Social Gaming Roundup: Mother’s Day, Capcom, Parodies, & More

Mother’s Day Offers Soar in Social Games — TrialPay released some interesting numbers this week stating that in the days leading up to Mother’s Day, promotional offers dubbed “gifts for mom” generated around $1 million per day. According to the offer-based payment platform, social game developers saw an offer-based revenue increase five-times that of their norm. Furthermore, 40% of consumers were first-time buyers.

Capcom Looks to Join Social Games – Japanese game developer Capcom said this past week that the company has plans to introduce a premiere title onto Facebook. According to Capcom President Haruhiro Tsujimoto, the time for them to start is now: “Gaming on social networks is poised to impact the traditional video game industry and is a presence that cannot be ignored.”

Nickelodeon’s AddictingGames Adds Virtual Goods — With 34 million monthly active users, television network Nickelodeon’s AddictingGames casual games web site has recently launched its first virtual goods platform. With it, users will be able to purchase virtual goods for participating games using a virtual currency dubbed AddictingGames Bucks.

Jolt Online Gaming Launches FarmVillain — We’ve been tracking FarmVillain’s hilariously offensive rise on Facebook, and now the farming-game parody from Jolt Online Gamingand SillyGoose.ie is live. Of course, it’s not so much a game as it is a hodgepodge of bizarre, random, lewd and just plain wrong “gifts” you can send to friends or put on your wall, somewhat reminiscent of Zynga’s hit game, FarmVille. The difference is these guys range from flashing sheep, to growing hemp, to earning more cowbell.

Sometrics Joins Up with Nexon & PopCap – Earlier this week, offer solution provider Sometrics announced two new partnerships: Nexon America and PopCap Games. Through the team up, the two game developers will utilize Sometrics to provide their player communities a means to earn free in-game currency. Furthermore, in the case of PopCap, this will be the first offer provision for the popular social game Bejeweled Blitz.

iPhone Outselling Android Globally – As we watch the battle between Android and the iPhone unfold, it’s difficult to discern who will eventually come out on top as a better gaming platform. But while NPD Group figures note Android adoption rates that rise above the Apple counterpart in the US, Apple, in a very rare move, has commited itself to third-party sales figures to counteract the claim on a global scale. According to Apple spokesperson Natalie Harrison in talking to The Loop, “IDC figures show that iPhone has 16.1 percent of the smartphone market and [is] growing, far outselling Android on a worldwide basis.” Furthermore, Harrison notes that iPhone sales for this quarter, with OS 4.0, were growing by 131%.

AdMob Stalls on iPhone; Grows on Android – To add more to the iPhone versus Android debate, major advertisement provider for the Apple device, AdMob, has been stalling out ever since the Google outbid Apple to buy the company for a hefty $750 million. Since then, ad impressions on the iPhone have dropped from 54% to 46%, while Android impressions have grown from 16% to 25%.

Game Sales Drop – When we pulled the numbers for our monthly Top 25 Facebook Games, the month of May saw a staggering decline in players. However, this may not be a sign for the social gaming space so much as the gaming industry as a whole. As VentureBeat notes, the entire gaming world’s sales numbers fell 26% over the course of April. In total, the revenue generated was $766.2 million, down from $1.03 billion a year ago.

Foursquare Teams Up With the Today Show – Television’s Today Show struck a deal with location based mobile game Foursquare this week. Based around the show’s yearly Summer Concert Series, visitors that check in at the location of a Today Show Concert will be able to earn three special badges including the “newbie” badge for a single visit, a “rocker” badge for three visits, and a “10 to 10″ badge for visiting ten times.