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Game DesignStudio SpotlightStudios

The Secret Games Company Tackles Colonial India, Procedural Generation in Kim

February 24, 2017 — by Gamesauce Staff

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The Secret Games Company was created in 2012 for the simple purpose of publishing a side project that founder Jeremy Hogan and some of his friends were working on. Since that time, Jeremy has kept The Secret Games Company alive as a vehicle to publish all of his independent work. While Jeremy is the sole founder of The Secret Games Company, he has always had key people working with him on all the projects he’s put his company name behind.

The first project to come out of the company was a board game in which the artist was extremely influential and the second was a strategy multiplayer game in which the programmer was vital. The third and most recent title from The Secret Games Company is Kim – by far the company’s biggest and most ambitious project to date – of which the project’s programmer, Lasse Jørgensen, has been “absolutely integral.”

EventsIndustry

GREE CEO to Speak on Industry Change at Casual Connect Europe

January 23, 2017 — by Gamesauce Staff

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Andrew Sheppard has had a productive career – playing key roles at companies like Kabam, hi5, Electronic Arts and Outspark. Now, as the newly appointed CEO of GREE International Entertainment, Inc., he will share his expertise and insights with the audience at Casual Connect Europe in Berlin, Germany, as its keynote speaker on February 7.

So what type of experience does Andrew bring to the conference and what can developers and other games industry professionals hope to learn? Here is a quick look back at Andrew’s career and what to look forward to at Casual Connect Europe.

DevelopmentIndieStudio Spotlight

The Deep End Games: Building a Bootstrapped, Innovative Game

January 18, 2017 — by Gamesauce Staff

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The Deep End Games made a splash on the gaming scene in mid-2015 when they announced Perception, their first-person narrative horror adventure game that puts players in the shoes of a blind woman who uses her hearing and wits to solve mysteries and escape a deadly presence inside an abandoned mansion. The game and studio has been featured in publications such as IGN, Kotaku and PC Gamer.

Here is a quick look at how the studio and game came to be – and some key takeaways other developers might be able to benefit from.

Dynamic Duo

The Deep End Games is the husband-wife team of Bill and Amanda Gardner – who run the studio out of their home. Bill has a history in game development – working at Irrational Games in many positions and on multiple projects – while Amanda has extensive history in writing and English.

IndustryServices

Top 5 Insights From Vungle For Ads Success

January 12, 2017 — by Gamesauce Staff

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2016 proved to be a fruitful year for Vungle, with the company reaching new milestones this last year. They are now the trusted ad platform for more than 25,000 mobile apps and serve two billion video views monthly on over 560 million devices across the globe. The company was consistently ranked No. 1 for cross-platform user retention – surpassing even Facebook and Google with gaming apps on iOS and Android in an AppsFlyer Performance Index Report.

How did these accomplishments come about? Here is a quick look at some of the key takeaways from Vungle’s successes.

EventsIndustry

Casual Connect Pushing Casino Envelope in Tel Aviv, Berlin

November 28, 2016 — by Gamesauce Staff

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Casino-oriented attendees at Casual Connect Tel Aviv packed lecture hall 2 at The Charles Bronfman Auditorium earlier this month to dive into everything casino – from sweeping overviews of the social casino industry to detail-oriented lectures on building apps to ways non-casino developers can break into the casino industry.

Highlights included a social casino industry overview by industry leader Playtika’s Elad Kushnir in which he predicted casino operators will ultimately find it difficult to capitalize on social casino and will exit the market. Anatolii Henis of rising star Murka dove into how the company crafted a poker game for a younger generation. PlayStudios’ John Lin looked eastward and discussed how social casino is evolving in Asian markets.

Game DesignIndustryStudio Spotlight

Plarium’s Rise to World Domination

November 19, 2016 — by Gamesauce Staff

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Plarium started out humbly enough in 2009 on Russia’s social networks with only a poker game and a farming game to its name. Today they are the #1 hardcore game developer on Facebook and a major force on mobile that is continuing to grow quickly. How did Plarium get from one to the other? It all comes down to its content, its employees and its players – with a dash of marketing thrown in.

IndustryStudio SpotlightStudios

Ilyon Innovates Amid Rapid Growth

November 15, 2016 — by Gamesauce Staff

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Ilyon has only been on the scene since 2013, but they already have over 40 titles and are continuing to see strong user acquisition and retention growth every month among their various titles. The company, which was started by four former Israeli military officers who worked on their game projects at home, has since grown to 40 employees with an office in Israel.

Scaling growth

The company started around a simple bubble-shooter game with only one game mode which Ilyon COO Ilya Molo says had a “total respectable” 2M downloads. They then took the feedback and data they received from that game and worked on it full-time to improve it. The resulting changes led to 1000% growth in downloads and revenue. Today, the same app has more than 14M downloads.

Ilyon has continuously used this model to grow: Reinvesting in its games as it reaches new thresholds – creating new levels, hiring new designers, adding game modes and improving in-app purchases. Additionally, they create special bubble-shooter apps to take advantage of current events such as the Olympics or holidays.

EventsIndustryResearch

Esports & VR: Casinos’ Upcoming Star Attractions

October 15, 2016 — by Gamesauce Staff

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This is part of a series on the convergence of video games and the casino industry and opportunities for non-casino game developers. Part 1 focused on mobile games. Part 2 focused on skill-based games. This is the final article in the series and focuses on esports and virtual reality.

Esports and virtual reality are coming to casinos. At the Downtown Grand in Las Vegas, esports have already arrived and at the Global Gaming Expo (G2E) esports and virtual reality were on display in major ways. Multiple panels were dedicated to the topic of esports and Gamblit Gaming showcased the possible future of VR and esports on casino floors with their G-Sports station and Virtual Reality Cube (VRC).

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