29 possible ideas for our platform

This list of 29 ways to monetise games intrigues the hell out of me. Our current merchandise platform can be viewed as a solution to number 27 on that list.

In the coming days, our team will be debating on which of these ideas is suited to build into other products. One particular thought in my mind is the tournament model. I am been thinking of how to build that kind of model for games without requiring any changes on the developers' end.

One simple way is to have a tournament system that can be used alongside any names. The developers can assign the tournament rules with a few clicks with the rest of the heavy lifting done by the software, including pricing of tournaments, collecting performance data during tournaments, progression rules et al.

This is just one possible tool we can build. If you have other ideas, do put them in the comments as well.

Casual Games Association

There is a professional international trade organization called Casual Games Association . It is founded to facilitate a healthy and stable global casual games industry. Primary services include professional conferences, industry research and a magazine.
The Casual Games Association hosts three yearly conferences in Western Europe, Eastern Europe and North America. Each conference spans several days and offers the very best of the casual game industry in the form of presentations, demonstrations and networking.

This organization is a good opportunity for exposure and marketing of own products.

Music vs Games

Image via WikipediaI am constantly amazed by the innovations seen in the music industry. We have seen the likes of MySpace, Last.fm and Pandora coming out of nowhere and becoming important players, within the space of 5 years. Today, I read abou another cool music company, Topspin, which is offering a set of tools for fans to connect with their favourite bands. All these left me wondering, what is the equvialent of all of these cool stuff for games?

Nevertheless, I am happy we are trying to do something similar for the game industry. Through our merchandise platform, we hope to enable fans to create hand made stuff for their favourite games. We think this is important becaseuse it enables fans to express their love of the games, something we can think of ourselves doing.

We will be posting videos of our status very soon. If you like to follow our adventure, do keep this blog.

How big is the video game merchandise market?

We have been asking ourselves this question since the start of our project. The answer? Nobody knows. The closest I have come across is this paragraph from the Escapist magazine:

Of the 15 gamers I talked to on the subject, most seemed interested in more traditional merchandise, like t-shirts, soundtracks and figures. Even those who said they weren't really interested in merchandise tended to have purchased at least something that qualified, though often these were items that tied into their specific, personal interests, such as art books or concert tickets. But when asked about the coolest merch they'd ever bought, it was clear that uniqueness played a big part in determining cool. Answers ranged from game music piano scores to a Metroid Prime studded-leather wrist cuff.

Based on the above, let's say 20-30% of gamers do buy merchandise. Is that big or small? We know really know and frankly, we don't really care. What we want to do is let gamesr connect to each other through game merchandise. In our web service, fans of a game have the option to post pictures of their hand-made merchandise for other fans to see or buy. This is what we want. Fans of games sharing their love through creating their unqiue items.