[arg_discuss] is ARG just a marketing technique to the press?

[Dan Hon]

Just before I left Mind Candy, I spoke at PSFK London on what we were  
planning for season 2 and was able to speak publicly about Mind  
Candy's plans for monetisation and funding of PXC Season 2.

There's a video of the talk here:

http://tinyurl.com/2rc5ck

Dan

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Dan Hon, CEO, Six to Start
{dan at sixtostart.com and +44 7870 600 828}




On 3 Jan 2008, at 15:01, Patrick O'Luanaigh wrote:


> Thanks Mike - very useful.

>

> -----Original Message-----

> From: arg_discuss-bounces at igda.org [mailto:arg_discuss-bounces at igda.org 

> ] On

> Behalf Of Mike Cox

> Sent: 03 January 2008 11:42

> To: arg_discuss at igda.org

> Subject: Re: [arg_discuss] is ARG just a marketing technique to the  

> press?

>

> Hiya Patrick,

>

> A number of other players and I interviewed Michael Smith after Mind  

> Cany

> abandoned plans for season 2 of Perplex City (though looking for it  

> now that

> podcast has gone AWOL along with Perplexorum closing its doors

> http://tinyurl.com/2pk6v9 I'll see if I can track it down again, I  

> think

> there was some interesting information in that) and the model for  

> season 2

> was something that was discussed.  They were to change the model so  

> that the

> cards stood slightly more apart from the ARG, the backs of cards had

> backstory for the ARG, but weren't directly embedded into the game  

> as was

> the case with a number of the season 1 cards.  The revenues for  

> funding the

> ARG would instead come from advertising within the game world,  

> companies

> could advertise their products and services in Perplex City.  The  

> problem

> seemed to be that whilst Mind Candy was regularly approached to make  

> bespoke

> ARGs for companies, convincing them to pay to advertise their brand  

> within

> another brand was tricky.  I remember seeing ads for the BBC on the  

> in game

> newspaper's site, though as they were also involved in Frozen Indigo  

> Angel

> that's not quite the same.

>

> Also of relevance to recent discussions, season 2 was designed to  

> consist of

> short, replayable episodes which would have been a nice test of that

> structure.

>

> Mike

>

>  1. Re: is ARG just a marketing technique to the press?

>>     (Patrick O'Luanaigh)

>>

>>

>> ----------------------------------------------------------------------

>>

>> Message: 1

>> Date: Mon, 31 Dec 2007 08:39:21 -0000

>> From: "Patrick O'Luanaigh" <patrick at ndreams.com>

>> Subject: Re: [arg_discuss] is ARG just a marketing technique to the

>>       press?

>> To: "'Discussion list of the IGDA ARG SIG'" <arg_discuss at igda.org>

>> Message-ID: <000901c84b88$a6680710$51fd28d9 at nDreamsRock>

>> Content-Type: text/plain;       charset="us-ascii"

>>

>> RE: Ian's comments about monetization

>>

>> Does anyone know whether Perplex City broke even and ended up making

>> profit?

>> For me, this was one of the bravest and most creative ARGs I've  

>> seen so

>> far,

>> but I've assumed that because the team didn't go straight into a  

>> sequel,

>> it

>> wasn't the successful monetization that Michael Smith had hoped  

>> for. For

>> me,

>> selling puzzle cards at retail doesn't sound like a monetization  

>> solution

>> that could support more than a few ARGs. My view is that whilst the

>> majority

>> of ARGs remain short, free advertiser-funded promotional vehicles  

>> (despite

>> the best efforts of the creative people behind them) it's going to  

>> be hard

>> to either:

>>

>> a) get more mainstream awareness and recognition for this exciting  

>> area

>> or

>> b) find a monetization model that gets players paying to play in  

>> some form

>>

>> The route that interests my company most is taken from the games  

>> industry,

>> as demonstrated by the superb "KartRider" game from Asia, which is  

>> worth

>> looking into if you haven't heard about it. It's a superb game that  

>> was

>> given away for free, but makes lots of money from micro-transactions;

>> selling small objects, better clothing, modifications for your kart  

>> and so

>> on. The key to this was getting lots of people to play the game  

>> over and

>> over again - once you have a large community playing repeatedly,  

>> then it

>> seems possible to start charging them small amounts to make their

>> experience

>> even better. In this model, the biggest challenges seems to be  

>> creating an

>> ARG that doesn't end after a month or two (not an insurmountable

>> obstacle),

>> and getting the funding to create the game in the first place. Anyone

>> agree/disagree? Has anyone tried the micro-transaction model?

>>

>> Patrick, nDreams

>>

>

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