Creativity and Tension

The industry has to date under gone a licensing frenzy, whereby the mobile rights to any intellectual property, whether it be licensing a console game to the mobile platform, a sports personality or other media property, have been in demand and commanding exceptionally high fees.

This flood of licenses to market has put a particular strain on the creative side, since a game for mobile must always be built from the ground up, regardless of what code and assets are available, and then must also meet the rigid approvals processes of the licensor. It is also a double-edged sword for sales because whilst a branded title is easier to sell into the distribution channels, they are also tasked with re-couping the investment in the license, taking into account a percentage of revenues go to the licensor’s product.

The trend of needing a brand to attach to a title is on the wane and what is increasingly becoming important is the quality of screen shots that show off a game and quite simply the name of a game – particularly in Europe where local languages and culture can impact on the appeal of the game.

That original IP is now back in vogue not only means that development and licensing costs are in theory curtailed, but the knock on effect means that potentially games can become individual experiments as opposed to products which investors are literally banking on. This clearly is not quite the case as relatively immature publishers continue to battle for their ground in this fledgling industry.