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Stealing Farmville's thunder one player at a time. 1 down, 80 million to go.
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David Barnes
6 Ways to Create a Deep Experience with Simple Gameplay
- Put your reader at a high level. If you want to give your players a "deep" experience without needing complex gameplay, put the player in a presidential position. Have their game character be somebody who (like the player in real life) is too busy to spend much time on your game's problem. If your game is about running a school, make the player an education minister not a janitor.
- Deal with lofty themes. Have your game touch on themes that make people think interesting thoughts, even if the game itself is shallow. Some wrestling with moral issues will help. Remember how Themepark Tycoon let you add more salt to the fries, in order to sell more drinks -- hardly a lofty theme in itself, but it got players thinking about the nature of capitalism a little at least. Anything that touches on environmental issues, politics, Fairtrade, education and other things that cause controversy or that people really care about will feel deeper.
- Distill the game down to key decisions. Somebody running a huge industrial farm doesn't "click to harvest". They tell their staff what to do and leave them to get on with it. Put the player in a position where they are making big decisions, not trying to mimick the minute-by-minute actions of real life. Can you distill your game down to the players choosing one of three options, based on a "proposal" presented to them? "The French are amassing a huge Navy. Parliament thinks you should half healthcare spending to fund our own Navy. Do you accept the proposal, reject it, or send back for amendment?" or "Chelsea FC wants to sell you Ashley Cole for 10m plus one night with Cheryl. Do you accept, reject, or hang on for a better offer?" Even a real time strategy game could be distilled to "move forward", "fall back", and "attack".
- Give actions unpredictable, far reaching, and logical consequences. When a player takes a decision in your game, they should know it has consequences -- but not be 100% sure what those consequences will be. That's what gives chess depth -- you know that your opponent will respond in some way, but you don't know how. The move could be what wins the game for you, or you could make a mistake here and lose everything. In Tower Defense games, you'll win the first level pretty much whatever you do -- but decisions you make on the first level will still have consequences many levels later. That gives the game depth even though its simple.
- Have multiple interacting score systems. Readers will get a sense of depth when they have to make trade offs between success in various different areas. There's a trade off between driving fast and getting good mileage. There's a trade off sometimes between having a winning sports club or a profit maximising one, but maximise short term profit too much and you'll lose all your matches and eventually your fans. Is it better to run a high yield farm with lots of fertilizer and pesticides? Or have low yield organic farming and charge premium prices? Even if the mechanic of the game is simple, having readers make trade offs between different score systems will make them think deeper about how they play.
- Introduce more complex "rules" for experienced players. There are various chess rules that beginners might not know -- em passant, castling for example. Professional Scrabble tends to have more rules than friendly Scrabble games at Christmas. Currently most social games only change statistically as the player progresses -- the new items that unlock are more powerful, but behave in about the same way. Make your game items change the gameplay "rules" a little, so that the game becomes more complex as the player gets more immersed in it -- but is still simple for anybody who starts.
What do you find gives a game depth?
Posted
by David Barnes
7 Reasons Why @FBIndie is Missing the Impact of the iPad
A few of you might be wondering why my recent anti-iPhone rant didn't even mention the iPad. I'm sure the iPad will sell and make lots of money for Apple, which is its purpose and we shouldn't deny Apple that success. But I don't think its impact will be felt very much outside of Apple's own revenue figures, and here's why:
- Apple has never succeeded at creating a market. Apple is amazing at building outstanding products in established or growing markets. Everybody knew that MP3 players would be mass market before the iPod took off. There were already many on the market, other forms of portable music player (pocket radio, cassette, CD, Minidisc players) were blockbuster products, but nobody had yet figured out how to make a really good MP3 player. The iPod delivered. And the iPhone didn't create a market either. It took the technology of a smartphone, and marketed it to the mainstream phone user. A genius and innovative twist. Where Apple try to create a new market from scratch or almost scratch, you don't hear much about it after the initial launch. AppleTV anybody?
- The Newton. !
- It's a giant Swiss army knife. Have you seen that DICE presentation? A "do everything" tool like a Swiss Army Knife works great in the pocket. But nobody has a giant Swiss army knife in their kitchen or toolshed. People want a whole bunch of tools to do different jobs.
- Let's face it, it really IS just a giant iPod Touch. We've already seen 90% of the "impact" of the iPad in the form of the iPod Touch. What exactly do you expect the impact to be, beyond being an iPod Touch with a bigger screen?
- The whole "multiplayer" angle is a red herring. Grasping for some interesting angle to iPad games, people talk about 2 player games where you each hold half of the device. But the iPad just isn't big enough. We like our personal space. Crowding around a single keyboard feels bad enough. With the iPad you'll be even closer together. Yuck!
- Even if it shifts a lot of units, it won't change the game. I'm not saying the iPad won't sell. I'm just saying that from a developer's point of view, it won't make that much difference. The iPhone might have been a game changer for the phone and app industry -- but did it make that much difference to the iTunes music store? I'll wager that 90% of iPhone users owned an iPod before they bought an iPhone, and that their music buying habits didn't change much at all once they got the iPhone in their hands. The iPad will hook into the existing AppStore infrastructure, I bet it won't sell anything like as many units as the iPhone and iTouch, and will lead to only a subtle difference in game and app purchase behavior.
- You need to get it out of your bag. The iPhone is cool because it's in your pocket and you can whip it out any time you like. The iPad is going to either go in a bag, or be left on its side next to your sofa. If it's in a bag, it'll need to be in a sleeve too to stop it getting mucky. It'll be a fiddle to pick it up. If you had an iPad in your bag and an iPhone in your pocket, which are you going to reach for to check your mail in a spare 3 minutes? 2000 FBIndie dollars says you'll reach for your pocket, right? Even if you have an iPad with you and ready to use, you'll still use the iPhone more. How's that for not having a lot of impact?
What kind of impact are you expecting from the iPad?
Posted
by David Barnes
Clickability and 5 Other Gestures for Your Social Games (kudos to @aquito)
Clickability means the physical pleasure you get from interacting with the game's interface, regardless of what your actions "mean" in the game world:
Clickability = the routine yet enjoyable behavior of executing a set of game actions, with the mouse, and intuitively responding to the UI feedback, during a single social (Facebook) game session
Some things are just fun to do, physically. Pressing the spacebar in Canabalt is fun. Clicking on things that move is fun. Dragging colourful objects around with the mouse is fun. Drawing or scribbling with the mouse is fun.
Trying to remember keys is not fun. Clicking a slightly too small text button is not fun.Â
So, here are a few simple mechanics that are straight out fun to play with. Make sure the player enjoys the physical act of playing your game!
- Simple keyboard controls. Controlling a character with left, right, jump is simple and fun for most players. Anything more and you're getting geeky. (Oh OK, I'll let you have "fire" too. Is that enough?)
- Drawing things with the mouse. Graffiti was one of the most popular early Facebook apps. Why? Because it was fun to scribble shapes and lines with the mouse, and because it was expressive. It scored on 2 of the 3 social gaming pillars. It fell on the 3rd.
- Clicking a moving object that is not too small and not too fast. You want the player to just enjoy meandering around with the cursor and clicking. They shouldn't feel frustrated by it.
- Moving objects around with the mouse. Even better if there's some kind of physics at work so that the objects have momentum or bounce of each other something.
- Tapping a rhythm with the keyboard, mouse button or touchpad. Build Finger Drumming Hero! (Oh boy I'd love that as an iPhone game.)
- Anything you do with your mouse when you're bored or thinking. If you're like me, you find yourself playing around with the mouse when you're at your computer. When I'm reading pages, I find myself selecting and unselecting blocks of text for no reason. Clearly, my brain enjoys doing that stuff. Build that into your game!
A few questions for you, for the comments or tweets:
- What gestures have I missed? What gestures do you recommend FBIndie build into their games to make them "clickable"?
- Can you think of a game concept that gives Graffiti a "third pillar"? How would it work?
- What do you find yourself doing with the mouse and keyboard when you're idle or bored? (Keep it clean)
The best answers win FBIndie dollars!
Posted
by David Barnes
9 Innovative Ways to Promote Your Facebook Game without Notifications
Facebook developers around the world are mourning the loss of "notifications" to app developers. No longer can an application force itself into the face of new players -- one of the key growth strategies used by the biggest successes in social gaming.
No need to too much boo hoo, though. There are plenty of ways to promote your game without notifications... without even using Facebook's social graphs at all, in fact. This is how most people in the world have to promote their wares. Here are 7 ways to get your Facebook Game free exposure:
- Create a video trailer. Do a search for "iphone game trailer" on Youtube and you'll get hundreds of results. Now try "facebook game trailer" and you'll find absolutely nothing, or at least no trailers for Facebook games. Game trailers are a very effective way to promote your game. Borrow techniques from the best trailers for other game genres. Then share your video anywhere you can. If you're not up to creating video, even a slideshow can give players a quick taste of your game.
- Get your game reviewed widely, and not just on the app's Facebook page. Reviews -- even bad reviews -- get publicity. Encourage as many bloggers to review your game as possible. Offer incentives to reviewers to review your game (but not incentives to review it well -- make sure they're honest). Contact bloggers, tweeters, forum posters, and so on. Tell them why your game is unique, interesting, and worth talking about.
- Write and distribute a press release. Try to make your press release a "story", not just an announcement. Write it in such a way that a journalist can add their by line to the end and publish it, and it'll read like a news story. Or write something utterly off the wall, like this. Search Google to find out the best way to distribute a press release.
- Give trophies and other virtual objects that players will want to show off. Give players trophies and other tokens of success that they'll want to share with all their friends, not just other players -- beautiful art, funny animations, or shareable freebies.
- Find your future loyal players, and engage with them. If you're aiming your game at a niche or niches -- and you should be -- then find out what communities exist for those niches already, and join in with them. If you have a social game about managing a 60s pop band then you should be promoting it to the following communities: people who like social gaming, people who like 60s pop music, people who like other "music" games such as Rock Band or Guitar Hero. These people are more likely than anybody to like your game. It's not rocket science.Â
- Build good relationships with other developers. Indie developers love to play and talk about each other's games. Attract other developers to your game by sharing your insights and learning with the developer community, being open about how you work, and asking people lots of questions.
- Create a web site, blog, and Twitter feed for your game or games. Give out news about your game, share strategies and secrets, and generally try to get "conversation" around your game. As always the best result is to get people to link to or share your tweets, posts, or pages.
- Make a remarkable game. Build a game that people will want to talk about. Part of this is just about being a good game... but also try to have a few key features that are surprising and that people will want to talk express, and can explain in just a few seconds.
- Copy what iPhone game developers are doing. The AppStore really gives very little promotional help to indie devs -- if you're not in a top 10 list, you're more or less invisible in the AppStore. So iPhone game developers promote their games on the "open web" outside the store. And it works. Look at what they do, and copy them!
As always, I invite you to discuss these points in the comments below -- or add your own promotion techniques and ideas.
Posted
by David Barnes
5 Top Tips from Indie Developers and the Facebook of Doom (from @karlbunyan)
View more presentations from iPlatform.
This slideshow by Karl Bunyan, a successful fully independent Facebook games developer, starts with some background on the platform, before sharing his 5 top tips for Facebook indie developers. And I like this guy's style too -- a fellow Jones fan.
The tips are:
- Go Niche. Don't try to compete with Farmville -- look for an audience that the big ones won't be interested in.
- Retention, not virality. Viral channel effectiveness is reducing. At some point you're going to have a buy traffic -- so once you have a user, hang on to them.
- Concentrate on Average Revenue per user. 100,000 users paying 50c per player is better than 1m at 5c. A loyal audience monetizes better than a mass migratory one.
- Don't overcomplicate. Release fast, early and often. Don't try to compete with virtual worlds. Maximise your average revenue per developer. Concentrate on fun, not realism. But still maintain depth of play.
- Build a portfolio. Not every game will be a success. Prepare to move on quickly. Cross promote. Make a virtue out of changing your mind.
Karl concludes that Facebook isn't the Holy Grail for game developers. But there are opportunities for indies that look for gaps in the market and take advantage of their ability to change.
You can see the full slideshow and a video of the first 10 minutes over on Facebook Developer Garage London.
Posted
by David Barnes
How To Work Your Social Game into Your Players' Morning Routine
When I turn on my computer in the morning, I can't resist checking my work email, then my personal email, then my Twitter, then Google Analytics, then Facebook, then Google Reader. Before I know it, the morning's well under way and all I've done is check stuff. It's then that I realize that I should probably put some clothes on and clean my teeth before I do much else.
If you're building a social game, aim to make your game one of the things that players check in on when they work through their morning routine. Here's how:
- Have stuff happen while the player is asleep. The player needs to wake up knowing that there might be "new stuff" in the game. So it's essential that the game world changes even when the player is away from it.
- Create a delay between action and result. The stuff that happens should be a result of actions the player took, not just random stuff that the game engine spits out by chance. But it shouldn't happen immediately -- the player needs to check back later to see the result of their action.
- Make it unpredictable. Players should feel an urge to check up because they don't know what awaits them. They are checking in to see if yesterday's action paid off. There's nothing worse than knowing that the answer to something you care about is in reach, but you don't yet have it. That's why we check email on our mobile phones -- the thought of an interesting message sitting unread in our inbox scares us.
- Give players a limited time to respond. Ramp up the urgency further! Make sure that players know that once something happens, they have to deal with it within some fixed period of time -- or the opportunity disappears. In other words, if they put of checking until lunchtime or evening, they might miss out.
- Make your technique fit the game. All of this might sound like a cynical manipulation of the player. And it is -- so make sure that these techniques fit in with the "rules" of your game world, and the sense of "checking" will become part of the game for players -- and even seem fun!
How can you work these into your game mechanic? Here are 3 examples of popular game genres, and how you could modify the way it works so that players come back to "check up":
- A driving or sport game. When you win races, you attract the attention of potential sponsors. Sponsorship deals come in some hours after you've raced successfully. You have only a few hours to choose to accept the sponsorship, or they'll withdraw the offer and sponsor somebody else.
- A one on one "combat" game. As you get better at the game (whether it's a one on one beat 'em up, chess, or scissors-paper-stone), "star players" challenge you to battles with lucrative prizes. These challenges can come in at any time -- but you have to accept the challenge within a few hours or you'll look "yellow".
- A football management game. You can offer to buy players, but you don't find out for a few hours whether the offer is accepted. Once the offer is accepted, you have a limited time to sign the contract and recruit the player.
How will you work your social game into the players' morning routine?
Posted
by David Barnes
The 10 Principles of Social Game Design -- at last, the DEFINITIVE LIST
There's been a lot of speculation about how to develop a successful social game. Now, after extensive research, I can present to you the definitive list of game design principles that will guarantee you social game success. Just apply the 10 principles below and you'll have herds of players ambling to your game like so many dumb cattle, ready to let you squeeze the milk of monetization out of their swollen, distended udders. (And if you don't, it'll only be because you didn't apply them properly, all right?)
If you've already got a game concept in mind, run it past these 10 Principles and see:
- If your concept naturally fits each of these principles, and
- Whether you can refine your game so that it meets these principles better -- will doing so make the game better, or worse?
Without further ado, here are the 10 Principles of Social Game Design:
- Nesting not questing. In most computer games you manage resources in order to keep playing so that you can compete "quests" -- for example you conserve lives, health, and ammo so that you can progress further without getting killed, shoot more baddies, and finally defeat the boss. In social games the quests are simply a means to gain resources that you can use to "feather your nest" in the game world. Imagine a shoot 'em up where the main goal was to amass ammo, health, and lives -- and killing baddies was only a means to achieve that. That's what social games are like. If you're designing a social game, turn the relationship between nesting and questing on its head.
- Single player mechanic, social dynamic. The most successful social games are at heart a simple, open ended single-player game. Built around that core game is a social dynamic -- which can be as simple as a high score table, but is usually far more elaborate. If you're designing a social game, build a 1-player game at the core Then look for ways that social dynamics can feed into and off the central single-player game.
- Compete with strangers, co-operate with friends. Social games tend to have high score tables that feature all players, and most social game players focus on moving up the general table, not beating friends. On the other hand, friends love to help each other out in social games -- and giving non-players ways to "help a friend" in the game can be a great way to introduce them to the game. Look for ways to let friends help each other in the game -- let non-players give gifts and support to the game addicted friends.
- Player self-expression. As well as getting help from friends, social gamers want to show their achievements to friends too. Let your players arrange and display their "nest" in a way that they'll want to show off with their online friends. Design your games so that the main incentive and prize for succeeding is something beautiful or fun that players can display on their profile page or give to their friends.
- The game never ends. A social game should never be "completed". The player should always be able to continue engaging with the game, continue to increase their score, continue to amass and invest new resources. Design your game so that there is no definitive conclusion. If you can still give the player a sense of purpose and narrative then that's a bonus, but not essential.
- Easy to learn, easy to make progress. The basic mechanic of the game should be something that players can "get" in a matter of minutes... or less. Include loads of in game prompts to guide readers through their first play. No matter how badly your players play on their first go, give them a prize for taking part. And never put them in a position where they feel like they're "stuck" -- keep increasing something every time they play.
- Accessible to all. Social games don't require fancy hardware or the latest OS. Anybody with a PC should be able to play your social game if they want to. Design your game so that it'll work on a $200 netbook with a 10 inch screen, as well as a $2000 Apple egobook.
- Virtual currencies and virtual purchases. Most social games feature a fictional currency that you can earn in the game, and a different currency that you can only get by buying it with real dough. They get players hooked on "buying" stuff with the fictional currency, and then show that it's much easier and more effective to just use real money. The trick of getting the right balance is to choose the right "real money only" virtual items so that players can do enough to get hooked without them but still have a strong incentive to cough up when the time is right. Choose a whole range of "virtual products", and design for three different acquisition methods: in game "earned" currency, real "bought" currency, and gifts from friends.
- Rewards for checking in. Successful social games want to encourage players to engage with the game regularly. It doesn't matter whether the player is playing well or poorly -- any engagement with the game is valuable for the developer. Therefore, social games often provide an incentive to the player just for turning up each day. The truly ruthless games (which also tend to be the most successful) will even punish the player for not coming back regularly -- denying them access to money or resources that they rightfully earned. Look for ways to encourage your players back frequently, but try not to alienate people by punishing them TOO hard if they don't.
- Light hearted and fun. Importantly, most Facebook games are not especially realistic, violent, or "deep". They focus on simple ideas that most people find pleasant and sweet -- cafes, farms, zoos, islands, and so on. Of course, mafia and zombie games work too -- but it is best not to get too brutal in a social game. Make sure your game puts a smile on its players' faces.
- What is the 11th principle? What other design concepts do you think are an essential part of the successful social game? Let rip in the comments below.
Do these principles just about cover it? What have I missed? And are these rules just made to be broken by creative, innovative indie developers? Tell me all about it, suckers.
Posted
by David Barnes
9 Reasons Why Indie Devs Should Embrace Facebook Like Crazy
There are plenty of reasons why indie devs won't do Facebook. But at least as many reasons to give it a go. Here are the top 9 reasons that Facebook is a sweet gift for the indie developers of the world. The developers I've seen who embrace these reasons seem to be doing quite nicely, thank you...
- Proven profit-making business model. The top Facebook games have proven, scalable revenue models. And unlike selling a game, once you've persuaded a player to pay once then they'll keep coming back for more -- PayPal account in hand. Even better you can keep tweaking the free version every day to get more conversions into paying customers. (Once a player's downloaded your free iPhone app, if it doesn't hook them onto the paid version then you've missed your chance. That's it!)
- Makes the Apple AppStore look like a kid's lemonade stand. Recently, Bejewelled became the first paid iPhone app to pass the 3,000,000 sales mark. The top 15 Facebook apps are getting 3,000,000+ users engaging with them every day. It makes the AppStore look quaint by comparison.
- Facebook gamers are cute girls and desperate housewives. The average iPhone user is either a geek or a self-fancying hipster. The average Facebook gamers are cute girls and desperate housewives. Who do you want to devote your life to impressing?
- Facebook games are sticky and addictive. Once a Facebook game is part of your Facebook experience, it stays there. Each time you log into Facebook is an opportunity to interact with the game. People use Facebook when they are bored and ready for distraction -- they'll keep coming back to your game again and again. Contrast this to casual Flash games on the "open web". Unless you remember or bookmark a game, the chances are you'll forget where you found it after the first play.
- It's underhyped among indies; most of them are staying away. Everybody's leaping on iPhone games. There is a real lack of people bringing an indie sensibility to Facebook games. The market is open.
- Even the most popular games have simple game mechanics, short development cycles, and low budgets. In terms of gameplay experience, with Facebook games you really can compete with the big boys. You can provide a gameplay experience that seems just as polished, clever, and professional as Zynga or Playfish. The pros might have good artwork, but it's also pretty simple.
- Viral growth is built into the platform. Even if you don't resort to "spamming" players' friends, there are plenty of opportunities to encourage Facebook players to share the game with their friends. People come to Facebook to check out what their friends are up to. If you can get the player "on your side" they'll happily brag about playing your games.
- Every computer user is a potential player. Most Facebook games will work on any computer, from the most basic netbook to the fanciest Mac. There are Facebook users all over the world. All ages use it and play games on it. Just about any niche group or target market could be engaged with a Facebook game. Your outlandish idea is more likely to find an audience on Facebook than anywhere else.
- You can retool your existing web games quickly. If you've got Flash or Unity games already written, you can quickly make them playable within Facebook. That might not turn them overnight into a social phenomenon, but it'll bring you a new audience and get you into the Facebook game... game. Are you game? Why not give it a go?
- What's the tenth reason? Add your own reasons in the comments below.
Is this enough to get you looking into Facebook games for your next projects? What's holding you back from jumping in? And if you're already working on Facebook games, what are the reasons that persuaded you to take the plunge?
Posted
by David Barnes
9 Reasons Why Indie Devs Won't Do Facebook
There just isn't much Indie action around Facebook games. Why not? I set out after some indie developers with zombie-like determination, to find out...
- The API keeps changing. Facebook frequently changes the API, meaning that the techniques used to market games stop working -- or even that the game itself breaks and becomes unplayable. Integrating with Facebook's oft changing UI is a nightmare.
- It's a winner takes all market. Zynga and the like have it all sewn up. Nobody else will make any money.
- You have to pay for servers. And if your game takes off you could be looking at a very big bill.
- Facebook games play on addiction. Indie developers are the moral type. They don't want to write games for the kind of addicts that can't keep away from Facebook. They'd prefer write them for the kind of addicts that can't put down their iPhone.
- Facebook games are annoying. Who doesn't hate seeing Facebook game notifications in their Facebook feeds? Developers will lose all their indie cred if they touch Facebook.
- No game portals have got any traction. So you can't distribute your games along with other Indie games. You have to build your own marketing channel, and...
- Marketing is hard and expensive. To really get users you have to pay for advertising, and unless you've got somebody bank rolling your game that's a risky strategy.
- Testing and debugging hell. To test the games you need either a load of fake Facebook accounts, or a load of willing friends. Either way, because the game is partly under Facebook's control you have to trust that their code won't break your work.
- Facebook games are for girls. The top Facebook games are all childish dumb things like farming and running restaurants. I don't want a part of that!
- What's the tenth reason? Add your own reason in the comments below.
Are these reasons good enough to ignore the biggest game playing market in the world today? Do you really think that Facebook gamers are so dumb that they won't enjoy thoughtful, creative social games? And if indie developers work together, can we overcome these problems? For example, groups of developers can help test each others games, share money making strategies, and keep abreast of API changes. What do you say?
Update: Now there's 9 Reasons Why Indie Devs Should Embrace Facebook Like Crazy too.
Posted
by David Barnes
