The App Store has become the great equalizer for game developers, allowing small teams to succeed where they never could in the console space. Interestingly, it has also had a similar effect with brands, allowing new IP to succeed and get noticed. We talked with Chris Ulm, Co-founder and CEO of Appy, along with Co-founder and Brand Director Appy Paul O’Connor about this trend for the App Store and what it means for brands of all sizes.
How do you account for the success of native brands on the App Store?
Paul O’Connor: It’s an interesting thing. What sparked this conversation was looking at the App Store before our games released. We looked at the rankings and what struck me was so many of the brands are unique to the iOS space. The top game is ICEE Maker, there’s a Spongebob game and maybe a Harry Potter game, but in the kids categories for the free games, it’s almost all original brands.
Chris Ulm: At any given time, between 70 and 90 percent are unique properties.
Paul O’Connor: In some of the categories, there’s more of a spread of original and established IP, but if you look at the top 3 games there’s’ a lot of new stuff. We’ve worked on new and licensed IP over the years and [the App Store] is the ultimate meritocracy for getting attention. We were speaking at the iKids conference in Santa Monica where there were some major executives of companies from kids brands like Hasbro, Mattel and Cartoon Network, and when it was our turn to get up and speak, we talked about how but we think the iOS space is the hothouse for new ideas and its a cheaper way to develop new IP.
Chris Ulm: When you ask why, we think it’s because kids are very open to new things. In the console business, it felt closed off, like if you didn’t have something that was a sequel or a core game it was hard to get a pitch through. But kids will approach anything that’s accessible to them.
Trucks & Skulls
Paul O’Connor: Looking at the top 25, number 23 is Cars 2. The movie might be a disappointment for Disney, but its a huge brand that’s in theaters, and its trailing a fireworks game, Mr. Ninja, Gravity Guy, Mall Party, etc. So there’s these giants of IP that have been in the business for a long time and its not getting the traction it should. We can blow away the Hotwheels app, it’s a sea change in the kids space.
Chris Ulm: The other thing we’re noticing is that people are using apps as distraction media — whether there’s a commercial on or whatever, they’re playing their games when they can. So what’s happening is it makes TV advertisements less effective for kids, who would rather play these games. So we think its a great way to launch new IP.
What you’re talking about makes me think of comparisons between Hollywood and the AAA games industry. Like, it seems for most blockbuster movies it has to be based around some established property, like Transformers which is a kids brand going back decades and is now an established action movie series.
Chris Ulm: And Transformers is not top 25 free games! They have this huge property but they still can’t figure out the app store.
How has Appy found success on the App Store?
Paul O’Connor: I think our approach is to refine a polish things to properties that you smile and laugh about. We added virtual currency for things like truck mods to Trucks & Skulls. Once we set the game to free, we got hundreds of thousands of downloads and remained in four star ratings. Fundamentally, we want people to want to play the game.
Chris Ulm: We don’t have the benefit of a license but we’re not also burdened by it! I’ve worked with those companies, and we can conceive, code and release in the time it takes to greenlight something at a larger company. They’re going to figure it out sooner or later, but they’re trying to bring the consensus driven perspective to an audience that needs games built from the ground up for the space. With a big brand holder or a smaller company, the perspective has to be the same.
Paul O’Connor: Our background is in Image Comics and we helped create a property Men in Black, which became a movie and a cartoon series. We did 30 and 40 comic books a month, all of them new properties. We went to Oddworld, so we went from comics to that unique place, and at Highmoon we did DarkWatch. So we have 25 years creating original things so that’s where our passions lie. We feel comfortable doing something new.
I remember that era of comics, which was all about more rights for comic artists and writers.
Paul O’Connor: The market right now on iOS is very similar, giving an opportunity for developers to express themselves so its a lot like comics. How many successful movie properties have been built on comics We think that the same thing will happen for IP on iOS they’ll it’ll have successful TV shows and comics and other stuff. The market for Apps will be 1 billion smartphones by 2015 so I think this is one of the most significant see changes in media ever.
What do you think makes a game successful on App Store?
Paul O’Connor: We don’t pretend to know! Seriously, we try to learn from our previous games. Firstly, you have to realize that designing for mobile is different than social or console games. Touch based mobile is its own unique area and you need to find games that people can play for a long time and also in five minute increments and link that to a large and deeper experience. That’s the trick. Some games are good for an hour but not second to second, but linking to that is key. And lastly is linking your game to what the device can do, which is relevant to what people are doing whether it is touch base or iOS.
I noticed a lot of success with food apps on the list provided. Why do you think these in particular are successful with kids?
Paul O’Connor: All kids like to make things. There’s fundamentally two play patterns — how do I make something and how do I destroy something After they build a sandcastle, the first thing a kid does is smash it back down! I think it appeals to a girls play patterns. We also have Trucks & Skulls where it lets you build it but it’s about destroying things.
Do you think that established brands are perhaps not using the medium the right way, especially when it comes to appealing to girls?
Paul O’Connor: We’re focusing generally on the games category, but if you notice there’s same pattern with large girls IP as with boys. If you look at the whole store there’s games that appeal to both boys and girls play patterns. Consoles are traditionally all about boy play patterns, though.
Chris Ulm: We tried to appeal to girl play patterns on consoles, but if we just appealed just to them a game would die. Generally their appealing to girl games was the same, except it was a pink Master Chief instead of a green one. Then, on iOS, there’s games like Angry Birds that really appeal to a wider audience: young, old, girl, boy – all four corners. Some things manage to appeal to a wider audience.
Do you think there’s any solution for larger children brands for iOS If you were approached by them and asked for the answer, what would you say?
Paul O’Connor: Firstly, we’d charge them a lot of money! Secondly, we’d say you need to have a focus on the space. You can’t have people looking at it part time, whether they’re home grown or hired, for these huge brands and make it work with these consumers. The brands and great, it’s just about building the culture around it.
Chris Ulm: They can’t come to a major developer two weeks before launch and say “We need an App” They’re the IP nuclear weapons of the kids space; you can’t do it lightly. You can’t it ship it off shore and develop it for $50,000. We heard for years, “you can’t make a good movie game” because you have a short period of notice that’s just not possible for a AAA game in 12 to 18 months — we can make a wonderful game in that time. Nielsen said this is where the eyeballs are and they need to they’re going to get their face smashed in by cupcakes and flaming monster trucks because those companies understand the space.
One good example of a large brand doing it right was Rio and Angry Birds. It fit the brand, they helped each other — Lima Sky has Doodle Jump they signed a similar deal with Hop was not as successful, so it’s not a magic bullet, but it was a smart partnership. Both of those guys are smart, and we could use more of that thinking. But because apps are so new, [large brands] don’t realize it takes time.
There’s sort of a traditional way of thinking for marketing, pushing the toys for movies like Transformers, Star Wars or Thor. One thing I’ll say though – for most kids, I’ll bet more played the Thor iOS game than bought the toy hammer! So maybe there’s a large audience that’s just waiting to get tapped.
It’s worrisome for the traditional portable gaming industry that it’s supposed to be reliant on selling $40 flash carts in a world where iOS devices are cool to kids and they can do so much with them.
Chris Ulm: You can have hundreds of apps in your pocket without carrying around things in a purse!They’re not buying a device, they’re buying an ecosystem of products, and if you’re not giving them multiple ways to enhance their life, then you’re not competing. They’re not going to to Walmart to try and find their latest game. There’s no way a single function device can compete unless it’s so much better, meaning you’d have to have it 20 or 30 times better than the iPhone — if you’re just twice as good, you’re screwed.
Paul O’Connor: Just look at sales of DS vs. 3DS. One of the big differences is there was no iPhone when the DS released.
Chris Ulm: I have enormous respect for Nintendo, but I think they might be on the wrong side of history. Talking about how they’re not going to do free games or mobile games. They have their walled garden of established IP and that’s great, but if kids are interested in iOS… they’re going to lose their business. If I was at Nintendo, I’d be worried.
Paul O’Connor: If I was Nintendo, I’d put my games on iOS!
Chris Ulm: There’s going to be billions of active mobile devices by 2015 — that’s going to outpace millions of console devices.
The Take-Two CEO [Strauss Zelnick] was recently trying to make a connection between pricing and quality. To take this old model and say this game is worth 30 bucks because of the investment… none of those statements make any sense [in the mobile space]. They’ve got to change their methodology and make a value proposition to gamers and right now they’re protecting their prices.
Anything you’d like to finish with?
Chris Ulm: There’s a truism: the markets are never wrong. God bless you Iwata-san for sticking to your guns, but the market is never wrong. If people were scared about the power of mobile devices now, there’s going to be a new series of iOS and Android devices this holiday season that will make them even more nervous.
Chris, Paul thanks.
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