Company Spotlight #1: Codeglue
Welcome to our first company spotlight. We will try to highlight an innovative mobile games developer every month. This month we kicked off with Codeglue. Codeglue is a company based in Holland and has a focus on developing games for publishers like iFone (Glu). We spoke to their CEO Peter de Jong.
[Arjan] When and why did Codeglue start with mobile game development?
[Peter] Codeglue started developing mobile games in 2002. In that year we ported the award winning game Toki Toki from another Dutch company, called Two Tribes, to mobile phones. The game used Mophun instead of J2ME and was probably one of the first color mobile games.
[Arjan] What does Codeglue do to stand out from other developers?
[Peter] Nowadays Codeglue creates and develops connected mobile games that empower mobile communities. In most of our games you will find community building elements like highscores, customizable user profiles, ghost racing and chats.
[Arjan] Can your players communicate across games to trigger sales of other titles from you, or are users bound to people that play the same game?
[Peter] Unfortunately, this kind of functionality is not supported
by the different multiplayer middleware providers that Codeglue works
with.
It would be a good idea though to stimulate cross-selling.
[Arjan] Your game GoWaku has been nominated for the PriceWaterhouseCoopers Innovation Award 2006. Can you tell us why you think this game is the one that should win?
[Peter] The award ceremony was June 20 and unfortunately we didn't win this award. But I think it is a good thing for the Dutch (mobile) gaming industry that a game such as GoWaku got nominated for such an innovation award.
[Arjan] The industry faces a lot of problems in regards to reaching their consumer base. Codeglue is not really involved with marketing games to consumers, but does Codeglue have a vision how to activate non-downloading consumers?
[Peter] There is a big challenge in activating the non-downloading consumers which is about 95% of the total consumers base. First thing is, how do we get the consumer to browse on their mobile phone? At this moment consumers largely browse the operator decks when they just purchased a new mobile phone and they hardly return because of poor user experience. So I think here is a great opportunity for large media companies that already know how to reach the consumer. A second challenge is how do we improve user experience? I think mobile community portals will play a big role here. We work with most of the leading multiplayer middleware providers who are setting up these kind of portals. Codeglue supplies them with original game content.
[Arjan] Codeglue is pretty busy with J2ME and BREW development. How does Codeglue look at technologies like Flash Lite?
[Peter] At this moment Codeglue is doing some experiments with Flash
Lite and we really think it looks promising! It will definitely solve
some of the fragmentation issues that the industry is facing these days.
The only drawback at the moment is the amount of phones which has e.g.
Flash
Lite 2.0 pre-installed (Although this is rapidly changing). But we'll
definitely keep tracking the developments of this technology.
[Arjan] You have developed ten games till date. Which one is your favorite and why?
[Peter] My favorite game would be So Square. This game is still in development. It has all the features of a game that can create a community. It's multiplayer, it has customizable characters, it uses user generated content and it has a chat function. We expect this game to do extremely well.
[Arjan] What kind of user generated content would the game incorporate?
[Peter] Players of this game can create their own levels for this game.
Codeglue will supply gamers with a free level editor for this game.
[Arjan] We gave you enough time to promote yourself. Now we'd like to ask you which game of any other developer you like most and why you like it?
[Peter] I like the one-thumb games from OrangePixel a lot. They have developed quite a few new innovative game concepts, e.g. Toddlers. Other games I like are the Playman series from Mr. Goodliving. These games offer nice gameplay with stunning graphics.
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Nice interview! Looking forward to future company spotlights.