Zynga wants to build social networks: get rid of Facebook's addiction

Core tip: June 26, star Jia also launched the Zynga with friends network, hoping to further strengthen its platform for the game's "social elements."　　In Beijing, where Facebook was a backer of the success of the social game developer Zynga ("star"), it is now the label the star wants to rip off. Since the end of 2011, the company has launched a series of transformational moves after the Nasdaq (Weibo) IPO has financed 1 billion of billions of dollars.　　Include: Strengthen the construction of the independent distribution platform, add social elements into the game, quickly launch the user's coverage of mobile phone end. June 26, star-Chia launched the Zynga with friends network, hoping to further strengthen the game on its various platforms "social elements."　　Whether these many moves will help the star to break through Facebook's restrictions is still unclear. But in the Chinese market, where Facebook has failed to reach, star has started acting alone.　　Before, in the United States, the star into other countries are also followed by Facebook, through the Facebook platform, star often use lower costs to cut into the new market. "In China, star positioning is a good game distributor, with a variety of platforms."　　"In the interview with our correspondent, Tian, general manager of Star China, told reporters that at home, Tencent, everyone, Sina Weibo and other platform users are billion-level, is a good habitat." Out of Facebook in December 2011, Star was listed on Nasdaq, financing 1 billion of billions of dollars.　　In the wake of the applause and flowers, it was also found from its prospectus that 90% of star's revenues came from the Facebook platform, and that "over-reliance on Facebook" became a weakness in its development. June 26 this year, star Jia announced the launch of the Zynga with friends network in U.S. headquarters.　　The network has a social lobby with features and services such as zfriends, instant socializing, chatting, and multiplayer competitions on the Zynga.com Platform (multiplayer). "The Zynga with friend platform is intended to bring together those who like to play games alone." On Facebook, gamers are just a small part of many users. "Tian, general manager of Star China, told reporters that whether users from Facebook or zynga.com, iOS platform or Android,zynga with friends will bring these users together,　　and provide the game to all players on the network through a new social approach. "We believe that games can be an important way for users to make new friends and strengthen relationships," said Mark Pincus, the star's founder and CEO Mark Ping. Establish ZyThe NGA with friend platform was designed to help users bring their games back to their lives. "In addition to adding their own social functions in the game, star also launched Zynga.com, a global distribution platform." Other social game developers around the world can be promoted on zynga.com. Intelligent Star Tong Vice President Xia Xianlin told reporters, "The game is borderless, there are good games must be extended to the international market."　　Relying on some international platforms to promote games is a time-saving and labor-saving way. The development of mobile end is also the star of the force point. 2012, the star bought a fiery game-"You draw I guess (Draw something)" Developers Omgpop, one at a stroke will you draw I guess more than 30 games income bag. This has led to a faster growth of star-best mobile gaming business.　　Currently, the number of active mobile users has reached 22 million. Whether these many moves will help the star to break through Facebook's restrictions is still unknown. "Zynga will gradually reduce its reliance on the Facebook platform, but it won't be able to get rid of it for a long time to come."　　"The relationship between Zynga and Facebook is a little tied up," says Zhou, a senior analyst at Eric.　　How to mass production of fine goods? At the time of the listing, the top five game of the Facebook platform was monopolized by the star one. This includes, City Ville, Castle Ville and so on. These star Games make star Jia a "undefeated myth" in social gaming.　　Now, star is also the world's largest social game developers, the market value of 3.5 billion of dollars. Why is the Star Canon (micro-blog) enough to continue to develop the user-favored game? In China's social gaming field, most game development teams can quickly make a "red" game, but often lack of continuity, it is difficult to make the next good game.　　In this regard, le Element CEO Wang that star success lies in rapid research and development, the user's entertainment needs of the "precise grasp", as well as the flexibility of institutional mechanisms. "Good games are changed, not done." Tian told reporters that the game performance is the user's entertainment needs, mail, microblogging is mostly functional applications. Most people's requirements for functional applications are convenient, fast, quality clearance and other basic needs, but the requirements of recreational applications are relatively high, and taste often change. In addition, the replacement cost of the function is higher, the substitution is more difficult.　　And the replacement cost of entertainment demand is lower, users often play half do not play, easy to cause the loss of users. "Star success depends on two major factors: one is creativity + rapid development, and second, data."　　Tian told reporters, in general, the game development process needs to undergo a number of stages such as conceptual design, research and development design, feedback modification. The first conceptual design is the brainstorming phase, which determines the concept, theme, gameplay, user expectations, and so on. This stage is mainly those of the active mind, to the gamePeople who have feelings. The next stage of design will need to complete a game prototype design, the key play to make, on this basis, to determine the game is fun or not fun.　　Research and development process, coupled with data analysis, really understand the user's ideas and needs, to understand whether the user likes a certain function. In this, some games may be "cut off". The successful game begins testing, and changes are made based on feedback from users.　　Finally, a better version of the user experience is introduced. "Star of the introduction of a medium-sized social game, at least more than 10 people need a research and development team, research and development time is at least 12 months ~18 months."　　Tian says the practice is to ensure product quality. According to the reporter understands, this kind of research and development cycle is longer than the domestic social game manufacturer.　　In China, the development cycle of the average medium social game is usually 6 months to year, such a development cycle in line with the Chinese Internet "only fast and not broken" mode of thinking. In addition, the flexible system is also a good star continued to promote the protection of the game. "Star-best in-house creative team, research and development team is separate, and each research and development team are independent operation, the global companies are basically independent operation."　　Tian told reporters, such independence so that star can be rapid development, the development process flow, factory pipelining, to ensure the development of efficiency and creativity.　　China's market to cooperate mainly at present, Angry Birds (micro-bo), Fruit Ninja and other foreign research and development of the game is popular with domestic users, these game manufacturers have entered China. At the GMIC2012 (third Global Mobile Internet Conference) held in May this year, overseas game makers ' "eager to" become a major feature of the Conference.　　For example, Halfbrick UBM (Fruit Ninja developers) in China through the fun games, Shenzhen Chuang Dream World and other agents of the way to carry out genuine authorization, and open up the domestic advertising market. "The global nature of social games and mobile games is better than client-side games," he said.　　Tian told reporters that this meant competition among social game makers was global. In this respect, Zhou Jieyi says, with the rapid growth of social platforms and global smartphones, this trend will become increasingly apparent. In his view, compared to client-side games, the importance of the local transformation of entertainment games is not high.　　In a mature global platform such as the app Store and Google harsh, the barriers to entry into countries are relatively low. In revenue, the current 65% of star revenue from the United States, and its access to overseas markets are often followed by Facebook.　　When Facebook enters a new market, the star is on the move. China is an exception. Thanks to Facebook's inability to land in mainland China, star-Chia entered China by the end of 2011. In May of this year, star Jia put its social game "CityVille" in the Chinese version of "Star City" began on the Tencent platformOperation。　　At present, the user volume of the game to reach millions. "Star Jia has only been in China for a period of time, and its Chinese research and development team will not be able to make better products."　　Instead, Zhou suggested that the game, which has been done better on Facebook, would have been done more quickly. Zhou that "overseas game developers have a very small risk of local research and development." "Each country's game environment and other countries are very different, for example, the Japanese card game comparison fire, the United States social game comparison fire." China, chess and card games have been relatively popular, have their own market, such as the QQ Game Hall. In fact, "will have proven more successful games, the localization of the transformation, the corresponding language translation, is to cut into a national game market is a better way, less risk, the likelihood of success is relatively high." "After in-depth analysis, star-Jia into the Chinese market to choose a more cautious strategy." "In the domestic, star good positioning is to do a good game developers, with a variety of domestic platform cooperation."　　Tian told reporters that star Jia in China will not promote zynga.com, will not assume the role of the game Ping Taiwanese. "In the next 3 years, the growth of China's market needs to address the growth of paid users, the ARPU value of the increase." Zhou that, at present, in the domestic platform, social game developers earn money is still a minority, game developers need to focus more attention on product quality and sustainability.