This Week’s Headlines From Across Inside Network

• Sep 18th, 2011
Social Games

Here are all the latest headlines from around Inside Network this past week.

IMA LogoInside Mobile Apps

Tracking the convergence of mobile apps, social platforms, and virtual goods.

Monday, September 12th, 2011

Tuesday, September 13th, 2011

Wednesday, September 14th, 2011

Thursday, September 15th, 2011

Friday, September 16th, 2011

ISG LogoInside Social Games

Covering all the latest developments at the intersection of games and social platforms.

Monday, September 12th, 2011

Tuesday, September 13th, 2011

Wednesday, September 14th, 2011

Thursday, September 15th, 2011

Friday, September 16th, 2011

IF LogoInside Facebook

Tracking Facebook and the Facebook platform for developers and marketers.

Monday, September 12th, 2011

Tuesday, September 13th, 2011

Wednesday, September 14th, 2011

Thursday, September 15th, 2011

Friday, September 16th, 2011

Social Gaming Roundup: Raptr, Japan, New Launches & More

• Sep 16th, 2011
Business, Casino, casual, facebook, Sim, Social Games, Strategy, zynga

Indiana JonesIndiana Jones Coming to Adventure World — Zynga and LucasFilm have partnered up and announced that they will be bringing Indiana Jones into the social game maker’s latest release, Adventure World. Further details have yet to be revealed.

Social Games Highlighted at Tokyo Game Show — Social games are getting a lot of love in Japan at the Tokyo Game Show this week between GREE and DeNA, says Reuters. The news service reports that the Japanese social gaming market to reach approximately $5.1 billion by 2013.

Double Down Interactive Opens New Office — Social games developer Double Down Interactive is expanding with a new office this week. The company announced its new headquarters within the 505 Union Station building in Seattle which has room to add a another 100 employees atop its existing 52.

Unity Wins Best Development Environment Award — Unity Technologies has announced that its Unity game development platform has won the award for “Best Development Environment” at this year’s CEDEC (Computer Entertainment Developers Conference) in Japan.

Even a Tiny Zoo Can be Cruel According to PETA – TinyCo is the latest gaming company to draw the ire of outspoken animal rights organization PETA. According to a letter sent to TinyCo’s cofounder and CEO by PETA, the game Tiny Zoo “sends the message that life for animals in actual zoos is acceptable when, in reality, captive animals suffer immensely.” The letter suggests that TinyCo could revamp and rename the game in the next release; instead of building a zoo, players could rescue animals and rehabilitate them as they play “Big Sanctuary.” Tiny Zoo is the latest entry in a growing list of games that have been accused of promoting cruelty to animals by PETA.

RaptrRaptr Hits New Milestone — Gamer social network Raptr now has over 10 million registered users and a daily active user count of over 1 million.

New Social & Mobile Golfing App – Teepsy is a new Facebook and mobile app, displayed at Demo, that allows users to brag about their golf game. Additionally, it lets users sign up for discounted tee times at certain golf courses. Players can earn badges for their golf accomplishments and track their scores.

HoneyLizer Offers More Monetization Tools for Social Games — Also at the VentureBeat-affiliated Demo conference was Bees and Pollen’s new marketing tool, HoneyLizer. The platform allows developers of social games to better target social gamers, based on their social data, with promotions intended to convert more of them into paying users.

[Launch] Viximo Launches Facebook Title — Viximo has announced the release of its social game, Snap Me Up for Facebook this week.  Already available on networks such as Quepasa, the game involves the buying and selling of photos of their favorite people in a buy low, sell high style of stock market play.

Idle Worship[Launch] Idle Worship — At the TechCrunch Disrupt, Idle Games finally sent its deity sim game, Idle Worship, into closed beta ahead of a larger beta launch planned for the immediate future. The total development cycle is at about 23 months as of now.

[Launch] Metrogames Launches Coco Girl on Facebook — Social developer Metrogames has released its latest title, Coco Girl. The app is a fashion game, targeting women, in which players create an avatar and and customize its look with thousands of outfits, hair styles, and accessories that they purchase within digital malls.

[Launch] Kixeye Unveils War Commander — The creator of Backyard Monsters, Kixeye, has announced the launch of its newest Facebook game, War Commander. The social game is a real-time strategy title in which players command over 27 customizable units as they vi for resources within a war-torn future version Earth.

[Launch] Itsmy Games Launches Games for Web — Mobile and social games developer, itsmy Games, has announced that it has launched its catalogue of over 100 free-to-play titles as mobile web apps. Each game makes use of HTML5 and can be played partly offline.

New Hires in Social Gaming: CrowdStar, Double Down Interactive, GREE Intl and More

• Sep 15th, 2011
Business, casual, Hires, international, Jobs, Social Games, zynga

The hiring lull in the social gaming space continues over into this this week, according to data from LinkedIn and other sources. Eight companies showed new activity. That said, there were some bigger hires in the past seven days from Double Down Interactive and Zynga. Peter Anderson joins the former as its new vice president of recruiting and human resources while Ryan Lysne joins the latter as its new director of strategic marketing

As always, if your company is hiring new people or making a notable promotion, please let us know. Email editor (at) insidesocialgames (dot) com, and we’ll get it into this or next week’s post. Also, please note that the information about most new hires, below, comes directly from company updates from LinkedIn, and is only as current as each person’s profile.

Looking for new opportunities? The Inside Network Job Board presents a survey of current openings at leading companies

Here’s this week’s full list:

CrowdStar

  • Anna Markosian, Finance Assistant – CrowdStar sees a single hire this week with Markosian. She was previously an intern at UBS Wealth Management.

Double Down Interactive

  • Peter Anderson, Vice President of Recruiting & Human Resources — Peter Anderson joins Double Down Interactive as its new vice president of recruiting and human resources. His prior role was as the vice president of recruiting and human resources at Big Fish Games.

GREE International

Kabam

  • Moses Lee, Software Engineer — Now at Kabam, Lee was previously a software engineer and at Involver.

Loot Drop

  • Steve Markgraf, Software Engineer — Markgraf joins Loot Drop this week. He was formerly a part of Zindagi Games.
  • David Armstrong, Junior Software Engineer — Also joining Loot Drop, Armstrong was previously a student at the DigiPen Institute of Technology.
  • Bill Drastal, Animator — Drastal was formerly an animator for Slide and Google.
  • Darron Smity, Artist — Smith was previously a part of Massive Black.

Peak Games

  • Hasim Karaman, Senior Software Developer — Peak Games hires two new team members starting with Karaman. Karaman was previously a software developer at MagiClick Digital Solutions.
  • Barbaros Usekes, Game Tester — Usekes also joins Peak Games. He was formerly a junior PHP coder at 2025 Arena.

PopCap Games

Zynga

  • Steven Johnson, QA Engineer II — Zynga hires three individuals, starting with Johnson, a former quality assurance tester at Sony Computer Entertainment of America.
  • Ryan Lysne, Director of Strategic Marketing — Ryan Lysne joins Zynga as its new director of strategic marketing. Previously, he was the senior engagement manager at McKinsey & Company.
  • Elain Eudy, Senior Artist — Eudy was previously a lead artist for Griptonite Games.

This Week’s Headlines From Across Inside Network

• Sep 11th, 2011
Social Games

Here are all the latest headlines from around Inside Network this past week.

IMA LogoInside Mobile Apps

Tracking the convergence of mobile apps, social platforms, and virtual goods.

Tuesday, September 6th, 2011

Wednesday, September 7th, 2011

Thursday, September 8th, 2011

Friday, September 9th, 2011

ISG LogoInside Social Games

Covering all the latest developments at the intersection of games and social platforms.

Tuesday, September 6th, 2011

Wednesday, September 7th, 2011

Thursday, September 8th, 2011

Friday, September 9th, 2011

IF LogoInside Facebook

Tracking Facebook and the Facebook platform for developers and marketers.

Sunday, September 6th, 2011

Monday, September 5th, 2011

Tuesday, September 6th, 2011

Wednesday, September 7th, 2011

Thursday, September 8th, 2011

Friday, September 9th, 2011

Social Gaming Roundup: Unity, Tagged, Green Games & More

• Sep 9th, 2011
Business, casual, Electronic Arts, facebook, international, Mobile, Playdom, Social Games, zynga

UnityUnity Technologies Partners with GREE — Unity Technologies has made its way to Japan through a partnership with mobile-social games platform, GREE. Through the partnership, GREE will be allowed to distribute a limited number of licenses for the development platform at no cost to its Japanese development partners, thus aiding Unity in its expansion into the Japanese gaming market. Unity has also announced the opening of Unity Technologies Japan in Tokyo where it will serve as a sales, localization, and support center.

Tagged Unveils New Social Game — Tagged has announced the launch of its new social game, Elections. A social management type of game, players invest into projects that will hopefully return them votes, hiring other players and friends to perform jobs for that project. The game is Tagged’s first social game since it launched its in-house game development studio under Tagged General Manager of Social Games Andrew Pedersen.

6waves Publishes Wild Card Football — 6waves is publishing a new Facebook game from developer Bat Bridge Interactive. Wild Card Football is a fantasy-style sports game that allows users to collect players, manage their positions, create leagues with friends, and even improve player performances with a few well placed power-ups.

Treasure KeepersNickelodeon Launches First Facebook Game — Nickelodeon’s Virtual Worlds Group has launched its first app on Facebook, Neopets: Treasure Keepers. Based on the Neopets virtual world, the game allows players to build and manage their own online shop, venture out on up to 60 quests and collect and sell over 500 items.

TeePee Games Raises Funds with Freddie for a Day Campaign — Discovery platform TeePee Games has announced its Freddie for a Day campaign to raise money for Aids charity, The Mercury Phoenix Trust. During Monday of this week, the company donated 20% of all profits earned through either TeePeeGames.com or its Facebook application.

TrashTycoonMore Social Games Go Green With Trash Tycoon — VentureBeat has highlighted yet another new Facebook game title called Trash Tycoon from Guerillapps. The game seeks to teach the concepts of “upcycling” as users clean up trash around a virtual community and try to transform it into a bustling and successful town. The app is sponsored by recycling company TerraCycle.

Amazon Seeks Social Game Developers — According to Reuters, Amazon is looking to enter the social media space, having already hired John Yurcisin for developing the company’s social strategies. Now, it is building a Social Games Group, as Reuters cites a poster from Amazon’s new Seattle campus. The poster notes a seeking of software development engineers and Flash developers. Moreover, Amazon has posted social games jobs on both LinkedIn and Dice.com. Amazon was looking for a social game designer as early as last spring.

Sulake Hires Former Playdom Executive, Paul LaFontaine — Sulake, the developer behind Habbo Hotel has announced the hiring of former Playdom vice president of global distribution, Paul LaFontaine, as its new CEO. According to Reuters, the hire is intended to help Sulake push into the realm of social gaming.

Playfish Shuts Down Restaurant City on Mixi — Gamebiz has reported that another successful U.S. company isn’t doing too well in Japan. Playfish has announced that it will be shutting down its Japanese version of Restaurant City on Mixi come October 7th.

Mayfield Fund snags game investor Tim Chang as managing director — Prominent social game investor Tim Chang has left Norwest Venture Partners to become a managing director at the Mayfield Fund, VentureBeat reports. He’s now the sixth managing director at Mayfield.

Nexon America publishes Wonder Cruise for Facebook — MapleStory developer Nexon wasn’t quite ready to debut its second Facebook game so soon after launching MapleStory Adventures — but a Korean Gaming Industry blog caught wind of it.

Zynga Killing 4 Underperforming Facebook Games — Games.com reports that Zynga is sunsetting Warstorm, Scramble, Pathwords, and Word Twist as of September 30th due to poor performance. Warstorm players will be able to transfer their balance plus 10% to any other Zynga game of their choice, players can receive additional bonuses for migrating to CityVille or Empires & Allies. Zynga’s newest game, Adventure World, just launched yesterday right after it’s next game in development, Kingdoms & Quests, was outed by a support page.

New Hires in Social Gaming: 6waves Lolapps, Kabam, Loot Drop & More

• Sep 9th, 2011
Business, casual, Electronic Arts, facebook, Hires, Jobs, Social Games, zynga

Hiring activity within the social space has dropped significantly this week, according to information presented on LinkedIn and through other sources. After a decent week of new hires last week, the past seven days have shown activity from only six developers who have hired only a handful of new team members.

As always, if your company is hiring new people or making a notable promotion, please let us know. Email editor (at) insidesocialgames (dot) com, and we’ll get it into this or next week’s post. Also, please note that the information about most new hires, below, comes directly from company updates from LinkedIn, and is only as current as each person’s profile.

Looking for new opportunities? The Inside Network Job Board presents a survey of current openings at leading companies

Here’s this week’s full list:

6waves Lolapps

  • Christopher Flork, 2D Illustrator — Now at 6waves Lolapps, Flork was previously a a 2D character designer for Invforge and is also currently a concept artist for Splice Productions S.F.

Kabam

  • Joal De Veyra, Player Experience Associate (Contract) — Kabam shows a single hire. De Veyra was most recently a sales associate at Footlocker. He is also currently a production assistant at Thud Rumble.

Loot Drop

  • Andrew Kane, Server Engineer — Loot Drop brings on new members this week starting with Kane. Kane was formerly a software engineer at Riot Games.
  • Matt Dalluhn, Senior Artist — Also joining Loot Drop is Dalluhn, a former concept artist at NetDevil/Gazillion.

Playfish

  • Aurore Valery, 2D & 3D Artist — Joining Playfish this week is Valery, a former motion designer for venteprivee.com.
  • Emily Wong, Product Manager — Also joining Playfish is Wong. She was previously an equity analyst for Arete Research.
  • David Armstrong, Junior Software Engineer — Armstrong was most recently a teaching assistant for 3DS Max at DigiPen Institute of Technology.

Work4 Labs

  • Rochelle Lee, Global Marketing Manager — Rochelle Lee joins the Work4 Labs team as its new global marketing manager. Prior to this, Lee was a web project designer for GreenBiz Group.
  • Hongyi Li, Business Development & Strategy Intern — Li also joins Work4 Labs. He was previously a co-program director of Jakarta Camp at Adam Khoo Learning Technologies Group.
  • Gene Lam, Sales Executive — Lam was most recently a multimedia advertising consultant at SFGate.com.

Zynga

  • Bill Galey, Senior Director of Contract Center Operations — Galey joins Zynga this week. He was previously the director of customer service for Europe at Blizzard Entertainment.
  • Will Cox, QA Engineer I — Also now a part of Zynga, Cox was formerly a quality assurance lead at UTV Ignition Games.
  • Chris Tyler, Product Manager — Tyler was previously director of merchandise planning at ShoeDazzle.
  • Hilda Karugabira, Animator — Karugabira was most recently an animator for Rivet Games.
  • Anthony Mars, Senior Character Artist — Joining Zynga, Mars was previously a lead character artist for Electronic Arts.

This Week’s Headlines From Across Inside Network

• Sep 4th, 2011
Social Games

Here are all the latest headlines from around Inside Network this past week.

IMA LogoInside Mobile Apps

Tracking the convergence of mobile apps, social platforms, and virtual goods.

Monday, August 29th, 2011

Tuesday, August 30th, 2011

Wednesday, August 31st, 2011

Thursday, September 1st, 2011

Friday, September 2nd, 2011

ISG LogoInside Social Games

Covering all the latest developments at the intersection of games and social platforms.

Monday, August 29th, 2011

Tuesday, August 30th, 2011

Wednesday, August 31st, 2011

Thursday, September 1st, 2011

Friday, September 2nd, 2011

IF LogoInside Facebook

Tracking Facebook and the Facebook platform for developers and marketers.

Monday, August 29th, 2011

Tuesday, August 30th, 2011

Wednesday, August 31st, 2011

Thursday, September 1st, 2011

Friday, September 2nd, 2011

Social Gaming Roundup: New Social Games, Playdom Contest, Unity Awards & More

• Sep 2nd, 2011
Business, casual, facebook, iPad, MMO, Mobile, Playdom, Social Games, Strategy, zynga

Unity AwardsUnity Technologies Announces Unity Award Finalists — Unity Technologies has announced the finalists for its annual Unity Awards for games on the web, iOS, Android, and consoles. For games in the social space, Cmune Games’ UberStrike is nominated for Best Cross-Platform title and a Community Choice award while Nival Interactive is up for Best Gameplay with King’s Bounty: Legions.

Zynga IPO Delayed — According to Reuters, Zynga may be delaying its initial public offering. The delay is partially due to questions the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission has regarding the company’s means of measuring daily and monthly active users and its bookings. Another reason behind the delay is poor market conditions.

Deep RealmsPlaydom Seeks Armor Designers — Playdom is issuing a virtual call to arms for Deep Realms. Designers and illustrators of all kinds are invited to design a suit of armor for the social game. The winning design will become part of the game and its artists will receive $1,000. Additionally, the 10 highest voted submissions and five runner-ups will be featured in an online gallery.

Woozworld Raises $6 Million — Children’s virtual world Woozworld has announced a $6 million round of funding, reports VentureBeat. The company is looking to use the money to expand Woozworld onto mobile platforms.

Whale Wars Captain Paul Watson Endorses Social Game — Captain Paul Watson of Sea Shepard Conservation Society and the TLC show Whale Wars officially endorsed the social game, MyConservationPark. Through a partnership with Sea Shepard, developer Good World Games will donate 15% of earnings to the Sea Shepard Conservation Society.

Dungeon OverlordNight Owl Games Displays New Social Game at PAX – At the Penny Arcade Expo last weekend, Night Owl Games debuted a new social strategy game by the name of Dungeon Overlord. The game tasks users with the management of an army of orcs, keeping them happy and equipped (with the construction of buildings and paths) so that they can battle through dungeons automatically. Players can work with friends to boost aspects of their army as they attempt to expand their dominion across the game world.

[Announcement] Bearville.com Passes 20 Million Avatars — The social virtual world for children that utilizes the Build-A-Bear-Workshop brand, Bearville, has reached a new milestone this week. Developer Frima Studios announced that the game has surpassed 20 million avatars.

Conquer Online[Announcement] NetDragon Websoft Announces Completely Free iPad & Facebook MMOG — Chinese online games developer and operator, NetDragon Websoft has announced that it will be bringing Conquer Online to iPad and Facebook as a free-to-play MMOG. The company states that the game will host no download fee, no subscriptions, and no in-game “Shopping Mall.”

New Hires in Social Gaming: 6waves Lolapps, CrowdStar, Digital Chocolate & More

• Sep 1st, 2011
Business, casual, facebook, international, Social Games

11 social companies showed hiring activity this week, according to data from LinkedIn and other sources, picking up from last week’s 10. Though the number of companies showing new hires has increased slightly, the past seven days showed no new activity in terms of major executive level hires.

As always, if your company is hiring new people or making a notable promotion, please let us know. Email editor (at) insidesocialgames (dot) com, and we’ll get it into this or next week’s post. Also, please note that the information about most new hires, below, comes directly from company updates from LinkedIn, and is only as current as each person’s profile.

Looking for new opportunities? The Inside Network Job Board presents a survey of current openings at leading companies

Here’s this week’s full list:

6waves Lolapps

  • Ray Chan, 2D Artist — Three new hires are noted for 6waves Lolapps this week, starting with Chan. Prior to joining 6waves Lolapps, he was a 2D concept artist for Vast Studios.
  • Leo Aquino, 2D Illustrator — Also joining 6waves Lolapps is Aquino. He was formerly a visual content artist and photographer for SwimOutlet.com.
  • Jeffrey Liu, Jr. Graphic Designer — Liu was previously a graphic design intern for OpenFeint and is also currently a graphic designer for Ginger Labs and Urii Designs.

CrowdStar

  • Kristen Wang, Online Marketing Associate — Wang joins CrowdStar this week. She was previously a marketing associate for Changyou.com (US).
  • Matt Ritchie, Software Developer — Also now at CrowdStar is Ritchie. Ritchie was formerly a software engineer for BigDates Solutions.

Digital Chocolate

Gaia Interactive

GameHouse

  • Dan Son, Web Developer — Now a part of GameHouse, Son was previously an enterprise integration software engineer for Clearwire.
  • Steven Thompson, Marketing Manager — Also joining GameHouse this week is Thompson, who previously worked within the ecommerce and paid search space.

GREE

  • Rafael Assumpcao, IT Infrastructure — He was previously a virtualization InfraOps tech leader at Yahoo!.
  • Benedicto Franco Jr., Architect — Also joining Gree is Franco Jr., a former international solutions architect for Yahoo!.
  • Greg Noll, Marketing Manager, Web and Analytics — Noll was previously a producer for online gaming at Namco Bandai Games America.

Loot Drop

  • Jason McIntosh, Software Engineer — Loot Drop starts off a trio of new hires with McIntosh. He was most recently a managing director for Otherwhere Gameworks.
  • Christopher Doucette, Software Engineer — Prior to Loot Drop, Doucette was a Ph.D. student at Princeton.
  • Jonathan Rodgers, Software Engineer — Rodgers was formerly an employee for HumaNature Studios and CrowdStar.

Nordeus

  • Jelena Cvetković, Software Development Engineer  — In an internal shift at Nordeus, Cvetković moves up from her prior role as an intern.

RockYou

  • Ruth Evaline, Account Executive — RockYou makes a single hire, bringing on Evaline, a former account executive for PK4 Media.

Wooga

  • Sako Salovaara, Product Manager Intern — Wooga shows activity this week, starting with Salovaara. Salovaara was previously a student at the Kajaani University of Applied Sciences.
  • Florian Steinhoff, Product Manager — Also joining wooga is Steinhoff, a former student at Technische Fachhochschule, Berlin.

Zynga

  • Viseh K., Associate Producer — Starting off the list of new Zynga hires this week is Visesh K., a former manager for pre-sales and solution design for Sify.
  • Alex Levinson, Security Software Engineer — Also joining Zynga is Levinson. He was previously a student at the Rochester Insitute of Technology.
  • Lisa Ton, Senior Consolidations Accountant – Ton was previously a senior accountant at American Honda Motor.
  • Nick Penninipede, Game Designer — Penninipede was most recently a game designer for Gameloft.
  • Vladimir Loktev, Product Manager — Now a part of Zynga, Loktev was formerly a summer consultant at The Boston Consulting Group.
  • Sharad Mitra, Art Producer — In an internal change at Zynga, Mitra moves up from his role as an associate art producer.
  • Stanislave Komsky, Product Manager — In another internal shift at Zynga, Komsky was previously a product management intern.
  • Cassie Morgan, Game Designer — Morgan was most recently a game designer for Sony Online Entertainment.

This Week’s Headlines From Across Inside Network

• Aug 28th, 2011
Social Games

Here are all the latest headlines from around Inside Network this past week.

IMA LogoInside Mobile Apps

Tracking the convergence of mobile apps, social platforms, and virtual goods.

Monday, August 22nd, 2011

Tuesday, August 23rd, 2011

Wednesday, August 24th, 2011

Thursday, August 25th, 2011

Friday, August 26th, 2011

ISG LogoInside Social Games

Covering all the latest developments at the intersection of games and social platforms.

Monday, August 22nd, 2011

Tuesday, August 23rd, 2011

Wednesday, August 24th, 2011

Thursday, August 25th, 2011

Friday, August 26th, 2011

IF LogoInside Facebook

Tracking Facebook and the Facebook platform for developers and marketers.

Monday, August 22nd, 2011

Tuesday, August 23rd, 2011

Wednesday, August 24th, 2011

Thursday, August 25th, 2011

Friday, August 26th, 2011

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