20130713 case study of candy crash saga

Case Study of <Candy Crash Saga>

What We Taiwan App Developers Can

Learn

Christina Hsu

Agenda Basic Data of <Candy Crash Saga> Post Mortem of <Candy Crash Saga> Best Practices for Creating and

Distributing Games Cross Platform Breaking the Success Formula of <Candy

Crash Saga> What We Taiwan App Developers Can

Learn Q&A

Basic Data of <Candy Crash Saga>

History Release:

Facebook : April 2012 Mobile (iOS & Android) : November 2012

Records: Over 10 million downloads in 1st month Number 1 game on Facebook (January 2013) 10+ million DAU, 45+ million MAU (March

2013) The highest-grossing app in the Apple and

Google app stores (April 2013)

Developer / Publisher

About King.comWelcome to King.com, the largest skill gaming site in the world, where you can play free games online in competitive tournaments in categories such as puzzle, strategy, word, action, card and sports games.

King.com was founded in 2003 with the goal of becoming the premiere destination for skill gaming on the internet. We currently have more than 150 addicting games in our portfolio and we are constantly developing new and exciting on line games.

Levels

Total Levels FB: 425 Mobile: 365 New levels to be

announced in July 2013

Post Mortem of of <Candy Crash Saga>

Game Developer Conference, March 2013

Session &. Speaker Session

Candy Crush Saga Postmortem: Luck in the Right Places

25-minute session of <Free to Play Design & Business Summit>

Speaker Tommy Palm Games Guru, King.com 20 + years experience

The Formula of Success ?

Chances

Before Candy

<Diamond Digger>

Pre-Candy in 2011

Game Play of Pre-Candy

Basic & Combo

#1 Game on Facebook

The Formula of Success = A*

Accessibility

<2005 vs. 2013> 1st time gamers

More Accessibilities

75% of those who completed all

levels do not payShort sessions for you to play and kill time

The Formula of Success = A*N

Never Ending

<lots of levels> A very long game

More Never Ending

Against your ideas of casual games, it’s difficult!

The Formula of Success = A*N*C

The index shows how social it is

Campfire Index

The Aisle Effect

The True Definition of Social is

Hashtag on Instagram

Qiotes from the team

Next Challenge

The Formula of Success !

Best Practices for Creating and Distributing Games Cross Platform

Casual Connect Europe, February 2013

10 M

20 M

2011

Now

Daily active users (FB)

3 platforms are shaping the future

1. Facebook

http://jmak.tumblr.com/

2. Smart phones

3. Tablets

A portable future

http://www.businessinsider.com/the-future-of-mobile-deck-2012-3?op=1

Play everywhere

Game State-Progress

Game State-Progress

?

Game creation

Hit driven

Risk elimination

150+ casual games

On Facebook: the ‘Saga'

“Saga Framework”Proven Game

FB connected users are MUCH more valuable

* Retention * Engagement * Likelihood to pay

My five cents

1. Small multi talented teams working agile

2. Rapid prototyping/testing3. No tutorials4. Respect data5. Intuitive game controls

Intuitive Controls

YouTube: Bullfrog playing Ant Smasher

Mouse

Touch Screen

Joypad

MARKETING & BRANDING

PRPR Word of mouth

Word of mouth

Feature by AppleFeature by Apple

Facebook traffic

Facebook traffic

AdsAds Cross promotion

Cross promotion

PC: Facebook App discovery mainly viral

(AppData 2012)

43%

19%

18%

10%

6%

4%

Friend Invite

Advertisement

Don’t Remember

Word of Mouth

Newsfeed

Other

0 0.1 0.2 0.3 0.4 0.5

Column1

Mobile: App discovery driven by App Stores

(Nielsen Q3 2011)

Over 50% of smart phone users are connected to Facebook

More than 500m of Facebook’s monthly users use mobile

Facebook enables cross-platform

viral user acquisition

Desktop to

mobile

Mobile to app / app

store

App to desktop

Facebook enables discoverability both on

canvas and mobile

Notifications

News feed and

Timeline

Bookmark

Ads

Social

Light social layer

Facebook is great tool for game developers

50

Recap

Casual Games

Cross platform

Truly Social

These games will be the dominating brand creator of this decade!

Breaking the Success Formula of <Candy Crash Saga>

King made Candy Crush Viral

-Candy Crush merges virality with mobile

-It lets you see the progress of your friends.

Goal-oriented play encourages player retention

It keeps players hooked through its goal-oriented level structure.

-Its level system gives players solid attainable goals

-Taking the old match-three formula and adding enough twists (such as unique tile grids, level goals, etc.)

-Big-fish-little-pond effect

Organic & Endless Monetization

-Candy Crush’s virality and compelling goal-oriented gameplay make it built for monetization. Its players are too busy trying to outdo their friends and/or finish every level. So to them, throwing down a few dollars here or there isn’t that big of a deal. This is organic monetization and it works.-King.com has created a win-win situation: either players boost King’s profits by spending 99 cents to replenish their spent credits, or they drive Candy Crush’s customer engagement and retention metrics by requesting lives from their Facebook friends while waiting for a refill.

Candy Crush syncs across platforms

Christopher Foley:-a data analyst and game analytics expert at Kontagent-founded two video game companies and was a lead programmer at Sony Computer Entertainment America-a Caltech engineering and applied science graduate and holds a master’s degree in complex adaptive systems and an MBA. -Contact him at Linkedin.com/foleyfoleyfoley.

What We Taiwan App Developers Can Learn

Easy to Pick-up

IF YOU NEED A TUTORIAL TO EXPLAIN YOUR GAME, THEN PERHAPS IT’S NOT REALLY CASUAL AND ACCESSIBLE TO THE MASS MARKET.

Think Differently

Jump Out from Comfort Zone

THIS BUSINESS IS ALL ABOUT RESHAPING AND CHALLENGING THE WAYS WE WORK. NO ONE CAN AFFORD TO STAY IN THEIR COMFORT ZONE FOR LONG.

Design to Monetize

As More Platforms as Possible

Paradigm Shift in Taiwan

Thank You

Q &. AFind Me at: www.facebook.com/christina.hsu.37 ( 徐志瀟 ) (Christina Hsu)

Chris_9801

Chris_9801 (貓奴 Chris 鍋貼 )

Christina Hsu