Social networks reach half a billion people, he told GDC attendees on Thursday. They connect you with your friends, and in social networks, games become a way for people to play together with others they know in real life. Networks also bring games to people, because the recommendations come straight from your connected friends.
"Our mission is to change how the world plays games," says Segerstrale. And he wants to share five early trends that he has seen that may impact the broader games industry, particularly as it moves towards digital distribution and games as a service, and as the industry as a whole moves towards more social experiences.
The end of big franchises may be over
We know why we continue to churn out franchise titles, says Segerstrale. They are easy to market. Consumers buy them because of how purchase decisions are made. You recognize what you like, and if you see two similar games you're drawn to brands and franchises that you are familiar with, he says. You don't want to risk money on unknown quantities.
It doesn't work on social networks, emphasizes Segerstrale. The adoption on social networks is through friends. Distribution and product relationship fundamentally changes. Who is playing matters a lot more than what they're playing. The source of trust that a brand normally brings you...that same social trust now comes from the friend who is recommending it.
Games will all become services
As soon as games become digitally distributed, they can be updated all the time. It makes sense to fix and evolve games once you have that power, says Segerstrale. And this means that product cycles don't have a beginning and end, but you are constantly improving an expanding product. Social networks are making all of us work like mini-MMO operators, he says. If you have a successful product, you should keep updating. All your revenues move from point of sale to continual.
Marketing by numbers
The videogame business spends billions on marketing, but digital distribution will push marketing spending down. It will look more like Web marketing. Traditional game marketing skills are of limited use because customer acquisition is based on the quality of game. You tweak games based on whether they are successful. You need to become a numbers ninja, and gauge the cost of customer acquisition, retention and monetization, he says.
Game design changes
We are forced to unlearn a lot, says Segerstrale. The journey you go through designing social games is much different than traditional games. They are much more akin to designing board games. You're no longer designing for interaction between you and the screen, getting gamers to collect something or level up. When you design social games it's not about your story but the player's story. You have to create a playground where players can play with their friends.
Design also starts driving audience and monetization, he says. How do I make this game really fun to play, but make it irresistible so that players want to pay to play them?
Listen to your players
Your players will teach you how to make better games, says Segerstrale. You get all the qualitative feedback from players, what they love and what they hate. But you can also track through data how they play, as well as actively ask players. Structured handling of this data will teach you how to make better games. There's no reason why Who Has the Biggest Brain? can't be the best brain game out there. This can teach us as an industry how to create new kinds of games that appeal to a much broader audience. You need to balance qualitative and quantitative feedback.
This is still a nascent industry, he says. Creating a hit is very hard. This isn't a protected environment. There are over 50,000 Facebook applications. Product quality is everything. And monetization is still being developed. What Segerstrale asked of his audience was that those who are entering the social space focus on creating value, not spam; that they innovate and insipire; and they build games for the long run.