online gaming

Mobile Card Games

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(A sort of free-flow post that goes all over the place in my attempt to get back to blogging)

For the past couple of years, app stores around the world have been invaded with a range of casual card games. I’m not referring to card games of the poker / casino variety (though that’s certainly a major category revenue-wise, especially in western markets), but rather the “collectible card game” type which has taken an interesting evolution in mobile.

One of the earlier games to hit market success in this model was probably Rage of Bahamut, which still puts on a respectable showing today (I was able to quite easily find it on App Annie’s grossing charts). But since then tons of clones have leveraged the same underlying engine, some with astonishing levels of success – Puzzle & Dragons being the flag-bearer (it has a match-3 mechanic, but the meta gameplay is the same). Various big name IPs have also been leveraged, such as Marvel (Marvel Puzzle Quest) and Star Wars (with the horrendous Force Collection mobile game). In China, “I’m MT” reached massive success with a derivative IP (it’s based on a fan-art based on WoW), and since then there’s been literally hundreds of clones, many infringing on global IP franchises such as Naruto, One Piece, and League of Legends (disclosure: which I happen to work on).

Put aside the specific puzzle mechanics in Puzzle & Dragons etc. (which I argue add some real gameplay engagement but doesn’t explain the popularity of the overall genre, especially all the games with no combat mechanic at all), the basic formula of these games is the card “level-up/evolution fusion” mechanic, the randomized card purchasing via a treasure-box, and a cheap PVE questing system.

The “level-up/evolution fusion”  mechanic is essentially a convoluted card leveling system which dramatically extends the collection depth, obfuscates the collection cost, and acts as an economy drain for in-game items that players farm up – a card can be both “leveled up” by using other cards as source material as well as “evolved” (again using various items as material) to become a different card (usually a higher-tier card of the same character). So, say you have a Tier I warrior that is level 5, he can be leveled up to a max of level 30, at which point he can be evolved to a Tier II warrior that starts at level 1 (and the cycle repeats).

The card purchasing treasure-box functions to add scarcity (and therefore collection depth) via randomization. It satisfies a psychological itch very similar to gambling (and is often called a gambling mechanic). It’s also the same primary gameplay loop that players seek out when farming items in Diablo (the chance to get some really good item “drop”).

The cheap PVE questing system is exactly that – highly repetitive, low production cost PVE engagement, with various bells and whistles on top to drive engagement (for example, some levels are only open at certain times of the day or week). Players generally farm these PVE levels to gain items that help them pursue the card level-ups and evolutions.

The fact that this basic formula has demonstrated immense market success is also revealing in other ways. For example, the fact that a large number of these games are successful without any stimulating “moment-to-moment” gameplay (e.g. Puzzle & Dragons’ match-3 combat) shows that players are engaging with them in a very low-intensity fashion (not in terms of time/money commitment, but rather attention and focus). These games are catered towards capturing the popular “fragmented time” space pursued by many mobile apps. They can be great “second screen”/multi-tasking experiences, which a high intensity game cannot satisfy.

At the same time, it’s really hard to see these games as not a fad. The formula can be extremely sticky initially but once players experience fatigue there’s very little to prevent them from churning. Some games have tried differentiating with higher production value (e.g. Million Arthur, which leveraged famous anime voice-actors) and/or IP tie-ins to create that initial draw, but I’m skeptical that players will continue to enjoy products in this space after engaging deeply with one product and breaking from it.

This brings my rather unfocused post to the other elephant in the room – Blizzard’s Hearthstone. This game has all the signs of being a massive mobile card game, despite only beta-testing on PC/Mac so far. Ironically, I get this confidence from playing the Chinese rip-off of Hearthstone which Blizzard has just taken action against. It has the right type of session length, onboarding accessibility, and gameplay depth. And it leverages a very familiar IP. (I do think there’s a lesson or two Blizzard could learn from the Chinese rip-off, especially the small client-size which I do think is a big deal on mobile.)

In short – Hearthstone may be the first massively popular “hardcore” game that is truly achieves cross-platform parity between mobile and PC/console (I’m discounting ports like XCOM because the mobile experience still has some issues). As more and more games figure this out, it may incidentally accelerate the decline of PC gaming. Once hardcore gamers form the habit of gaming on mobile, it will be harder to lure them back to PC/console experiences (demanding even higher production costs etc., which may break economics). All of this is just speculation at this point, but dramatic gaming engagement shifts may be coming.

Starcraft 2 and the e-sports eco-system, part 2

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In the first post in this series, I gave a very high level summary of professional gaming. In part 2, I will cover in some more detail the Starcraft 2 pro-gaming scene.

The Game

Starcraft 2 officially launched at the end of July this year, but really, gamers have been beta playing starting February of this year. Going further back, development was officially announced in 07, but had been in stealth mode since 2003 – making it a game 7 years in the making. That’s actually quite dangerous territory in video game development, since technology follows Moore’s Law – you may easily end up in vaporware territory like Duke Nukem Forever, the granddaddy of vaporware jokes. But Blizzard is probably in a league of its own, and has always been known for pushing back release dates. And if they think the game is going to flop, they just cancel it, which is why they have a perfect track record of hits.

Anyhow, the most interesting thing about Starcraft 2, from a content perspective, is in terms of the learning curve. For any Starcraft: Brood War veteran, the sequel is immediately approachable. I would say roughly speaking about 50% of the game is the same as before, in terms of buildings, units and spells, and even the hotkeys have not changed that much. So a Starcraft veteran can start playing instantly and feel very comfortable. But that’s deceptive, because the other 50% of the game which is new completely throws off the competitive play. Few battle-tested Brood War tactics still work in the sequel, and a lot more thinking has gone into the dynamics among units – which units counter which, which work well together. It feels familiar but it really is a new game – very well designed learning curve.

In terms of sales, Blizzard announced 3 million copies sold in the first month, which is a cool ~$200MM in terms of retail value. However, Starcraft 2 is not going to be beating video game sales (except for its own RTS category), since its tied to the PC platform (PC+Mac), whereas the mega box office hits (like Call of Duty Modern Warfare) are really cross platform on the Xbox 360 and PS3 consoles. Back in the day, RTS games have been ported to consoles, but they never really work out well in user experience – perhaps you really do need a mouse sometimes. It will be interesting to see how the new generation of input devices (Kinect etc.) inspires game development – can we see an RTS using a Minority Report type of input any day soon?

The Korean Pro Scene, and Blizzard vs. KeSPA

As said before, the biggest pro gaming scene is to be found in Korea, especially for RTS games. Interestingly, Blizzard used Starcraft 2 as an opportunity to regain control of the Starcraft “platform”. What had happened previously was that KeSPA (the Korean eSPorts Association) had been a driving force in pushing the commercialization of Starcraft in Korea, e.g. establishing the pro-leagues and handing out the TV distribution rights. Meanwhile Blizzard seemed to had taken a passive stance (it didn’t co-invest, but it didn’t charge licensing fees / royalties – it allowed KeSPA to use the game for commercial purposes, including TV broadcasting).

The growth of the sport in Korea probably surprised / delighted Blizzard, except for one thing – they weren’t getting any direct revenue from it. KeSPA had established such a strong control, to the point that pro-gamers needed licenses from KeSPA to compete in KeSPA competitions, and these licenses included some very restrictive terms (e.g.what types of commercial activities and matches the players could participate in, see this recent controversy over an exhibition match in Germany) – essentially, KeSPA was monopolizing the talent and therefore the entire market.

Blizzard saw Starcraft 2 as a chance to negotiate with KeSPA over royalties / licensing. Apparently the talks fell apart, and Starcraft 2 at one point got a “mature – 18+” rating in Korea by authorities (which people speculate as a retaliation move from KeSPA). Blizzard eventually struck a deal with GomTV, which seems to have had clashes with KeSPA before (the enemy of my enemy is my friend). One big implication, though, is that the best Brood War players will probably stick with KeSPA for a while, since that’s where the real money still is – although we have seen legendary players such as “Boxer” and “Nada” join the Starcraft 2 scene.

GomTV launched Season 1 of the GSL (Global SC2 League) in late August, and Season 2 is currently in full swing. Each season has a series of pre-season qualifiers, while the main season is a straight 64-player tournament. The total prize money for the 3 seasons planned this year is about $500,000. As expected, the tournament is dominated by Koreans, with non-Korean players collectively referred to as “Foreigners” – in Season 2, I think a total of 3 “Foreigners” qualified for the main tournament.

The Pro-Scene Outside of Korea

There are many semi-pro competitions organized via Battle.net globally, and players compete in the comfort of their own homes. The pro-scene has and probably always will be about big offline events (however Blizzard hampered that with the decision to remove LAN gaming from the game, which means even “offline” events are now actually battle.net gaming). In the US, the MLG (Major League Gaming) promotes a range of games (e.g. Halo3, Tekken 6) and has incorporated Starcraft 2 as of their Raleigh event in late August. In the recent MLG DC event, the top Starcraft 2 player walked away with $2,500, which indeed is exponentially lower than prize money of the Korean scene (and anyone can register, for $60, so not really a strong pro-scene). In Europe, ESL (Electronic Sports League) has incorporated Starcraft 2 into the Intel Extreme Masters competition.

To be continued…

In the next post, I’ll (finally) talk about the community and the social media related to Starcraft 2. Stay tuned!

Starcraft 2 and the e-sports eco-system, part I

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I have been playing a lot of Starcraft 2 recently. A LOT. So not really a surprise I haven’t blogged at all the past 2 months (the game launched end of July). But I thought I should put on my MBA hat (on top of the nerdy gamer hat), and analyze a bit the gaming eco-system, especially since a lot of it is related to social media.

I plan to cover this in a series of posts. This first post will give a quick overview of “esports“.

Overview

Gamers have played competitively since the inception video games (the wiki article linked above gives a historical perspective). Commercialization began in the late 90s, thanks to the popularity of First-Person-Shooters (FPS) such as Quake (which I think gave birth to a lot of the gamer vocabulary today – such as pwnage). But where commercialized gaming really took off, as most people probably knows, is South Korea. The common catalysts quoted are that Korea had great broadband infrastructure, and during the Asian Crisis of 97-98 many people took on Starcraft as a way to kill time (though this second one sounds more unlikely). Anyhow – Starcraft, the Real-Time-Strategy (RTS) from Blizzard, really took off in Korea, and starting from around 2000, Korea has had professional Starcraft gaming, involving professional teams, full-time players, television broadcasting, and around the year tournaments.

Globally, various organizations have attempted to create major global tournaments (the Olympics or World Cup of gaming). Two competitions that I believe have had good longevity are the World Cyber Games (WCG) and the Electronic Sports World Cup (ESWC). Total prize money for WCG has steadily risen to around $500,000 from $200,000 a decade ago, split over 10 or so games. This is by no means a huge jackpot (for majority of pro-gamers it’s not a sustainable career), but the growth has driven up the popularity of e-sports.

Major Game Genres

Judging by the prize money involved (check out the above links for WCG / ESWC, for prize money per type of game), FPS and RTS are by far the dominant genres, though there are a few up-and-comers such as MMORPG (World of Warcraft) and DotA (a custom map on Warcraft III, which really doesn’t fall under any major genre). Other popular genres including guitar hero, fighting, racing and sports simulation (football etc.).

Interestingly, by and large most of the competitive genres are solo play (one-on-one). While most games, such as Starcraft, support team-based play, the major competitive format has been solo gaming. This has given rise to a series of individual stars over the years, most of which only enjoying celebrity status within the community, but a few who have actually made legitimate money and fame (again, mostly Koreans – look up the Wiki entries on “Nada” Lee Yun-Yeol and “Boxer” Lim Yo-Hwan, probably the two most famous professional Starcraft players ever).

In contrast, the only major team-based genre is FPS, and especially the hit game Counter-Strike. Counter-Strike popularized the 5v5 format, which has been adopted into DotA. Of course, many FPS games are competed in solo, such as Quake.

Major Countries

In terms of where most pro-players are, this is heavily biased by game genre. Korea by and large “owns” RTS, especially Starcraft and now Starcraft 2. The Korean pro-leagues offer the highest prize money (the recent first Starcraft 2 pro-league, GSL Season 1, featured a ~$90,000 cash top prize) and attracts the best players globally, however most of the top players are Korean.

Warcraft III, another popular RTS, is slightly more diversified, with good European and Chinese players alongside the usual Korean suspects. My personal opinion is this is due to Starcraft’s overwhelming popularity in Korea, which has kept many great players away from Warcraft III.

In FPS, the scene is very different, heavily dominated by North American and European teams and players.

Business model of professional teams

Again probably pioneered by the Koreans, the professional team setup involves a manager (who also acts as the agent for his players) and anything from a handful to dozens of players. Players earn salary and are often provided accommodation and food; any prize money won is split between the player and team (I’m not sure of typical ratios).

Teams get income from competition winnings and sponsorships / advertising. Typical sponsors are major IT manufacturers (Intel, Samsung etc.) as well as specialized gaming equipment makers (e.g. Razer, which offers professional gaming grade mice / keyboards). Teams may be based out of a Internet cafe (which sponsors the team), which offers an environment to train in.

Growth Issues

There are several major issues with e-sports / pro-gaming that have hindered commercialization efforts. First of all, outside of Korea, where Starcraft is a national past-time, core gaming remains a subculture in society, mainly followed by adolescent males – the demographics base makes a big media play (such as a dedicated gaming channel on cable) very difficult. Furthermore, this base of core gamers are further segmented by the types of games and the specific games they play (again in contrast to Korea, where most of the commercialization revolves around Blizzard RTS games, such as Starcraft, Warcraft III, and now Starcraft 2). This limits the total advertising dollars and overall market size.

Secondly, the inherent short product life-cycle of video games goes against the needs to build stable spectator sports. New games, even sequels such as Starcraft 2, need to innovate on the gaming mechanics to sell; this however makes following the games harder (imagine if football or any other sport had major changes to its rules and therefore strategies every 2-3 years).

Thirdly, the steep learning curve for a spectator who has not played the games also blocks market growth. Most of these core games are incredibly complex, for example any RTS would feature 30 or more different types of units, each with unique attributes and mechanics. Also, the mechanics of certain games makes spectating boring at times (in Counter-Strike, there is usually pro-longed periods of stalemate with short bursts of intense action).