4.18.2012

Treat Android as a first-class citizen... it'll pay off!

Posted by Jennifer Lu, Director of Business Development

We wanted to share some recent results that may surprise others in the mobile gaming industry and challenge the often-repeated theory that “Android does not monetize”.

In late 2011, we announced our proprietary "Griffin" game engine that enables us to write code once, then deploy and make content updates on iOS and Android simultaneously. Griffin runs natively so we get top-notch performance on both platforms and it automatically adjusts itself to unique screen aspect ratios and resolutions, ensuring the game looks great on phones and tablet devices.

This year, we launched our first Griffin game Tiny Village in three App Stores (iTunes, Google Play and Amazon), and it's currently a top grossing/top free game in all three stores. Having a successful title across multiple platforms has allowed us to make apples-to-apples comparisons of the two OS's and the three App Stores. This is what we learned:

Google Play monetization is better than you think.

Flurry recently published figures stating that Google Play's Average Revenue per Active User (ARPU) is only 23% of iTunes App Store's ARPU. However, we found that for Tiny Village this number is much higher. Google Play ARPU is 65% of iTunes ARPU, and if you only look at smartphones (removing iPads and tablets) that number increases to 82%.

We also see that Average Revenue Per Paying User (ARPPU) for Google Play and iTunes is about the same. The key differentiating factor between the two stores is the percentage of people who pay — but as more and more Android users begin entering their credit card information for the first time, this percentage difference is going to shrink.

Amazon is a gold mine.

Flurry reported that Amazon ARPU is 89% of iTunes ARPU. However, we found that Amazon ARPU is almost twice that of iTunes ARPU, and if you compare Kindle vs iPad, Kindle ARPU outperforms iPad ARPU by 43%. And now that Amazon allows developers to sell IAP packages above $20, we expect Amazon ARPU to increase even more.

Why do most see poor results on Android?

We were once in the same situation that most developers find themselves in: 80-90% of our time and resource was focused on iOS leaving little for Android, our games worked perfectly on iOS but crashed on Android, and our Android version lacked many of the features found on iOS. Furthermore, with the complexity of Android's device fragmentation, we needed to be spending even more time on our Android version than our iOS version in order to maintain the same game quality and performance, which we clearly were not doing.

As a result, we saw a huge revenue difference between the two platforms (similar to the numbers Flurry reported) and we realized that it would be almost impossible to give both platforms equal and adequate attention without a cross-platform engine. Finally about a year ago, we decided to take the Android pledge. We built Griffin and made Android a first-class citizen-- and now, it's starting to pay off.

*** Addendum, added 5/1/2012:

We’ve received comments stating that since Amazon’s App Store is currently only available to U.S. consumers and our iTunes and Google Play numbers include international markets with lower ARPU, our data must be skewed...

In response to this, we went back to our data and segmented ARPU by country. What happened when we looked at U.S.-only ARPU as opposed to worldwide ARPU across the three App Stores? Our overall results were the same. iTunes and Google Play ARPU did increase a bit, but they both still trail Amazon’s significantly.

Two reasons as to why our results didn’t change:

• There are international markets with higher ARPU than the U.S. which help to counteract lower ARPU markets
• A large percentage of our players are U.S.-based

It’s also important to note that Amazon’s ARPU should increase even more given that Amazon now allows developers to sell IAP over $20.

12.8.2011

iOS first or Android first? With Griffin, TinyCo no longer has to choose.

Posted by Jennifer Lu, Director of Business Development

Today we’re unveiling Griffin, our landmark development engine that allows us to develop simultaneously for iOS and Android! To see it in action, check out our first game developed on Griffin: Tiny Village, now available with both an Android version and an iOS version.

Why we decided to build Griffin

iOS and Android are both exploding. Historically, iOS has been the primary mobile game market, but Android has also been growing rapidly and quickly catching up. Android now has over a billion downloads per month!. Like many other game developers, we initially developed on iOS, then ported our games to Android. This really wasn’t an efficient way of doing things since we needed twice as many engineers, twice the development time, and the Android version would always lag behind the iOS version. We realized there must be a better way. Last April, we began developing an engine that would allow us to write code once, and then deploy and make content updates on both platforms simultaneously. We’ve been working on Griffin for months, and we're excited to announce it today!

Awesome Griffin features

• It runs natively, so you can see native performance on both iOS and Android.
• It’s written in C++, so game developers from other platforms will know how to use it.
• It’s customized to develop mobile social games. It includes social gaming features like goals, isometric environment, etc.
• Fragmentation, shmagmentation! Games created in Griffin look beautiful on all Android and iOS phone and tablet devices. Griffin automatically adjusts itself to unique screen aspect ratios and resolutions.

Griffin also has...

• Analytics tracking built in to automatically push data to Vertica, allowing us to visualize in Tableau.
• Our "TinyContent" system to push new virtual items to users in real-time.
• Social features for players to add Facebook friends, visit their friends' games, and interact with each other.
• Urban Airship-like push notifications.
• An interface builder to auto scale to multiple screen sizes and aspect ratios automatically.
• Single path to feature development.
• Designed such that platform support is an abstract layer that the game engine interfaces with behind the scenes.
• This means game developers don’t need to think about file systems, network connectivity, platform features (email, SMS), etc. They just call a Griffin method, and it takes care of the dirty work.
• Tier 1 tool chain.
• Designers and artists work best when using their preferred tools. There is no need to use a clunky Interface Builder, where subtleties of design can be lost in translation or during the handoff from an artist to a UI engineer. We can go straight from Photoshop to the game.

5.24.2011

Calling All Mobile Game Developers-- Apply for our $5 Million TinyFund!

Posted by Jennifer Lu, Director of Business Development

Here at TinyCo, not only do we love making awesome games but we also love seeing other passionate and talented developers do the same. We’re thrilled to announce the launch of the TinyFund -- a $5 millon fund to help promising iOS and Android developers bring hits to market.

Selected candidates will receive:

• Up to $500K per title, as well as marketing, development and business support
• Access to TinyCo’s large and rapidly growing user base-- within a year, we’ve launched 5 top grossing games that have all reached the Top 10 Free Games on the App Store and accumulated +20 million downloads!

“There are over 600,000 iOS and Android apps. We see it as our mission to help quality games rocket to the top of the charts.” -- Suli Ali (CEO)

Excited? Apply here!

2.25.2011

TinyCo Gets a Not So Tiny Investment

Posted by Suli Ali, CEO/Founder

$18M Series A From Andreessen Horowitz

You may have noticed the new look we’re sporting at TinyCo.com -- the refresh coincides with a not so tiny investment.

We’ve just raised $18 million in Series A funding, led by Andreessen Horowitz and joined by Ron Conway, Keith Rabois, and a handful of other angels. Marc Andreessen will join our board of directors. With the backing of these Silicon Valley legends, we’re intent on building TinyCo into a mobile gaming force. What will we do with the money? Grow our team, grow our portfolio of games, and make them all more riveting to come back to again and again.

More Games, More Fun

Thanks to all of you, Tiny Chef and Tap Resort Party have been downloaded by over 10 million iPhone users to date and are consistently among the top-grossing games in the App Store. In addition to keeping these games fresh through feature updates and new daily in-game content, we’re in the midst of developing several cool new titles and we hope to share more with you soon. Stay tuned!

Hiring Great People With Big Dreams

TinyCo is building a world-class game development and engineering organization. Already 37 strong, our team includes industry veterans from Playdom, Electronic Arts, Amazon, Microsoft, and other technology powerhouses, and we’re always looking for motivated game hounds with big dreams to join the TinyCo adventure. We’re looking for awesome engineers, game designers, producers, QA testers, and more. Fit the bill? Visit our Jobs page for more information.