Shh!! 3 Unspoken Lies About Social Games

The inimitable Greg Costikyan wrote an excellent piece for Gamasutra, lambasting Social Games, and claiming that they are in fact not very social at all.

I agree, and thought I'd add two more topics that came up in conversation at Login recently, and in conversations with a couple social games developer friends.

So let's give Greg Credit for calling out the first lie on my list:

Lie #1. Social games are social games. (Truth - they aren't very social at all)

And to this I'll level two more accusations.

Lie #2. Social games are viral. (Truth - they aren't)

Social games are often cited as "viral", or having the opportunity to be so, because of the social network on which they reside. However, short of the early days in which FB allowed apps to spam a user's friends list, this just isn't the case.

Companies like Zynga are rumored to spend many millions on advertising within FB to acquire users, but if the games were truly viral, they would spread on their own, being recommended whole-heartedly by friends via word of mouth.

The fact that few social games have been able to exceed the virality of the average dog-on-skateboard Youtube video - let alone the virality of an Angry Birds - is proof that they aren't viral. (Some examples do come to mind though. Parking wars and Cow Clicker certainly got a lot of watercooler talk.)

Lie #3: Social Game Publishers are building Games, not Products. (Truth - most have little respect for the medium other than as a revenue generator).

I'll cut to the chase: To my knowledge large publishers in this space, like Zynga and Playdom, don't have developer credits listed in their games.

I wasn't able to find them anyway. I had a couple developer friends lament about the fact that there were no game credits and that when they'd asked management at these companies, they'd been told no.

I think that speaks volumes about those publishing these games and what they think of the people working on them, and of their contributions. "It's just a product, and you are just a cog".

There are a few companies out there doing the right thing (I'm looking at you Brenda!), but I fear these are the exception.

With all the excitement around 'Social Games' these days, it's important that we don't delude ourselves about some of the lies being told.

//rant off

Good Brenda Brathwaite article on Escapist

Escapist has a great article entitled Ivory Tower Defense from Brenda Brathwaite, discussing the unjustified “those who can’t teach” lack of respect for academia in the games industry. It certainly swayed my some of my prejudicial opinions.

Can a board game make you cry

Wow.

Awesome read on Brenda Braithwaite's talk at the Triangle Game Conference. 

There were audible gasps in the audience when Brathwaite revealed Train's shocking conclusion; one attendee was so moved by the experience that she left the conference room in tears

Short read, well worth it.

Thanks Raph!