投资者对游戏开发者的期待是什么？
发布时间： 14:07:29
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作者：Jeremy Liew
在过去的几年时间里，游戏开发者的机遇呈爆炸性增长。游戏平台比以前更多了----从越来越多的智能手机到Facebook，游戏成为最热门的一类应用程序。这些平台为开发者提供了大量的潜在玩家。因为开发者现在能够在这些平台上自主发行游戏了，于是他们开始寻找风险投资，而不是资助他们研发的发行商。
同样地，风险投资商对游戏的兴趣也再次高涨----特别是对网页、社交、PC、手机和平板游戏。
因为我本人正是一名风险投资商，所以我常常会问，当寻找游戏公司作投资时，我对他们的期待是什么。在这方面的投资，我有过几次成功的经历，印象最深的是Playdom和Kixeye，但这仍然不是一个容易回答的问题，因为投资毕竟不像驾照考试。即使有一家通过了所有测试，也不等于我就会开支票。但以下几样东西是我始终期待看到的。
优秀的团队
万事始于团队的组建。当游戏第一次在Facebook和手机平台上亮相时，只是微不足道的事。有些勉强算是游戏，有些只是已有的游戏的直接端口，完全没有考虑怎么使新平台变得与众不同。但游戏质量已经有了相当大的提高，并且一直在进步。
现在要成立一家好的游戏公司、你需要一支由经验丰富的游戏设计师、开发人员和营销人员组成的团队。你需要各种各样的经验，包括在过去发行过成功的游戏、理解社交和手机游戏与游戏机游戏的区别以及明白免费游戏与盒装游戏的不同。这些都不是临时拼凑就能解决的事。
当我看到像Innovative Leisure、nWay、Hawken和U4ia这类具有制作好游戏的经验的团队时，我就非常激动兴奋。
U4ia推出的《offensive Combat》(from gamasutra)
所有游戏都有风险。在游戏发行以前，我无法告诉你这款游戏会不会成功。坦白说，我想你应该也不能。我很高兴你对自己的游戏有激情。你必须有，否则你是不可能成功的。但是，失败的游戏仍然数之不尽，而且每一款失败的游戏都是由信任它们的开发者制作出来的。而真理则掌握在玩游戏的玩家手上。
随着Unity、Adobe Flash和HTML5等工具越来越强大，制作一款高质量的游戏并发行也越来越容易。我希望看到真正有多少玩家正在玩和回归这款游戏的真实数据。长期看来，玩游戏的累计时间越长，游戏赢利的可能性就越大，所以我希望看到你的游戏玩家沉迷于游戏、不断地回归游戏。
OMGPOP凭借《Draw Something》最终成功以前，经历了许多失败。相反地，Supercell的头两款游戏《Clash of Clans》和《Hay Day》都成功了。但在此之前，未卜先知是很难的。
要成就一家出色的公司，第一款成功的游戏是必要的，但并不是充分的。当游戏只是盒装产品时，我们都知道游戏是项目，是有“终结”的。既然我们把游戏当作一种服务，我们要制作的游戏就得能够长时间吸引玩家注意力。我们想让玩家数月甚至数年地留连于我们的游戏。但终有一天，玩家会厌烦该游戏，然后离开。终有一天，你会耗尽所有潜在的玩家资源。终有一天，你的游戏会走向终结。
如果游戏运营顺利，这个过程也许会持续许多年，游戏自发行起就会带来数以亿计的收利。但即使是像《魔兽世界》这样的游戏，现在也呈现出衰败的迹象了。世界上玩家最多的游戏封号落到《英雄联盟》上，但总有一天，后者也会步入暮年。为了创造持续的企业价值，你必须拥有一支能够不断做出好游戏的团队。你不能只创造一次成功，你必须打造一支成功的团队。
正如中国的游戏发行商所证明的，依靠一款大作也能维持很久。但你必须找到最大化成功的策略，并为下一次的成功积累经验。
在第一款成功的游戏之上，相比于竞争对手，你就掌握了不公平的优势，因为你可以借力于第一次的成功来促进下一次成功。你可以利用交叉营销来获得玩家资源，重复利用代码库以更快地更廉价地制作新游戏，或发现玩家对游戏的独特兴趣所在。
但如果你没有考虑如何利用第一次的成功，那么你面临的风险就是，成功了，但有且只有一次。这个成功可能惊天动地，像《英雄联盟》或《魔兽世界》，但毕竟只有一次。
CCP Games（《EVE Oline》）和Jagex（《RuneScape》）现在就面临着这种风险，而Zynga、Kixeye、 Gameforge和Bigpoint则是不断复制成功的榜样。据说，Riot和Wargaming都在开发新游戏，以实现这种转变。
寻找“被发现”渠道
目前，在游戏界有一个好消息，即将游戏呈现在玩家面前更容易了。在网页、Facebook和应用商店之间的推广问题看似已经解决了。
坏消息是，所有人都知道以上那个好消息了。因此所有渠道都人满为患了。游戏市场拥挤喧嚣。一般来说，游戏开发者得依靠发行商为游戏“广而告之”。结果是，游戏发行商寻找“被发现”的策略，他们往往会在这个问题上出现闪失。“我们的游戏会大火的。”“好游戏赢天下。”“苹果会帮我们，我哥们在那工作。”这些话说得容易做得难。所以在设计时， 开发和推广是很重要的，在成功的游戏与失败的游戏之间，真正区别往往在于“发现”。
2009年，Facebook游戏“获得曝光”的方式是通过邀约和通告来获得病毒式增长。随着这些渠道的监管更加完善，“曝光”的方式转向更含蓄的“流入”。但现在，即使是流入也不再是“曝光”的可靠驱动力。结果，依赖病毒式增长的游戏想要复制Zynga的成功，面临的则是更加困难的境地。
至于手机游戏，排行榜是主要的“发现”渠道，这导致了应用商店的普及。今天，手机游戏发行商利用各种各样的技术来“挤”排行榜，希望游戏的好质量会帮助游戏在榜上多留一阵子。
在上文中提到的策略里，我们确实看到有些在当下环境中被反复地利用于扩大“发现”范围。我希望看到能利用这些策略的游戏公司。希望他们能采纳以下策略：
1、交叉推广
掌握了大量Facebook和手机游戏玩家基础的开发商可以免费使大量玩家得知新游戏的发行消息。Zynya正是重复利用这种方式来发行新作，并吸引到大规模的玩家。Facebook现在允许利用Facebook中已存在的玩家基础向手机平
台拓展。为了好好利用这一点，你手上必须有能够吸引同类玩家的大多数游戏。但是利用交叉推广的方式，不太适用于针对不同受众而制作的不同游戏。
发行商往往利用大获成功的游戏支持改编游戏的发行。Rovio对《愤怒的小鸟》就是这么做的。因为该游戏的市场如此红火，所以大部分玩家如果玩过第一款游戏，就会多多少少关注一下续作。值得一提的是，与《愤怒的小鸟》相比，《Amazing Alex》在这方面做得就逊色了。
3、借助其他IP的影响力
与续作类似，玩家会对自己认识的品牌有所反应。可以借用另一款游戏（游戏邦注：例如《Bejeweled Blitz》、《Zynga Poker》、《Sonic the Hedgehog》、《The Sims Social》)或其他媒体品牌（《Battlestar Galactica Online》、《Marvel: Avengers Alliance》、《Temple Run: Brave》）的IP来提升游戏知名度。
在60美元一个软件包的世界里，玩家在购买任何游戏以前都会查看游戏评论，即使是授权改编的游戏，如改编自电视或电影的游戏，也有很多没有获得成功，因为游戏本身做得不好。但在免费游戏的世界里，玩家更乐意尝试任何游戏，只要他们认出该游戏的改编品牌。
4、有偿获取用户
在这一点上，智能手机和Facebook都各有相当有效的有偿获取用户的市场。如果一款游戏的赢利状况比另他的好，它可以为一名新玩家付出更多，并且它可以通过支付渠道发现自己的受众。这需要相当可观的赢利条件，往往意味着命中核心玩家。Kixeye是一家Lightspeed资产组合公司，就很成功地利用了这个方法。
5、以平台为特色
这一点比较难做到。《无尽之剑》能得益于苹果的大量营销，很大程度上是因为它改变了人们对iPhone游戏的可能性的认知。这吸引了大量玩家，尽管其收费相当高。很难获得平台特色，需要组合不同特性，如游戏本身的特点，如提升平台、业务拓展的专门技术、促进某些只是喜欢你的游戏的人与平台的关系。
6、早起的鸟儿有虫吃
Zynga仍然主宰着Facebook上的游戏发行领域。Gameloft、EA、Gree等则是手机游戏排行榜上的常客。我认为iPad是目前唯一还没产生独霸型发行商的新平台。
iPad专属的游戏还少得多。结果是，iPad游戏比iPhone游戏更容易“被发现”。前者的市场目前还不那么拥挤。大多数平板游戏只是手机游戏的代名词。但平板游戏与手机游戏是相当不同的，前者的游戏时间更长、画面更精美、与其他玩家的互动性（游戏邦注：这里的“互动性”是指与持有相同设备的玩家进行合作或竞争）更强。开发者开始利用这一特点，先做一款平板游戏大获成功，然后再进军其他平台。从短期看，与其他平台相比，我们可能可以在iPad游戏平台上看到更多赢家。
7、团结特定玩家群体
Riot在这一点上做了大量工作，如把DOTA玩家群体作为《英雄联盟》的受众。近来我们还没看到其他人这么做过，但Riot利用这个方法取得的巨大成功使之值得探索以决定它是否是可重复操作。在游戏机和PC游戏世界，这个方法已经被使用过几次，如《反恐精英》就瞄准了《半条命》的玩家群体。
有些策略对比较大的公司更可行（如交叉营销或续作），但小公司为了以后的发展仍然要牢记在心。现在许多新兴的游戏公司面临的问题是如何“获得曝光度”，所以应该在这方面多花时间考虑一下。你不可能做完一款游戏就幻想着成功。
我们曾多次误以为“游戏开发者的黄金时代”已经来临。每一款新主机游戏的发行都让我们看到这种希望。但每一次获利的都是发行商而不是开发者。但这次，因为开发者确实能够自主发行，所以我认为我们最终迎来了游戏开发者的黄金时代。作为投资者，我感到兴奋。如果你命中了以上我所列出的元素，那么我很高兴听听你的想法！（本文为游戏邦/编译，拒绝任何不保留版权的转载，如需转载请联系：游戏邦）
What Do Investors Look for in a Game Developer?
by Jeremy Liew
In the past few years, the opportunities for game developers have exploded. With more places than ever to play — from proliferating smartphones to Facebook — games are the most popular category of applications. These platforms offer developers a huge number of potential players. As developers can now self-publish on these platforms, they are starting to look to venture capital instead of publishers to fund their development and growth.
Equally, venture capital interest in games is strong again — especially for web, social, PC, phone, and tablet games.
Since I’m a venture capitalist, I’m often asked what I look for in a game company investment. I’ve had some good success in investing in this category, most notably Playdom and Kixeye, but this is still a difficult question to answer because investing isn’t like giving a driving test. If a company checks all the boxes, it doesn’t mean that I’ll write a check. But there are a few things that I always do look for.
A Top Team
Everything starts with the team. When games first started to appear on Facebook and mobile, they were pretty lightweight affairs. Some were barely games at all, and others were straight ports of existing games, without consideration for what makes the new platforms different. But game quality has risen considerably and continues to do so.
To build a great game company today you need an experienced team of game designers, developers, and business people. You need a mix of experience that includes having shipped successful titles in the past, understanding how social and mobile differs from console, and understanding how free to play and games as a service differ from the packaged software model. You can’t just wing it anymore.
I get excited when I see teams like Innovative Leisure, nWay, Hawken and U4ia who have assembled teams with the right experience to build great games.
U4ia’s Offensive Combat
A First Hit
All games have title risk. I can’t tell you that your game is going to be a hit before it is launched. Frankly, I don’t think that you can either. I’m glad that you are excited about your game. You have to be, or you would not be an entrepreneur. But there are plenty of games that flop, and each of those flops was built by a developer who truly believed in that game. The only truth lies in what users think and do when they play a game.
As Unity, Adobe Flash, HTML5, and other tools increasingly get better, it is getting cheaper and easier to build a quality game and launch it in beta. I like to see real data from real users to see if people are playing a game, and returning. In the long term, aggregate time spent playing a game is the best predictor for monetization, so I like to see your early users getting addicted, and coming back again and again.
OMGPOP had many flops before finally hitting on Draw Something. In contrast, the first two games from Supercell, Clash of Clans and Hay Day, both look to be hits. But it is hard to predict in advance.
Hit After Hit
A first great game is necessary, but not sufficient, to building a great game company. When games were simply packaged software, we all knew that games were projects, with a defined “end of life.”
Now that we think about games as a service, we build games that can hold players attention for longer periods of time. We want to retain players for months and years. But at some point a player will tire of your game and move on. At some point, you will run out of your universe of potential players. And at that point, your game will start to die.
If things go well, this might be many years and billions of dollars in revenue after the game has launched. But even games such as World of Warcraft are now showing signs of aging. League of Legends has supplanted it as the most played game in the world, but one day League of Legends will enter into its twilight years as well. To build enduring enterprise value, to build an enduring enterprise, you must build an organization that can build more than one great game. You can’ you need to build a hit factory.
As the Chinese game publishers have shown, you can only ride on a single great game for so long. You need to have a strategy for how you can leverage your success and learnings from your first game into future games.
You need to have an unfair advantage based on your first success that you can leverage into future games. This can take the form of cross marketing to your player base, reusable code libraries to make the next games faster and cheaper to build, or even insights into what players want that you uniquely have.
But if you aren’t thinking about how the success of your initial title can be leveraged into future success, you run the risk of being a one hit wonder. It could end up being a tremendous hit, like League of Legends or World of Tanks, but it is still only one.
CCP Games (EVE Online) and Jagex (RuneScape) run this risk right now, while Zynga, Kixeye, Gameforge and Bigpoint are all examples of companies that have been able to replicate their success. Both Riot and Wargaming are rumored to be working on new games to make this transition.
Getting Discovered
The good news about the game industry today is that it is easier than ever to get your game in the hands of players. Between the web, Facebook, and app stores, distribution has seemingly been solved.
The bad news is that everyone else has figured this out too. All these channels are flooded. The game marketplace is crowded and noisy. Traditionally, game developers have relied on publishers to get their games discovered. As a result, creating strategies for discovery is a new area for them, and they are often glib about how to solve the problem. “We’ll just get viral.” “Best game wins.” “Apple will feature us, my buddy works there.” All easier said than done. So while design, development and distribution are important, the real difference between a successful game and a failed one is often discovery.
In 2009, viral growth through invitations and notifications were the way that Facebook games could get discovered. As these channels became better policed, discovery moved to the feed. But today, even the feed is no longer a reliable driver of discovery. As a result, games that rely solely on viral growth will have a harder time replicating the success of Zynga.
For mobile, charting is the primary mode of discovery, and this led to widespread app store manipulation. Today, mobile game publishers use various techniques to “burst” to the charts, hoping that game quality will keep them there for a while.
All that being said, we do see a few strategies that work repeatedly for at scale discovery in the current environment. I like to see game companies that are taking advantage of some of these strategies, and preparing themselves to take advantage of more as they grow:
1. Cross-Promotion
Game publishers with a lot of Facebook or mobile install bases are able to make their user base aware of new releases in a free and scalable way. Zynga has repeatedly made use of this approach to launch its new games at real scale. Facebook has now made it possible to cross-promote from a Facebook installed base to mobile. To be able to do this well, you need most of the games in your portfolio to appeal to a similar audience. Building different games for different audiences makes it much harder to take advantage of cross-promotion.
2. Sequels
Publishers with a hugely successful hit game can often milk the IP with subsequent releases. Rovio has done this repeatedly with Angry Birds. With the game market being so noisy and confusing, most players will give a sequel a shot if they enjoyed the first game. It’s notable how poorly Amazing Alex did in comparison to the Angry Birds sequels.
3. Borrowing IP
Much like a sequel, players will respond to a brand they recognize. This can be IP from another game platform (Bejeweled Blitz, Zynga Poker, Sonic the Hedgehog, The Sims Social) or another medium (Battlestar Galactica Online, Marvel: Avengers Alliance, Temple Run: Brave).
In the $60 packaged software world, gamers would check game reviews before buying any game, even one with licensed IP, so many games that borrowed a TV or movie brand were not successful because they were not good games. But in a free-to-play world, players are more willing to give a game a try if they recognize and identify with the IP.
4. Paid Acquisition
Smartphone and Facebook both have relatively efficient markets for paid installs at this point. If a game monetizes better than others, it can pay more for a new player than others can, and it can find its audience through paid channels. This requires excellent monetization, which typically means targeting core gamers. Kixeye, a Lightspeed portfolio company, has followed this approach with great success.
5. Get Featured by the Platform
This is hard to do. Infinity Blade benefited from a lot of promotion from Apple, in large part because it changed people’s perceptions about what was possible for an iPhone game. This drove a lot of users for the game, despite its relatively high price point. Getting featured by the platform is hard to plan for, and can take a combination of distinctiveness, something in your game that also promotes the platform, business development expertise, relationships with the platform and someone simply taking a shine to your game.
6. The Early Bird Gets the Worm
Zynga did this on Facebook and is still the dominant publisher of Facebook games. Gameloft, EA, Gree and others are frequently in the top games charts for mobile. I think that iPad is the only fast-growing new platform that does not currently have a set of dominant publishers.
There are far fewer games built specifically for iPads. As a result, discovery is substantially easier for iPad than iPhone. It is less crowded, for now. Most tablet games are simply up-rezed mobile games. But tablet gaming has the opportunity to be quite different to phone gaming, with longer session times, more screen real estate for display and the opportunity for co-op and competitive play with another person sharing the same device. Developers are starting to take advantage of this by building tablet first games and having great success. In the short term we may see more winners coming out of the iPad gaming platform than any other.
7. Co-opting a Community
Riot did a tremendous job of this, co-opting the DOTA community to come over wholesale to League of Legends. We haven’t really seen this done by anyone else recently, but the tremendous success that Riot had with this approach makes it worth exploring to see if it is repeatable. In the console and PC gaming world this has done this several times, notably with Counter-Strike, co-opting the Half-Life community, for example.
Some of the strategies are more available to larger companies than startups (e.g. cross-promotion or sequels), but they should still be held in mind by startups as they think about their future.
Discovery is the problem for many game startups today, and companies should spend real time thinking about discovery and how to prepare for it. You can’t just make a game and hope for the best.
We’ve seen many false dawns as we’ve waited for the “Golden Age of Game Developers.” Every new console release has offered that hope. But each time it has been the publishers that have benefitted and not the developers. But this time, because developers really can self publish, I think we finally are at a golden age for game developers. I’m excited about this as an investor. If you’ve got the elements that I’ve listed above, I’d love to hear from you! In the meantime, let me know what your thoughts are on what game developers need to be successful in comments.（）
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