Tag: Dena »

Team up with your favorite Marvel heroes in this digital card game on DeNA/ngmoco's Mobage social games platform--the same folks who produced Rage of Bahamut. I got to see the game at PAX this year, and it looks to play similarly, but with Marvel Heroes and an original Marvel storyline.

The game consists of more than 200 types of cards featuring heroes and villains from the Marvel universe; players recruit classic Marvel characters into their decks, such as Spider-Man, Iron Man, Punisher, Captain America, Black Widow, The Hulk, Thor, Dr. Strange and many others. By evolving and fusing characters’ powers and abilities, players build stronger teams capable of challenging the most dangerous foes. New Marvel characters and events tied to the Marvel Universe will be added to the game on a regular basis, ensuring a continuously evolving gameplay experience.

Just about everyone in the world dreams about having super powers. Flight, strength, x-ray vision, that kind of stuff. While DeNA (think Mobage) and Marvel Entertainment’s upcoming Marvel: War of Heroes may not bestow impossible abilities to its players, it does put them in charge of a slew of iconic heroes.

Assuming the role of a S.H.I.E.L.D agent players will collect cards featuring various Marvel heroes and craft their own super team. Powers and abilities can be fused and upgraded as well, making an already powerful legend even more so. If you’re thinking it sounds similar to the more than a little popular Rage of Bahamut, that’s because it is. And because it’s being crafted by the same developers. Although the story – which is a thing that actually exists in this freemium card game. I know, right? – is all original and comes directly from Marvel itself. As does the art, actually, which is ridiculously awesome.

Marvel: War of Heroes is due to hit the App Store this fall. Anyone with even the slightest interest will be able to check it out for free, but those of us who are already curious can head over to the official website to pre-register. Why? Because it earns a free rare card, among other things. And if there’s one thing I’ve learned from playing similar Mobage titles it’s that rare cards, no matter how useful they might be to my strategy, can pay off big. Also it might actually be really cool.

WeDoodle is ngmoco's latest application to be launched on the iTunes App Store, a game based on multiplayer sketching and guessing that's sure to improve your all-necessary doodling skills.

WeDoodle is free and available for both iPhone, iPod Touch and iPad, providing users with a miniature digital canvas to draw on. The application features various "creative crafts" like stencils, brushes, canvas backgrounds and more so that the drawings aren't so much doodles as they are sketches, making it easier for those who have the task of having to guess exactly what is being drawn. With support for seven languages built in, as well as a multiple game mode that "allows doodlers to challenge the world in live in online play," the game is sure to shake some heads and provide hours of doodling practice. Who says the iPhone isn't productive?

On a related note, this is ngmoco's first release since its now-confirmed acquisition by DeNA, the Japanese gaming company, who are branching out into a world that is already over 250,000 applications strong.

Much is riding on the future health of ngmoco's releases. Although DeNA put forward $300 million in cash and securities, an additional $100 million is available assuming specific milestones are met by the company throughout next year. With a free application, the right marketing and advertisements are crucial. One thing's for sure - if ngmoco's platform of free applications and advertisements is successful, we could well be seeing a glimpse of what the future has to hold. Until then, you'll just have to doodle about it.

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We have known for a long time that the iPhone was far beyond just just a viable gaming platform, it was the future.  One of the biggest examples of that to date has gone down this morning, with Ngmoco announcing their purchase by Japanese gaming company DeNA for a staggering 400 million dollars.

Ngmoco, best known for their early successes like the critically acclaimed Rolando, has recently embraced the social gaming space, releasing games such as their "We" series including We Rule, We City and We Farm.  While these were viewed as a departure from some of their back catalog, they were more appealing to an organization like DeNA, which has made their fortune developing social games focused on a Japanese market.

Though DeNA does very little business in the west, the New York Times reports that the company managed to rake in $640 million in 2009 alone and are (without this recent acquisition considered in the equation) on pace to earn a projected $1.5 billion in 2014.  Their big hit, Mobage Town, is a traditional social networking structure that earns most of its income from clothing and accessory purchases for in-game avatars.  Plus, as a point of comparison, it is also reported that compared to Facebook's 500 million user accounts, DeNA paltry 20.5 million accounts record an amazing 25-to-1 return on income per user.

It is being reported by Mobile-ent.biz that plans are in place for DeNA to integrate Mobage Town into Ngmoco's Plus+ community, to further expand the reach of their empire into the mobile space.  This now pits the companies head to head with US-based Zynga and their numerous Facebook and recently expanded portable social gaming presence.

Once again speaking with the New York Times, CEO of DeNA, Tomoko Namba was quoted as saying:

"We’re only active in the Japanese market, and we haven’t figured out how to cover the Western market. We want to enable developers to go cross-device, and to go cross-border. And we need this to happen quickly, in about the next one or two years."

If expansions into western markets is the aim of this acquisition, this may be a great chance to finally see that be successful to its full potential.  Plus, when you consider that Ngmoco's Plus+ platform recently expanded to the Android as well, DeNA is now primed to be accessible on virtually every modern handset available in North America.  Now the question remains what will be left of Ngmoco after this take-over is complete?  We just hope that they will be able to keep making the games that we have grown to know and love.

Most importantly, this monumental purchase validates the assertion that there is quite a bit of money to be made in the iOS development world.  We are no longer the minor leagues of game development, because with money like that being thrown around, soon everyone is going to want a piece of the action.