Candy Crush, Vine, Snapchat among top smartphone apps of 2013

TORONTO — Snapchat, Vine, and Candy Crush Saga earned coveted spots on smartphones this year, making them among the most downloaded apps of the year.

There are more than a million apps on Apple Inc’s App Store and Google Inc’s Play store, the two dominant marketplaces for apps, which see billions of downloads each year.

The remarkable rise of the European hybrid market [For Advisers]
Continue reading >>
This year, the most downloaded apps were new takes on communication, gaming, and entertainment, according to mobile app experts.

“2013 was a really interesting year in terms of maturation, milestones and new trends,” said Craig Palli, chief strategy officer at Fiksu, a mobile marketing company based in Boston.

“The most downloaded apps were in familiar categories, but offered new twists,” he added.

While old favorites such as Instagram, Facebook and Twitter — available for iPhone, Android and other devices – continued to be popular ways of communicating with friends, Snapchat eclipsed them in downloads in 2013, becoming the sixth most downloaded free app of the year on the App Store, according to Apple.

“Snapchat went from being a niche app to achieving much more critical mass, so much so that Facebook was reportedly willing to spend billions of dollars to acquire the company,” said Palli.

With Snapchat, users can send photos and videos that disappear shortly after they are viewed.

Launched in 2011, the app’s user base continued to grow rapidly in 2013, with over 13 million people using the app in October, according to the latest available estimates from global information and measurement company Nielsen. In December alone, over 400 million pieces of content were shared through the app, according to Snapchat, based in Venice, CA.

Vine, a video sharing app released earlier this year by microblogging company Twitter Inc, was the fourth most downloaded free app in 2013. The app, for iPhone, Android and other devices, allows users to share videos under six seconds in length. Nielsen estimates over 6 million people in the US were using the app in October of this year.

Snapchat and Vine fall into a category that mobile analytics firm Flurry calls camera-enhanced messaging, which they said grew eightfold in 2013.

“The communications category underwent phenomenal growth this year. Messaging apps like Snapchat, Line, Kakao (KakaoTalk) and WeChat are all exploding and becoming bigger than the carriers in their home countries in terms of users,” said Simon Khalaf, chief executive of San Francisco-based company Flurry.

Crushing Saga

Games were another popular category, with Candy Crush Saga for iPhone, Android and Kindle Fire securing its position as the top downloaded free app, and as the top revenue grossing app. It has been downloaded over 500 million times since its launch last year, according to its creator King, based in the UK. Nielsen estimates that over 20 million people in the US were playing the game in October of this year.

In the entertainment category, Pandora continued to be the leading way to stream music and was the ninth most downloaded, and third top grossing, app in 2013.

“Clearly the device has swallowed radio,” said Palli. “Despite the new entrants, Pandora remains the dominant player in the space,” he added.

But the biggest trend of 2013, according to Palli, is the emergence of apps as a way to control companion devices, which he believes will continue to grow in 2014.

On Christmas Day, apps that pair with devices were among some of the top downloaded apps on the App Store.

The Fitbit app, for iPhone and Android, pairs with an electronic wristband to track metrics such as steps taken, distance traveled, and calories burned. It was the 16th most downloaded app on December 25, according to Palli, who monitored the Apple rankings.

Other apps that pair with devices, such as Chromecast, UP by Jawbone, and GoPro were also among the top downloads that day.

Khalaf predicts that apps for televisions will be the trend to watch for 2014.

“I think 2014 could be the year the TV industry gets disrupted by mobile,” said Khalaf.

“If you think about it, every American spends $100+ dollars per month on a service that is not personalized and not mobile. It’s an area that’s ripe for disruption and I think someone will come up with new content, maybe a new device and more importantly a better business model.”

source: interaksyon.com

How gamemaker gets players to pay

STOCKHOLM, Sweden — With 100 million people logging on every day for a fix of its games like Candy Crush Saga, global gamemaker King is showing rivals not just how to hook players, but how to get them to pay.

King is the latest among European tech firms like Rovio, creator of mega-hit Angry Birds, and Mojang, behind Minecraft, to make it big on the global gaming scene. But its stunning profitability in an industry littered with firms who failed to make money from popular games has made it a totem for others seeking to emulate its success.

King’s focus on the multi-billion dollar mobile games market – creating short, addictive puzzles for the fastest-growing part of the gaming industry – has helped it reap profits rare in its field. Though the company does not publish numbers, industry experts have estimated its revenues at $1 million-$3 million a day. Media reports now talk about an IPO valuation of $5 billion after a source recently said the company had filed to go public in the United States.

King was set up in Sweden a decade ago by friends working at the same tech startup and got 34 million euros funding from Apax Partners and Index Ventures in 2005. It has been profitable since, a fact that analysts put down to its ability to persuade players to pay several times over to continue the same game. Its “freemium model”, in which games are free but players can pay for add-ons or extra lives, has been particularly effective because of the success of Candy Crush, described by some analysts as a global phenomenon.

“Candy Crush is one of the biggest mass market consumer games in years,” said Adam Krejcik at Eilers Research in California. “They have been profitable for a while. This game has certainly brought them into a new category.”

The puzzle game, in which players line up gleaming 3-D sweets to knock out jelly, chocolate and liquorice, is available online, on smartphone and Facebook. It has held the No. 1 spot for apps on Facebook for nine months and is Apple’s top-grossing U.S. app, more popular than Spotify and TripAdvisor. King also says it is considering new platforms for the game such as smart TV.

Globally, mobile game revenues generated through Apple iOS & Google Playstore are expected to exceed $10 billion this year, according to Krejcik. Roughly half of those are revenues generated by seven publishers including King, DeNa, GungHo Online and Electronic Arts.




Bite-sized

According to King’s Chief Creative Officer Sebastian Knutsson, Candy Crush is addictive because it’s equal parts pain and fun and fits consumers’ short attention span.

“We talk internally about.. bite-sized entertainment, and we think that fits the mobile generation of today… short game rounds as opposed to having a super deep, long game,” he said.

Knutsson, one of the five founders of King who between them hold 25 percent, is also part of the 10-strong Swedish team that came up with Candy Crush. It combines elements of other popular games – the shiny graphics of Bejewelled, the candies of Candy Land and the grid-like action of Tetris.

“Candies felt like something that everybody would have a positive feeling about.. And I wanted something that could have shine and glossiness without being something unattainable,” Knutsson told Reuters in a Stockholm office where meeting rooms have names like Bubble Witch Lair, after the game.

Players lured by the appealing graphics of Candy Crush can pay for more lives, or must wait for 30 minutes before they may start again – though some cheat and move the clocks on their smartphones ahead so they can continue. The game’s appeal was broadened by its social aspect: Players can share their progress on Facebook, swapping lives as well as tips on how to crack the various levels. Others share their pain: “Die Candy Crush. Die.” writes one player, stuck at level 60, on King’s Facebook page.

King says its decision last year to shift its focus to its mobile platform was pivotal because that market was booming and the game suited it well.

The candies worked well on mobile screens, Knutsson said. Analysts note the game is easy to hop in and out of, making it a good time killer for mobile players, yet offers new challenges to give players a new twist when they play again.

“We knew it would be big on Facebook but I think the mobile success is what really took us by surprise,” Knutsson said.

The game’s success led CEO of arch-rival Zynga, former Microsoft Corp Xbox boss Don Mattrick to admit: “I’ll fess up, I’m a candy crush player and I’ve enjoyed it.”

California-based Zynga’s trajectory demonstrates the fate of many others in the industry. In 2009 it developed social game FarmVille – a huge hit in which players harvested crops and raised livestock – but is now struggling to make money from it because it is still based on Facebook as players migrate in droves to mobile. Zynga’s stock price has slumped 65 percent since a high-profile $1 billion IPO two years ago and it is now slashing staff numbers while closing offices.


Next level

Market researcher Newzoo estimates global game revenues across all platforms to reach $86.1 billion by 2016 as the number of gamers reaches 1.55 billion. It expects the fastest growth to come from mobile gaming, which will make up almost 30 percent of the total, up from about 17 percent this year.

Accordingly King – currently offering 150 games and boasting more than a billion gameplays each day – is lining up its next mobile games, readying alternatives for when its immense audience is no longer as mesmerized by its cascading candies.

Analysts expect the company to launch a mobile version of Farm Heroes Saga, a game in which players must match 3 items, which is already Facebook’s second-most popular app. King is already starting to roll out a mobile version of Papa Pear Saga, currently available on the web and on Facebook, in which players bounce and dive into barrels.

In the meantime, it plans to build on growth in Asia, the latest market to succumb to Candy Crush, which is gaining popularity there along with Supercell’s Clash of Clans.

“These are really the first western productions to break into the top 10 or the top 20 in the app store in Japan,” said David Gibson, a senior analyst at Macquarie in Tokyo.

source: interaksyon.com

Candy Crush players warned vs ‘dubious’ Android apps

MANILA, Philippines — It was only a matter of time, but security experts have already issued warning against “dubious” applications trying to latch on to the success of Candy Crush, an Android game with Facebook integration that has already surpassed the likes of Farmville in terms of popularity in the social network.

In a security alert, Trend Micro Technical Communications Specialist Gelo Abendan warned that “dubious developers” have already started creating suspicious app that ride on the Candy Crush fame, which could become launchpads for malware attacks in the future.

Candy Crush Saga, a free mobile game developed by King.com, has amassed widespread popularity among users worldwide. It is a puzzle strategy game that requires players to connect matching “candies” to score points, and comes with a social component that makes the game a lot more addictive.

According to Abendan, Trend Micro was able to detect “adware” apps that contain code for the Leadbolt and Airpush ad networks, which were among the most prevalent form of adwares found in 2012.

“While not inherently malicious, adware can be abused by cybercriminals for their own gains. Adware not only uses aggressive advertising tactics such as persistent notifications, but also collects information about the user. This could be construed as a violation of the user’s privacy,” Abendan explained.

Some of the dubious apps detected by the security software company includes an app that offers tips and tricks for getting through the game, as well as another that recommends playing another game through persistent notifications. Trend Micro said the same kinds of apps have been detected for popular mobile applications such as Instagram, Bad Piggies, and Temple Run.

So as their device will not be hit with by one of the more than 1 million malicious Android apps predicted to hit devices this year, Trend Micro suggests taking extra security precautions when installing apps on their devices, such as reading thoroughly through the app’s description page.

“Comments can be a goldmine of information, since you’ll know what other users are saying about their experience with the app. Once you install any apps, make sure that you check out the permissions that they are asking for,” Abendan added.

Touted as the most insecure mobile platform today thanks to its “openness,” Android has become a breeding ground for malware in the past several years, especially with the ease of distributing apps through the Google Play Store.

In 2012, 293,091 apps on the Android platform were found to be malicious and of these, 68,740 were found on the official Google Play store. Around 22% of these malicious apps were found to leak information about the user.

Such developments are crucial in a market like the Philippines, where one out of every four mobile phones are powered by the Android platform, and where games such as Candy Crush Saga enjoy a huge following.

source: interaksyon.com

Candy Crush Saga, Facebook Favorite, Heads to the iPhone

King.com has been producing nothing but hits on Facebook since it launched its first game on the platform in April. So much so that it’s now the #2 creator of social games on the social network, second to only Zynga.

Now it is releasing one of its most popular games to date, Candy Crush Saga, on iOS. It’s available for iPad, iPad mini, iPhone and iPod touch in November.

The Bejeweled-like game currently has an astounding 5 million daily active players on Facebook, making it the 4th most popular game and largest casual social game on the social network. The mobile version of Candy Crush Saga will offer a similar gameplay experience to the Facebook version and will keep track of player’s leaderboards, progress, and virtual goods purchased across both platforms.

“One game after another is a hit, because we take games that are hit before [Facebook],” Riccardo Zacconi, CEO and co-founder of King.com told Mashable.

The company first releases all of its games on King.com in the form of a single level timed game you play along with your friends, trying to achieve the highest score in the allotted time.

When a game is successful in that form, King them turn it into a saga franchise and releases it on Facebook, and later mobile.





Candy Crush Saga is following in the footsteps of King’s Bubble Witch Saga that the company launched on Facebook earlier this year and on mobile in August.

Zacconi says that players that started playing Bubble Witch on Facebook often play on mobile, but return to the Facebook game as well.

“This is increasing gameplay by 50% on top incrementally,” he says.

There’s no denying Bubble Witch Saga’s popularity. The game is currently the 10th most popular iPad app in the United States, and the 4th most popular iPad game in the App Store.

Gaming on Facebook as a whole is growing, and growing fast. The social network recently revealed that 251 million people played games on Facebook in September 2012, up from 226 million in September of 2011. Right now gaming on the social network is anyone’s game, and it looks like King is up to the challenge.

“We have a very simple strategy: to launch good games and the best games everywhere,” says Zacconi. “For me this is the most important launch this year.”

Candy Crush Saga will be available for iOS in November and later for Android.

source: mashable.com