[casual_games] RE: Business models

[Margaret Wallace]

One pervasive trend I see in the Casual Games market is that production
budgets are continuously going up and so are production cycles  --  but
the "churn rate" for the majority of casual games on portals is higher
than ever: a week or two at best. 
 
All of this leads me to question: At what point do you see minimizing
returns for these hefty production budgets and development cycles? 
 
Of course, part of the answer lies in continuously churning out hit
games, however, I worry these conditions may impede growth and
innovation. 
 
Thoughts?
 
 
-----Original Message-----
From: casual_games-bounces at igda.org
[mailto:casual_games-bounces at igda.org] On Behalf Of Allen Varney
Sent: Thursday, September 01, 2005 9:14 AM
To: casual_games at igda.org
Subject: [casual_games] RE: Business models
 
Brent Lowrie wrote:
 
   (((This is the unknown that most new developers fear and having
access to this sort of information would help more new developers break
out of indie development and into commercial deals.)))
 
   "Break out of indie development"? This makes indie gaming sound like
a second-string, minor-league affair. I argue indie game developers are
in a far better situation, both economically and culturally, than the
increasingly beleaguered developer of retail computer games.
   For a discussion of the benighted state of retail game development,
see Greg Costikyan's article in the current issue of The Escapist
magazine:
 
   http://www.escapistmagazine.com/issue/8/3
 
   And to see why I think casual-game designers are far better off in
the long run, see my article "Casual Fortunes" in the same issue:
 
  http://www.escapistmagazine.com/issue/8/14
 
-- Allen Varney
www.allenvarney.com <http://www.allenvarney.com/> 
-------------- next part --------------
An HTML attachment was scrubbed...
URL: http://seven.pairlist.net/pipermail/casual_games/attachments/20050901/bf42f549/attachment.html