Cofounded Host Collective (DiscountASP.net). Cofounded Player Axis (Social Gaming). Computer Scientist and Technology Evangelist with 20+ years of experience with JavaScript!
You are right, I only worked with freemium games (we tried other types of monetization but they did not work, the players are too used to this technique now days) and the Whales (and Dolphins) are the ones who keep the lights on. As it is a private matter under NDA I cannot talk specific stories.
For the readers who do not know, the gaming industry split the players in 4 major categories: non-payers, payers (regulars made at least 1 purchase), dolphins and whales. The exact amount and criteria to become one of these are different for each industry (eg: 25$ dolphin 100$ whale, or 250/1000 ).
You can compare the Whales with the VIP/corporate customers in a non-gaming industry (special features, premium support and so on).
I think that the most success story driven by dolphins and whales is StarCitizen, they raise over 200M USD neowin.net/news/star-citizen-fundi... , as a side not I am a big fan, contributor and made a fan site starcitizen.center
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I made social games for a while as well. Free to play. The industry never talks about the whales.
99.99% of people wouldn't pay for our games.
A few payers were casual players and we made some money from them. But they weren't our bread and butter.
But we had a very very small amount of players that would spend thousands (with an s) of dollars every month.
They basically funded our whole company.
Was your experience similar? I'd love to hear about the monitizing of the games. And any stories about the whales if you had any.
Cheers!
Hello! Thanks for stopping by.
You are right, I only worked with freemium games (we tried other types of monetization but they did not work, the players are too used to this technique now days) and the Whales (and Dolphins) are the ones who keep the lights on. As it is a private matter under NDA I cannot talk specific stories.
For the readers who do not know, the gaming industry split the players in 4 major categories: non-payers, payers (regulars made at least 1 purchase), dolphins and whales. The exact amount and criteria to become one of these are different for each industry (eg: 25$ dolphin 100$ whale, or 250/1000 ).
You can compare the Whales with the VIP/corporate customers in a non-gaming industry (special features, premium support and so on).
I think that the most success story driven by dolphins and whales is StarCitizen, they raise over 200M USD neowin.net/news/star-citizen-fundi... , as a side not I am a big fan, contributor and made a fan site starcitizen.center