While deep-pocketed publishers try to wow gamers with sophisticated titles and eye-popping three-dimensional graphics, Randy Shepherd is stooping to conquer.
The managing director of Werd Interactive Inc. is targeting middle-aged businessmen, soccer moms and other unlikely gamers with a handful of simple, stripped-down offerings at cut-rate prices. Last week, the Huntsville, Ala.-based company launched a series of $2 games that evoke nothing so much as arcade games from the early ’80s. The four titles comprise two casino-style poker games, a Bejeweled-like matching title and a space-based hybrid of Space Invaders and Asteroids.
“Right now, if you look at the top 10 mobile games, most of them are arcade classics,” explained Shepherd. “We want to make games like you would play in the early to mid-’80s. They’re easy to pick up and play; they’re simple. Nothing complex.”
“Nothing complex” may aptly describe Werd’s offerings, but the company’s business plan decidedly is complicated. Unlike its bigger brothers, the five-employee developer/publisher has neither the carrier relationships nor the bank account to place its wares on carrier decks, which represent the most valuable real estate in the wireless content market. Instead, Werd, which is privately funded, distributes its games through Bango, a U.K.-based off-deck sales channel for mobile content.
In fact, the only U.S. carrier with whom Werd has a billing arrangement-allowing users to download games and pay for them through their monthly statements-is Cingular Wireless L.L.C. Gamers with other carriers must pay for downloads with credit or debit cards. That limitation has crippled sales in Werd’s home market, Shepherd said, where consumers are fearful of divulging credit information over wireless networks.
“Europe has been much better to us than the U.S.,” said Shepherd. “In the U.S., the majority (of consumers) are scared of identity theft. That’s the biggest problem in the U.S. market.”
But Werd is trying to exploit what some say is another substantial obstacle in wireless gaming-a disconnect between what most gamers are willing to pay for mobile downloads and the prices for which carriers and content providers are trying to sell them. According to a recent study from The NPD Group Inc., the average price for a single-game download is $5.31, while the optimal price point among game purchasers is $2.75.
“I think price is an issue; I think that does make a difference,” said Clint Wheelock, who headed the study and serves as vice president of wireless research for The NPD Group. “I think it has to do with the use case for these games. We’ve found the average gameplay session is only 11 minutes long, and the top reason is to kill time and eliminate boredom.”
A recent survey from U.K. game-maker I-play found that 69 percent of those polled had played games on their phones, but only 25 percent actually had tried to download titles. Worse, only one-fifth of those who tried were successful at downloading games.
A study from M:Metrics, a Seattle-based mobile data measurement firm, echoes I-play’s findings. Earlier this year, the firm found nearly one-third of U.S. wireless users had played games on their phones, yet only 3 percent successfully downloaded games.
While those figures illustrate the utter inconvenience of download and purchase processes, they also highlight the value-or lack thereof-most consumers place on wireless gaming, Wheelock said.
Gamers don’t mind shelling out $50 for the hottest console title they’ll play for days, weeks or even months on end. But asking $5 or more for a “digital snack,” as Wheelock calls mobile gaming, serves only to anchor the industry in its infancy.
“I think it’s definitely a casual-use case,” he explained. “Casual games are clearly the leader, and I think people are only willing to pay so much for a (casual) game.”
And if carriers are barking up the wrong tree with high price tags, those looking to ring up recurring charges with subscription gaming services may be in the wrong forest, Wheelock warned. Only 14 percent of current wireless game buyers purchase subscriptions, and only 16 percent of those willing to pay for games at all are interested in subscription packages.
In an effort to push subscription revenues, though, a substantial number of game makers are working to combine the phone’s connectivity with a gaming platform. InfoSpace Inc., Sennari Inc., Digital Chocolate Inc. and at least a half- dozen others want to create wireless communities of like-minded gamers who meet, chat, compete and talk trash in a mobile forum-often paying monthly fees to do so.
Other publishers hope consumers may buy into the subscription model to access a kind of evolving game model. Instead of paying monthly to play a single title, developers are building game foundations that can be expanded as a player progresses through the scenario. New levels could be added monthly, for instance, or characters could be given new assets or qualities.
But Werd and a handful of others have something more simple in mind: to create games that are at once stripped down and engaging and require minimal investment from a player-in terms of time as well as money.
“I think most traditional publishers feel like they have to answer to the hard-core gamer, for whatever reason,” said Werd’s Shepherd. “The games could look better, trust me. But it’s the mindset we have with it. We want your mom to pick up the game and play it.”
