Gaming

Hamburg Games Conference 2022 sets course for new markets – and confirms first speakers

Published

2 years ago

December 10, 2021

Reading Time: 4 minutes

The hybrid conference’s program under the overarching topic “Moving Markets” on March 2 and 3, 2022 will revolve around the challenges and opportunities of the international games industry. Participants can join either on-site in Hamburg or from anywhere in the world via a custom developed, playable online conference platform. The first international experts who will contribute to the program with keynotes, talks and discussion panels have been announced. A new trailer video (https://youtu.be/e9mSPhEbqgE) gives first impressions of the extended hybrid concept of the conference.

With Joost van Dreunen (New York University), Alex Nichiporchik (tinyBuild Games), Kerstin Schütt (Twisted Ramble), Jakub Stokalski (11 bit studios), Jared Gerritzen (IllFonic) and Jana Grünewald (Kreativ Transfer), the first experts from academia, games industry and public funding institutions are confirmed for the conference program. More will be announced shortly.

An additional conference track is dedicated to the topic of “Games Funding” with news and best practices regarding Germany’s federal government games funding and regional funding offers of the federal states, such as the Games Lift Incubator and prototype funding in Hamburg.

The latest trailer for the Hamburg Games Conference 2022 showcases a new central element of the hybrid event’s concept: The virtual cruise ship, which serves as an interactive conference platform playable in the browser, will call port at various international games hotspots. In line with the conference theme “Moving Markets”, users can explore different international markets and get to know the conference’s partner companies and speakers from these markets.

There will also be extensive networking and matchmaking opportunities for conference participants, both online via the conference platform and on-site at Hamburg’s Zeise cinemas.

The first speakers for the Hamburg Games Conference 2022:

Joost van Dreunen is an Adjunct Assistant Professor at NYU Stern School of Business in New York and is one of the most internationally recognized games industry researchers. In addition to teaching at New York University, he serves as advisory board member for several games companies and start-ups and covers background topics from the games, tech and entertainment industries in his weekly newsletter SuperJoost Playlist. In his conference talk, he will assess the current state of the blockchain gaming market – whose top companies are currently collectively valued at over $12 billion. He will highlight recent successes and failures, drivers and trends, as well as how industry players look at the developments and make an outlook into the future of this market.

Alex Nichiporchik is CEO of the US-based publisher and developer “tinyBuild Games”. In his conference presentation, he will recap the development of the “Hello Neighbor” franchise: A journey from a small 7-person studio with a failing crowdfunding campaign to a successful multimedia franchise that now has a team of over 100 people across multiple studios working on the series, including five games, merchandise, books and an animated series.

Kerstin Schütt is co-founder and CEO of the Berlin-based startup game studio “Twisted Ramble”, which puts socially marginalized and stigmatized topics at the center of its games – balancing serious subject matter and playful entertainment. In her presentation for the Hamburg Games Conference, Kerstin Schütt will share her experiences on how challenging it is to master this balance and how their game “Duru“, which addresses depression in a playful manner, finds its place in the market.

Jakub Stokalski is game co-director for 11 bit studios game “Frostpunk 2“. His aim is to create meaningful experiences in a language native to the medium of games. For the Hamburg Games Conference 2022, he will examine how the medium of video games has matured: games enable forms of storytelling that are not possible through movies or books. Games are an integral part of (pop-)culture and, with their inherent interactivity, can pull players into a dialogue and convey a thoughtful message in their own unique way. In his talk, Jakub Stokalski will shed light on what this mature storytelling can do.

Jared Gerritzen, Head of Creative & Design at the Colorado-based development studio “IllFonic”, will address the question of how a studio can make the transition from working on well-known IPs to creating and marketing its own IP from scratch – from idea development, to design, to the finished product.

Jana Grünewald is project coordinator of the funding program “Kreativ Transfer” at the “Dachverband Tanz Deutschland”, through which games companies can receive funding for participation in international trade fairs and conferences as well as for international networking. In her presentation for the funding track of the Hamburg Games Conference 2022, she will present the “Kreativ Transfer” program in detail.

More speakers for the Hamburg Games Conference 2022 will be announced shortly. In addition to international experts from the games industry, companies who received support through various state and federal funding programs will give first-hand-insights into their experiences and share best practices in the funding track of the conference.

Early bird tickets extended until December 17

Business tickets for the Hamburg Games Conference are still available at the Early Bird price of 119 euros until December 17, 2021. After that, tickets will go on sale at the regular price. Ticket store: https://bit.ly/HGC22

Business Ticket holders can participate in the online and on-site program of the conference and benefit from additional opportunities to organize appointments with other participants via a digital matchmaking system, access to an exclusive business area, and guestlist spots for the networking event “Gamecity Treff” by Gamecity Hamburg.

The Basic ticket, priced at 25 euros, includes access to the conference program online and on-site.

Gaming

Flexion Enters into Partnership with Jam City

Published

1 week ago

May 9, 2024

Niji Narayan

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Reading Time: < 1 minute

Flexion, the games marketing company, has partnered with Jam City, a leading mobile entertainment company behind some of the world’s highest-grossing and most enduring mobile games, to bring a selection of the publisher’s best-in-class games to the Alternative App Stores: Amazon Appstore, Huawei App Gallery, Aptoide, ONE store, Samsung Galaxy Store, DT Hub and Xiaomi GetApps.

“We are always looking for new opportunities to build our network of global players, and Flexion is a proven partner that will help introduce our award-winning titles to new audiences in the alternative stores,” Curtis Barnes, Senior Director of Publishing Operations for Jam City, said.

“We’re all about helping developers like Jam City reach the full potential of their games. We’re delighted they have chosen us to add revenue and audiences for their games on the alternative app stores,” Jens Lauritzson, CEO of Flexion, said.

The post Flexion Enters into Partnership with Jam City appeared first on European Gaming Industry News.

Gaming

Mobile Games Index: Analysis of 95M Game Interactions Reveals Shifting Engagement Trends, Available Now

Published

2 weeks ago

May 7, 2024

George Miller

mobile-games-index:-analysis-of-95m-game-interactions-reveals-shifting-engagement-trends,-available-now

Reading Time: 2 minutes

The anticipated fourth edition of the annual Mobile Games Index, powered by adjoe and Statista, is now available.

The latest report offers a clear look into the current state of the mobile gaming sector, analyzing the past 12 months of the first-party data from 95 million app interactions across 27 million users. The MGI 2024 reveals what people choose to play on their mobile devices, filling the gap in industry knowledge and enabling game developers and user acquisition specialists to benchmark their products and ultimately target the right audiences with the right content.

Moving forward, it is up to the industry decision-makers to analyze the findings and promptly adapt to the newly-emerged engagement trends from MGI 2024, effectively engaging desired audiences.

A Peek at Shifting Engagement Trends to Capitalize on

Based on predictions from Statista, the overarching trend in the market is its robust growth with a forecasted expansion from $166.1 billion in 2024 to $227 billion by 2028.

Remarkably, Card games are expected to grow the most dramatically at 13.8% a year, nearly doubling their global revenue by 2028. Judging from the engagement charts of MGI 2024, the main driver of growth in this category is Solitaire games. The audience is showing a clear preference for Solitaire – these games hold 7 out of 10 positions in the top list of card games worldwide by time spent with titles from MobilityWare, Gimica, Scopely, and Playvalve, among others.

What allows the market to show revenue growth is the positive changes in global daily time spent. After the dip in engagement highlighted by the last year’s Index, adjoe confirms that average daily sessions have rebounded to 21.5 minutes from 17.3 minutes reported last year, marking a 22% increase.

The most engaged demographic of mobile gamers globally is the 40-49 age group, which has experienced a remarkable 33% increase in daily gaming time, now at 23 minutes daily. The strategies targeted at older demographics over the past 12 months can be deemed successful. However, this has led to a loss of focus on engaging Gen-Z, which has shown only modest growth in time spent.

The MGI also reveals that women are outpacing men in daily gaming time across most genres – as reported for the 4th edition in a row. This consistent and high performance makes the female audience a continuously safer bet when it comes to user targeting.

Another continued trend is the dominance of top publishers such as Supercell, Garena, King, and Playrix, while there’s still space to occupy for smaller publishers. For instance, ForgeGames tops the engagement charts with their game Special Forces Group 2 – capturing over 43 minutes of average daily engagement.

The insights continue in the MGI 2024, going granular to segment and visualize global mobile game engagement data from adjoe by genre, region, and demographic. At the same time, Statista’s extensive market research provides a macro-view of the current and future industry, offering figures for global downloads and revenues with forecasts extending to 2028.

Mobile Games Index 2024 Is Available in Open Access

The MGI 2024 goes deep below the surface of market data and creates a comprehensive snapshot of the mobile gaming industry today. Inside are

For developers and marketers, this report is the green light to benchmark performance against industry leaders and align their products with the rising expectations of mobile gamers. This comprehensive tool is now available for free to inform decision-making and help optimize strategies for short- and long-term actions.

The post Mobile Games Index: Analysis of 95M Game Interactions Reveals Shifting Engagement Trends, Available Now appeared first on European Gaming Industry News.

Gaming

The German Games Industry Association congratulates all winners of the German Computer Game Awards 2024

Published

4 weeks ago

April 22, 2024

George Miller

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Reading Time: 3 minutes

• “EVERSPACE 2” by ROCKFISH Games is ‘Best German Game’ 2024
• Pixel Maniacs from Nuremberg wins in the ‘Studio of the Year’ category
• ‘Best International Game’ is Baldur’s Gate 3
• ‘Player of the Year’ is Maurice Weber

High-quality games, great entertainment and many well-known personalities from the games industry and the cultural, societal and political spheres – the German Computer Game Awards 2024 (DCP), presented this evening in Munich, featured all that and more. Numerous guests celebrated the best games from Germany and the creative minds behind them in person at Eisbach Studios in Munich. The award show, which was hosted by Katrin Bauerfeind and Uke Bosse, was additionally followed by hundreds of thousands of viewers via live stream. A total of 800,000 euros was awarded in cash prizes. “EVERSPACE 2” by ROCKFISH Games was chosen ‘Best German Game’. The ‘Studio of the Year’ award went to Pixel Maniacs from Nuremberg, which has made a name for itself with successful games like the party racing game “Can’t Drive This”, its multifaceted involvement in the game industry and its promotion of young talent, as well as with its innovations in the area of marketing. The ‘Special Jury Prize’ was awarded to the project “Gaming ohne Grenzen” (Gaming without Borders), an initiative that enables young people with disabilities to participate actively in game culture – for example, by assessing in inclusive game testing groups the accessibility of various games as well as the ability of certain technologies to help overcome barriers in video games. In voting by the community and the jury, Maurice Weber was selected ‘Player of the Year’. The games editor and Twitch streamer regularly analyses current developments in the games industry and takes a critical look at them, while at the same time formulating a clear stance for more diversity and against extremism in games and society.

The German Computer Game Awards, which honour the year’s best German-produced games, are hosted by the German Federal Government, represented by the Federal Ministry for Economic Affairs and Climate Action, and game – The German Games Industry Association.

‘Congratulations to all winners of the German Computer Game Awards 2024!’ says Felix Falk, Managing Director of game. ‘Even in these very challenging times for many German firms in the industry, German games companies have created high-quality and successful games that have deservedly been honoured on the big stage of the DCP. Around half of these outstanding games were developed with the support of federal game funding. This once again demonstrates the potential that we can leverage when the underlying policy framework for game development in Germany provides for truly predictable and internationally competitive conditions – conditions that allow games from Germany to shine even more brightly all over the world and achieve even greater success on the national as well as international stage. We must make this our goal!’

Overview of all winners:
Best International Game (not endowed)

Baldur’s Gate 3 (Larian Studios)

Best German Game (endowed with 100,000 euros)

EVERSPACE 2 (ROCKFISH Games)

The other nominees will each receive 30,000:

Atlas Fallen (Deck 13 Interactive/Focus Entertainment)
Fall of Porcupine (Critical Rabbit/Assemble Entertainment)

Best Family Game (endowed with 40,000 euros)

Spells & Secrets (Alchemist Interactive/rokaplay)

Newcomer Award – Best Debut (endowed with 60,000 euros)

Ad Infinitum (Hekate/NACON)

The other nominees will receive 25,000 euros each:

Fall of Porcupine (Critical Rabbit/Assemble Entertainment)
Lose CTRL (Play From Your Heart)

Newcomer Award – Best Prototype (endowed with 50,000 euros)

Misgiven (Symmetry Break Studio)

The other nominees will receive 25,000 euros each:

Bloodletter (Katharina “Mikey” Müller, David Cafisso, Marvin Braun, Alica Schneider/Hochschule für Technik und Wirtschaft Berlin)
EcoGnomix (Lars Hinnerk Grevsmühl, Lars Eble, Bahy Nguyen, Marcel Zurawka, Alec Shae)
Footgun: Underground (Eduard Dobermann, Theo Lohmüller, Georg Nimke, Robert Pistea, Lukas Salewsky)
REPLICORE (Sarah Inés Roeder, Rody Nawezi, Leonhard Gläser, Maximilian Götz/ HAW Hamburg)

Best Innovation and Technology (endowed with 40,000 euros)

Marble Maze (Fox-Assembly)

Best Serious Game (endowed with 40,000 euros)

Friedrich Ebert – Der Weg zur Demokratie (Playing History/Stiftung Reichspräsident-Friedrich-Ebert-Gedenkstätte)

Best Audio Design (endowed with 40,000 euros)

Ad Infinitum (Hekate/NACON)

Best Game Design (endowed with 40,000 euros)

Lose CTRL (Play From Your Heart)

Best Graphic Design (endowed with 40,000 euros)

The Bear – A Story from the World of Gra (Mucks! Games)

Best Mobile Game (endowed with 40,000 euros)

Cat Rescue Story (Tivola Games)