Comment: Ilya Salamatov on Gameforge's rejection of mobile
Gameforge announced the dismissal of one fifth of its employees. The publisher explains this by moving away from mobile in favor of “new opportunities in the PC freeplay market.” We talked with the director of the 101XP Business Development department about how much this market is more interesting than mobile.
What do you think about the Gameforge statement in general?
Ilya Salamatov – Director of 101XP Business Development Department
I would like to note right away that Gameforge is not going anywhere from the mobile market to the PC. This is a large company with experienced management, which we know well. They are now making a big bet on Dropzone, a new MOBA made by American developers Sparkypants Studios (a very experienced team of industry veterans). Gameforge publishes it. The game had a big buff on Gamescom. The first streams went great on Twitch.
So they didn’t just leave?
No, of course, they have a flagship PC project for this year.
But if we talk about their statement about high competition on mobile in comparison with PC. Is the PC MMO market really less competitive than mobile today?
In a sense, yes. Many developers and publishers have switched their attention to mobile in recent years. Today we see a situation where the mobile market is becoming a “red ocean”: a large number of large companies are investing monstrous amounts in marketing to occupy their positions in the top. Competing with them is really very and very expensive. For paying users, these companies are ready to shell out crazy money – up to $ 200-$ 300.
That is, it is easier to make a fritupley MMO on a PC?
There are pitfalls here. To make a more or less digestible online game, you need a big team. This is a big committee in itself: studios should clearly understand what they are doing and for what audience.
On the other hand, now there are fewer such projects in a sense (there are fewer of them coming out). And, perhaps, we can say that the market has become less competitive.
Accordingly, it turns out that attracting users to a PC is not as expensive as on a mobile.
The price is lower, including thanks to the community, which is easier to build on a PC (thanks to channels like Twitch, YouTube and social networks). On mobile in this format, communication is more expensive and often simply impossible.
Is it possible to say that the development of MMO is a less risky business in which certain schemes work stably?
Any market has its own risks. They’re just different. But yes, if there is a unique idea that turns out to be well implemented, then, in my opinion, there will be more chances for such a product on the PC market. Simply due to the fact that the audience here is traditionally more hardcore and more open to various innovations.
At the same time, of course, the market is far from forgotten. Very large companies are actively investing in it. He is very lively and interesting. And I am sure that we will see significant breakthroughs here in the near future.
Here you mentioned breakthroughs. And isn’t there a feeling that today the free-play PC market is a kind of well-established machine, where there are no revolutions, discoveries of new genres?
No. The last couple of years we have seen a huge breakthrough of games with a hybrid monetization model, in particular, survives like Arc, H1Z1 and Rust. Plus, of course, updating the generated content in games. An obvious trend of the last few years: games that allow users to create something are on the rise.
Are you planning to move to the mobile market yourself?
Having the right product and the right strategy for its withdrawal, you can achieve great success in this market, having enough funds, a lot of knowledge and, of course, experience. And we are interested in a mobile with the right product, of course, because mobile players are also waiting for new products.
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