What the Hell Have We Done As Gamers - The Death of Premium Mobile Games

The rather interesting Go series of games by Square Enix is dead. We will not see new entries to accent Deus Ex Go, Lara Croft Go, or Hitman Go. The series is dead according to Patrick Naud, head of Square Enix Montreal. For those that do not know, the Go series were developed by this studio, so Mr. Naud would know if the series is dead or not. The kicker is, apparently premium mobile games from Square Enix could be not too far behind.

PocketGamer interviewed Mr. Naud recently and boy is it worth your taking the time to read it in full. An excerpt that stands out is below:

“Despite the critical success and the great revenue we’ve had, it’s sad to see that our games are only played by a small slither of the population because of the price point,” said Naud. “That’s such a big barrier for mobile users.”

Yep. Apparently mobile gamers are cheap. There is no other way to think about it. Is it a lack of ever having a physical connection to the games? Even on other portable platforms the digital only releases are not exactly burning up the sales charts.

To think that $5 is too much to pay for a quality gaming experience is a sad. Unfortunately, game publishers have learned just that as premium mobile games receive a tiny bit of the financial backing from fans that “freemium” games receive.

It is clear from the interview with Mr. Naud that Square Enix is not abandoning mobile gaming altogether. Just that there is a coming restructuring that puts premium games closer to the back burner, so they can focus on freemium games.

For me, a gamer on the go for over 30 years now, it is a sad to see companies such as Square Enix having to even fathom not making “pay once” premium games. To think, some day we will be forced to watch ads between battles or levels, possibly as we switch in and out of the inventory screen of an RPG, is just annoying beyond belief.

We as mobile gamers brought this “freemium” hell upon ourselves and now we will have to deal with it.

I love playing new experiences on my phone. I have discovered tons of new and interesting titles via the freemium model. I am just as guilty as anyone else for supporting freemium gaming.

I like to think that I have also supported premium games as much as I humanly could. Some titles, particularly Square Enix titles, are almost impossible to take seriously at $20+ for the mobile version. While I love the tale of Chrono Trigger, I have been there, done that. The mobile game did not offer enough new stuff for me to warrant dropping $20 on it, or $10 when on the rare 50% off sale.

Maybe that is the problem here. As the old saying goes, it takes two to tango.

While it is true freemium games are taking over, I cannot help but think that gaming companies may prefer that method. Everything is coming around to the Massively Multiplayer Online style of development. Meaning that it never truly is a “complete” game as additional content is constantly being added and old content is being tweaked for fresh players.

While it is sad to see the Go series end like it has, we still have three great titles in the series. There is nothing saying that Square Enix Montreal will not continue the Go series as a freemium series with players watching ads or paying cold hard cash for digital consumables rather than one-time purchases.

It is true that there simply is not enough support from mobile gaming fans to warrant companies focusing on single purchase releases. It is a failed business model in the mobile market. It didn’t have to be that way.

Early on Apple and their iPod Touch/iPhone platform showed that the sweet spot for premium mobile gaming was $0.99 – not $1.29, not $2.99, etc.

iPad platform releases were shown to be successes at $7.99 and $9.99 but not much else. iPad releases were also advertised as the “HD” version of the respective title – fans were given an obvious reason to support justifying purchasing the iPad version, even if they had the title on their iPhone.

What happened is gaming companies forgot this. They let greed, or game budgets, get out of hand and started raising the prices of games.

Look, I get it. Games cost money to develop. Everything costs money.

I think the catalyst for freemium to take over was the moment that Rovio released an ad supported version of Angry Birds. It was not long before the ad supported version was earning Rovio more than the paid downloads were for the same period.

This, I believe, was the final nail in the coffin for premium games on mobile. This is just one aspect of the situation that has called for the death of premium, pay once, mobile games.

Another aspect I want to call your attention to is a little title called Candy Crush Saga. Maybe you have heard of this one?

Way back in 2013 Candy Crush Saga was earning more in a day than most premium mobile games do their entire life. I am not sure what the earnings are today but five years ago daily income was over $500k for this match 3 title.

This money is earned from In-App Purchases for things such as additional moves. Things that are paid for with real world money and then consumed. Gone. Digital widgets that you just gave real money for. A fleeting chance at completing a level or getting a new digital item. Literally 1 and 0’s in your phone.

How can premium game makers battle that type of enticement? I mean, seriously. Premium games earn the publisher money one time. In-App Purchases and advertising, as shown in these examples, can earn money for the publisher every day for years.

What is the best way to get your game in the hands of as many players as possible? Yes, of course. Make it free. If your game is free more people will download it. This is true for anything. We gave away the digital copies of Retro Gaming Magazine and charged for the physical prints. RGM, across 18 digital distribution platforms passed 250,000 downloads of the free PDF. The physical sales maybe hit triple digits. Maybe.

It is no wonder that Square Enix is ending the Go series. The games had no chance to battle the potential earnings that freemium games can bring in. Even Sega has gotten in on the freemium model with their retro releases on iOS and Google Play (you can pay a small fee to remove the advertising).

Remember, we as gamers brought this upon ourselves and sadly, I don’t see this changing any time soon. There is simply too much money in advertising supported games or In-App Purchases. Maybe next time, before buying that digital widget, think “do I really need this?” Unfortunately, that will not cross your mind. It is too tempting to cough up a buck for five more moves in a game like Candy Crush Soda Saga or another title so that we can get past this one tough level.

Mobile games are designed with this in mind.