Bart Decrem谈迪士尼打造手机游戏角色之路
2012-07-20 09:28:18   来源：donews   评论：0 点击：

　智能手机和平板电脑应用是娱乐巨头迪士尼的优先考虑目标。自两年前迪士尼收购了Bart Decrem初创公司Tapulous后，Bart Decrem便开始引导着这家公司朝手机游戏领域发展。Decrem为迪士尼的手机游戏开发做出了巨大的贡献并创造出了一系列热门手机游戏——包括《小鳄鱼爱洗澡》以及《神庙逃亡：勇气》等。在本周迪士尼有三款游戏占据了苹果iTunes App Store付费应用排行榜前三名，这是非常罕见的情况。

disney-mobile-brave-bart-decrem(from venturebeat)

　　但是Decrem拥有更大的野心。他希望通过手机游戏而衍生出更多新角色，并使其成为世界瞩目的迪士尼角色。《小鳄鱼爱洗澡》中的Swampy这种角色似乎并不受电影制作人和电视节目制片人待见，但是Swampy却通过多种设备（与其它迪士尼角色出名的方法不同）而俘获了数百万玩家，尤其是新一代的儿童群体。也许将来有一天，Decrem也会打造出手机游戏中的米老鼠神话。

　　Decrem在最近的GamesBeat 2012大会的媒体采访中分享地公司通过手机游戏挖掘迪士尼新角色的创想，以下为访谈内容：

　　你们的游戏已经占据iPhone App Store付费应用榜单前三名，但是很显然做到这一点并不容易。能否跟我们分享下你们在此之前付出了多少努力？

　　我来到迪士尼已经两年了，而7月11日正是App Store的4周岁生日（游戏邦注：App Store于2008年7月11日上线）。在此之前我们已经展开了一系列的活动，而在越狱软件出现之后我们创办了Tapulous这家公司，并最后被迪士尼所收购。7月11日也是最初版《Tap Tap Revenge》登上排行榜第一位的4周年纪念日。

　　能否继续跟我们描述一些你在进入迪士尼之前的经历。之前我们谈到了一开始所遇到的种种困难以及新角色的创造。之后你们又做了些什么？

　　2007年6月29日iPhone正式发布了，而在此之前的12个月内我更是尝试了6款完全不同的手机。在iPhone一出现时我便说道：“等的就它！它将成为与众不同的手机！”同年10月出现了这款手机的越狱软件，并且用户能在App Store等平台下载到这些应用。从那以后中国市场开始广泛掀起越狱热潮。到2007年12月，你已经能够在这个小小的生态圈中看到数百款应用。我和几个好友一起进入了这个平台并预感它具有无限潜力。虽然我们不能明确地说出它的潜力所在，但但我们知道它能够吸引更多人针对于该平台开发应用，并形成一个稳定的社区。2008年1月我们创建了Tapulous。而在App Store上线后我们发行了3款应用，一款是让用户能够连接到Twitter和Facebook的应用，一款是照片分享应用，还有一款则是《Tap Tap Revenge》游戏（刚好发行于越狱软件出现的那几天）。在7月11日《Tap Tap Revenge》登上了排行榜的第一位，我们在意外中摇身变为游戏公司。《Tap Tap Revenge》成了首个衍生于App Store的品牌产品。

tap-tap-tour(from venturebeat)

　　对于如何创造出这种爆炸性发展，你的回答是意外。接下来让我们谈谈你们在最后四年的经历。因为这对于那些还未能与迪士尼合作的开发者来说非常重要。他们仍在制作属于自己的游戏。

　　我们需要明确的是何时转向下一款游戏，以及何时放手或坚持下去？就拿《Tap Tap Revenge》来说吧，虽然这款游戏在7月11日登上了榜单首位，但是在8月中旬它却跌落到了47名。所以我们便决定放弃这款游戏并专注于“Twinkle（游戏邦注：用于连接Facebook）”这款应用。

　　随后在苹果的秋季发布会上，乔布斯公开了他们的新款iPod Touch，并且他们在展示过程中使用了《Tap Tap Revenge》截图。后来在所有的苹果商店，所有的苹果营销宣传材料中都出现了运行于iPod Touch设备的《Tap Tap Revenge》广告。这款游戏时来运转了，我们也开始为之持续更新内容。最终让游戏变成了一棵常青树，我们认为这一切应归功于App Store。我想与之最为相似的当属YouTube。用户进入YouTube并查看最新视频，然后打开一些自己感兴趣的视频并与好友进行交流，也许他们还会将某些视频添加到书签中。而在App Store中玩家也会在此搜索最新应用，下载自己感兴趣的应用并尝试着玩看看，然后删除大部分应用并与好友分享感受。它们所遵循的道理完全相同。所以在这个充斥着50多万应用的世界中你如何才能创造出不被淘汰的产品？所以我们便能够以《Tap Tap Revenge》为基础而向前发展。但是对于我来说最困难的挑战便是再次创造出同样成功的游戏。我们必须投入好几年的时间去研究如何创造出另一款热门游戏。就像Rovio，他们便坚守着同一款游戏（《愤怒的小鸟》）好几年，才在最近推出第二款游戏（《Amazing Alex》）。

　　尽管已经拥有了一大批忠实的粉丝，他们仍只是在进行一系列的扩展。

　　的确是这样的。但是这么做却会推动游戏的进化和发展，就像我们基于《Tap Tap Revenge》所做的那样。对于这种行动好像总会有一个固有“套路”，对不？当你的游戏受到热捧后你便能够投入更多精力去延续这种热潮，并开始进行扩展。就像《Tap Tap Revenge》、《愤怒的小鸟》、《小鳄鱼爱洗澡》以及《Where’s My Perry?》所经历的那样。创建一个新IP以及新品牌对我们来说真的很困难，我们在迪士尼已经很了解这一点了。

wheres-my-perry(from venturebeat)

　　在拥有众多可选择的迪士尼角色之前，你有何体会？

　　就拿我们自己来说吧，我们拥有一款热门游戏并且我们也像Rovio运营《愤怒的小鸟》一样对其加倍投入精力。之前我们在《Tap Tap Revenge》中投入了很多并反复进行了测试才最终创造出这个新IP。而在我们创造出《小鳄鱼爱洗澡》之前，迪士尼一直都坚持使用现有的角色去创造出热门游戏。

　　就像Dean所说的那样，大约在一年前我的上司John Pleasants曾经说他并不认为这种方法可行。如果没有成功的胜算那我又应该做些什么？他便告诉我应该进行更多尝试，应该尝试着思考各种策略以及其它内容。为何不专注于创造最优秀的游戏，让它自己有序地发展起来？我们在洛杉矶工作室中有一个小团队便创造出这么一款简单的小游戏，并且我们能够从中感受到游戏乐趣。所以我们需要做的便是支持这个团队，不让其他人干扰他们，并提供给他们足够的时间。虽然他们拥有技术，但是我们还必须验证一个问题，也迪士尼的问题，即如何才能让游戏与众不同——我认为这也是让游戏获得成功的关键问题。

　　你是如何从迪士尼众多角色中做出选择？你又如何与拥有不同艺术理念的其它部门人员共事，并将他们的想法运用于自己的设计中？显然迪士尼所有些角色已经诞生了数十年之久，其本身也已经拥有非常高的品牌价值了。

　　这是个很简单的问题。一开始我们的设想是玩家通过移动手指开始游戏，也就是从所谓的核心机制开始进入游戏。而他们又会经历什么乐趣呢？就拿《小鳄鱼爱洗澡》来说吧，游戏的乐趣在于玩家用手指穿破污垢让水能够往下流动。随后我们便会问道，为何玩家需要这么做？接下来会发生什么？然后开发团队便会就此而思考；我们接着说道，我想因为底下有种子存在吧，如果能够给予种子水分，它们便能够发芽。但是如此看来这却不具有多大乐趣。

　　然后有一天游戏制作人Tim FitzRandolph说道，何不在下面设置一只短吻鳄，并且它希望在此洗澡。我们听说过一个大城市下水道中有一只短吻鳄这样的故事。所以我们便认为这是一种有趣且特别的设置，并且当我们联想到短吻鳄时也不会认为它是可爱的动物。所以我们便接受了这一想法。而对于你的问题，我们能做的便是想办法挖掘游戏的乐趣以及核心内容，然后问自己为何要这么做，游戏发生在怎样的世界中，它适合哪种设置？

wheres-my-water(from venturebeat)

　　而如果是娱乐公司他们则会采取相反的做法。就像当一款电影发布后，他们会要求你以此创造一款游戏并在某个特定日期发行游戏，但是如此你便只能发行一款质量糟糕的游戏。因为你是根据发行日期，电影中的角色和世界去创造游戏。如果你真心想要创造一款优秀的游戏，你便需要先明确游戏乐趣，然后思考游戏所呈现的世界，并在一切都准备完善后才推出游戏。这便是我们创造出成功的游戏以及创建出最佳IP的主要过程。当我们开始设计《小鳄鱼爱洗澡》时我们并没有特别偏爱或排斥迪士尼的角色。我们只是专注于游戏设定，并最终想出了短吻鳄这个角色。这是一个全新的角色，我们就围绕着它去创造游戏。有时候我们会用新的迪士尼角色，有时候会用现成的迪士尼角色开发游戏。

　　你也创造了一些原创IP，你如何向迪士尼其他成员传达IP理念？你们拥有各种不同的市场营销渠道以及品牌部门，而你又是如何让他们与公司其他部门为共同的目标而努力？

　　迪士尼有两样特长。他们最擅长的便是创造令人惊艳的娱乐体验。并且总是会利用一些来自电影世界和故事中的角色。就像围绕着皮克斯的电影，如《勇敢传说》而创造游戏。其次，迪士尼擅于使用大规模的市场营销渠道和发行方法去推广游戏。

　　我们同样也希望在App Store中做出同样的尝试。即我们努力创造出一些特别的游戏体验，然后使用迪士尼全球平台去推广这些游戏。我们与对方公司的合作便是表露我们正在努力制作一个项目，正在努力创造一款出色的游戏，而对方刚好也在制作一部出色的电视节目，正在创造吸引人的娱乐体验，或者正在制作一部优秀的电影。这便是我们正在做的事。即我们刚好拥有适合游戏的角色并表达了合作意愿，或者对方的角色适合我们的游戏所以我们希望与之合作。这是一种交涉，迪士尼是IP创造者，所以我们很重视质量。这也是我们的策略。当《小鳄鱼爱洗澡》发行后，如果玩家喜欢这款游戏，他们便会希望我们能够制作与游戏相关的周边产品（如T恤）。而我们便可以从中扩展业务。

　　这点很有趣。我想起了Playdom和Playfish这两者被收购时，业内有许多疑问，即这种收购能够为买主引进更多用户并实现收益增长吗？当时有很多人怀疑这两笔收购的可行性，并认为这种收购与角色无关。。而在App Store中又是何种情况？很多开发者都在抱怨很难获得更多用户，而最热门榜单前列也长期被一些相同的游戏占据着。这是否是一种自然发展规律，苹果是否希望看到这种情况？

　　我来到这个平台已经将近5年时间了。我认为这是一个非常了不起的平台，并且我也觉得它还是一块空白画布，我一直在思考着如何与之相连并创造出最棒的娱乐体验。所以我认为这是一个坚持平等主义的平台。

　　拥有热门游戏可以占据有利地位……

　　是的。就拿《翼飞冲天2》（游戏邦注：它其实是该游戏原版本的扩展内容，并非独立版新游戏）来说吧。这是一款来自德国独立开发者的作品，但是它却能够让无数人对之报以期待。其背后并没有任何强大的后台，开发者也并不认识苹果的公关经理。这主要是因为苹果和乔布斯创建了一个神奇的平台。在iPhone和iPad这两种神奇的设备相继诞生后苹果又创建了App Store并为我们展示了一些有趣的内容。所以现在的人们便希望能够看到更好的内容。我也认为优秀的内容仍然是制胜法宝。因为我们是迪士尼，而如果你是Rovio这类优秀团队，你便拥有强大推广能力，你便能够攀上排行榜前列。

　　如果你没有任何特殊的经验你便很难长期待在那里。这主要取决于App Store中的变动。对我们来说，位列榜单前三名真是一个很棒的时刻，我们也真心希望这一时刻能够长久一点。我们也一直在尝试着寻找自己获取真正喜欢游戏的热情玩家的法则。另一部分需要注意的就是，要善用数据辅助游戏设计。这是我们从Facebook，Playdom或Playfish中得到的经验。数据和分析的作用便是帮助你了解用户并想办法吸引他们再次回到游戏中。这的确具有很大的功效。所以我们一直在努力将科学与艺术结合在一起。

　　对于那些正在努力进入这个行业的人士，也就是那些拥有一款热门游戏但却不清楚接下来该怎么做的开发者或小型团队，你有何建议？能否说说如何才能获得苹果的推荐？

　　我们之所以得到苹果的推荐是因为我们创造了一款高质量的游戏。这便是我们遵循的方法。记得当我们还在Tapulous时，我们多次试图得到苹果的推荐，但是我们并没有公关经理并且也不清楚该向谁请求帮助，他们只会叫我们走开，如果逼得太紧也会引起他们的不快。这是我们从中吸取的经验教训。

　　但是如果你的游戏真的非常优秀，苹果便会主动为你做推荐。苹果的推荐确实很重要。当然了这里也还有其它推广渠道，例如Free App a Day以及其它用户获取渠道，我也并不反对这些方法。我只是认为我们可以更有策略性地使用这些方法。但是就像我之前所说的，如果你创造了一款优秀的游戏，它自然就会攀上榜单前列，你也无需各种瞎忙活了。

　　当我们在玩《Draw Something》时便能够感受到这是一款简单的游戏，并且具有极大的潜力。但是当我们转向《翼飞冲天》时，我们会发现即使只有一名开发成员，即使没有花俏的商业模式，它也取得了非常出色的成绩，其背后蕴含着巨大的潜力与激情。在Tapulous被收购时有一些同事也随之离开了，而后来他们自己发布了3款游戏。一款是僵尸游戏，一款是第一人称射击游戏还有一款是儿童游戏。这三款游戏都登上了榜单首位。当我问他们创造游戏的目标和策略是什么时，他们的回答是不知道，他们只是想创造自己喜欢的内容而已。所以他们便做到了。我想这也是获得成功的最佳武器吧。

temple-run-brave(from venturebeat)

　　我们相信跨媒体游戏还存在着巨大的潜力。我们知道电视圈或电影圈的人士还不理解游戏中的角色和故事如何发展，而游戏界人士也并不清楚电影中的角色和故事的走向。你认为该如何填补这个认知鸿沟呢？

　　我还记得我们第一次前往Disney Channel（游戏邦注：迪士尼公司旗下的有线电视频道）时的情景。我说道，看，这是我们所创造的游戏《小鳄鱼爱洗澡》，它已经连续数周蝉联App Store排行榜首位了，我们想围绕这款游戏制作一个电视节目。但是其中一位负责人却表示这是不可行的。因为他们已经有《飞哥与小佛》了，他们只会考虑他们所创造的角色以及世界，他们只想写自己的故事。我想这也是为何他们的电视节目会如此成功的重要原因。

　　而当我们冒冒失失地前往那里并说道，嘿，帮我们创建一个电视节目时，我们其实并不清楚如何才能创造出一个高质量的电视节目。在他们拒绝后我们反问道，那你们的想法是什么？他们反而回答道，我们有一部名为《飞哥与小佛》的电视节目，你们何不围绕着它去创造iPhone游戏。这时倒换成我觉得不可行了。（大笑）当我们开始创造游戏时，我们会先明确一个游戏机制，然后围绕着这些机制开始创作。而我们在迪士尼的工作便是努力维系这些不同领域的工作。就像在创造《小鳄鱼爱洗澡》时一些来自动画工作室的人员便帮助我们设计了角色的外观，写了游戏中发生的故事，这是一种异花授粉的工作方式 。从总体上看，大多数媒体公司在游戏中遭遇失败便是因为在这方面做得不好，许多游戏角色不能跨媒体发展也是因为这一点。所以这是一种核心挑战，但却很少有人能够成功克服它。（本文为游戏邦/gamerboom.com编译，拒绝任何不保留版权的转载，如需转载请联系：游戏邦）

　　Bart Decrem says mobile games will spawn a new generation of Disney characters (interview)

　　Dean Takahashi

　　Smartphone and tablet apps are a major priority for entertainment giant Disney. Bart Decrem has been leading the charge into mobile games since Disney bought his startup Tapulous two years ago. Now Decrem is heading all of Disney’s mobile gaming efforts and he has had a string of hits, from Where’s My Water? to Temple Run Brave. In fact, this week, Disney had all three of the top paid apps in the Apple iTunes App Store. That’s an exceedingly rare occurrence, since top apps come and go often.

　　But Decrem has even bigger ambitions. He wants mobile games to spawn new characters who could become the basis of new Disney-wide characters. It might seem like it would be easy for film makers and TV show creators to dismiss characters such as Swampy from Where’s My Water? But Swampy is reaching millions of people, particularly a new generation of kids, through more relevant devices than other top Disney characters. Some day, Decrem may find the Mickey Mouse of mobile games.

　　Decrem spoke with Eric Eldon, co-editor of TechCrunch, in a fireside chat at GamesBeat 2012. Here’s an edited transcript of the talk.

　　Eldon: Your games have become the top three paid apps in the iPhone App Store, which is obviously an extremely difficult thing to do. So you were telling me backstage that you were coming up on a big milestone, what was that?

　　Bart Decrem: Well, I just had my two-year anniversary at the Walt Disney Company, and then tomorrow [July 11] is a four-year anniversary on the App Store. The App Store went live on July 11, 2008. We had a little bit of activity before then, after the jailbreak, we started a company called Tapulous which ended up at Disney. But yes, tomorrow will be the four-year anniversary of hitting number one for the first time with Tap Tap Revenge.

　　Eldon: So before we get into the modern era of what you’re doing right now at Disney, walk us through a bit. The last session was talking about how hard it was to get off the ground and build these new characters. What did you do?

　　Bart Decrem: Well, mid-2007, I think it was June 29, 2007, the iPhone came out, and I had gone through six different phones in the last twelve months before that. The iPhone came out and I said, ‘Wow, this thing is it, this is going to be different.’ Almost by October of that year, the phone got jailbroken, and you could download these little apps through something like the App Store. I started doing that, and people in China started doing that massively, because it was the only way you could get an iPhone in China. By December of 2007, you could see this little ecosystem of hundreds of apps showing up. I was there with a couple of friends and we all said this was going to be big. We don’t know what’s going to be big, but it’s going to be about building apps on this platform, it’s going to be about building a community. In January 2008 we started the company. We put out three apps when the App Store went live, a little app that let you connect on Twitter and Facebook, and we had a photo-sharing app, and then we had a game called Tap Tap Revenge that came out in those jailbreak days. That went to number one on July 11, and we woke up as an accidental game company. Tap Tap Revenge became the first brand born on the App Store.

　　Eldon: How did you take it from this one hit that happened to blow up, you said it was an accident. Just walk us through the last four years. Because this is really important for a lot of different developers who aren’t with Disney right now. They’re building their own games.

　　Decrem: A thing that we were talking about is, when do you move on to the next title, and when do you sort of double down and tough it out? In the case of Tap Tap Revenge, we were just talking backstage. The game sat at number one on July 11, but by mid-August it was dropping down the charts, sitting at number 47 or something like that. We were about to give up on the game and focus on this app called Twinkle, a social app to connect on Facebook.

　　And then Apple did their fall announcement. At their event, Steve Jobs started showing off the new iPod Touches, and they were using these screenshots of Tap Tap Revenge. It ended up in all the Apple stores, all the marketing materials, you’d see Macy’s ads for the iPod Touch with Tap Tap Revenge. The game came back, and we kept doing upgrades and updates and adding new content to it. It became an institution, it became an evergreen, and that’s how we figured out that the App Store is basically. The closest thing to it is YouTube, and apps are by and large consumable. The entertainment experience is, go on YouTube, check out what’s new, play a few videos, talk to your friends about a couple of them, and maybe bookmark one of those videos. Go to the App Store, see what’s new, download a couple of things, play one or two, delete most of it, talk to your friends about it. It’s the same thing. So in a world where there’s half a million apps or more, how do you build things that are not consumable, that stick around? We were able to do that with Tap Tap Revenge. And then, for me, the hardest thing was doing it again. Certainly for me it took a couple of years to figure out how to build another hit. If you look at Rovio, they’ve been at it for a couple of years, their second title’s coming out Thursday.

　　Eldon: They’ve had some expansions, though, they’ve had some follow-ups.

　　Decrem: That’s right. But that’s evolving the franchise, like we’ve done with Tap Tap. There’s a playbook for that one, right? Once you’ve got a hit and you can make it be relevant for more than a couple of weeks, then you can do the expansions. We’ve done it with Tap Tap Revenge, you’ve seen it with Angry Birds, Where’s My Water?, Where’s My Perry? Building a new IP, building a new brand, is hard, and I feel like we’re now getting the swing of it at Disney.

　　Eldon: What had worked for you before you had this massive repository of Disney characters to draw upon?

　　Decrem: Well, in my case, we had one hit and we doubled down on it the same way Rovio has with Angry Birds. We invested in Tap Tap Revenge, and it took a number of trials, creating new IP. But also, at Disney, taking existing Disney characters and building hit games. Disney was at it a couple of years before we hit it big with Where’s My Water?

　　What happened, actually, for me, was not unlike what Dean was talking about, about a year ago, sitting down with a guy named John Pleasants, who is my boss, and saying, I don’t feel like it’s working. I don’t feel that we’re winning. What should I do differently? He said, well, you’re trying to do too many things, you’re trying to think about strategy and all this other stuff. Why don’t you focus on building great games, and then everything else will take care of itself? There was a small team in our LA studio that had built this very simple little game. You could feel the fun in it. What we did is we just supported the team, we didn’t let people distract them, we gave them the time that they needed. They had the mechanic, but we asked them the one question, it’s the Disney question, it’s what makes us special, and I do think it’s what drives the success of our games…

　　Eldon: Just to back up a little bit, how do you figure out which Disney characters and franchises to build around? How do you work with people in other parts of the company who have these other ideas about the art and how it should be used? Some of these characters have obviously been around for decades and have a lot of brand value to them.

　　Decrem: It’s a simple question, and I was just getting to it. You start with a thing that you do with your finger, you start with what you call a core mechanic. What’s the fun thing that you’re doing? In the case of Where’s My Water?, the fun thing was, you cut through dirt with your fingers to get water to go somewhere. That’s the fun. And then we asked, the one question was, why are you doing that? What’s going on here? And so then the team thought about it, we said, well, we think there are seeds down there, if you give them water, they’ll sprout. But nothing interesting came from that.

　　And then one day Tim FitzRandolph, the game-maker, came and said, we think there’s an alligator down there. He wants to take a shower. There’s alligators in the sewer below the big city, we all know that story. So we said, well, that’s interesting because it’s funny and unexpected, and alligators aren’t necessarily cute when you think about them. So we went with that idea. To answer your question, it’s about finding the fun in a game, the core thing that you do, and then we ask ourselves, why are we doing that, what world is this taking place in, where does it fit?

　　Traditionally, when you look at entertainment companies, they do it the other way around. There’s a movie coming out, it’s called blah blah blah, you need to build a game and it needs to ship that day. That’s a recipe for shipping a poor-quality game. You’re shipping against the date and you’re building a game based on a character and a world. If you want to build a great game, you’re going to first figure out the fun, and then figure out what world it takes place in and ship it when it’s ready. By doing it in that sequence, it’s how we build successful games and that’s how we figure out what IP to use. When we started Where’s My Water?, we didn’t have a bias for or against Disney characters. We just asked, what’s going on here? And the answer was an alligator. It was a new alligator, so we went with that. Sometimes it’s a new Disney character and sometimes it’s an existing one.

　　Eldon: You’ve also been developing some original IP. How do you communicate that with the rest of Disney? You have all these different marketing channels, all these brand departments. How do you bring that together with the rest of the company?

　　Decrem: Disney is good at two things. At our best — and we’re frequently at our best, if not always — we create amazing entertainment experiences. And more often than not, there’s a character in the world and story that rolls out of it. Like any Pixar movie, Brave, that’s what we do at our best. We do that, and then the second thing that Disney does, we then blow it out on a global scale with a massive marketing machine and distribution power.

　　So that’s what we’re trying to do on the App Store. We’re trying to build really exceptional quality gaming experiences, and then you want to market them and use the global platform of the Walt Disney Company. The way that connects with the company is that we tell folks, hey, we’re trying to build a business, we’re trying to build awesome games, you’re trying to build awesome TV shows, you’re trying to build amazing park experiences, you’re trying to build awesome movies. That’s what we’re doing. We have a character here that fits with this game and presents an opportunity to work together, or you’ve got a character that fits our game, let’s work together. That’s the conversation, and Disney is about IP creation, so they understand that commitment to quality. That’s how we engage. What happened when Where’s My Water came out, people just loved the game. And because they loved the game, they wanted us to make a T-shirt for it, they wanted it to show up somewhere else. And you go from there.

　　Eldon: It’s fascinating for me, having been covering this stuff since I was back with Dean at VentureBeat. Having seen the Playdom acquisition go down, I think both Playdom and Playfish, there’s a lot of doubt, it’s all about growth numbers and monetizing right now. There was a lot of skepticism at the time, about both of those acquisitions, saying that it’s not about the character. What’s happening now in the App Store? A lot of developers are complaining that it’s harder to get users, the top rankings aren’t changing as much. Is this natural maturity, is this what Apple wants?

　　Decrem: I’ve been at this for almost five years, come November. I think it’s an amazing platform. I still think it’s a blank canvas, I still think we’re trying to figure out how to connect and craft amazing entertainment experiences. And I think it’s such an egalitarian platform.

　　Eldon: Having a hit helps…

　　Decrem: Yeah. But if you look at the App Store, tomorrow Tiny Wings 2 is launching. That’s a dude. Maybe it’s five people out in Germany. But that’s the thing that may push us out of one or two tomorrow. There’s no big machine behind it. He doesn’t have an Apple relationship manager. It’s a dude in Germany. And it’s because Apple and Steve Jobs built a platform that’s kind of magical. The iPhone, the iPad, people think this is a magical device. And then Apple did a really amazing job curating the App Store and showcasing the good stuff. So now people want the good stuff. I think the good stuff still wins. Because we’re Disney, because you’re Rovio, and you have that kind of distribution power, then you will go to number one, you will go high on the charts.

　　But you’re not going to stay there if you don’t have an exceptional experience. It depends on what’s going on in the App Store. This is a great moment, for us to have those top three spots. It’s very special, and hopefully we can make it last a little bit longer. But we’re trying to find our formula, and our formula I think is going to be about finding passionate audiences for games that are truly great. Dean was talking about this for Rovio, about building something that you’re really proud of. And then the other half is, live in the world of the data. That’s what you get from Facebook or Playdom or Playfish. The power of numbers and analytics and understanding who your users are and understanding how you can make people come back the next day. There’s real power there as well. We’re trying to combine the science as well as the art.

　　Eldon: You have your own launch coming tomorrow, right? Tell us how you’re thinking about that.

　　Decrem: Well, we’ve got a big launch of a really big game that’s coming up, tomorrow night. I’m not supposed to disclose it, but it is an anniversary…[The game was Tap Tap Revenge: Tour].

　　Eldon: Before we open up to questions, what advice would you have for guys who are trying to get in now, just one developer or a small team, they have that one hit and they’re not sure what to do next? What can you tell them besides, hope you get featured by Apple?

　　Decrem: Well, we got featured by Apple because we built a great game. It worked that way for us. I remember when we were at Tapulous, calling Apple and trying to get featured, and we didn’t have a relationship manager, nobody knew who to call, people would tell us to go away, and they get a little bit cranking if you push too hard at them. I tried that. So we learned.

　　But Apple will come to you, they will feature you, and Apple featuring is important. There are other distribution channels, and I’m a little less binary about them. Free App a Day, and there’s other user acquisition channels, and I don’t have anything against them. I think there’s a way to use these things in a strategic way. But again, what I said earlier, if you build a great game, it will float to the top and you don’t necessarily have to do crazy machinations. It’s not mechanistic like that.

　　Play Draw Something, it’s a simple game, it’s really powerful. But then you look at, say, Tiny Wings, it’s one guy, doesn’t have a fancy business model around it, but it’s beautifully done, it has a sense of power and passion behind it. I’ve got a couple of guys who left Tapulous around the time of the acquisition, they put out three games. One of them was a zombie game, one was a first-person shooter game, and the other one was a kids’ game. They all went to number one. I said, dude, what did you do, what’s your vision, what’s your strategy? He said, I don’t know, we just built these games that we love. And he did. It does work when you do that. That’s the most exciting thing, and it is the key to success.

　　Question: We believe there’s a huge untapped potential for transmedia games. Our experience so far has been that TV and film guys don’t really understand how character and story work in games. And games guys don’t really understand how character and story work in film. How do you bridge that gap?

　　Decrem: Well, I remember my first meeting at Disney Channel, it was actually a really great one. We said, look, we’ve got this game called Where’s My Water, it’s at number one on the App Store for a couple of weeks, and we think we should make a TV show around this. And one of the guys said, you know, that’s so insulting. Because they had Phineas and Ferb. That didn’t come out of nowhere, they thought about that, they thought about those characters they developed and that world for ten years. They were dying to tell that story. And that’s why the TV show is so good.

　　When we came in there and said, hey, build me a TV show… We just didn’t understand what it takes to build quality television and be successful. And then we said, alright, what’s on your mind? Well, they said, we’ve got this TV show called Phineas and Ferb, we think you should build a couple of iPhone games for it. And I said, that’s so insulting. [big laughs] When we build a game, it starts with a mechanic, we sweat over that thing. What we’re trying to do at Disney is bridge those worlds. When you look at Where’s My Water, there are guys from the animation studios that help figure out what that character is and how you draw it. They literally wrote the book on animation and character animation, the little stories in there… We do that cross-fertilization. But in general, the reason that most media companies have not succeeded in gaming is because of that, and a lot of game characters don’t cross over to other media because of that. So that’s a core challenge, and very few people pull it off.(source:venturebeat)