August 2014 | Page 5 of 20

Top 25 Apps Revolve Around Millennials

August 26, 2014, 12:00AM

When it comes to the popularity of certain apps, millennials certainly have no problem dealing the cards – or being social, for that matter.

A new report from comScore indicates that a number of social apps are amongst the most popular used for those 18 and over, starting with Facebook at 115.4 million, followed by YouTube with 83.4 million and Google Play with 72.2 million. That’s visitors clocked for the month of June 2014, according to a report.

Other companies had no problem making the list as well, including Pandora with 69 million, Google Maps with 64.5 million, Gmail with 60.3 million and Instagram with 46.6 million.

Surprisingly lower on the list are Twitter with 34.7 million, Netflix with 27.6 million, Snapchat with 26.5 million and Skype with 18.8 million. Still, those numbers aren’t too shabby, especially when being used by millennials in a certain age group.

Apps aren’t the only thing that are quite popular with the group. Games continue to be a part of their social activity as well, whether they’re dealing cards in a classic game of Solitaire or playing along with their colleagues in a seasoned game of Words With Friends. While no games actually made it into the top 25 list overall, they’re still clocking in a strong audience, with certain titles reaching 10 million unique visitors.

Out of all the apps featured, Netflix seems to be the top one requiring a subscription, as its 28 million unique visitors actually represent more than 75 percent of its U.S. streaming subscriber base. That’s including trial members.

The full list can be found here, and the statistics are certainly startling – and show that millennials aren’t going anywhere when it comes to social use. Other age groups count as well, but this appears to be the strongest audience out of those polled.

Source: QZ.com, The Atlantic

PC Sales Back On The Rise

BY Robert Workman

August 26, 2014, 12:00AM

It’s funny how the technical market works sometimes. For quite a while there, tablets were all the rage, with Apple’s iPad devices and Samsung’s Galaxy Tabs producing quite a few numbers. However, as of late, we’re seeing an interesting spurt in sales on the PC front, while tablet sales are slowing down a little bit. What gives

Peter Yared of TechCrunch attempts to explain in a new article that goes into greater detail about the upswing on the PC front, and downswing when it comes to tablet sales. “The tablet slowdown shouldn’t be a surprise given that tablets have hardly improved beyond relatively superficial changes in size, screen resolution and processor speed,” said Yared. “The initial market for tablets is now saturated: grandparents and kids have them, people bought them as Sonos controllers and such, and numerous households have them around for reading. People that want tablets have them, and there’s just no need to upgrade because they more than adequately perform their assigned tasks.”

Both PC’s and Mac computers are showing a boost in sales, particularly through businesses, who consistently upgrade their computer equipment to keep up to speed with the times. The call for a keyboard, a larger screen and the usage of Microsoft Office seem to be the key components when purchasing new technical units – three features that tablets seem to be missing, despite the introduction of certain add-ons.

Yared addresses the need for “super tablets,” devices that carry a larger screen than the usual tablets have now, as well as better processing power. Getting out of the “toy phase”, as colleague Chris Dixon puts it, would benefit the market greatly, with the introduction of key features such as a 13″ screen, a 64-bit processor, 2GB of RAM space, a 256 GB hard drive (the largest being offered right now is the new iPad’s 128 GB), a physical keyboard (not a snap-on like Microsoft’s models have), a file system, and an operating system that allows for windows and multitasking – something, again, most models are missing today.

The report can be found in full here, but Yared definitely has his points. Would you invest in a “super tablet,” or stick to the tried and true PC when it comes to your business needs

Source: TechCrunch

Why Helsinki Is A Hotbed For Hit Games

BY John Gaudiosi

August 25, 2014, 12:00AM

Seriously could be the next Helsinki company to deliver a mobile hit, in the wake of global successes like Rovio Entertainment and Supercell. In fact, Seriously co-founder Petri Jarvilaehto has already been involved in two local game companies that become global powerhouses. Jarvilaehto is the Chief Creative Officer at Seriously. Seriously is his third game start-up in Helsinki, having been one of the founders of Remedy (and project and lead game designer on Max Payne 1 and 2) and joined Rovio Entertainment right after the launch of Angry Birds and headed up the games division.

Now the new mobile company is poised to release its first game, Best Fiends, this October. Seriously will also be launching animated shorts, original music, making-of videos, limited edition artwork, a brand book and stickers for messenger apps in partnership with distributor Swyft Media. The company has offices in Santa Monica, California, where business development and marketing functions are based, and in Helsinki, Finland, where the game development team is located. Jarvilaehto talks about the new company, the evolving video game business and explains why Helsinki has had so many mobile game successes in this exclusive interview.

Petri Jarvilaehto

[a]listdaily: What did you learn from Rovio that you’ve applied to Seriously?

Petri Jarvilaehto: The biggest thing is that right now the entire gaming and entertainment industry is going through a massive transition. If you look the amount of reach that you can have with hundreds of millions of players every single day and that pretty much changes the entire digital entertainment industry. We feel that going forward some of the biggest entertainment brands are going to be created on mobile platforms and we want to be there leading that change.

[a]listdaily: How do you approach developing entertainment franchises versus mobile games?

Petri Jarvilaehto: It’s really about building up the IP and putting a lot of effort into how we create the world, what kind of characters do we have, how do we create characters that can translate from within the game and genre to outside the game. And it’s about setting up the conflict and creating a compelling scenario and then deriving multiple games around the same IP. There are a lot of companies out there that are doing one type of game development. We’re approaching this from the point of view of how do we build a bigger portfolio around the same IP.

[a]listdaily: What games are you working on right now?

Petri Jarvilaehto: Going forward we have a road map of three games that are all built around the same character, the same world, the same conflict and we’re very happy with the way it’s all been coming together. In Best Fiends, players will discover the world of Minutia and its population of cute, courageous and increasingly fiendish inhabitants as they work to collect them all and level them up to gain special powers. Best Fiends is the first in a series of games, telling the story of these heroes’ epic journey, and their battle against the voracious Slugs of Mount Boom. This is a game and a world that I have wanted to build for a long time, and it’s a dream to be working with the incredible talent we have at Seriously to develop Best Fiends together.

[a]listdaily: How long have you been working on this particular project?

Petri Jarvilaehto: Seriously was founded last August. We’ve been working on building up the company for about a year now. We’ve been focused on this one property so far completely. We generally believe in being extremely focused and doing fewer things but doing them really well. Right now we’re 14 people and that’s something that’s still a very focused team.

[a]listdaily: Why did you decide to explore the mobile game space

Petri Jarvilaehto: Mobile is, by far, the most exciting area to work in games right now. With the rise of the mobile, we’re living in a perfect storm where there’s several transitions going on at the same time. The business models are changing from premium to free to play. The distribution models are changing. You’re no longer distributing through publishers or box copy or similar format. Games are becoming a service. It’s no longer that when you ship a game and you’re done. That’s when you start building and interacting with the fan base. At the same time we’re even seeing the console transition, which to us isn’t really that material, but that is one more transition going on.

This perfect storm of change has not been present in gaming throughout my entire career. It’s a very unique time and with mobile you can probably reach 10 million to 20 million people with a successful game. On a highly successful mobile game you can reach hundreds of millions of people. And you can keep entertaining them much more regularly. Essentially, you’re building a hobby for these players and you’re interacting with the entire audience constantly. We never saw anything like that in console space. To me, consoles seem extremely rigid and limited in terms of what you can actually do as a developer. I have a background in AAA at Remedy and I know very well what it’s like to work on bigger console titles, but to me this new mobile world is much more exciting.

[a]listdaily: What excites you about the rate at which mobile technology is advancing?

Petri Jarvilaehto: The biggest change that we’re seeing is that everything is accelerating so fast. The time spaces are getting so compressed. It also opens up completely new opportunities. On a big scale, if you look at what’s been happening in the gaming industry, you have big giants of the previous previous generation like Electronic Arts and Activision’s and newcomers from this transition like King and Supercell. When you factor in everything that’s happening in Asia, there’s a huge amount of opportunity that’s purely created by this change that we’re seeing now. As a developer and somebody who makes games to reach a large audience and somebody who’s targeting at building a business out of it, it doesn’t get much more exciting than this.

[a]listdaily: How has being in a small company spurred creativity?

Petri Jarvilaehto: Once you start scaling up, you start having a mandatory need for process and structure. Whereas being able to operate with a smaller team you can be completely agile. You can get a huge amount more work done in a much more compressed timeframe. The way we’ve approached this at Seriously is to find veteran people that have worked together in the past who have experience on shipping highly successful titles. By having a small team of highly experienced people, you can get out of the way and let them work. It’s very different from a big organization where it’s all about reporting and budgeting and by default is much more inflexible. With a small team you can focus on the game as opposed to having all the inherent disruption that comes with a smaller organization. Plus a smaller team has more responsibility in many different departments versus having many departments with too many people. There’s an automatic feeling of ownership. We don’t have anyone else to blame if this thing fails. If this thing succeeds, then it’s because we worked really hard at it. That automatically creates a very different sense of ownership in both the creative process as well as in the product.

[a]listdaily: What impact has the fall of Nokia and the rise of Apple and Android had on Finland?

Petri Jarvilaehto: While it’s tragic for the friends I have who work at Nokia to go from an undeniable number one position over seven years to being acquired by Microsoft, from a developer point of view as long as there are healthy platforms that you can develop on and reach an audience that’s the one thing that really matters. Android is great in providing an audience where you can reach an order of magnitude more people than an iOS. We’re very happy working with those two platforms now.

[a]listdaily: How do you feel the Finnish culture influences games developers make here?

Petri Jarvilaehto: What really has a big impact over here is that within the games industry here in Finland we have a pretty unique community. There’s a culture of sharing and people helping each other. The more we have success stories here, the more that attracts attention and new capital and more doors open. What we saw back in 2001 when the original Max Payne shipped and Finland had its first AAA hit, that opened a huge amount of doors to everyone else. Suddenly publishers were interested in Finland. The quality of that game opened a lot of eyes. Now with the success of Rovio and Supercell, there are a lot of opportunities for everyone else to follow in those footsteps.

[a]listdaily: How have you seen the game development community grow here in Finland?

Petri Jarvilaehto: There’s been incredible growth. The local IGDA chapter is the most active in the world. Fifteen years ago we might have had 10 to 15 developers meeting up for a beer once a month, and now we get 200 to 300 developers. There are lectures and presentations. It’s become a great happening where you get to see all of your friends and you can talk about the latest changes in the industry.

The Oculus Rift Is Coming To Hollywood

BY Matthew Defulgentiis

August 25, 2014, 12:00AM

The Washington Post did an online piece last week about virtual reality’s possible future in Hollywood. According to the article, recent reports suggest that Facebook is now going after Hollywood studios and directors, asking them to create “Oculus Experiences” specifically for its virtual reality device, the Oculus Rift.

By putting on a virtual reality headset like the Oculus Rift, fans would (hypothetically) be able to interact with scenes or characters within the film, thus creating a more immersive experience for moviegoers.

Well, believe it or not, there have already been rumors that Hollywood directors might be willing to consider the idea. In fact, this past summer’s Comic-Con in San Diego featured “Drift with the Rift” promotions for three different projects — “X-Men,” “Pacific Rim: Jaeger Pilot” and “Sleepy Hollow.” Fans could strap on an Oculus Rift and experience what it felt like to be immersed in a virtual reality experience.

For example, you could pretended you were a pilot of one of the massive 250-foot-high Jaeger robots in “Pacific Rim: Jaeger Pilot.”

You could have also experienced a scene with the Headless Horseman or Ichabod Crane from “Sleepy Hollow.”

Or, if you were a fan of “X-Men,” you could have experienced a three-minute, virtual reality presentation involving Professor X and Mystique.

Image Courtesy Of The Washington Post

The important factor to take away from all of this is that fans could potentially become part of the storytelling experience, when real-world actions are transformed into virtual reality actions. 3D films were designed to make the movie experience bigger and more real. If virtual reality ever came to be, it would blow 3D out of the water–allowing actual interaction with characters and plot lines.

According to the Washington Post, Facebook could potentially get people to buy the Oculus Rift headset and then follow up with a steady stream of video content offerings, transforming the Rift from a pure gaming device into a video entertainment device.

This being said, virtual reality is still not ready for its Hollywood debut. The only current steps being taken to integrate this innovative technology into the movie business is discussions of developing companion shorts for feature-length films (similar to the way Guillermo del Toro did with “Pacific Rim: Jaeger Pilot”), as well as creating other types of shorter-form entertainment content designed specifically for the Oculus Rift.

In short, virtual reality could change the moviegoer experience entirely as well as create a big leap forward in long-form video storytelling experiences.
Source: Washington Post

Twitter Recommends Content, Facebook Style

BY Lauren Arevalo-Downes

August 25, 2014, 12:00AM

In an effort to bring relatable content to its users, Twitter has began publishing additional content on its user’s timelines. The platform began this development early last week and it doesn’t intend to stop anytime soon.

If you are a current Twitter user, chances are you’ve seen a tweet Twitter has inserted from someone you don’t follow, aimed to consist of something you care about. More so, it usually includes a short header trying to explain why the tweet is appearing on your timeline. For example, you might see a tweet from a stranger, along with a label saying that a friend you follow on Twitter favorited the tweet, or follows the account that generated the tweet.

It would be reasonable to assume that you’re seeing that tweet because of your friends’ actions. However, that isn’t the case necessarily.

While it is clear why the social platform wants to present users with relatable and important information based on their actions and preferences, it is unclear just how Twitter is going about doing this.

According to Re/Code, sources familiar with the update say Twitter’s algorithm “searches for popular tweets in your ‘social graph,’ marked by actions like favorites and retweets.” However, the algorithm isn’t showing you those tweets because of a friend’s specific actions, it’s showing it to you because lots of your friends have either favorited or shown interest in that tweet.

This means users can favorite a tweet and not have it appear on someone else’s feed (due to the necessary engagement from many other people, too), however it is speculated that users might still begin to treat the favorite with more caution.

Despite 50 other people favoriting a tweet that Twitter surfaces, if your name is the one included on the label it certainly looks and feels like an endorsement, regardless of your intention.

In response, people familiar with the algorithm are saying that Twitter is considering an alternate method to indicate why you’re seeing certain tweets.

Source: Recode

The Lowdown On Gen Z

BY Matthew Defulgentiis

August 25, 2014, 12:00AM

It’s no secret that marketers are beginning to pay more attention to Generation Z, the generation defined by those born in 1995 or later. With Generation Z becoming the largest population demographic at 25.9 percent, its appeal to marketers is rather obvious.

AdWeek says 52 percent of Generation Z is immersed in social media, using such platforms for “typical research assignments,” and other classroom activities, as opposed to millennials, who grew up with just the Internet.

With Generation Z’s influence increasing, marketers are being forced to adapt and engage this demographic in new ways. For instance, those who are 19 and younger prefer social networks like Snapchat, Secret and Whisper as a quarter of 13- to 17-year-olds have left Facebook this year, according to Sparks & Honey. Some marketers are ahead of the game and are adapting already.

Check out the infographic below to learn more about Generation Z.

Image Courtesy Of Adweek

Source: Adweek

AwesomenessTV Goes To TV (Again) With New Roku App

BY Lauren Arevalo-Downes

August 25, 2014, 12:00AM

by Sahil Patel

AwesomenessTV has launched an app on Roku.

Developed by 1 Mainstream, the app features all of the multi-channel network’s original content, including shows like Side Effects, The Jenn & Andrea Show, and Runaways. Other content includes shows and videos featuring beauty tips, teen advice, celebrity gossip, sketch comedy, and pranks produced by the youth-oriented digital media company.

The move to Roku for AwesomenessTV continues the trend of YouTube-built media companies expanding to other platforms in order to attract new revenue streams. Fullscreen is also working on a Roku app as well as an over-the-top video platform, while Maker Studios has launched an owned-and-operated platform called Maker.TV as well as apps for some of its creators in recent months.

For its part AwesomenessTV, which was acquired by DreamWorks Animation in a deal that could be worth $117 million, has been pretty active in expanding its brand to other platforms. The company has a weekly TV show on Nickelodeon and a feature film in the works with Vine stars Nash Grier and Cameron Dallas, among other projects.

News of AwesomenessTV’s Roku app launch was first reported by Variety.

This article was originally posted on VideoInk and is reposted on [a]listdaily via a partnership with the news publication, which is the online video industry’s go-to source for breaking news, features, and industry analysis. Follow VideoInk on Twitter @VideoInkNews, or subscribe via thevideoink.com for the latest news and stories, delivered right to your inbox.

Nintendo Looking For Wii U Momentum

BY Robert Workman

August 25, 2014, 12:00AM

Nintendo has faced quite an uphill struggle with its Wii U console since its release in 2012. The system has failed to find a massive audience, unlike the Wii and GameCube have before. It’s also lost some big support from third-party companies, as Ubisoft has confirmed it won’t make any more “mature” games for it after Watch Dogs releases this fall, and Activision won’t be releasing the highly anticipated Call of Duty: Advanced Warfare for it. Electronic Arts has already said it’s not planning any releases for the Wii U.

That said, Nintendo needs to rely on its biggest strength to bring the system to prosperity – itself. The company’s first-party and second-party properties seem to be the main thing driving its success right now, as the recently released Hyrule Warriors (a second-party game) has found big sales in Japan, and several titles have seen an increase in pre-order since their unveiling at Gamescom in Germany last week.

Ubisoft’s European boss Alain Corre has said, despite the company’s decision to not make “mature” games for the system, there’s still success to be found. “To be honest, we always want more consoles,” Corre said. “Just Dance 2015 is resonating very well. We think it will please a lot of [existing] Wii U owners and push more families to buy extra Wii Us. But we also believe that Super Smash Bros. will be a trigger to increase the momentum of the Wii U at Christmas. As a gamer, I was playing [Super Smash Bros.] over ten years ago, and it has some of the best moments that Nintendo has shared. I think that franchise could be magical [for the Wii U].

“Nintendo has some of the best franchises in the world and it knows how to make great games. It proved that with Mario Kart, and it will prove that again with Super Smash,” he said.

Nintendo is planning on bringing a few mature-themed experiences to the Wii U, judging by its picking up of Platinum Games’ action-packed Bayonetta 2, which is coming but doesn’t have a release date yet. However, it’s still focusing primarily on families, and that may be one of the reasons why games such as Tom Clancy’s Splinter Cell Blacklist and Assassin’s Creed IV: Black Flag just don’t sell for the console.

GamesIndustry International’s Rob Fahey laid out what Nintendo needs to do in a detailed editorial, talking about how Nintendo needs to focus to make the Wii U shine, even if its on its own. “Core gamers buy a Nintendo console as a second device because they want access to Nintendo exclusive titles, primarily first-party games,” said Fahey.

“Nintendo needs to find a solution to its current woes which actually suits Nintendo; something which leverages all the things the company is good at.”

The company has a pretty good line-up going into Christmas, with Hyrule Warriors set to launch on September 26, and Bayonetta 2 and Super Smash Bros. due for release before year’s end, pending any delays. Still, it will take some time before we see if the Wii U can pull through or not. The system is still fairly expensive, and customers have plenty of alternatives these days for platforms that can play games.

On the bright side, there’s always Mario Kart 8, which has sold quite a few units since its release, and continues to be a big mover and shaker.

Source: GamesIndustry International