Wrong Impression

(Sorry for the non gaming blog entry)

Strange. Strange is what you get as an impression of people and the world when reading social media and the news sites. While news sites are prone to optimizing visitors and throw ads and click bait headlines at you the impression is still that the world is in a bad shape. A very bad. Some people even call it the end of the world.

Bullshit.

The world is in amuch better shape than it was last century. Yes, I mean pre 2000. You can argue what you want but researchers can show you stats that we have less problems all around.

What changed is the information flow to your mind. Before the internet all we had was TV news and newspapers. Imagine the information lag you had. Imagine the information filter put before those. Of course you didn't get half the catastrophes information, wars, terror attacks or whatever - as many of them weren't news worthy when none of your country men died or the number of deaths wasn't high. Whatever high means.

So it is no wonder that in the time of social media and you tube that you get information instantly about everything bad happening in the world - changing your impression that things got worse.

But they didn't. Numbers and researchers and historians show that we are improving at a fast pace. Less hunger. Less terror attacks. Less wars. Less everything.

The primary reason is the reason why you get that impression: people are information nerds now. Everyone is. Everyone can now access the humanities knowledge, the news from any country, access live video coverage of any event, access news, research, compare, even study. Everyone - with your smartphone.

Think about it. Remember how it was before the iPhone changed the way we use the internet. Remember how it was before the internet, when you had to access newspapers and libraries or ask dad about information.

Remember. And think.

Do you feel I did help you? Donations Welcome

Many of my talks are references for free to play design now. Some of my courses are very popular and I get asked frequently to repeat them at studios, conferences or other events.

It happens often that teams approach me and thank me for the help I gave them ... through my talks or advise. Even well known teams or companies approach me and thank me, telling me that nearly every team member saw most of my videos.

Well, let me tell you that those talks and courses are a lot of work and usually I do not get paid for them. So here is my plea: if you think I helped your project a great deal and my videos, talks or advise helped you to success think about a donation, please.

I can use it. Not only for me but for my family (I expect my fifth baby anytime soon).

Some developers send a donation without me asking them, just telling me how thankful they are. I thank thee for your donation, kind returns kind. You know who you are.

So here it goes:

https://www.paypal.me/Teut

If you need an invoice please email me your billing address and VAT number (if EU).

And in case you missed some of my useful talks here is a short overview of my popular ones:

University Aalto f2p course, full day, day 1:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fdzk7x3W3kE

and day 2:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=I3OGGqZsPQw

My famous dissecting talks:

World of Tanks: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=c7H40Qd_lis
King.com games: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=EDZ9Hqwuun0
League of Legends: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-igrqyssllk
Puzzle & Dragons: coming soon (video not found)

Bad Monetization Mechanics: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jxDH_8Y0ceE

Evil Game Design Challenge (which I won): https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yMXBSri_Ttc

Or simply search for me on YouTube:
https://www.youtube.com/results?search_query=teut+weidemann+

And of course look for my GDC talks on GDC Vault.

Thank you so much, this will help me continue doing my talks and helping developers & indies not failing at the most prominent business model to date.

Cheers, Teut

Bad Monetization Mechanics

and how to turn them good: my talk from Casual Connect Asia

VR dissappoints

I wrote this in February 2014:
http://teut.blogspot.de/2014/02/oculus-rant.html

Now with E3 these articles appear:

http://www.rockpapershotgun.com/2015/06/17/editorial-why-vr-is-going-to-be-an-enormous-flop/

http://www.bbc.com/news/technology-33177283

Just saying.

Dissecting King Games

My Casual Connect video for your viewing pleasure:

GDC Vault with free content

I just want to mention that a lot of talks on GDC Vault are now free to access. Most of my slides are available and some videos too, simply check out

GDC Vault talks by Teut Weidemann

Die Typisch Deutsche Diskussion

Sorry this post is in German but it addresses a typical German problem which was heated up in our industry discussions.

Da wird ein Post von Malte auf Gamesmarkt zur hitzigen Diskussion in Deutschland. Wie immer lieben wir es zu diskutieren.

Es ist heute schon vieles besser als "damals". Kaum jemand erinnert sich an die harten Zeiten wo kaum ein Deutscher Entwickler überhaupt ein Publisher Vertrag bekam. Heute gibt es so viele Studios und Produkte wie noch nie "Made in Germany". Also kann es so schlecht nicht sein.

Einen Punkt der Diskussion möchte ich rausgreifen weil er mich persönlich in mehreren Bereichen trifft: Die Situation der Ausbildung.

Früher gab es keine Ausbildung von offizieller Seite, heute gibt es ein vielfältiges Angebot in fast allen Bundesländern. Toll oder?

Eher nicht. Die meisten Studenten wundern sich das sie nach der Uni von vorne anfangen können selbst wenn sie einen Job finden - und selbst das ist schwere als gedacht obwohl angeblich so viele Stellen offen sind.

Woran liegt das? An der Ausbildung selbst. Aber die Schuld trifft hier nicht die Unis oder privaten Ausbildungsstätten - die Schild sind wir - die Industrie.

Wie viele Profs und Ausbilder an den Unis haben denn echte Projekt Erfahrung? Kaum jemand, einige rühmliche Ausnahmen - aber woher sollen sie diese auch bekommen? Hier sind wir - die Veteranen gefragt - auszuhelfen. Unser Knowhow anzubieten und aktiv unserem Nachwuchs unser Wissen mitzuteilen. Das machen einige - aber immer dieselben Gesichter. Danke hierfür übrigens! Ihr seid Klasse!

Verständlich das die Veteranen genug zu tun haben in ihren Projekten - verständlich das nicht jeder Veteran in der Lage ist auch pädagogisch tätig zusein.

Warum unterrichten so wenig an den Unis? Weil sie meistens schlecht bezahlen und sich uns nicht leisten können. Hier muss eingegriffen werden von Politik, Industrie und Verbänden. Ja alle drei sollen zusammen legen. Denn wer unterrichtet schon eine Woche wenn er kaum was verdient und sein Verdienst von seiner Arbeit noch ausfällt? Wenige Entwickler/Publisher zahlen weiter oder geben freiwillg Leute ab für solche Zeiten (Danke Blue Byte das ihr das macht!)

Nur: wenn ihr euren Arsch nicht hochbekommt unseren Nachwuchs zu fördern dann wird das nie was, dann bleiben irgendwann die Studenten weg von den Unis weil sich rumspricht "soviel bringt das nichts". Dann bleibt unser Nachwuchs weg der unseren Standort Deutschland stärkt. Und dann schaut auch ihr in die Röhre.

Ich selbst unterrichte seit einem Jahrzehnt. Und es macht Spaß. Es bringt mir sehr viel und den Studenten auch. Fast alle meine Studenten gründen Firmen oder sind in der Industrie tätig - auch sehr erfolgreich - gewinnen sogar Preise, Förderungen, Apple Featuring und mehr. Da bin ich echt oft Stolz wie ein Papa!

Also: so einfach ist es das Problem zu lösen das wir nicht als "Fluchtland Ausländischer Entwickler" gelten wenn es dort kriselt (wie in UK, Spanien etc.). Schon mal aufgefallen das kaum ein Finne hier arbeitet? Dafür gibts Gründe. Aber das soll nicht unsere Sorge sein. Wir brauchen Talente, Frische Leute die mit ihren Projekten erfolgreich werden. Das schaffen wir nur wenn wir - die "alten Dinosaurier" ihnen alle die Fehler aufzeigen die wir gemacht haben.

Daher auch mein Wille das BUI Dev net zu unterstützen, damit der Verband Entwicklern helfen kann über die Hürden unserer Industrie. Und der BUI trägt da auch die Kosten. Vorbildlich. Danke für diese Initiative.

Also ihr alten Hasen: Schaut vorbei an den MDH's, Games Academies, Filmakademie Ludwigsburg, HTW's, Uni Trier, SAE's und den anderen tollen Angeboten und bietet euch an. Und wenn es nur für ein Workshop ist. Die Leute brauchen euch! Wir brauchen diese Talente!

Dissecting King Games

My Casual Connect Amsterdam talk is online dissecting King.com games:

World of Warships

As my readers know I am a big fan of World of Tanks. The company behind this game have another hit in development as it seems. Let us listen to the Mighty Jingles to show you what that upcoming game is all about:

Clarification on my work

Many visitors and industry friends know me from my talks or games I have worked on at Ubisoft. This left the impression that I am employed by Ubisoft as Online Games Supervisor (my title there) but I might want to clarify:

I am a contractor working for several clients but Ubisoft is my largest client since over 5 years now. Among others I have also consulted for:

Supercell, Wooga, Cipsoft, Digital Extremes, Edge of Reality, Play Raven, Remedy, Bigpoint, and Unity.

all in my special field as f2p expert and online games.

I am also teaching at various Universities and offering courses and workshops in f2p monetization & online games.

Due to my loyalty to my clients I am usually not accepting work for games which are similar or in competition on projects I have consulted for, so if you want to hire me you might need to ask first if your game fits that limitation.

F2p reached its limits?

The ceo of SuperData research claimed that f2p reached its limits:

http://www.screwattack.com/news/superdata-ceo-says-free-play-popularity-decline

I tend to disagree. Some reasons here.

First there is a lot of talk about families and kids. If you ask big f2p games about their audience then you will notice that families and kids are not their audience. In fact most f2p games have a pretty mature audience. PvP games tend to address 90% males 16-25 years old while MMO RPG's and strategy games have an average age beyond 30, some of them even 35+.

F2p is not for kids. Do not try to target kids with f2p games as it won't work revenue wise. Kids are to a large extend non payers and that has obvious reasons (no access to payment systems). And believe me or not: this is good.

The talk also claims LoL has a 11% worldwide market share. Having $681 million yearly revenue thus us hard to believe. I can name 10 games who have more revenue, some even double than LoL. Add all the medium and smaller ones then LoL can't even reach 3% worldwide market share.

Most companies analyzing the f2p market fail to notice that older good f2p games are still around with a healthy audience and revenue. If you check just the genre MMO RPG's: there is an endless number of games available and every week more are coming to the list. Most of these games you never heard of.

Furthermore the analysts underestimate the mobile f2p market. As most of you should know most revenue of App Appstores on mobile are coming from f2p games (not apps, not paid apps, just games). Considering that the number of mobile users will double in the next 2 years to 3 billion (and that is a conservative number as the growth is exponential) we soon reach a point where the worlds population own smartphones and control their lives with them. This means the good old and new f2p games on App stores will also double in revenue.

And last but not least: the audience of f2p games is not a fixed amount of people. It is not static. In fact it is a very dynamic group which loses people all the time (no interest anymore, death, job, etc.) and gain many people all the time as new humans are born every minute and come to the age to play on mobile. So no, there will NEVER be a saturation in target audience.

Often analysts make the mistake of taking a sample of a few months as a forecast basis for the future. This is of course a basic approach but fails to take trends into consideration. It also fails as it usually only takes a sample of the market and forgets how large the f2p market really is: it includes mobile, client, browser games and territories like Asia and Japan. And some territories are just not explored yet in f2p and will grow really fast really soon (like India). there you go, 1b people added to the audience.

All in all I tend to disagree for the above reasons. I say that the f2p market will continue to grow and dominate all other business models on most formats so that sadly we might see some type of genres, game types or formats diminish over time simply because it doesn't make sense for companies who invest in games for revenue to go the risky route.

Dissecting League of Legends

My talk on League of Legends made quite a fuzz on the internet. The GDC Europe 2014 Video should be up on the vault, but here is the Casual Connect San Francisco version:



Link to the article of Casual Connect with interview:
http://gamesauce.org/news/2014/08/14/teut-weidemann-i-teut-you-so-casual-connect-video/

Link to the few articles:

Lee Alexanders article:
http://gamasutra.com/view/news/223071/Dont_monetize_like_League_of_Legends_consultant_says.php

http://www.pcgamer.com/2014/08/11/ubisoft-analyst-criticizes-league-of-legends-monetization-warns-other-studios-not-to-try-it/

http://www.polygon.com/2014/8/11/5991115/league-of-legends-riot-monetization

http://www.gamesindustry.biz/articles/2014-08-11-if-they-let-me-change-league-of-legends-i-could-double-its-revenue
(read the comments, excellent stuff in there!)

Btw this is interesting for people who listened to my talk and know League of Legends itemsales:

http://oce.leagueoflegends.com/en/news/store/sales/satisfy-your-sweet-tooth-sugar-rush

Short history of MOBA's:

http://venturebeat.com/2014/09/01/the-history-of-mobas-from-mod-to-sensation/

This Blog isn't dead

I am just very busy at the moment, sorry for the lack of updates. I am also flying to Casual Connect soon to hold my talk about League of Legends. I hope that between there and GDC Europe / Gamescom I get time to update here.

Cheers Teut

The Settlers - Kingdeom of Anteria

BÄM:

Dissecting World of Tanks talk now on slideshare

My most booked talk "Dissecting World of Tanks" is now on Slideshare.

Dessecting World of Tanks from Teut Weidemann

Why do you forget

People forget online games are 35 years old. People also forget that commercial MMO's are 18 years old. They also forget that plenty of professional research has been done decades ago.

So I am always surprised that f2p publishers and their ceo's, designers or producers present surprising new discoveries about their players although it has been written decades before.

Let me give you some sources everyone should read completely before even claiming the "news" is yours:

The Daedalus Project
http://www.nickyee.com/daedalus/archives/001588.php?page=1

By Dr. Nick Yee the one and only long term research about player behaviour in online games - and plenty of other topics. Must read for everyone working in online games.His research is so important that he now works at Ubisoft doing exactly this: researching player behaviour in online worlds.

Edit: Link to his player behaviour paper: http://www.nickyee.com/daedalus/archives/pdf/3-2.pdf

Dr. Nick Yee is one of my mentors of everything I know about online games.

Designing Virtual Worlds by Dr. Richard Bartle

He invented the thing you know? Reading the book has to be done with a grain of salt though as he is hooked in the old world. Still his research he has done at the University of Essex is so fundamental that it should be fundamental knowledge for everyone in online games.

Raph Koster

My 2nd mentor is Raph Koster, designer of Ultima Online, Star Wars Galaxies and many more. He talked about online game design at conferences 2 decades ago but not many people remember that. Most of his talks are still available on his website. Worth a read. Or two.
True treasure and could be seen as laws of online game design:

http://www.raphkoster.com/gaming2/laws-of-online-world-design/the-laws-of-online-world-design/

Any of this new to you? Then you should bow to the wisdom of the above three people and humbly thank them for their openness!

MMO's where invented here

Lack of Updates - but!

Sorry for the lack of updates but I am pretty busy either visiting conferences or assisting my customers. So Ubisoft Blue Byte released two further titles into open beta you might want to try:

Panzer General Online

and

Might & Magic Heroes Online (German only, English follows soon!)

Cheers Teut

F2p is not a genre

I discuss a lot about the design & business side of f2p. Often enough in these discussions people mix and match games and argue with them only because they are f2p - right?

If both are f2p they should be comparable yes?

Well - no. Let me give an example. I use Assassins Creed Black Flag to show open world game play while you come up with the retail version of Angry Birds to counter my argument. Both are retail games right? You would find that silly wouldn't you. Both are targeting different audiences and are different genres.

So why oh why do you argue with f2p games only because both are f2p? Because both are free and such comparable?

The business model f2p is NOT the games genre. So stop mixing up games in the discussion.

So please stop using Clash of Clans in a f2p MMO RPG discussion. Why do you refer Farmville 2 in a discussion about World of Tanks. Why do you use Candy Crush Saga as a reference when we talk about f2p FPS.

Only because all are f2p? Think again.

Stuff one game does in f2p does not mean it works for your game. Stop copy/pasting things.

Stop saying "But I see game xyz is doing ... so we need to do ...". You don't know if what they do is successful - you don't have their data.

You assume ... and how one of my bosses always says "Assumption is the mother of all fuck ups"

Watch this making of "Triple Town" for some really excellent advice.

Quo Vadis 2014

The title doesn't mean I am asking where we go in 2014 but it is the name of the largest developer conference in Germany happening next week April 8th to 10th.

My talk on Thursday morning will dissect the monetization of Puzzle & Dragons. After my talk about doing the same with World of Tanks was so successful I decided to expand those topics. Btw this is the first talk I will hold on an iPhone!

At Casual Connect 2014 in San Francisco in July I will repeat that exercise with League of Legends.

I am doing this simply to educate teams how these games work. I usually pick top f2p games for this as they aren't at all "evil" - which seems to be a major criticism of f2p. I assign 3 pillars on those dissections:

Public Metrics
Numbers and data I find online, either from services like Appannie, Comcast or simply from the game providers PR or shareholder messages.

Own Monetization & Online Game Experience
I use my professional skills to take the game apart into its foundations and mechanics and examine them for their functions.

Self Experimentation
I play the game as a player for a while (usually until mid game) and then as a payer (note the missing L) and research what this changes in the game experience compared to the former experiment.

Those three usually give me enough information to understand fully how the game works in terms of game mechanics & monetization.

I hope to see you at one of the above conferences.

GDC 2014

I am off to GDC 2014 in San Francisco tomorrow. Besides being the largest developer conference of the world with over 20.000 attendees the 2014 will be important simply because we are in transition years (see previous post).

A lot of talks will focus on the new generation of consoles, others on the other cool stuff happening like indie, f2p, digital etc.

I also expect a major announcement from Amazon, you read it here first.

(Edit::told you so: http://gizmodo.com/amazon-fire-tv-hands-on-the-fastest-smart-tv-youve-ev-1556986083/@jschreier)

I might blog the major findings during my stay - that depends on my internet, jet lag and hang overs.