2011 Crystal Ball

Lets look into the Crystal Ball and check what's installed for the future in the online games market ... Madam X predictions and advice are as follows ...



THE SOCIAL GAMES MARKET



Consolidation, M&A will continues as the market can only sustain a few heavy weight players. However an occasional unpredicted success will come from the unexpected new players. Majority of new players will fail. More venture money will be pouring on to this area as there maybe an eventual IPO sooner than Facebook. Branded social games will be the next big hit thing in 2011, lookout for something from EA and Disney.

Social Games will become more sophisticated replacing repetitive game play and mechanics. Eventually "Viral Game Play" will need to blend in with true "PLAY VALUE".

Sorry Alex of Hi5 hard core MMO will not be replacing social games this coming year. We wont see players of Farm Ville playing ULTIMA ONLINE too on Facebook so sorry Richard Garriot !

BUT we will see some smart companies and studios blending the following together to create the next generation of social games on Facebook :

1.) Play Values
*ignore viral but put in more play values.

2.) Casual Game Play
*not hard core as casual play still rules.

3.) MMO elements
*it will be real multiplayer.

4.) Social Graphs
*never leave this one out.

WEB BASED MMO MARKET

2011 and 2012 will be the year of 3D WEB MMO online games.
UNITY engine and others will be a big hit next year, revenues on web base MMO will grow while client base MMO may slowdown. However for kids MMO and virtual worlds the Flash base world will still be the No.1 choice as a plugin is still considered an entry barrier for kids world where they are told not to install anything from the web.

VIRTUAL WORLDS MARKET

Forget about the teens and adults market as these are for MMO.
The kids market is the only market for virtual worlds but competition will be heavy certainly. China will be a new market arena for kids world and will boom sometime next year.

TBC ...