Zuma developers -Big Fish Studios Leads Industry in Casual Game Development
Big Fish GamesTM (www.bigfishgames.com), a leading developer and distributor of casual games, today announced that games released by Big Fish Studios, Big Fish Games’ game development division, have held on to 20 to 40 percent of the ‘top ten lists’ of the top twenty casual game sites for the past six months. These top ten lists are tracked weekly by the industry tracking website www.game-sales-charts.com. Big Fish Games also announced the upcoming release of two widely anticipated titles, Mystery Case Files: Ravenhearst and Travelogue 360: Paris, securing its position as the leading development studio in the casual games industry. Big Fish Studios’ PC games have sold more than 1,000,000 units so far in 2006, and are expected to generate more than $24 million in revenue by the end of the year.
It is impressive for Big Fish Studios’ titles to consistently rank so high over such a long period of time given that there are more than 400 game developers in this industry,” said Pat Wylie, vice president of studios for Big Fish Games. “Our game portal is one of the top two casual game portals in the industry, with more than 500,000 games downloaded per day on peak days, and gives us incredible insight into what is working and what is not. By distributing a new game every day from over 400 game development partners, we have been able to tune the games we develop and release consistent hits. Many of our recent releases have averaged well over a four percent conversation rate, far exceeding the industry’s average of one to two percent.”
Big Fish Studios is best known for its top-selling franchise Mystery Case Files. Since the launch of Mystery Case Files ten months ago, more than 500,000 units have been sold online, at a rate equivalent to more than one unit sold per minute. As of this month, Mystery Case Files and four other titles from Big Fish Games are for the first time available in traditional retail stores through a publishing agreement with Activision announced earlier this year. Mystery Case Files is one of the top selling boxed games in the Activision Value line and can be found at a variety of retailers including Best Buy, Target, Wal-Mart, and GameStop.
In the coming months, in addition to the third episode of the Mystery Case Files Franchise, Big Fish Studios is introducing a original new concept titled Travelogue 360: Paris.
“Travelogue 360 is unlike anything ever seen by casual gamers and we seem to be on to something pretty amazing,” said Paul Thelen, founder and CEO of Big Fish Games. “We have never had a game test so well before. We literally had to turn off the monitors and politely ask the beta testers to leave. They just could not get enough.”
Other hit titles developed or published by Big Fish Studios include: Hidden Expedition: Titanic, Virtual Villagers, Atlantis: Sky Patrol, Fish Tycoon, Mahjong Towers Eternity, Mystic Inn, Magic Vines, and Fairies.
Big Fish Studios’ games are currently distributed on the following portals or networks: Yahoo!, AOL, Pogo, MSN, Atom-Shockwave, Nickelodeon, VH1, CMT, NickJr, iVillage, Neopets, Reflexive, Iwin, Arcade Town, Slingo, SpinTop Games, FreezeTag Games, PopCap Games, Playfirst Games, Intermix, MacGameStore, Shockwave, Game Fiesta, Download Free Games, and several hundred other game sites through game portal operators Oberon Media and Boonty.
