Synchronous and Social - Evolve Conference
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Presentation by Hussein Chahine at the Evolve Conference in London on December 1, 2011. Synchronous social games and the psychology behind them.
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Synchronous and Social - Evolve Conference
- 1. TM SYNCHRONOUS AND SOCIAL Why games that connect people in real-time are the real future of social games TM Hussein Chahine December 1, 2011
- 2. TM INTRODUCING YAZINO Immediate Real-time synchronous social games Cross-platform Global, instant, and accessible to play anytime, anywhere at the flick of a button (web and mobile) Intimate Closer to people: Invite and play with friends We call this in-sync gaming Meet new, like-minded people In-game chat and mentoring Create private tables and challenge in tournaments
- 3. TM ANALOGY If Nintendo Wii was... Free Global On your computer or phone Anytime, anywhere Instant & bite-size
- 4. TM GAMES ARE INHERENTLY SOCIAL Personal interaction builds a dynamic of competition and cooperation which is psychologically positive
- 5. TM BUT THERE’S LITTLE THAT’S SOCIAL IN SOCIAL GAMES If Solitaire was on Facebook, would that make it a social game? The definition of a social game “Games that run on or integrate with a social network and use that network to enhance gameplay between players.” - Quora
- 6. TM ASYNCHRONOUS VS SYNCHRONOUS GAMES Asynchronous games connect players but are about playing alone Synchronous games use real-time online interaction between players to create a shared experience Synchronous = Social
- 7. TM IN-SYNC GAMES AND MOTIVATION INTRINSIC / I WANT TO EXTRINSIC / YOU NEED TO Synchronous games don’t have extrinsic features
- 8. TM SECRET SAUCE FOR A SUCCESSFUL SOCIAL GAMING BUSINESS Business Challenge Business Goal Asynchronous Synchronous Need Satisfaction No. of players Acquisition Cost per player Retention Churn rate Engagement Playtime Monetisation Revenue
- 9. TM SECRET SAUCE FOR A SUCCESSFUL SOCIAL GAMING BUSINESS Business Challenge Business Goal Asynchronous Synchronous Need Satisfaction No. of players Advertising cost Acquisition Cost per player Virality is dying Retention Churn rate Engagement Playtime Monetisation Revenue
- 10. TM SECRET SAUCE FOR A SUCCESSFUL SOCIAL GAMING BUSINESS Business Challenge Business Goal Asynchronous Synchronous Need Satisfaction More acquisition No. of players Advertising cost channels Acquisition Cost per player Virality is dying Relevance gives virality Retention Churn rate Engagement Playtime Monetisation Revenue
- 11. TM SECRET SAUCE FOR A SUCCESSFUL SOCIAL GAMING BUSINESS Business Challenge Business Goal Asynchronous Synchronous Need Satisfaction More acquisition No. of players Advertising cost channels Acquisition Relatedness Cost per player Virality is dying Relevance gives virality Retention Churn rate Engagement Playtime Monetisation Revenue
- 12. TM SECRET SAUCE FOR A SUCCESSFUL SOCIAL GAMING BUSINESS Business Challenge Business Goal Asynchronous Synchronous Need Satisfaction More acquisition No. of players Advertising cost channels Acquisition Relatedness Cost per player Virality is dying Relevance gives virality Lack of brand loyalty Retention Churn rate creates churn Engagement Playtime Monetisation Revenue
- 13. TM SECRET SAUCE FOR A SUCCESSFUL SOCIAL GAMING BUSINESS Business Challenge Business Goal Asynchronous Synchronous Need Satisfaction More acquisition No. of players Advertising cost channels Acquisition Relatedness Cost per player Virality is dying Relevance gives virality Loyalty to friends Lack of brand loyalty Retention Churn rate and community creates churn Reduced churn Engagement Playtime Monetisation Revenue
- 14. TM SECRET SAUCE FOR A SUCCESSFUL SOCIAL GAMING BUSINESS Business Challenge Business Goal Asynchronous Synchronous Need Satisfaction More acquisition No. of players Advertising cost channels Acquisition Relatedness Cost per player Virality is dying Relevance gives virality Loyalty to friends Lack of brand loyalty Retention Churn rate and community Relatedness creates churn Reduced churn Engagement Playtime Monetisation Revenue
- 15. TM SECRET SAUCE FOR A SUCCESSFUL SOCIAL GAMING BUSINESS Business Challenge Business Goal Asynchronous Synchronous Need Satisfaction More acquisition No. of players Advertising cost channels Acquisition Relatedness Cost per player Virality is dying Relevance gives virality Loyalty to friends Lack of brand loyalty Retention Churn rate and community Relatedness creates churn Reduced churn Less emotional Engagement Playtime engagement Monetisation Revenue
- 16. TM SECRET SAUCE FOR A SUCCESSFUL SOCIAL GAMING BUSINESS Business Challenge Business Goal Asynchronous Synchronous Need Satisfaction More acquisition No. of players Advertising cost channels Acquisition Relatedness Cost per player Virality is dying Relevance gives virality Loyalty to friends Lack of brand loyalty Retention Churn rate and community Relatedness creates churn Reduced churn Heightened Less emotional emotional Engagement Playtime engagement engagement Live experience Monetisation Revenue
- 17. TM SECRET SAUCE FOR A SUCCESSFUL SOCIAL GAMING BUSINESS Business Challenge Business Goal Asynchronous Synchronous Need Satisfaction More acquisition No. of players Advertising cost channels Acquisition Relatedness Cost per player Virality is dying Relevance gives virality Loyalty to friends Lack of brand loyalty Retention Churn rate and community Relatedness creates churn Reduced churn Heightened Less emotional emotional Mastery Engagement Playtime engagement engagement Autonomy Live experience Monetisation Revenue
- 18. TM SECRET SAUCE FOR A SUCCESSFUL SOCIAL GAMING BUSINESS Business Challenge Business Goal Asynchronous Synchronous Need Satisfaction More acquisition No. of players Advertising cost channels Acquisition Relatedness Cost per player Virality is dying Relevance gives virality Loyalty to friends Lack of brand loyalty Retention Churn rate and community Relatedness creates churn Reduced churn Heightened Less emotional emotional Mastery Engagement Playtime engagement engagement Autonomy Live experience Monetisation Revenue Reduced motivation
- 19. TM SECRET SAUCE FOR A SUCCESSFUL SOCIAL GAMING BUSINESS Business Challenge Business Goal Asynchronous Synchronous Need Satisfaction More acquisition No. of players Advertising cost channels Acquisition Relatedness Cost per player Virality is dying Relevance gives virality Loyalty to friends Lack of brand loyalty Retention Churn rate and community Relatedness creates churn Reduced churn Heightened Less emotional emotional Mastery Engagement Playtime engagement engagement Autonomy Live experience Greater motivation Monetisation Revenue Reduced motivation driven by live play
- 20. TM SECRET SAUCE FOR A SUCCESSFUL SOCIAL GAMING BUSINESS Business Challenge Business Goal Asynchronous Synchronous Need Satisfaction More acquisition No. of players Advertising cost channels Acquisition Relatedness Cost per player Virality is dying Relevance gives virality Loyalty to friends Lack of brand loyalty Retention Churn rate and community Relatedness creates churn Reduced churn Heightened Less emotional emotional Mastery Engagement Playtime engagement engagement Autonomy Live experience Greater motivation Mastery Monetisation Revenue Reduced motivation driven by live play Autonomy
- 21. TM THREE KEY GAMING TRIGGERS Self Autonomy actualisation Esteem Mastery Belonging Relatedness Safety Psychological Revenue
- 22. TM IN-SYNC PLAYERS PLAY FOR LONGER The Average Lifetime Value (ALV) of a Yazino purchaser is $230 over six months compared to an industry average of $60. After six months, 15% are still purchasing. $60 $230
- 23. TM INTRINSIC DRIVES INVESTMENT By focusing on intrinsic motivation through positive game design, Yazino players play for longer and spend more. $0.30 $1 $1.50 Monthly ARPU Monthly ARPU Monthly ARPU for an average for a high for a Yazino performing performing player social game on social game on Facebook Facebook
- 24. TM CHALLENGES OF SYNCHRONOUS GAMES Why isn’t everyone doing this? Latency and broadcasting Single currency Auditing Supporting the games One platform, multiple games Platform independence
- 25. TM ANY QUESTIONS? Hussein Chahine Founder & CEO hchahine@yazino.com @husseinchahine TM
Editor's Notes
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- Yazino is the destination for playful grown-ups seeking an intimate and fun social gaming experience. Our multiplayer ‘in-sync’ games heighten competition and social interaction, making every game more real, live and intense.\n
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- Play is part of the fundamental psychology of well-being in humans. Some of the most popular games today are those steeped in local and regional culture.\n Technology has now reached the point that we have the ability to play online in the same way we have played offline for centuries.\n
- The industry standard definition describes a game hosted on a social network - but ignores the game mechanic itself\n Social connections are part of the distribution and revenue model of these games (virality), not the motivation to play\n Motivation in the game is focused inwards on the player; interaction is a requirement (to complete/achieve) and not an intrinsic motivation for play\n
- 95% of games which claim to be ‘social’ are built around asynchronous gameplay - Farmville, Mafia Wars, Pet Society, etc.\n Synchronous play enables a deeper, more meaningful opportunity for interaction between gamers both within the game and within the community of players that surrounds the game.\n
- Inviting friends is a major source of acquisition for social games. Utilising intrinsic motivators leads to players inviting people who would actually like playing the games. Games are more relevant and therefore more engaging, which also means you’ll acquire a higher quality of user.\n \nIntrinsic motivation comes from within - it is motivation that is driven by an interest or enjoyment in the task itself, and exists within the individual rather than relying on any external pressure. Extrinsic motivation comes from outside of the individual. Common extrinsic motivations are rewards like money and grades, coercion and threat of punishment.\n\nthe fundamental weakness of many ‘social’ games are that they have a business model, and therefore gameplay mechanism, based on extrinsic motivation. Extrinsic motivation delivers rewards for actions completed - but these actions are also mandatory in order to progress and succeed. \n\nExample - Zombie Cafe - players are rewarded with increasing rewards for each day in succession that they play - but miss a day, and the rewards start again from zero. While this is a successful way to encourage players to continue to play, it also penalises the player for their own behaviour if it is contrary to the game mechanic - becoming a negative motivation (“I just lost my bonuses - what’s the point of starting again from scratch?”)\n\nNintendo Gamecube game Animal Crossing - if you stop playing for a prolonged period, the animals in your town send you letters telling you you have upset them!\n\nFarmville - if you are unable to harvest your crops at the alloted time of the games’ choosing, they wither and die\n\nIntrinsic motivation on the contrary seeks to reward engagement in a positive way. Crucially, people are likely to be intrinsically motivated if the task/challenge gives them a sense of autonomy, relatedness and mastery.\n\nExamples are increased opportunities to play (chip bonuses, score multiplyers, unexpected rewards) and a focus in giving plenty of positive feedback to the player - which appeals to the autonomy and mastery triggers of our play.\n\nWhile games that use extrinsic motivation may attract lots of players and drive big DAU and MAU numbers, they also see players spend less time in the games, and from our data on the comparative behaviour of Yazino players, extrinsic motivation also results in less purchasing and a less deep relationship between the player and the game\n
- Acquisition: the window of opportunity for Facebook games is closing as the cost of player acquisition continues to rise.\nRetention: Social games have been traditionally designed to maximise virality to acquire new users. However, virality is not the same as loyalty. Retention is problematic.\nEngagement: asychronous games penalise engagement by trying to keep players in the game. Synchronous games reward players for time spent in the game - this creates a sense of mastery (i am making positive progress) and autonomy (I am in control at all times)\nMonetisation: Industry averages is about 2%. We are at least in line with this figure (and we’re only just starting!)\n
- Acquisition: the window of opportunity for Facebook games is closing as the cost of player acquisition continues to rise.\nRetention: Social games have been traditionally designed to maximise virality to acquire new users. However, virality is not the same as loyalty. Retention is problematic.\nEngagement: asychronous games penalise engagement by trying to keep players in the game. Synchronous games reward players for time spent in the game - this creates a sense of mastery (i am making positive progress) and autonomy (I am in control at all times)\nMonetisation: Industry averages is about 2%. We are at least in line with this figure (and we’re only just starting!)\n
- Acquisition: the window of opportunity for Facebook games is closing as the cost of player acquisition continues to rise.\nRetention: Social games have been traditionally designed to maximise virality to acquire new users. However, virality is not the same as loyalty. Retention is problematic.\nEngagement: asychronous games penalise engagement by trying to keep players in the game. Synchronous games reward players for time spent in the game - this creates a sense of mastery (i am making positive progress) and autonomy (I am in control at all times)\nMonetisation: Industry averages is about 2%. We are at least in line with this figure (and we’re only just starting!)\n
- Acquisition: the window of opportunity for Facebook games is closing as the cost of player acquisition continues to rise.\nRetention: Social games have been traditionally designed to maximise virality to acquire new users. However, virality is not the same as loyalty. Retention is problematic.\nEngagement: asychronous games penalise engagement by trying to keep players in the game. Synchronous games reward players for time spent in the game - this creates a sense of mastery (i am making positive progress) and autonomy (I am in control at all times)\nMonetisation: Industry averages is about 2%. We are at least in line with this figure (and we’re only just starting!)\n
- Acquisition: the window of opportunity for Facebook games is closing as the cost of player acquisition continues to rise.\nRetention: Social games have been traditionally designed to maximise virality to acquire new users. However, virality is not the same as loyalty. Retention is problematic.\nEngagement: asychronous games penalise engagement by trying to keep players in the game. Synchronous games reward players for time spent in the game - this creates a sense of mastery (i am making positive progress) and autonomy (I am in control at all times)\nMonetisation: Industry averages is about 2%. We are at least in line with this figure (and we’re only just starting!)\n
- Acquisition: the window of opportunity for Facebook games is closing as the cost of player acquisition continues to rise.\nRetention: Social games have been traditionally designed to maximise virality to acquire new users. However, virality is not the same as loyalty. Retention is problematic.\nEngagement: asychronous games penalise engagement by trying to keep players in the game. Synchronous games reward players for time spent in the game - this creates a sense of mastery (i am making positive progress) and autonomy (I am in control at all times)\nMonetisation: Industry averages is about 2%. We are at least in line with this figure (and we’re only just starting!)\n
- Acquisition: the window of opportunity for Facebook games is closing as the cost of player acquisition continues to rise.\nRetention: Social games have been traditionally designed to maximise virality to acquire new users. However, virality is not the same as loyalty. Retention is problematic.\nEngagement: asychronous games penalise engagement by trying to keep players in the game. Synchronous games reward players for time spent in the game - this creates a sense of mastery (i am making positive progress) and autonomy (I am in control at all times)\nMonetisation: Industry averages is about 2%. We are at least in line with this figure (and we’re only just starting!)\n
- Acquisition: the window of opportunity for Facebook games is closing as the cost of player acquisition continues to rise.\nRetention: Social games have been traditionally designed to maximise virality to acquire new users. However, virality is not the same as loyalty. Retention is problematic.\nEngagement: asychronous games penalise engagement by trying to keep players in the game. Synchronous games reward players for time spent in the game - this creates a sense of mastery (i am making positive progress) and autonomy (I am in control at all times)\nMonetisation: Industry averages is about 2%. We are at least in line with this figure (and we’re only just starting!)\n
- Acquisition: the window of opportunity for Facebook games is closing as the cost of player acquisition continues to rise.\nRetention: Social games have been traditionally designed to maximise virality to acquire new users. However, virality is not the same as loyalty. Retention is problematic.\nEngagement: asychronous games penalise engagement by trying to keep players in the game. Synchronous games reward players for time spent in the game - this creates a sense of mastery (i am making positive progress) and autonomy (I am in control at all times)\nMonetisation: Industry averages is about 2%. We are at least in line with this figure (and we’re only just starting!)\n
- Acquisition: the window of opportunity for Facebook games is closing as the cost of player acquisition continues to rise.\nRetention: Social games have been traditionally designed to maximise virality to acquire new users. However, virality is not the same as loyalty. Retention is problematic.\nEngagement: asychronous games penalise engagement by trying to keep players in the game. Synchronous games reward players for time spent in the game - this creates a sense of mastery (i am making positive progress) and autonomy (I am in control at all times)\nMonetisation: Industry averages is about 2%. We are at least in line with this figure (and we’re only just starting!)\n
- Acquisition: the window of opportunity for Facebook games is closing as the cost of player acquisition continues to rise.\nRetention: Social games have been traditionally designed to maximise virality to acquire new users. However, virality is not the same as loyalty. Retention is problematic.\nEngagement: asychronous games penalise engagement by trying to keep players in the game. Synchronous games reward players for time spent in the game - this creates a sense of mastery (i am making positive progress) and autonomy (I am in control at all times)\nMonetisation: Industry averages is about 2%. We are at least in line with this figure (and we’re only just starting!)\n
- Acquisition: the window of opportunity for Facebook games is closing as the cost of player acquisition continues to rise.\nRetention: Social games have been traditionally designed to maximise virality to acquire new users. However, virality is not the same as loyalty. Retention is problematic.\nEngagement: asychronous games penalise engagement by trying to keep players in the game. Synchronous games reward players for time spent in the game - this creates a sense of mastery (i am making positive progress) and autonomy (I am in control at all times)\nMonetisation: Industry averages is about 2%. We are at least in line with this figure (and we’re only just starting!)\n
- for a game to be truly social, it needs therefore to satisfy a number of psychological needs in order to motivate a player. \nThere are 3 key psychological triggers for player engagement:\nAutonomy - the basic need to feel we are in control of our own choices - that our actions have clear and understandable ‘cause and effect’. For example, games that provide the ability to customise characters or choose story paths offer the player a high degree of autonomy; but if these choices ultimately have no effect over the gameplay itself, it can be unsatisfying as the autonomy experienced by the player is false. True autonomy is the key motivator inherent in all traditional games as the strategy is always controlled by the player (this is the basis of Yazino games)\nmastery - is the basic need to feel effective in what we do. It provides a sense of progression and achievement - that we are getting better, whether through experience, skill, or progression through a story arc. Games which offer a high degree of mastery give the players lots of feedback on their progress, as well as showing a clear goal for long term development - e.g. ranking system in games like MW3, levelling system in WoW\nrelatedness - the feeling of meaningful connections to friends, other players and the community around us.Best described as the feeling of ‘I matter’ to others and they matter to me. Relatedness most often felt in situations of cooperation and competition which also fulfil our autonomy or master needs - so, for example, when cooperation opens up more choice/options, or where competition enables us to increase our ranking within a game world\n
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- As you can see from these numbers, the monthly ARPU of a Yazino player is at least 50% higher than even a successful Facebook game. These figures, quoted by PopCap and also the virtial currency company Social Gold, show the ARPU of average and successful games hosted on Facebook.\n\nYazino has an incredibly consistent level of purchasing behaviour across all of our games. We believe that this is because of the consistency of our game design, meaning that players are ONLY motivated by their enjoyment of the games themselves - there are no barriers to play or challenges to be met\n
- Auditing - Today with 100K daily users we have 35-40m transactions per day\n\nSupporting the Games (infrastructure, Management Back-office, Updates, Communication)\n\nPlatform independence (One code base for web, Android & iOS)\n\n\n\n
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