On Technology and the Future: Education, IoT, AI, Mobility, Games

Tag: Flash games

Mobile Browser-Based Flash Games?

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On 29/09/2009

In 1

Today, I read a press release from UK firm MoMac who announced the launch of a browser-based games platform, which uses Flash Lite. I had been looking at the use of Flash Lite for mobile gaming quite a while ago (2 years back in fact; see here and here). The front-runners on this (not browser-based but downloadable) was Mobitween, a French company that was bought by Zed last year. Back in 2008, the estimated install base of Flash Lite on mobile phones was already approaching half a billion, so just ever so slightly more than there are e.g. iPhones. In principle, all good.

But where did it go from there? uGenGames, the company’s original user-generated games site, seems to be stuck where it was back then. There is still the showcase of mobiGamz, a Flash-Lite-based gaming portal on Verizon Wireless. But otherwise? Nothing much…

So MoMac will do it in the browser then. I don’t think it makes that much of a difference but, given my early enthusiasm, wondered where the pitfalls (of which there apparently are some; otherwise it would have taken off more forcefully) might be. So where then?

I have argued in the interim the advantages of applications vs mobile web, and this still stands: apps often will give better usability and navigation tailored to the input constraints of (small) handsets when compared to browser-based solutions.

Discoverability might be another – albeit perhaps short-term – constraint: people are not (yet!?) used to looking for games (or other “applications”) on the web. That is arguably one reason of the huge success of the app store: it does what it says on the tin and it is very easy to discover.

Billing would be the third big differentiator: Apple managed what probably only a brand of Apple’s power can command, namely that people happily and without second thoughts sign up with credit cards and all via iTunes. To replicate this somewhere on the open seas of the wide web is almost certainly wishful thinking at best. The only other companies who have as easy a billing interface are the carriers who will almost always be more control-minded than independent service providers might wish for. MoMac claims that

the first casual games portal to go live on major MNO’s in October

and that might change things in this department a little. However, it will arguably take a few of those major MNOs in order to make it worthwhile for developers to address the platform.

A fourth point – and this is following from the above – is content. MoMac seems a little light on this side. It claims the availability of 30 games through its partner Booster Media and, with no disrespect (!), they do not seem to have the most compelling stuff available. This of course is nothing that comes with the concept but perhaps with the (current) offering, the announcement of which I believe might actually have come a little early because of this.

Anyway: the principle is (still) great, and I really wish them all the very best. Keep me up to date, guys; I’d love to publish a retraction of my take here…

Mobitween bought by Zed

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On 09/09/2008

In Deals

Every reader of this blog will have realized for some time that I am a fan of mobile Flash and the good folks at Mobitween (just see here and here), the mobile Flash pioneers from Paris. And, boy, would I have wanted to work with them some more but, alas, it seems this will remain wishful thinking as they have been the first prey of D2C giant’s Zed M&A fund: yes, they have been acquired.

The deal – unfortunately for me, I guess – makes a lot of sense to Zed, who have been raising their revenue numbers to heights so dizzying they would nearly make the initial investments comprehensible… (if only the initial investors had seen anything of that success; but well…): Zed famously claims to make up to 85% of their revenue with
 predominantly in-house produced generic content, and when it comes to speed and efficiency, mobile flash in general and the guys at Mobitween in particular have no match.
So, well done them, and let’s hope Flash will continue to roll as it started to promise, so that we can all marvel at dramatically reduced time to market and, consequently, hopefully a vastly improved content offering all around (oh, and buy Zed shares if you can).

Convergence in games

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On 08/02/2008

It’s been the buzz for some time but no one had, with few exceptions, been seeing too much of it but now it seems to start taking off: cross-platform convergence of games. It is a bit of a holy grail: the network operators (or carriers) are not always the most creative and daring bunch when it comes to trying things out and they take a very healthy cut of the revenues from a tough, fragmented and still relatively small market. No wonder then that a lot of people are praying for alternative solutions. But, alas, it never really worked: every games publisher will tell you that, other than for music, wallpapers, etc, the direct-to-consumer model never really worked for games; the operators dominate the space as the, by far, most important distribution channels.

This could be, one thinks, overcome when more users would actually get themselves familiar with the games in a less constrained environment, the web being an immediate answer. Many have tried, many have failed (even the superstars of mobile games, Gameloft, stopped their in-house offering). But, hey, maybe it was just the wrong approach. Trip Hawkins‘ brainchild Digital Chocolate showed with their approach to their award-winning game TowerBloxx how it can also be done: they created a Facebook app and an online Flash version of the game that have been roaring successes: allegdely, the Flash game saw more than 10 million plays to date and the Facebook app has had 430,000 lifetime users. For a property that sprung from mobile, these are very respectable numbers indeed. And whilst I have no idea if it actually helped selling more games (300,000 clicked the “buy now” button but, for some odd reason, they don’t know how many actually bought it), it will have played its part to keeping the game in the front of people’s minds – and that’s half the work done, isn’t it?

Other players are onto it, too: online gaming giant Oberon Media bought mobile publisher I-Play last year in order to offer a more comprehensive line-up across media boundaries. Real is doing similar things. It is probably only a question of time before EA connects its pogo.com online destination with its mobile titles. I also know of quite a few smaller developers that start to very actively incorporate the multi-platform into their game design and development considerations. Very encouraging, that is!

And it makes so much sense of course: handsets get more and more powerful, the garden walles gardens start to come down with flat-rate data plans for mobiles becoming more and more the rule: all in all, a perfect runway for the ascent of convergent media consumption.

Now let’s add (mobile) Flash to the equation, and things could become very interesting indeed… (and, yes, I know, we may not yet have the install base but it’s getting there…)

Games 2.0: UGG (or user-generated games)

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On 04/09/2007

In Games, Social

The wonderful guys from French Flash specialists Mobitween launched a user-generated-games portal called ugenGames. Here’s the PR blurb: “The site invites players, developers and designers to create, upload, customise and share web and mobile Flash-based games. It also offers the chance to personalise and share games with others players by embedding them into social websites such as Facebook and MySpace or blogs like Blogger and WordPress.”

Mobitween’s CEO, Philippe Chassany, reckons that this approach “bridges the gap between web and mobile game developers and players allowing them to create, customise, embed and share an endless library of games”.

The concept is intriguing: basic casual game engines that can – because all done in Flash – be easily customized even by amateurs. Moreover: as the creator can adapt screen sizes, you can also choose to have it output in Flash Lite flavour – suitable for higher-end mobile phones! It is a rather sweet accompaniment to the 2.0 revolution.

However, will Flash Lite become J2ME’s nemesis and revolutionize mobile gaming? Probably not just yet but the potential would certainly appear to be there: with over 200m enabled devices it is no match to the other technologies around but it is reaching a size where development for it might make a lot of sense: it is faster and cheaper than J2ME or BREW (last but not least because the porting nightmare falls away due to the vector-graphics approach used by Flash). Given that the limitations of input via mobile handsets limit the complexity of game play anyhow, the inherent limitations of Flash might not actually be too much of an impediment. Interesting…

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