Filling the need for Immediacy

The latest NPD numbers are out, and aside from Guitar Hero 3 selling best on the Wii out of the next-gen consoles, the response to Nintendo's lack of units has been the most interesting piece of information. From Gamasutra:

Nintendo has upped worldwide production of the Wii to 1.8 million systems per month, twice as much as at the console's launch. "We’ll keep production at that level for quite a while," said Fils-Aime

The first part of the statement is something we already knew. The second part is fascinating.

Nintendo is getting a black eye in the media for not having enough consoles available. This is a problem of immediacy. People want the consoles now. Now it's Christmas. Now I will buy.

There aren't any consoles right now, but based on the statement from Fils-Aime, there will be...oh boy will there be!

Let's think about that 1.8 million number a moment. It's huge. That essentially means 800,000+ Wiis will be brought to the US every month until they lower production. It takes time and money to take factories off line, so it seems unlikely that Nintendo would stop the number any early than March.

If that is the case, there will be a minimum 2.4 million Wiis delivered to US stores during the first Quarter of 2008. (Another 3 million would be split between Japan and Europe!) I only have numbers back to 2001, but can you guess what the highest US sell through of any console ever was for Jan-March?

1.3 million PS2s in 2002. So the Wii is expecting, essentially to nearly double the best sales ever. Stop and think about that for a minute. The PS2 is the all-time best-selling console and the Wii expects to nearly double the best Q1 sales the PS2 had...ever...

At some point, a Nintendo executive saw those numbers and freaked out, leading to the raincheck program with Gamestop. As well as the Wii is selling, these numbers, if they happen are beyond anything the industry could ever dream of.

Of course what got the Wii in this predicament was selling so many consoles all year that no substantial Christmas stock could be built up. It's a great predicament to be in, but it's got to make Nintendo nervous to have so many consoles coming through the pipeline. They keep trying to get it through everyone's head how many they are making, but the message isn't getting through because people don't have Wiis in front of them. However, in the very near future, the understanding of what 1.8 million Wiis per month means is going to become abudantly clear.

While there are no Wiis right now, and Christmas shoppers are going nuts in frustration, Nintendo has to be eyeing the future with a lot of careful consideration. They don't want a million extra units sitting on store shelves come April. If you run these figures forward just 3 months (imagine 6 months!?) Wii sales will have to be beyond the wildest dream of every video game company ever just to keep up with supply.

And the scary thing is (or the wonderful thing if you are making software for the thing) the Wii might just do it.

Who are casual gamers?

Great article from the Seattle Post-Intelligencer today: http://seattlepi.nwsource.com/videogames/342095_casualgames.html.

The first part of the article talks about how Seattle is where much of the casual games industry is found, which is interesting, but doesn't lead to any additional insight. The second half of the article is out-standing, with some insights into what casual gamers are looking for out of a casual game, which is quite interesting and should lead to a lot of additional thought.

I play games to relax. I don't crave the adrenaline rush of fighting my way across the universe. Getting chased or shot at makes me nervous and I just don't find it very fun. With casual games I can just relax at the end of a long day

What a great quote. It encapsulates what a lot of the casual games industry already knows about casual gamers in a very easy to understand way. Many casual gamers play because the like to relax and they find games that put them in danger as not relaxing.

This is one of the reasons that shooters from Space Invaders to Halo don't do well with casual gamers. Many casual gamers simply don't enjoy the emotions created from the games that historically has been the key to growth in the console market. (and it's probably why some core gamers seem to struggle to comprehend casual gamers)

Another quote, this one directly related to Hidden Object games:

It still makes you think a little. You follow a theme or an idea to its conclusion. It makes you wonder. It's like reading a mystery novel. A third of the way in, you want to read the last chapter, but you can't until you work your way through it. You never know when it's going to end

Another great encapsulation. Players looking for 'wonder' and wanting to take a theme to its conclusion. Notice there was not mention of finding objects, but there was mention of having to think. What the player is noticing is the story and the progression and the way they feel in response. Hidden Object games are quite interesting as they may be some of the best pure story-telling opportunities in gaming today. (this is especially true if your story is a mystery)

I see often remarks belittling casual gamers as they play multiple Hidden Object, Match 3 or other common casual game types. Many people seem to think that it is bad for the industry and negative for the people to be playing games that are so similar. They may be right.

However as an alternative, perhaps we should consider casual games are the first successful episodic games. (Sam & Max coming in close behind)

Perhaps casual gamers are simply looking at the different games as different episodes where the key framework, the game mechanic, stays unchanged. Each different game may feel more like another episode of the same TV series than a different series. The close similarity between the games may be helping this belief along.

In any event I find the many arguments towards either gamers in the casual space being somehow mentally behind or casual game companies forcing cloned games on gamers to lack much of an intellectual punch (though they create some wonderful emotional arguments). Clearly as a group, casual gamers are driven by a different set of gaming desires than the typical console gamer, and that isn't a bad thing. Learning what is driving the choices, I think, is a fascinating bit of understanding that has yet to be fully grasped.

Paying the Messenger...er distributor

Thought this post from Seth Godin was particularly interesting and have wanted to share it for a week or so.

http://sethgodin.typepad.com/seths_blog/2007/11/who-pays-the-me.html

It talks about retail, where the last mile, getting your good or service to the consumer:

accounts for the bulk of the cost of the service or good being sold.
Retailers get half. Insurance people get commissions. Distributors make their share.

In the downloadable distribution model of games, we run into the same issue. After making the game, how do you get it to consumers? Though it seems like the Internet should solve this issue and make it easy to find people to buy, the sheer amount of information on the Internet makes finding customers as difficult as it was in retail. (which, btw, is why casual game portals can give developers a 25-40% of the revenue and keep 60-75% for themselves)

Seth addressed this point and should get you thinking about a solution:

If you're not going to plan on paying the messenger, your offering better be so remarkable and have such a viral story that your investment in product eliminates the need for media and sales.

Many Indie game developers start out with the idea that they can simply make their game and that people will naturally pass it on. Viral marketing is really hard. There are very few products that are viral. Expecting your product to be viral is probably not the best approach.

What is the best approach?

That depends on you and your product. At the Game Developer's Conference in March of this year I did a session on marketing Indie games. I suggested that developers should use the portals, and abuse the portals by placing things in their games such as level editors and obvious, but obscured secrets, that would cause players to go out looking for the developer's own website. Over time, you can build an audience that comes directly to you.

NPD - Spin it good

A goal of marketing is to control the message. I found the messages near the NPD October results particularly interesting.

• Microsoft's Message - You may have sold more, but our stuff sold for more money. Therefore we are king. (Just overlook the fact that all 360 stuff costs more, hence the higher gross...)
• Sony's Message - October was bad, but it's also in the past. Forget the past, live in the present. Right now, we are king. (which of course we can't confirm, and that is kind of the point)
• Nintendo's Message - We're selling as many consoles as ship to retail. (...but note, they aren't shipping all the consoles to retail! They state they're making 1.8 million consoles per month. NA 520k + Europe 500k + Japan 150k = 1170k. Where are the other 630k? Not in Australia! Guaranteed they are in a warehouse, being held until the holidays to ensure that Nintendo is the top selling console for December in NA, instead of coming in second b/c it didn't have enough units to sell. There is no spin like a spin you are preparing for two months in advance.)

So coming out of the NPD spin did you get spun?

Sales data and Top 10 Lists

Recently the NPD had stated that they would no longer be providing their estimates of hardware and software sales to the media, which meant that the public wouldn't be seeing them. The public was outraged and NPD was surprised by the widespread backlash.

This phenomenon is really quite interesting. After all, if you've already bought a Wii or X360, why should you care how many are selling each month? What difference does it make when you've already made your purchase?

In July of this year I did a compilation of 3 years worth of GameTunnel's monthly round-up, creating a Top 100 games list based on the round-ups. In addition to learning that most people don't actually read an article before responding to it, doing the top 100 compilation reinforced something I'd already learned through my Game of the Year articles, people need context.

Each year GameTunnel has done a game of the year article highlighting the Top 10 Indie games. It's an impossible task that cannot possibly please everyone and will even leave some people indignant. Doing the Game of the Year awards takes around 160 hours of my time every December. So why am I doing it again?

If you go to the listing of Action games on GameTunnel, you are quick to become overloaded. There are so many games! Which ones are good?

This is the problem of context.

There has been some decrying of review scores lately and I agree with the complaints. In fact GT did away with review scores 3 years ago. However, I'm not sure that not having review scores helps the general public.

The general public needs some sort of context to make decisions or the decision will be to do something else with their time and money. Looking at the list of Action games on GameTunnel, you should be able to find a game you will absolutely love. However, due to the fact that you have no context to compare the games one to another, you are more likely to become overwhelmed by the sheer number of games and quickly move onto somewhere else where there is context.

The GOTY awards for GT provide context. Though impossible to make the perfect list of top games, it provides a list of games that are considered to be the best. It's a starting point. It gives the reader a context to work within. It keeps people from feeling overwhelmed by the available choices and gives them direction.

NPD data also provides direction. Though the blog commenters who complained about not having the data have already purchased hardware and software, most of them are trying to put their purchases into context. Are they a part of the majority? Are they missing out on something? There is a secondary issue of the comfort of the majority, but the primary issue is context.

If you make games, what is the context that will get people to notice them? Nintendo used alpha moms to make the Wii more relevant and a brilliant pack-in game. Mystery Case Files launched a new game this week that is more of the same, but more polished. However, the brand gives context and makes the game have tremendous value that it wouldn't have had if it had been released as a MCF game. Jay Barnson runs a blog about RPGs and development and sells games he recommends alongside the blog.

Indie and casual games both face a low awareness and struggle in having the right context for the customer. How to help customers find quickly find something so they don't leave, and so that they also add the vendor's website to the small list of sites they visit frequently.

How are you providing context to what you are doing? How are you helping your customers find things for them? If you aren't doing it, be assured someone else is.