‘Flappy Bird’ To Become An Arcade Game

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If you thought the Flappy Bird craze, that consumed the lives of almost all mobile gamers (at least at some point) was finally coming to an end, you were wrong. Arcade Company Bay Tek Games has now decided to allow gamers to play on a giant display by introducing the first coin-operated Flappy Bird arcade cabinet.

According to Mashable, the arcade cabinet is 300 pounds, 91 inches tall and features a 42-inch portrait screen along with a big red button that players use to keep the Flappy Bird flapping. The cabinet is coin-operated and will dispense a certain number of tickets depending on how far you get. The game will also keep track of daily high scores and all-time high scores

Bay Tek Games’ website makes clear that this is a licensed game and that all trademarks were used with permission; the arcade cabinet includes Dong Nguyen’s (the developer of Flappy Bird) company name, Gears, on the Flappy Bird sign, which sits above the giant screen.

Bay Tek has no listed price for the Flappy Bird arcade cabinet as of yet.

Influencer Brand Deals: The New Celebrity Endorsements?

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The age of social media has given rise to a unique class of new celebrities, each rising to fame in ways impossible before sites like YouTube, Vine, and Instagram existed. Brands eager to remain relevant have co-opted these social stars’ followings for sponsored content, hoping to drive sales from a new generation of consumers.

Now, as their one-off influencer campaigns rack up great engagement figures, some brands are considering signing Internet celebrities to long-term endorsement deals.

Dick’s Sporting Goods, emboldened by a holiday campaign featuring a dozen such influencers that generated well over 27 million impressions, is considering bringing those same faces back from a year-long campaign instead of finding new social stars. “It’s not just one and done — it’s a relationship that we’ve developed with social media influencers,” said Dick’s senior digital director Jay Basnight.

Old Navy, on the other hand, is taking a different tack to its influencer campaigns.

Instead of using the same cast of social stars they’d used for a summer campaign, the Gap-owned clothing chain brought a new roster of Vine influencers on board for a winter promotion that brought them 6,600 Vine followers and 84,000 engagements.

Taylor Bux, Old Navy director of digital and social, said the company used new stars so as to make their spots look like something more organic than simple paid placement. “We don’t want to be overly disruptive, so we’re not pushing a commercial message first.”

Skeptics worry whether influencers have the same sort of staying power traditional celebrities command, as they are known for rising and falling with the increasingly fickle tastes of their mobile-first audiences. “The speed at which these influencers are rising and falling is very quick,” stated Upshot senior vice president of interactive marketing and analytics Dan Swartz.

It’s clear that influencers, as obvious of a successor to traditional celebrities as they may seem to be, still stand in reasonably uncharted territory. If Dick’s gambit pays off, other brands might follow, paving the way for groundbreaking new endorsement deals.

SteelSeries Exec Explains How Eye Tracking Will Enhance ESports

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At CES 2015, video game peripheral company SteelSeries and eye tracking company Tobii unveiled the Sentry. Available now for $200, the Sentry rests on a keyboard and tracks the eye movement of the PC gamer. Some of the top gaming streamers from Twitch were at the SteelSeries suite at The Cosmopolitan hotel and casino, showing off the overlay that allows fans to see exactly what pro gamers are seeing when they play titles like Counter-Strike: GO, DOTA 2 and League of Legends.

Jamie Kieffer, Chief Marketing Officer of SteelSeriesJamie Kieffer, Chief Marketing Officer of SteelSeries

The Sentry also brings emerging professional-level players an entirely new way to train for competitive gaming, by allowing the player to analyze a wide range of statistics based on where and how long he focused, or fixated, on different parts of the screen during gameplay. But that’s just the beginning of the device’s potential, given the number of game developers currently working on games using the $95 Tobii and SteelSeries SDK. Jamie Kieffer, Chief Marketing Officer of SteelSeries, discusses the present and future potential of eye tracking in games in this exclusive interview.

Can you explain how eye tracking works?

As complicated as the underlying technology is, it’s amazingly simple and intuitive to use. The three infrared sensors and camera onboard the Sentry track your eye movements while you play. This simple data can be manipulated in a number of ways. For streamers, their viewers can now watch their gaming sessions and see in real time where the streamer is looking. This provides a new level of insight into gaming strategy — where you look has a lot to do with how you perform. It brings streamers one step closer to their loyal followers.

How can gamers benefit from this technology?

For gamers, the Sentry provides not only a new view for their game replays, but also allows us to capture and report on a lot of key metrics — fixations per minute, percent of time spent in key regions of the gaming screen, etc.  By tracking these stats over time and benchmarking against their peers, the data from the Sentry can help gamers set goals for their performance and make real measurable breakthroughs in training.

What else do you see eye tracking opening up?

Ultimately, the possibilities are endless once your computer knows where your eyes are looking. We are working closely with developers to explore opportunities for in-game control using the Sentry, and will have much more news on these opportunities throughout 2015.

How do you see eSports fans using the Sentry?

Sentry is a great training aid for the gamer. For the first time ever, gamers can track their eye movements and measure their performance over time and against competitors. The Sentry tracks fixations per minute — essentially an efficiency measure that tracks how many things a gamer’s eyes perceive in a minute’s time.  It also tracks time spent in key areas of the screen — while these are very different from game to game, this data can be incredibly specific and valuable. Are you looking frequently enough at the mini-map in Dota 2 Spending too much time obsessed with your cool down meters in World of WarCraft Track these key stats and train to improve your performance.

Apart from that, a lot of pro gamers also spend a considerable amount of time streaming and discussing their game strategies with their fan bases. The Sentry allows them to provide an entirely new angle for their viewers, tightening the connection between pros and their greatest fans.

What differentiates your Sentry technology from some of the other eye tracking tech at CES?

First off, it’s the first consumer eye tracking device in the world. Quite simply, it’s a world-beating combination of the best eye tracking technology, overlaid with the greatest gaming insight. And a ton of development effort.

First, we partnered with Tobii, who we believe is the undisputed world leader with the greatest track record in innovation in eye tracking technology. Second, we have spent over a year working closely with them to optimize the experience — and the data we collect — for the needs of the streamer and gamer. Everything from the gaze overlay tool to the user interface to the charts and graphs we use to report data has been tested and validated by our stable of pro gamers and our partners in the streaming space.

So we started with the best tools, partnered with the smartest experts, and did everything in true service to the streamer and the gamer.

Why did you decide to focus on the eSports audience for this technology?

A few reasons. They are passionate about their PC usage and the games they play. They are explorers and experimenters, who love to try new methods and technologies to better realize that passion.

They are inherently a “sharing” community, looking to explore new technologies and to share their streams, their gaze data, their stats with each other and their fans.

And, of course, they are the audience that SteelSeries been has obsessed with since our founding. It’s a perfect fit with our mission of making gear to fundamentally improve the gaming experience.

How big an audience is there for this technology given the popularity of eSports and Twitch?

We think it’s massive. ESports is global. It is growing at around 20-30 percent per year. Its fans are passionate and dedicated. There are hundreds of millions of them and it is not uncommon for players to spend 30-40 hours a week committed to their passion.

More than any device, the Sentry impacts all parts of gaming. It makes streaming much more interesting to watch. It helps competitive gamers train and improve their performance. And it will help innovative developers create new methods for immersing gamers more fully into their worlds.

How far away are we from allowing gamers to actually play via eye tracking (What type of developer support would be needed )?

Not far at all. In partnership with Tobii, we have had development kits in the industry for well over a year. At CES this year, we are showing a number of immersive gaming experiences already developed — all of which show the true power and potential of the game. We are working very closely with major development studios and we anticipate some major announcements on this front in the very near future.

Azubu Holds ‘Best Zed North America Tournament’ For Charity

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ESports broadcaster Azubu is set to start the weekend off with a bang for fans of League of Legends everywhere.

The Best Zed North America Tournament will feature 32 of North America’s premiere League of Legends players showing off their best moves in a bracketed tournament, each fighting for tons of cool prizes and the right to declare themselves the best Zed, Master of Shadows, in North America. Players will play for either Extra Life or The Humane Society of the United States, making the tournament a surefire win-win for gamers and charity alike.

A formal announcement about the tournament can be found on Azubu’s News page; viewers looking to donate to the Humane Society or Extra Life should visit Azubu’s PayPal page for more information.

January Events: What Marketers Need to Know

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While you’re setting up your plans for the year, the relentless approach of industry events is almost upon us. Fortunately, this month is lighter than most when it comes to events that marketers should consider, but it’s never too early to begin your planning. We’ve already had the first major show of the year, the Consumer Electronics Show in Las Vegas, and if you want to avoid being caught by surprise by the next event, the [a]listdaily has got you covered. Let’s take a look at what’s coming up for the rest of January, and provide some general advice on planning event attendance for the year.

Keep an eye on the [a]listdaily‘s Events tab on the right-hand side of the front page, lower down. That will keep you updated on the upcoming events.

Event Planning for 2015

January is a slow month for events, but that makes it the perfect time for marketers to take a little time to consider what’s coming up this year and how to maximize your benefits and minimize the time and expenses. There are more events in more places than you can possibly attend, so it’s time to pick and choose. Planning in advance helps you line up the best rates for hotels, as well as the best prices for travel.

When you evaluate what events to attend, think about all the different things an event can provide for you — and not just what’s listed on the web site. One of the key reasons to attend many of these events is the opportunity for networking, deal-making, and creating or cementing relationships in the industry. Look at who’s attending and see if that’s a group you’d like to work with, sell to or learn from. Smaller events are best for this — something the size of CES or Gamescom makes meeting the right people difficult unless you arrange something ahead of time.

One thing to keep in mind as you look at the show calendar is planning your own vacations. Many of the industry events take place in locations well worthy of a vacation, and if you can tack on some vacation days after a show you’ll be saving some money. If you’re really attending an event, you won’t have any time during it to see the sights or try out some of the experiences offered by the city you’re in. Can you really say you’ve been to a city if all you’ve seen is the airport and a convention facility Maybe your significant other would like to join you when you visit someplace interesting . . . Keep that in mind as you look over the events for the year.

NATPE

The National Association of Television Program Executives, NATPE, is the place for the movers and shakers in the television business to get together and listen to speakers such as Jay Leno, Netflix Chief Content Officer Ted Sarandos and Breaking Bad creator Vince Gilligan. It also has a dedicated track called “Master of Marketing” featuring top CMOs from PepsiCo, Chipotle, Unilever, L’Oreal and Mastercard plus media buyers talking about the future of video advertising and branded entertainment.

The show is especially important this year as the whole nature of video is changing, and the schedule shows plenty of sessions where you can hear thought leaders debating how the future of video will unfold. YouTube and Vine are discussed right along with new platforms, distribution, and business models for traditional television programming. The show takes place from January 20 through January 22 in Miami, and it includes an exhibit space as well as a full program track. If you are involved with video creation, production, marketing and monetization in any way, this show should be extremely useful.

PAX South

The Penny Arcade Expo South is debuting this month in San Antonio, Texas, extending the PAX brand to a new region following the success of the original PAX in Seattle, PAX East in Boston, and PAX Australia in Melbourne. This show is aimed at game players of all types, from the traditional tabletop games (which are changing rapidly) to the latest in mobile games, with plenty of PC and console games along the way. This is the first time for PAX in San Antonio, and it looks like it will be an excellent place to connect with gamers. The show takes place January 23 through 25 at the Henry B. Gonzalez Convention Center in the middle of San Antonio.

Many game companies will be exhibiting at PAX South, and it’s a terrific spot to test out new game concepts and build some excitement for upcoming games. Savvy marketers will be seeing what attracts the most interest at the show, and taking notes on which booth displays work and which don’t. When you walk the exhibit area, note where the biggest crowds are — and find out what’s drawing them in. There may be some good ideas for you to use with your own products.

The PAX South show is the first consumer event of the year, and as such it will be an interesting guide to what the most core gamers are interested in for the year ahead. There will no doubt be some news announced at the show, and plenty of new game trailers will appear. There will also be a number of talks and presentations covering all aspects of gaming, and it’s often useful to note which are drawing the biggest crowds. Think of PAX South as a giant focus group, giving you insight into what gamers in this region are playing and what they like — and don’t like.

While you’re there, take some time to enjoy San Antonio and its delightful Riverwalk, and all of the fantastic restaurants you’ll find in the area. You’ll need a break from the crowds at the show!

‘Call of Duty’ Championship Offers Big Money; Bolsters ESports

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With last year’s tournament being an eminent success, Activision (per an official announcement on Xbox Wire) has gone ahead and announced a 2015 Call of Duty Championship, which will take place on March 27-29th in Los Angeles, California. The tournament promises to be a big boost for eSports in general and especially for console-based eSports, offering over $1 million in prizes for prospective teams.

The tournament will focus on multiplayer sessions featuring the newly released Call of Duty: Advanced Warfare, with a total of 32 teams from around the world battling to become World Champions.

The qualifying events for the tournament are set to be broadcast online through Xbox One consoles, while the final round of the Call of Duty Championship will be available both on Xbox Live and other networks.

With it, Activision hopes to “boost eSports to new heights,” beyond the same level that it produced with last year’s championship. “We developed Advanced Warfare with the competitive community in mind, and we can’t wait for the top talent from around the world to compete in the Call of Duty Championships,” said Sledgehammer co-founder Glen Schofield. (Sledgehammer Games is the developer behind Advanced Warfare.)

What’s more, the tournament isn’t exclusive to top-tier players. Anyone can enter and try their luck with it, whether they’re amateurs or professionals. This is a nice change from pace from usual tournaments that focus more on top-tier players. Those that are interested in applying can do so over on the official website.

The official trailer for the tournament is below, and really shows you how hyped up it has become in just a short amount of time, with thousands in attendance (and watching online) as players go all out in full-blown competition.

“From Day 1, the team at Sledgehammer Games set out to bring a new way to play Call of Duty multiplayer to fans. We couldn’t be more thrilled of how the competitive community has embraced and mastered the new player movements and game modes of Advanced Warfare,” said Michael Condrey, co-founder and studio head, Sledgehammer Games. “This is posed to be one of the most exciting Call of Duty competitive seasons, with the Call of Duty Championship presented by Xbox being one of the best eSports tournaments of the year.”

More information on the tournament can be found on the official page.

 

Bring The Popcorn: Twitch To Host Online Movie Nights

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Twitch is an ideal service when it comes to broadcasting gameplay sessions and other live events that amass a huge following by gamers and other audience members everywhere. For the next six weeks, however, it’ll become an online movie house.

Per an announcement on the company’s blog, the streaming channel is teaming up with Austin-based game publisher Devolver Digital to host an online movie event, with new films based around the game industry premiering every Friday, for audiences everywhere to see – free of charge.

Starting today and running through February 20th, Twitch will be host to such films as Stream Dream, Pixel Poetry, Angry Video Game Nerd: The Movie, Gaming In Color and Super Game Jam: The Movie, with a sixth film to be announced before February 20th.

In addition to the film, filmmakers will also be on the channel, live chatting with the hosts and interacting with the audience.

“Twitch represents a new frontier for filmmakers looking to connect with an audience who is passionate about video game culture,” said Ben Goldhaber, director of content marketing for Twitch. “Devolver Digital is the perfect example of a studio who understands the appeal of Twitch’s social video format by both documenting our brand in Stream Dream and scheduling broadcasts of half a dozen gaming films on our platforms.”

The films will premiere every Friday around 2:15 PM PST over on the main Twitch channel. The movies will also be made available for rental and download on several video-on-demand platforms, including Amazon, Google Play, PlayStation, Xbox and Vimeo On Demand.

Those looking to get a better perspective of online game culture – or just want to kick back and have fun with video game-related content – would be wise to catch these films in action. In addition, viewers can also learn a thing or two from the filmmakers as well.

Google Outlines Three Trends For Marketers To Watch

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Marketers are always on the lookout for hot new trends to help boost their business, and with a new year kicking into high gear, it always helps to know the “hot” ones that will lead business for the next few months. With that, Think With Google has published a report that indicates the three top tech trends that companies should keep an eye on this year.

The three trends in general are Connected Life Platforms Are Emerging, Mobile Shapes the “Internet of Me” and The Speed of Life Gets Even Faster. While those sound a bit general, they break down more specifically below . . .

Connected Life Platforms Are Emerging


According to the report, “the ‘Internet of Things’ is officially a thing. As devices proliferate and start to work together, connected objects will become platforms for your life. They’ll help you with the things you do every day — from entertainment to driving to taking care of your home.” The searches for this method have increased by two and a half times since December 2013, with an even larger growth by three times the number of searches with the health-conscious.

Mobile Shapes the “Internet of Me”


According to Think With Google, “your smartphone is getting smarter. As the hub for all these connected platforms, it can use lots of data to create better, personalized experiences. The ‘Internet of Things’ is becoming an ‘Internet of me’ — all to simplify your life.”

With 1.3 billion smartphone shipping globally in 2014 and 151 minutes per day spent on mobile devices (more than TV or laptops, according to Millward Brown), they’re certainly becoming more of a personable technology.

The Speed of Life Gets Even Faster


From the report, “Online or off, we can now get information, entertainment and services in the exact moment we want them. These quick moments of decision making happen constantly — and the more connected we are, the more they’ll happen.”

Devices like built-in cameras on smartphones and lightweight HD cameras make it easier to capture “moments” in users’ daily lives, and searches for these devices grew greatly over the last year. Drone services estimated a sharp 270 percent growth overall, while 4K was close behind with 142 percent, compact was up 42 percent, and HD was close behind with 25 percent — not too shabby compared to 2013’s numbers.Â

Drones have also been a huge draw with videos, as over 800,000 hours of clips made by them were watched on YouTube during November 2014, and their search numbers grew larger, 2.6 times greater than in the previous year, according to Google Data.

Gaming’s First Robots Push STEM Education, Too

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It’s always fun to interact with games of some sort, whether you’re playing them digitally on a console or PC, or using real objects to get into a good match with your opponent. Very rarely, though, do you see ones made merely for the sake of education, although they can still be entertaining.

That’s certainly the case with the Mecha Monsters, a new toy being produced by UK-based startup tech company Reach Robotics. Led by Silas Adekunle, this robot gaming system enables players to battle against one another, using voice commands given through a connected smartphone app.

As revealed by Robotics Today, the machines are actually able to learn and grow as they fight, working their way through a pre-programmed web-based universe. As players progress with them, they can earn new customizations, being able to add items like shields and additional skills that become unlocked over time.

Where the education part comes into play is with dual-level developers’ software, which not only provides endless opportunities for players, but also devoted programmers who want to adapt the behavior of their robots even further. Using STEM (Science, Technology, Engineering, and Mathematics) education, they provide an easy way to learn more about robotics in general, as well as coding and mechanics for up-and-coming inventors and experienced builders alike, all through the convenience of the app.

“Although they are very fun to play, they are also an easy and accessible gateway into learning about robotics,” said Adekunle. “When you’re done playing with our robots, you can use our developer software to start creating custom motions. It’s a simple way to try out coding and see it play out in real life.”

The product recently won People’s Choice runner-up at the Pitch@Palace showcase, and the team is hard at work preparing a prototype for a mass-market production sometime this year.

“Before we can make a lasting impression on people through exposure to STEM and robotics, we first need to capture their imaginations,” said Adekunle. “We’ve created a product that combines entertainment and education, but we know that the journey to bring it to life is difficult.”

The Mecha Monsters can be seen in action in the video below.

mNectar Playable Ads Get Integrated

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Creating mobile ads is one thing, but creating effective mobile ads is quite another, especially for mobile games. Ads that interrupt a user are worse than useless, but ads that users actively want to engage are another thing entirely. According to Pocket Gamer, interactive ad company mNectar has made it easier than ever by integrating its functional ads into several of the most popular platforms, including Twitter.

mNectar’s streaming ads mean that users can try out a game or other mobile app without having to go through the hassle of a download, as we detailed in this interview with the CEO last year. Now, the company’s services have become integrated with a number of the most popular integration programs, including Twitter, Opera Mediaworks, Fuse Powered and Sprint, which will allow more than 7,000 app publishers to have access to mNectar’s playable ad network. This will allow would-be consumers to try games and apps before they download them to their phones.

Using server-to-server integration and a full-screen display, the ads are an easier way to give users a full app experience, rather than enduring a download or just watching a video of an app in action. Better still, mNectar’s ads don’t require any sort of SDK to implement, making it easy for developers to use the technology in a brief amount of time.

A number of companies have already signed up to use the service, including game publishers like Big Fish, GREE and Zeptolab. This is the latest move by San Francisco-based mNectar, following a fundraising period last July, in which the company successfully raised $7 million in a Series A funding round hosted by New Enterprise Associates.

The video below shows the ad program in action, and although it’s a rather brief clip, it does indicate how effectively it works. No doubt a number of clients should pick up on it as the year rolls along – which will just lead to bigger success for mNectar.

mNectar Playable Demo Video from mNectar on Vimeo.