In this episode of the Mobile GameDev Playbook, we take a look into the challenges faced by game developers when working with licensed IP. With a specific focus on design and feature consideration, we also discuss how licenses have affected mobile game sales in different countries, such as the US and China.
Host Jon Jordan is joined by regular guest, GameRefinery's Chief Analyst Joel Julkunen along with special guests Rosemarie Sarno and Stephen Wark, Community specialist and Lead Game Designer at mobile developer Ludia. Ludia has published several titles around well-known IP including Jurassic Park, Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles and Dungeons & Dragons. Thanks for listening!
In this episode of the Mobile GameDev Playbook, we take a look into the challenges faced by game developers when working with licensed IP. With a specific focus on design and feature consideration, we also discuss how licenses have affected mobile game sales in different countries, such as the US and China.
Host Jon Jordan is joined by regular guest, GameRefinery's Chief Analyst Joel Julkunen along with special guests Rosemarie Sarno and Stephen Wark, Community specialist and Lead Game Designer at mobile developer Ludia. Ludia has published several titles around well-known IP including Jurassic Park, Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles and Dungeons & Dragons. Thanks for listening!
Welcome to the mobile game dev playbook. This podcast is brought to you in association with game refinery. Join us as we uncover the latest trends in mobile game design.
Speaker 2:Hello and welcome to the mobile game dev playbook podcast. Thanks for tuning in for another episode. I'm your host Jon Jordan and I'm joined as ever by Joel young Cunnane who's VP of games at game refinery. Ella Joel has it going. Hi John. I'm great. Great to be here again. Good. So just remind people, uh, the mobile game, Dave playbook, uh, provides insights into what makes a great mobile game and what trends mobile game designers should be thinking about. And in today's episode in particular, we are discussing the challenges of working with licensed IP. I'm specifically looking at the design and feature considerations that have to be taken into account. And we have two expert guests joining us to talk about that. And we have a Rosemary Sano who's a community specialist and we have Steven walk who is a brand manager at a Canadian developer Ludia games, which has extensive experience of working on high profile licenses ranging from how to train your dragon drastic park, Jurassic world, teenage mutant Ninja turtles, Dungeons and dragons and many, many more. So thanks everyone for, uh, coming to the podcast.
Speaker 3:Thank you. Thanks for having us. Thank you for having us again.
Speaker 2:Good. So to kick us off, it's going to set the scene. Um, Joel is going to give us a kind of a, a kind of a broad kind of overview, particular looking at kind of the, the top games, um, in different global marketplaces and how kind of IP, how important IPS is to those and the kind of variations they're in. So Joel, I do want to take, take it away.
Speaker 3:Yeah, thanks. Thanks John. Yeah, so IPS are a big thing in, in mobile. Uh, it doesn't matter if you're in the U S or in Japan or China. It seems that the, a number of other share of games utilizing third party IPS is on the rise. Um, in the U S at the moment, if you look at top grossing 200 or even 100 games, it's roughly one quarter of all of those games, no matter the genre are utilizing third-party IBS and, and TV and movies, movie brands, uh, sports brands, consumer brands, you name it, the U S and other Western market have it. I don't know if you go to China and Japan and the number of games utilizing the bus IPS actually rises. So it's about half of the games[inaudible] 200 crossing. Um, if you go to Japan, you be most likely running into games based on certain animal manga series. And in China it's mostly about PC and console IPS, which mainly PCI piece in China, which is quite, quite interesting. Um, so that's, that's, that's um, it seems that uh, a mobile game market is really loving those brands and uh, the trend is upwards as we speak.
Speaker 4:[inaudible]
Speaker 2:cool. Good. Thanks. Um, I guess, uh, kind of Rosemary and, uh, and see if you guys, you know, running these, these big brands, I mean, I guess they're Western brands. Do you see any difference in kind of global, um, kind of uptake or interest?
Speaker 5:It's been really interesting, uh, working on, um, on, uh, Dungeons and dragons and seeing how, uh, how the different territories are surprisingly active in it. Um, I would have thought, uh, initially when I started this project a few years ago that it would been focused mostly on, you know, the English speaking world, but it really does have branches, uh, all the way, uh, across the globe. So, uh, that's been really interesting too. That's been really interesting to see. Uh, people love dragons.
Speaker 6:The thing about dragons, uh, yes. So for our game as well, uh, for, I work mostly on how to train your dragons, uh, IPS, um, with Dreamworks. So we do see that it's really, it's a worldwide thing considering that these are big blockbuster movies as well. Uh, people are super passionate about just the characters themselves. So when it comes to the game, it's kind of a no brainer for them. It also, we have a lot on our shoulders to do a good job at making the game, but you know, a game like rice of Burke that's been around for so many years and is still doing well, uh, and players are just so passionate about it. I see that firsthand on our social pages and uh, I just love hearing from them get taking part in the Reddits and stuff. So it really helps in keeping it alive and for sure the brand is a big part of that.
Speaker 3:I'm kind of a say another kind of trend thing we should probably consider before we kind of go deep into this. This is some, some genres seem to work better, um, kind of some kind of mobile games, genres and kind of IP seem to work better together. Do you want to kind of unpick that at a high level for us as well, just to kind of give a, an overview of how you see that kind of playing out across different genres? Yeah, sure, sure. Yeah. We, again refinery, we study a lot of games of course, and we also study the features and the genres of the games. And as we track IPS and different type of a brand brand categories, we've noticed that certain genres are much more kind of well aligned with utilizing third-party IPS. Just to give you an example, um, many of the top RPG games, location-based games or any games, genres that fat rely on, on metal layers of collecting characters or or, or that kind of stuff, those usually are much more synergetic with IPS. Uh, then for instance, uh, mastery games, which are much more about the core games, swiping tiles and blasting, dusting balloons. So it's, it's very clear that if you are thinking about utilizing the IP and kind of thinking about the gospel or spending benefits, they are showing the genres that are much, much more energetic. And that of course then real stone to features. So when you decide to go with an IP, uh, you want to make sure that your games features that, a support that the IP, I can again use the same example for using like a RPG RBG or games, um, combined together with let's say Marvel IP or star Wars IP for example. Makes that make sense. Really good, good combination. Um, but then on the other hand, I said certain games, uh, features that are not as well adjusted to get most out of the IP. So for example, if you're doing, let's say casual star Wars Metree game, it doesn't say, it does mean that the star Wars IP will hurt your game per se. But as the game is more focused on the features that is more focused on the core game experience, uh, and not, let's say character collection or, or, uh, that kind of stuff by Beck backstory. So rich lore, um, the benefits might not be as as big. So that's kind of on a higher level. And of course then there still have to be combined the dim player demographics or just diabetes and all that. But, uh, that's, that's really interesting. And, um, that's kind of where we noticed that, uh, you might want you think about those elements as well when playing around with IPS.
Speaker 2:Good. So, and I guess the other thing we, um, kind of IP over the, over the years has become much broader. So as opposed to, you know, we were, you know, maybe 10 years ago talking much more about kind of licensing, um, kind of external kind of, um, properties from, from the, from the game space, bringing in films and, and other kinds of prophecies. And whereas now we have this other kind of thing which is bringing kind of console games to mobile, which isn't, I guess, not just IP, um, in that sense that it is a game already, but there's a kind of, uh, an interesting kind of reimagining the whole IP space is in fact very, um, got much deeper, I think, much more kind of sophisticated in how you, how you, um, kind of chop it up, which I guess he's, yeah, yeah, sure, sure. Exactly. Under, uh, if you, as I mentioned before, I compete with U S T U S a and the brand types, and I'd be typed in that been used in the top games for example. It's really kind of diverse. You have your, you have your TV, movie, branch, have your constant product, dance brands, sports brands, uh, novel brands, celebrities,
Speaker 3:brands, and of course, like you mentioned some PC and console games. And I think the PC console, um, IPS are coming over, uh, our two more bottle, uh, even stronger in the, in the upcoming years. And, uh, of course, um, in China for example, as I mentioned before, uh, PC brands are the biggest browser IPS used in, in mobile, uh, or hub of all the IPS. Uh, using top grade top games in China are from PC, like for example, uh, uh,[inaudible] and on a perfect world crossfire and so on and so forth.
Speaker 7:Hello.
Speaker 2:Um, so, uh, Rosemary and Steven, so from the Ludia point of view, I mean, you guys, as far as I know of the company has always been involved with IP. Um, you know, that's kind of been your kind of DNA, is that correct? Is that what has been the kind of the, the way you've, you've approached the, the games market? Oh, uh, absolutely. I've been at Ludia for, um, uh, for 10 years and, uh, we've always worked on, uh, uh, IPS like that. I mean, we started off with the television game shows, uh, like, uh, like the prices right? And adapting those into, uh, into PC games and then, uh, variations as the other platforms up and
Speaker 5:now working with, uh, with big IP brands.
Speaker 2:And when mobile started out, that was kind of, you know, mobile games, you know, got big and absolutes, clinical Lords. So that was seen as quite, um, I mean, Oh, maybe I'll just the wrong word, but it was kind of, there's kind of a lot of creative, um, you know, kind of, uh, creativity going on with these, any developers coming up with this kind of crazy stuff. We could do this, they do these things on mobile devices for the first time and, and for, you know, Canadian company to come out and do and do these kind of big, uh, you know, TV IP to begin with. And then moving up. He was, I think, seen as, as a little bit at least different. Obviously it's been successful for you because you've grown to a fairly substantial company. And, um, but it's kinda interesting that there's not so many people have taken that route. I mean, people will traditionally mobile people kind of have a go. Um, we put up, I mentioned that there's a few big games coming out at the moment, which involves kind of IP and, but the company is not set up around that. So do you think kind of come the way you, the company set up is different because of the type of games you make and how you think about new projects and how you think about operating in live ops? That sorta stuff.
Speaker 5:I think that's an interesting way of, uh, of, of looking at it from a, from a design perspective. I mean we're looking at, uh, what are, uh, the familiar things that people really enjoy in terms of media and in terms of gameplay to terms of familiarity and try to find ways for them to bring that experience, uh, with them on the go no matter what that is. If they really like, um, you know, Battlestar Galactica, we had the Battlestar Galactica game for awhile. If you really like teenage mutant Ninja turtles, here's a way that you can play in that world. Uh, same thing for Dungeons and dragons or if you really like the, um, the prices, right? That was, uh, how we got started. We looked at things that people already liked and uh, you know, honestly given their longevity, loved and um, and found ways to surprise the players with, um, with those twists that mobile makes possible.
Speaker 8:Okay.
Speaker 2:And I guess kind of Rosemary from a community standpoint, that's kind of that kind of balance between the kind of the rich kind of law and characters you have in an available in IB and what the community, what you to do with them and what the lesson saw allowed you to do them. It's an interesting creative tension, let's put it that way.
Speaker 6:Oh yeah. Cause we see it a lot on the pages as well. Like players will chime in and they will correct you if something is wrong. Absolutely. So we do try to take it to heart and we are all people working on those games, whether it's Jurassic or how to train your dragon, really get into the world to learn to then produce these games. It's, it's something that takes a lot of time and dedication. Um, and you get really tied to the games you work on. You, you see like you walk through our, our office and you, you really feel like these are people who enjoy what they're doing, um, and are passionate about it just as much as the players. Uh, on the front line. I get to actually see that and I get to feel the tension when, you know, certain things are not accurate. Um, but it rarely ever happens. Um, and uh, one thing that you were mentioning before about bringing the lore into the game and trying to choose a proper features that are still representing the world that we're giving to players in our mobile games, uh, for one is something that's challenging in a way because we're trying to stay true to what let's say for how to train your dragon to the book that then got turned into a movie trying to represent all the dragons while creating new ones. Uh, in our newest game, dragon tighten up rising, we have hybrids. So this is a whole process of approvals that we go through with Dreamworks and our artists who create these dragons. And, uh, yeah, it's just cool work for the people working on the project and just the passionate players and people who follow these movies for 10 years. Just love to see it.
Speaker 2:That's a really interesting point because particularly if you have, you know, um, games based around specific movies rather than kind of kind of, I guess deeper universities, but specific movies you kind of want to be, you know, you need to be close enough to what was going on in the movie. Cause people who watched the movie, you kind of, they want some of that. But equally if you're going to run something for, for many years, then also you need to, I mean the game in a sense is, is the, becomes the living embodiment of that IP rather than it being like a third party. I'd be, I mean the game is, it has much more, you know, going on, cause it has to, cause I'll see films, Jenny lost two hours and there's only so much I can put it in and even says backstory it game again going on for years and years and years is almost, you become the creative, um, kind of holders of, of, of that kind of vision to some degree. I mean, honestly, you're not the license, but, but you're kind of doing the work that, you know, thousands, maybe millions people are playing. You're on. Yeah.
Speaker 6:Yeah. I think, I think Steven, you had quite a challenge with that in D and D such as like an expanded universe. So like taking, trying to figure out what should we bring into the game. Uh, I don't work on D and D, but Stephen, a hats off to you.
Speaker 5:It, uh, it was, it was a huge challenge to figure out what kind of characters, for example, to put into the world. Like what was the, we had huge brainstorming sessions at the start of the warriors of water D project to figure out what, what were the iconic monsters of, um, of Dungeons and dragons. What were the elements that we really needed to have in the game, uh, for it to be considered an authentic game. Something that, you know, matches all the other different ways that people experience, you know, the brand of Dungeons and dragons. And so where did we, where did we fit in with that? And that was not only just about content, but also about, uh, game play mechanics themselves. What would you expect to see? You'd expect to cast a lot of fireballs and, and, uh, have a lot of exploration in and, uh, even rule a lot of dice, even though it's on a mobile, on a mobile game, we had to find those, those familiar elements that people might've been reminded of. Uh, when they watched, uh, other people play or saw, you know, those stranger things, uh, references and went, Oh yeah, that's what D and D is like, what, what are elements them, I don't know, the popular culture could we put in, uh, to have, um, have an authentic, uh, gameplay and brand experience that was still fun. You know, in and of itself. It didn't, it's not entirely nostalgia dependent, but is, could get somebody interested in the brand in that sense that we were talking about of, um, being, you know, also a, a big pro, the game being a big proponent of the, of the, of the brand. Um, but also, um, uh, have them have fun just for, uh, just for the quality of the game itself. So there were a lot of, a lot of discussions in, there were a lot of, a lot of listening. It had to happen with the community to have to figure out what kinds of things people were looking for.
Speaker 2:Hmm. Cause I guess the other thing we using a brand is, is you want you, I guess when you choose brands, maybe this will be a, a future question, but yeah, how do you, how do you choose brands? But you want to choose brand obviously have broad appeal. Um, but equally the broader the appeal, then say someone like me who's who I did play, the what, the one of your, one of your train your dragon games. Or they will have totally the wrong target audience and never saw the films. Um, so for me the kind of the law didn't matter because I didn't know the game, but you know, you've just as something that I'll download that and then see what it's like. So you have this kind of actually quite a broad spectrum of audience. Then you put it if a game, if you choose the right brand, you have a very kind of newbie audience. You don't know it apart from maybe the name. And then you have people who are like really into it. And that's again, another difficult balance in this, I guess. I don't know if that's where some IP games based on might be kind of go wrong. They go to too newbie and then the fans don't like it or they go too fat too hardcore and then it's a great game for the 20 people who play it.
Speaker 6:Yeah. Well one thing that Ludia does really well is try to manage expectations. And so a lot of games, we'll see how it works and then add features as we go on. We'll listen to the audience, get the feedback and see, okay, gilts, we should OD gilts to this. And it works with the IP. It works with the game and structure and how it is. Um, so like now a JWA, which is a geo-location game, uh, has, uh, gilts. Uh, so does D and D, so does drag and tighten uprising. It just really helps bring the community together. It's a lot of discussions around creating clans, uh, getting groups of people playing. Um, it helps with, uh, keeping people engaged as well. Uh, and it, it fits with the IPS, uh, with the dinosaurs, with the dragons and with the D and D.
Speaker 2:Hmm. Joel, coming back to the kind of a, a more kind of kind of trend level I guess because the kind of IP licensing kind of goes in cycles. So I guess where we had a few years ago when we had this kind of star Wars reboot, we had like just tons and tons of style or star Wars games. And I guess, you know, we've had a lot of game of Thrones games. Um, what's your kind of kind of view that, that when you see multiple kinds of games all watching roughly at the same time and maybe having an RPG and in a, in a, maybe a match three in a, in a, in a, in a strategy game, all based on the same IP. And I guess at the moment we have it with Marvel. I mean the whole Marvel universe is, that's the point of it. So I think, um, do you think that that that's, that's a good thing. Will, you know, do you think developers get a bit sucked into like, Oh, I'm doing a Marvel game and they kind of forget that there's like another 25 mobile games also out there at the same time? Probably only one's going to be successful.
Speaker 3:Yeah, I think that's it. That's it really, really well. It points. Uh, of course I will, I like to take the day, look at the data and look at the games utilizing IPS. I always say that even with the best IP, it doesn't replace any mistakes you make in the game designer. So, so even if you had the hottest brand, let's say after infinity war you had the Marvel Bryan up your hands and you making, making game, um, the keys. So of course, as I said before, you understand how the IP fits your genre, how the IP feature feature sets and how the ho the IP feature play demographics. So, even with the most powerful brand, if you don't understand, um, the, the kind of, uh, features that you should have in your genre or, or the features that you're a core audience is going to love or, or expect from the game. Um, this I best, I got a big chance of, of, of not, not, not kinda unleashing the full potential of your, of your package. Um, but then, um, when it comes to kind of oversaturation of, for certain brands, uh, we haven't yet seen any kind of statistical data, uh, killing that direction. But what we have seen is that, um, people are all designers taking branch that they think are, let's say, um, kind of home medium or, or even very hot at the moment. And then, uh, kind of fat losing the potential because they fail to kind of understand the IP and geography and feature fit. So it's, it's, uh, it's not too much about players getting bored of certain brand, but, but more, more about people and players. Um, kind of, uh, being let down when, when they play the game and it doesn't fit their expectations of the offer. Maybe the IP for that, for the hardcore fans, uh, or then the other game mechanics, uh, players expect. So that's kind of thing.
Speaker 2:Yeah, you do, you do kind of end up, I mean, I'm sure it's just just to kind of the journalist in me kind of, but we do kind of seem to go for these, these phases of having like cursed IPS. I mean, particularly the star Wars one a few years ago, but there were a lot of star Wars games came out on only really, um, galaxy of heroes was, was the one that made it. And I guess we've had a few attempts at different sorts of Harry Potter games. Um, I think all of which had been kind of interesting and, and you could say kind of well designed games, but certainly, um, not all found, found the audience and found maybe the Harry audience had, had kind of, um, moved on potentially or that know, I guess it's something else to mention. Um, Logan, go ahead.
Speaker 3:Oh, my snicker. Um, well, uh, so I was really looking forward to the geolocation game. Uh, so, uh, you know, I played it for a bit and I kind of dropped off.
Speaker 6:Geo-locations games are very, um, not time consuming, but you know, it's, it's, it's dedication. It takes dedication. So even a game like Pokemon go, you're relying on the nostalgia factor, but you're also taking into account like, okay, every time I'm walking around I need to open my phone cause I need to be catching certain things. So how do you gain someone's dedication? Um, right. And honestly, I haven't looked at the stats after the first month of it launching. I'm not too sure how it's, uh, doing our JWA, uh, is still, is still going strong. So I am, I'm, I'm, I still playing, collect my dinosaurs as for what it is, but I have kind of dropped off on the Harry Potter one. Uh, it didn't really run well on my phone as well. So there's a whole issue with devices and GPS and there's a lot to take into account. It's just, it's, it's, uh, they're big games, you know?
Speaker 2:Hmm. Hmm. And I guess, you know something, I was kind of, I mean I know how much you can kind of say on this, this sort of stuff. Um, or do you want to say, but you know, they're kind of the, you know, the, the, the power in this kind of scenario in talking about sort of any kind of big kind of movie, sort of that external IP is, is the license or has kind of the power, cause they get[inaudible] they're risking their IP a little bit, but obviously they, they're getting a cut of the revenue all the time. And um, and the business model for IP games, games based around IP can be quite difficult because you're giving up, you know, you're giving up your, your app store share and then you potentially giving up another, you know, however many percent each of the, of your kind of gross, uh, maybe on, on to the license. Also, you know, very sensible for Disney to decide. It's not making games anymore than license everything out. Cause I, you know, obviously doing very well off that. Um, but, but, um, you know, how, how, how does that kind of play into your thinking that, you know, you're getting a license, you're getting kind of access to someone else's fan base, but, but you are going to have to in a sense, yeah. Go, these games have to be quite big. Um, um, and, and you know, you, you have to have all the, um, I guess the process of dealing with the license saw and you can't just go, we're going to put in your character in the next week. You have it cause you have to those turnaround times, I mean, maybe some license was a quicker than others, but maybe some have a big whole process that he has to go to another license or, and then you can't, you know, it may take a couple of months to put new characters in. Um, how, how does that impinge on your kind of flexibility to do the things you would otherwise want to do in a mobile game? It's, uh, it's really hard to, uh, you know, to, to turn those corners really quickly. Right. It requires a lot of planning. Uh, you know, internally it requires a lot of communication with the, uh, with, uh, the licenser to discuss the different ways any, uh, the next steps, the next, uh, the next updates can go because, uh, you're right, there's, there are all kinds of, uh, all kinds of approval processes and, um, every, every relationship is different. Some IP holders, um, hold'em keep a much tighter oversight over things. Other ones, ones are a little bit looser. Once, you know, trust has been established and you can,
Speaker 5:you don't need quite so many intermediate reviews of a, like, say a character creation process or a environment creation process. Um, so that, that can make the a, that can make the Workday, you know, more or less stressful as it, uh, as a company. Because you, you, I'm working in the games, you know, from, from my perspective, you know, as a designer, I'm very, uh, you know, player focused. I want the fans of the brand to be happy and pleasantly surprised all the time by what, um, what the implementation of their, of their favorite brand is inside the game. Uh, I also wanna, you know, turn new players on to, uh, this cool brand. I think this is the part of the virtuous cycle of, uh, of licensed IP. I think that's pretty cool. Um, and then I want to make sure that, uh, all the business objectives, uh, are met at the same time. This is the, uh, the other, uh, the other bit of tension, make sure that everything, all, you know, we hit the deadlines, everything is nicely approved and we're getting, we're building up, uh, that, uh, that great community that, uh, that is always possible with, uh, with fans of a brand.
Speaker 2:Kind of on the lookout for a of yours, kind of think about new games that you'd want to make, but you know, how, how does that process go, you know, do you come up with a game or doing that and think, what brand would that appeal to or do you go, we realized that there's a couple of people, we really love this brand and we were in the company and we kind of picked your game. I guess it's, you know, put a bit of both. But, um, cause it's kind of a, is it interesting that, you know, when we talk about brands, we maybe talk about the, you know, the big, the Harry potters and the star Wars and the game of Thrones and which obviously massive, um, in, in their kind of original kind of form. Um, and honestly expense for that as well. But, but you, but you guys are working with, you know, I mean dressy[inaudible] was massive. Um, but then some of the other ones that, you know, doesn't have dragons is bigger as a but not, it doesn't have that kind of similar appeal I suppose. And train your reg and w was, I guess I don't know how you, how you measure kind of kind of, um, the size of an IP, but I guess we could say it's like a, like a mid ranking IP and maybe mid racking. My P's are better cause you have a bit more flexibility. They're not so expensive. Um, that was a very prolonged question. Uh, we have an outstanding business development department. Uh, the,
Speaker 5:the, the answer a lot of those questions, uh, uh, for us, I don't know, sometimes, sometimes I'm just presented with, uh, with the project we're going to make, uh, we're, we're looking into making card games and we'd like, we, we have these, these IPS available, which ones would you think would be the best fit? And I'm like, Oh, well, this is a really interesting list and let's, you know, let's go through and let's see what's possible and let's see what I, you know, as a designer, um, in so far as I'm, you know, I'm writing the pitch, what would I like to do with the game genre that's different, knowing what's in the market and what bits I think might be, um, might be missing or could be done differently, and then find it where they match up to the, the key experiences of the IP. What, what are the key experiences of, um, of, uh, of this brand? I worked on, uh, on a card game based on the, uh, the underworld franchise of movies, uh, the last two specifically. And, uh, that was a fun match to see, you know, OK, there's a, there's a vampire will versus werewolf war going on. Great. I have a foundation now, how can I turn this into a, a card game with the team? And, uh, it's, it's, uh, that in itself is a fun, uh, uh, game of game design, so to speak.
Speaker 2:Joe, you've been talking, you know, can you kick us off, talk about kind of the global, um, kind of, uh, kind of, kind of view, and it seemed to be particularly kind of in the West versus kind of some of the Asian, um, big Asian markets that there's a kind of a globalness also a localness. Do you think that as, you know, more us kind of films get launched in, in, in, in China and, and you know, these are the kind of IPS that we could be using. Are they becoming more, more global? Um, we still haven't seen an awful lot of say, kind of. There's really big Japanese kind of, um, anime or manga brands. I mean they appeal to the kind of hardcore, you know, guys in the West, but they haven't really, an I pocket one was the obvious one. But do we think that we're going to get kind of more, more global, these brands are going to kind of get more global over the next kind of, you know, five to 10 years. So we'll be seeing more and more, you know, I feel become more and more important part of, of mobile games.
Speaker 3:I will. Well my bet is that, um, even at least in David upcoming couple of years, um, each region let's have these major regions like the use of the Western markets. Japan and China will, will have their own kind of unique, unique, um, IPS and brands work in those specific regions. Like for example, certain anime and manga manga high piece will still be, uh, hot in Japan and, and rather unknown in, in the West. But there, there is, um, of course some exchanged, uh, cross borders. Uh, just from top of my head, the newest, um, big brand Unimog brand, a seven deadly sins is in our RPG game. That's actually doing really well in, in, in the U S U S charts. Um, based on, based on that Japanese animal, you can actually watch this from Netflix. It's really, really well made game, RPG timbers, RPG game. Uh, I strongly suggest you check it out. So there is, this is the CS that you can see a couple of titles based on based on regional IPS, uh, making it in, in other, other regions as well. But then of course, uh, um, I said like in China when you have the IPS are based on their own own on a PC, PCPs or even their own folklore, like a journey to the West store or romance of the street in them. So, so it will probably increase kind of cross cultural it change. But, uh, I still bet that, uh, even in[inaudible] let's say five to 10 years, we will still have our own own, own, um, stay Western, Western IPS. We really, really, really are successful. And Hudson here and, and then of course Korea market will have their own and China, Japan throw in as well. I'm not, at least in the broad spectrum, I would say.
Speaker 2:I'm gonna guess. It was interesting just thinking about the film thing with[inaudible] with the parasite film winning, winning the Oscar and I guess in general[inaudible] in general kind of thing say the same, but you kind of have, if you pick the right example of two, it'd be pretty hard to make a mobile game based on parasite. I mean obviously I'm sure she'll keep an idea of how you do that, but yeah, but that's not the first one. That kind of appeals. But you can kind of see how, how I think kind of stuff does break through different cultures. So you can imagine, you know, you can imagine. Yep.
Speaker 3:Yeah, yeah, that's true. And I've been, I've been, do you have your kind of, uh, let's say you had like a cable bands for example, this PDs game, like a kind of visual Nobel game in interviews, pretty, pretty successful here in the West as well, based on really, really hot Korean pop band. Don't ask me about, and I don't know anything about it, but I just noticed that there was this, uh, for example that that's kind of a game or then you have a, um, I remember that Warcraft movies, they were a big thing in China, uh, commercially. Uh, but then if you look at the star Wars movies, they are not speaking China. And then you asked, as I said, you have the[inaudible] been doing pretty well, uh, in, in, in the West as well. And the game is based on that, uh, or the Dragonball Z enema series that's pretty, are in it so that we will always be this health, couple of big pots. Brian's from, from Japan and China probably I'm going to be making it here in the West as well, especially with their kind of hardcore target ODS that also might have a lot of purchasing power when it comes to IAP. So, so kind of boosting, they made charts. So it's interesting, interesting phenomenon. And I were really kind of looking forward seeing how it evolves.
Speaker 2:Hmm. Just to kind of finish up. I kind of thought it might be a nice thing for us to kind of go through what our kind of favorite, uh, kind of mobile IP games where and, and why we like them. I can kind of kick off. So, so, um, I am not a big star Wars fan byte by any means, although I'm the right kind of demographic. But, um, I've really liked, uh, galaxy heroes actually played it for over three years. Um, and it was interesting because, because I didn't really care, I could, I didn't really care about the characters very much. Um, that was almost in a weird way, made it more enjoyable for me. And it was, it was just enough so I wasn't like desperate to unlock the, the special, um, uh, doth data, you know, character. Um, but it was just familiar enough that it kind of just, just kind of kept me going. And there were other reasons why I played for a long time. I was in a kind of good Guild and, uh, did a lot of that cause, that kind of stuff. Um, so it was just, it was just kind of enough that without that kind of, um, kind of familiarity. Um, I, I think I probably dropped out much early and often that game has been been, you know, very, very successful. So, um, um, Steven, I guess you can choose what one of the games you worked on, whether that would that would, that would not smokes, but any, any, any, uh, IP, mobile game that you've really enjoyed and why? I really enjoyed, um, I can't forget, I can't remember the full title, but there was a WWE, a world wrestling, uh, game, uh, that was a sort of a tap Titans style,
Speaker 5:uh, idle game where you had, uh, four wrestlers in the ring battling, you know, a recurring series of bosses. And it was just, I'm not a huge wrestling fan, although like you said, for star Wars, I kind of fit the demographic, but I recognized quite a few names. They had a big classic repertoire of heroes. And mechanically it was, um, it was more than just tapping on the screen while I was watching a different show on Netflix. And, uh, I played that one for relentlessly for, uh, for almost a year. So anything that had, uh, characters that were just familiar enough and a game play that was, um, uh, that held my attention to something that I, uh, that I latch on.
Speaker 2:Joel,
Speaker 3:I, I have to go with the same driver that you picked up, but they are biggest tribals so, uh, was force. Uh, I think it's for me to invest RBG I like typi and why I P a and the game, I have to say it's really well polished, uh, offers excellent, excellent quality and a lot of lot of things to do. And if you are in a good guilt[inaudible] heroes, um, you kind of, you kind of just have to come back on. I'm gonna keep crime being on, uh, I, I enjoyed the grind. Uh, so that if I have to be just to one and Hearthstone would pick close second.
Speaker 2:Yeah. I have to say I really, I was playing with Strikeforce as well at the same time with us. And[inaudible] Guild kind of had a Guild over there as well, but it became impossible to play both those games at the same time. It just took up hours and hours of time. I had to choose one. But I guess it's kind of an interesting conclusion cause I guess we, you know, none of us have gone for, um, you know, we were massive fans of, of the IP. It was just kind of like, you know, we'll put Steve and it was kind of kind of familiar enough and maybe S maybe when we talk about IP, we certainly took talking. You know, we were doing the fan base in the wrong way. It was just, it was just one, one extra thing, maybe not the main reason we played that game. It was enough to get us in there. And then we found that, you know, other things that kind of kept us going. So maybe that's a, a good, um, sort of point to conclude really good. So thank you very much. Thanks for your, uh, thanks your time, Steven. Uh, thank you very much for, uh, for inviting me. It's been a real pleasure. Good. And, uh, thanks to Rosemary as well who has a few kind of technical issues, but thanks for her input and one of the community side, Joel entered over for the, uh, the high level, uh, trends. I your honor. Thank you. And uh, just to say thank you, uh, listeners for listening and I'm making it through a another podcast. We hope you have a subscribed or we'll subscribe to the mobile game dev playbook. We are coming out regularly with a podcast looking at what's going on in the world of mobile games, always vast amount going on there. And it's great that we can kind of bring in experts in the field. I am certainly not one of those, but group, we can have these, these guests in to kind of shine a light on what's going on in this field. So thanks very much for listening and come back next time and find out what we're talking about then.[inaudible].