Are Games the Future of Facebook?
Posted by Nick O'Neill on February 19th, 2008 11:00 AMIn the spirit of the Game Developers Conference taking place this week in San Francisco, I figured I would touch on the subject since the biggest buzz at the event revolves around “social gaming.” Ultimately, playing games with your friends is nothing new. People have been playing MMORGs (massively multiplayer online roleplaying games) for a while now and XBOX Live is not exactly the freshest gaming platform out there right now.
While not social gaming may not be a foreign concept for many, playing games on Facebook is becoming an increasingly popular past time. The primary selling factor is that you can easily connect with your friends for a quick game of Scrabble or Texas Hold’em and there is very little time requirements. Best of all it’s primarily our friends that we’re competing with. This is in comparison to sites like Kongregate that provide aspects of social gaming but the users you play against may not necessarily be your friends.
If you take a look at the most popular applications on Facebook you will notice that all the top developers are building either gaming or dating applications and any other top apps are simply an expression of self-identity. So do you think Facebook is going to become the next hot gaming platform or will the users simply go to the next cool thing? Many of these games remind me of a more flashy version of the original Yahoo! Games.
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February 19th, 2008 at 10:55 am
I've been saying this since the start, but it's possible the Facebook Platform becomes nothing more than a gaming platform.
I don't think it's decided yet, but that's not such a bad “worst case scenario.”
Here's what would be even more funny. Tech-heads like to pretend people adopt technologies because they're “better” or “more open,” so lots of people are pushing OpenSocial and related technologies.
What if it's the cross-platform game platforms that are what ultimately bring all the social networks closer to interoperability? e.g., I want to log into Facebook and see my high scores from Bebo, damnit!
February 19th, 2008 at 11:55 am
I’ve been saying this since the start, but it’s possible the Facebook Platform becomes nothing more than a gaming platform.
I don’t think it’s decided yet, but that’s not such a bad “worst case scenario.”
Here’s what would be even more funny. Tech-heads like to pretend people adopt technologies because they’re “better” or “more open,” so lots of people are pushing OpenSocial and related technologies.
What if it’s the cross-platform game platforms that are what ultimately bring all the social networks closer to interoperability? e.g., I want to log into Facebook and see my high scores from Bebo, damnit!
February 19th, 2008 at 2:48 pm
Yes, they are the future and I posted on that at my blog a few weeks ago.
However, where I would extend that is to games like Live Gifts. Even though they aren't traditionally an embeded flash game, they are simulations like The Sims and Sim City…which out sell traditional games.
February 19th, 2008 at 3:48 pm
Yes, they are the future and I posted on that at my blog a few weeks ago.
However, where I would extend that is to games like Live Gifts. Even though they aren’t traditionally an embeded flash game, they are simulations like The Sims and Sim City…which out sell traditional games.
February 20th, 2008 at 1:00 am
They're very probably a major part of FB's future, but not it's end-game as a platform/product. But they'll be big - especially since, in the words of Chris Crawford, “Games are frequently used (especially by adults) as social lubricants. The game itself is of minor importance to the players; its real significance is its function as a focus around which an evening of socializing will be built.”
Social networks are perfect places for this to occur; I expect to see more games built for FB and the other social nets that serve this particular motivitation to play.
Customers could give a damn about what technology is better, or what's “more open”. Customers go with what they feel is better. If it feels good, it is good; cool games feel good, and perhaps cool games across networks feel even better.
We'll see , and probably soon, with the recently announced initiatives by Zynga and SGN.
February 20th, 2008 at 2:00 am
They’re very probably a major part of FB’s future, but not it’s end-game as a platform/product. But they’ll be big - especially since, in the words of Chris Crawford, “Games are frequently used (especially by adults) as social lubricants. The game itself is of minor importance to the players; its real significance is its function as a focus around which an evening of socializing will be built.”
Social networks are perfect places for this to occur; I expect to see more games built for FB and the other social nets that serve this particular motivitation to play.
Customers could give a damn about what technology is better, or what’s “more open”. Customers go with what they feel is better. If it feels good, it is good; cool games feel good, and perhaps cool games across networks feel even better.
We’ll see , and probably soon, with the recently announced initiatives by Zynga and SGN.
October 14th, 2008 at 12:04 pm
Nice write up and blog , Thanks for sharing all those good info
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Moris
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October 30th, 2008 at 12:56 pm
Honestly I would not be that interested to join facebook if not for their game applications…I do have my friendster and can’t even handle that well…I hardly visit my friendster account because it was so time consuming for me to do some stuff updating it….but I do have plenty of time for playing lol….and so when I learned about facebooks various game application accepted my friends requests and signed up immediately….luckily I found this amazing game http://apps.facebook.com/realmofempires and I’m getting a little addicted now…I am still exploring the game and hopefully try on other games available in facebook as well
November 9th, 2008 at 4:40 am
I think I will have to agree on this. That is one of the greatest factors to have made them famous today. They have all this fun games to suit everyone’s taste.
November 16th, 2008 at 10:07 am
as i get to explore more and more on this site, i find lots of interesting stuffs. actually, i really am looking forward more on their gaming features. i think it is really cool. i hope this site would soon gain more popularity as it deserves to be. their gaming features would definitely be one of their best assets.