GameMaker: Studio now supports Linux publishing

YoYo Games today announced its game development software suite GameMaker: Studio now supports Linux publishing for the first time.

GameMaker: Studio is a cross-platform development suite designed to let game designers create titles affordably, with a modular pricing structure. Over the past year, YoYo Games has added support for features and operating systems, including Windows 8 and Windows Phone 8 as well as analytics and monetization tools.

Now, GameMaker: Studio will let developers export their programs natively in Ubuntu. According to a statement from CEO Sandy Duncan, this is the first time the suite has supported Linux publishing.

GameMaker: Studio Ubuntu Export can be purchased either from YoYo Games directly for $99, though it’s promised to arrive on the Steam Software Store soon. Ubuntu Export is free for current and future purchasers of GameMaker: Studio Master Collection.

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Kabam officially reveals it’s in the publishing game

Mid-core developer Kabam today announced the official launch of Kabam Publishing, a new part of the company that will allow third-party game developers to utilize Kabam’s technology platform and marketing tools across all the platforms Kabam is present on (Facebook, web, iOS and Android).

Note the term “official.” Kabam’s actually been publishing third party games since Casual Connect 2012, something we picked up on at the time and confirmed with Kabam VP, Corporate Communications Steve Swasey. At the time, the company was testing the publishing waters with 5th Planet’s Clash of the Dragons.

Now Kabam has 15 publishing partners, including Reality Square Games (of Wartune fame), Venan Games (known for Book of Heroes) and ZQ Game Inc (Shadowland Online).

When it comes to mobile partners, there are few game developers with a larger audience than Kabam, which managed to find huge success with its Kingdoms of Camelot franchise across a variety of platforms (including taking the No. 1 spot on iOS). Venan Games is a case study on the power of Kabam’s promotion power: In the two months since Book of Heroes launched, the game’s made it into the top 100 grossing apps on iOS, and CEO Brandon Curiel says Kabam increased the game’s number of daily active users approximately tenfold.

As the mobile games scene grows increasingly crowded, we’re hearing more and more from developers who struggle with discoverability. Zynga’s been another company that’s been bullish about getting into publishing mobile games. When we spoke to COO David Ko this past summer about Zynga’s mobile efforts, he was quick to point out both how Zynga has a great deal of development, optimization and marketing experience to lend to mobile studios, as well as a substantial audience of mobile gamers to tap into. While Zynga’s also been aggressively courting mid-core game developers lately, Kabam might be more appealing to said studios simply because the entirety of their audience is composed of mid-core players.

Developers interested in learning more about this program can head over to Kabam’s website for more info.

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Kabam gets in on the publishing game with 5th Planet’s Clash of the Dragons

5th Planet is the first third-party developer to publish a game with Kabam, having just launched Clash of the Dragons on the company’s web portal.

Clash of the Dragons launched on Kongregate in December 2011, with the developer reporting 300,000 installs within 30 days. This is the second CCG 5th Planet’s put out within the past month, having launched Legacy of Heroes on Kongregate’s portal on July 9. 5th Planet Games is finding great success as it expands from Facebook to other platforms and game networks; this year the developer is on track to bring in $10 million in annual revenue.

We spoke to Kabam VP, Corporate Communications Steve Swasey this morning at Casual Connect before spotting the game on Kabam’s portal. When asked about publishing third-party titles, Swasey said the company had no official comment yet, but to stay tuned for related news.

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RockYou taps into Facebook’s bingo trend with publishing deal for Bingo by Ryzing

RockYou is throwing its hat into the bingo sub-genre of social games, announcing today that its third party publishing unit Studio Partners will now be publishing Ryzing’s Bingo by Ryzing.

Available on Facebook since July of 2010, so far Bingo by Ryzing has shown the slow growth that most other bingo games have on the platform, with the game’s monthly active users peaking this month at 250,000 according to our AppData traffic tracking service. What sets Bingo by Ryzing apart from the other bingo games on the platform are the game’s real world prizes, which are awarded via a sweepstakes method to skirt Facebook’s restrictions around cash payouts.

“Facebook doesn’t allow gambling and Bingo by Ryzing does not incorporate gambling as there is no purchase required and purchasing does not improve a player’s chances of winning,” explains Ryzing’s CEO Manu Gambir when asked about the game’s prizes.  “Bingo by Ryzing is a sweepstakes exactly like other sweepstakes you may be familiar with, such as the popular McDonald’s Monopoly sweepstakes.”

According to Gambir, the game uses multiple types of bingo cards, only some of which allow players to win prizes, which can be either cash, merchandise or gift cards.

“The first, and primary type of bingo game, is played using blue-colored bingo cards. Players purchase these bingo cards using virtual currency which can be obtained for free (by playing often, completing achievements, inviting friends, or watching videos) or by purchasing,” he says.

While blue bingo cards don’t allow players to win prizes with any real monetary value, one of the prizes a player can win with them are gold and silver bingo cards. Those cards function like entries in a sweepstakes. Like other sweepstakes, no purchase is necessary — players can either win gold and silver cards, ask for them, or be awarded them for free when purchasing in-app currency for the game. Players must be at least 21 years old to win or earn the gold and silver cards.

Other than its cash prizes, Bingo by Ryzing drives engagement with social features like live chat, gifting and voting on charity initiatives. According to Josh Grant, RockYou’s GM of Studio Partners, the company is targeting fans of bingo games and fans of what he calls “traditionally social parlor games” as a core demographic.

Under the terms of the agreement, Studio Partners will provide analytics, product management support, user acquisition, advertising and monetization help for the game and Ryzing will continue to manage the game’s  product development, customer service, prize fulfillment, game operations and sweepstakes compliance.

Overall, competition in the bingo sub-genre on Facebook is beginning to heat up as bingo games continue to gain traction on the platform. The current leader of the crowd is Buffalo Studios’ Bingo Blitz, which currently has 3 million monthly active users and 980,000 daily active users, according to AppData. Other competitors in the genre include BitRhymes Bingo Bash, Mytopia’s Bingo Island and SpiceRack Media’s Bingo!. Zynga’s take on the genre, Zynga Bingo has just gone into closed beta.

Bingo by Ryzing is RockYou’s first foray back into publishing since confirming it would be laying off more than half of its staff, selling Playdemic back to its founders and parting ways with Loot Drop in November.

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Arkadium signs social game publishing deal with Microsoft Studios

Social and casual game developer Arkadium announced a multi-year publishing partnership with Microsoft Studios today that will help the developer accelerate its cross-platform game development.

Though few details were available on the agreement, we assume that it applies to Microsoft’s Bing, MSN Messenger and Zone.com games portal where Arkadium games already appear. Beyond that, it is likely that Microsoft Studios would publish the games on Xbox Live Arcade or Windows Phone 7. It is unclear if the publishing deal extends to Facebook, where Arkadium currently enjoys 1 million monthly active users and over 200,000 daily active users as recorded by our AppData traffic tracking service.

Statements included in the press releases from Microsoft Studios’ Matt Booty, general manager of connected experiences, suggest that Microsoft is looking to expand its publishing beyond its web services, console and phone. Assuming the tech giant isn’t attempting to launch a social network of its own to compete with Facebook and Google+, we could perhaps expect to see Microsoft Studios-published games on these platforms. Already, Microsoft has begun to soften its stance on publishing for rival platforms, recently bringing a version of its Xbox 360 game Kinectimals to iOS.

“Arkadium has a ten-year track record of developing entertaining and well-architected casual and social games,” Booty’s statement reads. “Our team is excited to be partnering with a developer that we believe will help us entertain millions of people as we expand our reach to a broader audience.”

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