DRM Bandwidth Merchant fees / payment processing Other incidental costs
June Casuality Seattle: A Conference for Casual Game Developers, Publishers and Distributors 7 What does Portal do (2) They bring the customer –(this is their big value) But so do Brick & Mortar Retailers –(at a much greater cost!) B&M retail margins are 1-20% Games to retail have a wholesale price typically around $12-$15 for a $20 title –Retailer only gets $5-$8 and all their costs come out of that!
June Casuality Seattle: A Conference for Casual Game Developers, Publishers and Distributors 8 But wait there’s more
June Casuality Seattle: A Conference for Casual Game Developers, Publishers and Distributors 9 What about Advertising? Price Clubs? Subscriptions?
June Casuality Seattle: A Conference for Casual Game Developers, Publishers and Distributors 10 Advertising Assume: –10% of page views download (probably high) –1% of downloaders purchase –2 ads per page Every purchase = 2000 page views Typical CPM = $1 CPM (much higher?) Portal += $2 –Goes to $4 if 1 in 20 page views download –Skyrockets if conversion rate is lower From yesterday – ad revenue is almost equal with download revenue
June Casuality Seattle: A Conference for Casual Game Developers, Publishers and Distributors 11 What about web-demo? It’s worth it to upsell the download, right? These areas are setup to drive ads, not upsell downloads! Typical ads / play = 4-8 How many plays / download? –If 10 then every purchase = ad views! Again Developer = $0
June Casuality Seattle: A Conference for Casual Game Developers, Publishers and Distributors 12 Price Clubs / Subscriptions Portal gets $10 / user / month Developer gets rev share ($3) when user buys their game (at a discount) But what about breakage? –Significant numbers of users do not purchase in any given month! Portal gets $10 (plus ad revenue) Developer gets $0
June Casuality Seattle: A Conference for Casual Game Developers, Publishers and Distributors 13 Why is this? Most developers don’t know –They don’t run the numbers –They don’t know to ask –They just blindly accept whatever is offered Those that do –Can’t do anything alone
June Casuality Seattle: A Conference for Casual Game Developers, Publishers and Distributors 14 What is Right? Share ad revenue just like download revenue (even if it is very small) –Real and Microsoft have announced they will be so start asking for this NOW! Monetize developers for breakage Wholesale pricing model?
June Casuality Seattle: A Conference for Casual Game Developers, Publishers and Distributors 15 What do we do? Get the word out! Tell new (and old) developers how everything works Don’t take no for an answer Make the deal that works for your business
June Casuality Seattle: A Conference for Casual Game Developers, Publishers and Distributors 16 What Else? You can’t get it if you don’t ask Demand ad share Demand breakage compensation Realize that your content provides value to the entire chain
June Casuality Seattle: A Conference for Casual Game Developers, Publishers and Distributors 17 Don’t Roll Over (unless you choose to)