Casual gaming company King.com announced a new version of its site designed for Facebook, an application called MyGames portal. While the app has been on Facebook for years, the version launched last week includes new games and an attention currency mechanic that had been previously tested and proven on King’s growing match-3 title, Miner Speed.
And that’s not all. The company has also had another app portal on Facebook for more than a year, called FunFlow, which has a decent following at 1.14 million monthly active users, according to AppData, even though it has had higher traffic in the past.
In addition to the portals, two standalone games – the aforementioned match-3 title Miner Speed (currently at 670,000 MAU), and the other is Puzzle Saga, which we covered in November, which has a current MAU count of 504,000 – have been showing appreciable numbers. King.com cross-promotes these games and its portals, feed directly into the portals.
Added all together, the company has a solid 262,000 DAU and 3.06 million MAU on Facebook, following a strong second half of 2010. Check out our AppData tracking service for top developers and applications t0 get more detail.
Here’s how the apps work.
Looking at the similarities between the two destination sites, each has a similar layout, pool of coins, and daily bonus. MyGame’s layout links to FunFlow and the two standalone titles at the top of the page, calling them “our other games”; FunFlow has “promotions” at the bottom of the page which link to MyGames, the standalones, and an additional rotating title. MyGames is of a muted color scheme in a more traditional layout; FunFlow is bright, bold and modern.
Daily bonuses on MyGames are in the form of a spin-the-wheel for coins to spend. On FunFlow, you earn a 10 percent bonus increase to your score each successive day you play. The coins are important on MyGames as each game is timed and to play additional games the player must spend coins to play versus other players. On FunFlow, coins are earned by reaching goals and the bonuses earn further points. Players can spend Facebook Credits to spin again on MyGames or to buy bonus items on FunFlow. Miner Speed (which has demographics similar to MyGames) uses the same daily bonus mechanic; Puzzle Saga follows FunFlow in both as well.
The defining difference between the two portals and their sister games is the stable of titles each carries and the way each is scored. MyGames titles depend heavily on a dizzying array of match-3 mechanics. Though some are polished clones of existing titles, more than a few are original; but all are tied to the aforementioned time mechanic. With a much older demographic, the shorter play times that don’t depend upon a reaching a goal that requires concentration or time an extended commitment that and older demographic may not be able to commit to.
FunFlow has its share of match-3 titles but the mechanic is used in novel ways as in CiviBattle – an RTS that requires building structures to produce military units to fight in battles, but all resources are gained using match-3. A post-apocalyptic top-down FPS can be found in GibFest; and an oddly satisfying pattern-matching game in NUMB3R5. Few of the games have time limits unless the time limit is needed to complete the game. Most have definitive win conditions. The player must reach this condition – spending the time to do so – in order to win coin.
At first blush, King’s single portal seems to be no different than many other attempts on Facebook. But the entire picture paints a different story. Combined they create a diverse portfolio of games that covers a broad spectrum of the market, a cornucopia of more than 47 titles to choose from.
Source: Inside Social Games
Friday, February 25, 2011