When we last spoke with GamersFirst at the 2008 Austin Game Developers Conference, they were off to a fresh start in the Free2Play market and were expanding their coverage area and game offerings. This year, we met with the new Senior Vice President, Head of Global Markets Rahul Sandil on the new mission of GamersFirst, and where he hopes to take the company in the next year.
GamesBizWire (GBW): Rahul, can you give us some background on how you got involved in the gaming industry. What lead you to join the GamersFirst team?
Rahul Sandil (RS): I started my career with EMI (HMV) India spearheading sales and licensing for Ethnic Indian Music in Asia Pacific, EMEA and North America. I went on to manage the North American operations for EMI's subsidiary, Saregama Plc. During this time, I also carved out an entirely new business in North America in licensing Indian Music to mainstream labels for creating new genres like the highly popular Bhangra Rap, Neo Indian Classical and Indo Fusion.
After that I was Senior Director at a technology start up, Net Matrix Solutions, which grew their solutions practice from zero to $15 million USD under my leadership in under a year. I was then Senior Manager and Client Partner at HCL America, a $4 billion technology outsourcing giant. Most recently, I was a founding team member at Gameshastra. Gameshastra started as an outsourcing services company in the video games industry, but we scaled rapidly to become a first party developer for SCEE.
I joined GamersFirst in 2009 to spearhead Global Business Development. My key focus is to forge strong and strategic business partnerships across all of GamersFirst markets. Over the years I have also served as a consultant to the Recording Industry Association of America.
GBW: When we last spoke with GamersFirst, the company was starting to entertain the idea of making widgets available on popular networking and social media sites. How has that developed in the last year?
RS: With the growing popularity of social networks, it is very important to us to have a presence on social networks. We are continuing to explore the idea of making social gaming apps available on Facebook, iPhone and MySpace. We have already taken aggressive leadership in buying ads and keywords in these immensely popular social networks.
GamersFirst has also entered into a long term strategic partnership with Hi5 which is generating a lot of new traffic and opening new markets for our games. Our strategy going forward is to dive further into social networking and use it as a way to build and strengthen our community. We are seeing more community interaction and involvement than ever and have developed Facebook and Twitter accounts for each of our games.
GBW: The Free2Play MMO and digital download arena has become a huge driver of the video game industry, much larger than many expected. Do you think that MMOs represent the future of the video game industry, and if you do, how do you see that shift happening?
RS: The shift has already begun. Social networks and MMO’s are similar. Gamers don’t want to play by themselves when they have the option to play with others. As being online becomes easier on a global scale and almost anyone can gain Internet access, MMO’s are growing at a rapid pace. 2010 will be a huge year for MMO’s, but the challenge will be to constantly come up with fresh new content for players and surviving in the increasingly competitive MMO market. We are excited to be a part of that growth and will continue to work with our developers and community to come up with the newest and freshest content available in the MMO Free2Play arena. Our existing games like War Rock, Knight Online and Sword of the New World have seen tremendous growth in traffic and revenue in 2009 and our super exciting slate, which includes Sword 2, Parabellum, Taikodom, et al. for 2010 is a testimony to the phenomenal growth our industry is seeing going forward.
GBW: With the expansion of MMOs and digital content, where do you see the future of console development going? Do you think most players have loyalty to the console a game is played on, or loyalty to the content that they play? What does this mean for content developers, the positioning of titles and the time to market?
RS: Well, consoles will always have a large and loyal following. Traditionally, it has been challenging to beat the quality and innovation of the console market. With the introduction of the Wii, consoles have also penetrated a brand new gamer audience, shifting the mindset of gaming.
There is a big enough difference between PC and console gaming, that many players choose to do both. The great thing about Free2Play PC MMO’s is that the content changes more frequently than that of console releases or even box-set PC games. Also, if you see the new expansions we have released in War Rock, Sword and Knight Online, our developers have rapidly bridged the technology gaps and our content is now at par with the best in the console business.
The development cycle for a Free2Play MMOG is on-going, which is really what attracts and keeps many of our players. Even if they take a break to go play a console game, it is not long before they come back to their computer searching for the newest content in our MMO’s. Console games are already moving steadily towards MMO gaming, but will never be able to keep up with the content production of a PC MMO. The video game industry is now witnessing a paradigm shift. MMOGs were long considered as cheap mimics of console games. Over the last year it is now the console games who are trying to mimic the community experience and global footprint of MMOGs. The three major console developers are investing millions in their online play capabilities and they now have an uphill task in catching up to the expertise we have developed in servicing our 28 million strong online community.
GBW: Is the preferred content delivery, via console or digital download, different in other parts of the world? Meaning, do Eastern countries prefer one method versus Western countries? How does GamersFirst deal with the differences to provide the best possible user content experience?
RS: There is definitely a difference between markets. However, the gap between them is beginning to decrease. North America is still very console centric with their preferred method of content delivery, while Eastern Europe, Asia and even South America have been adopting the digital download much easier; this may be largely associated with the cost difference. It is much cheaper to download your game digitally than to purchase a console game.
We have teams in various markets to determine the best delivery methods in each market. There are some markets where they need to obtain a DVD or something physical to install; other markets prefer online download patches. In the end, the consumer only cares about a great entertainment experience – the mode of delivery will continue to become immaterial.
GBW: GamersFirst publishes titles all over the world. With global game distribution and releases becoming more and more popular, how does localization fit into the production of your titles? Is it a main focus of the company?
RS: GamersFirst works with each individual developer to find the best localization solution for their titles for all our markets. We have a very experienced production staff that works to ensure that titles are culture and market specific, and they work hand-in-hand with the local translation group to make certain the process is smooth and accurate.
We take localization very seriously, as many of our fans and players have come to expect our titles to be specific to the country they live in, and to match the culture and language of that territory. For example, we publish Runes of Magic TR in Turkey; so when our games are released in that area, we ensure that all costumes, actions, language and cultural references are correct and corresponding to those traditions found in Turkey. We also run localized holidays and make sure to be culturally sensitive to various differences. We are doing the same with South America and Eastern Europe to really cater to each gaming market. War Rock is one of the most popular MMO FPS title in Germany and we have localized that game for the German market intensively. We are also working with a global footprint of developers to address these specific localization challenges. In our current slate, Acony (developer of Parabellum) is a Germany-based developer, Runewaker (Runes of Magic TR) is based out of Taiwan, Hoplon (Taikodom) is based out of Brazil and Vae Victis (Victory) is HQ in Italy.
GBW: In challenging economic times, many people have labeled the game industry as “recession proof.” How is this industry more “recession proof” than others? Where do you see the game industry headed in the next five years? What are the three largest catalysts and milestones you can identify around the industry’s evolution?
RS: The game industry has definitely had its many challenges in 2009, but maybe a little more protected than some other more volatile industries. However, I think it is more the console market that was hit during this time due to the cost. A significant reason that the GamersFirst model was able to maintain itself through tough economic times is the low barrier to entry for a gamer. Free2Play games are significantly easier to access and do not require gamers to pay a charge to start playing. With the financial struggle that the world is going through, gamers still feel safe in a Free2Play environment, where they make financial investments at their will. One of the greatest characteristics of the Free2Play MMO is that it is not necessary to have money to play, which keeps a lot of players engaged until they are able to or choose to make investments.
GBW: What other new titles or genres is GamersFirst working on?
RS: GamersFirst has worked very hard this year to identify titles that will complement our Free2Play catalog, which we will be expanding in 2010. First and foremost, GamersFirst will be releasing Sword 2 the second chapter to Sword of the New World. We also recently released an all new expansion for Knight Online titled “Chaos”. War Rock will be releasing their new Clan Expansion in early 2010. Our slate for 2010 also includes Parabellum, Victory and Taikodom. Please be sure to see all our Free2Play Games at www.GamersFirst.com. You can also follow us on Twitter (@GamersFirst) and join us on Facebook.
