Among the complaints analyst and investors have been lobbying at Zynga over the past year or so are two big ones: that it hasn't expanded its audience much beyond traditional social game players, and that it's behind the trend in transitioning away from the web and onto mobile devices.
The company that FarmVille built is hoping to alleviate both of these concerns with one big acquisition. On Friday, it announced that it acquired November Software, the Mill Valley-based developer formed in 2011 by console game developers from LucasArts and EA.
With the buyout, Zynga acquires not only November's talent, but also a high-performance cross-platform 3D engine (November claims it pushes 60 frames-per-second on mobile devices) and the first game to show it off: Battlestone, a free-to-play action game that is a much closer resemblance to a console game than something you'd traditionally see Zynga's name attached to.
Expanding social and free-to-play games to reach more traditional video game players is rapidly becoming an arms race for most companies in the space. In a blog post that says "mid-core" four times, November Software's Szymon Swistun said of the announcement that "We know that players, like us, love a good action combat game, so we want to push the limits on social and mobile games, and at the same time create an experience that fits around their schedule."
A trailer for November and Zynga's Battlestone, from its pre-Zynga days when it was called Golden Arrow.
The move comes at a crucial juncture for Zynga, which has been losing players at a rapid clip lately, causing a significant round of layoffs, studio closures, and its shares to dip to an all-time low.
"We didn't create enough new heat for our players by innovating on content and features," CEO Mark Pincus told investors during a conference call last month, explaining why its quarterly financials were below expectations.
I think it's good that Zynga is at least expanding into 3d games and not just into online gambling. However, they still carry some pretty hefty stigma due to their practices of substituting innovation with buyouts and cloned games.
For now, I'm impressed by November Software's work on the title, and look forward to trying it out in the future.
Well... if you add a cup of fine wine to a barrel of sewage, you have a barrel of sewage. On the other hand, if you add a cup of sewage to a barrel of fine wine, you have a barrel of sewage.
You have zero insight into November's situation or the game, you just hate on everything that has Zynga's logo on it.
I don't understand why you waste your time on coming up with such elaborate analogies, it doesn't make your hate more legitimate. Writing "Fuck Zynga" would get your childish point across just as well.
"you just hate on everything that has Zynga's logo on it."
That's his right, you can't be a shitty company and then expect people to just forgive you because you're struggling with all the backlash.
The fact that it's being developed by November doesn't preclude the fact it's branded by a company that has treated it's customers and peers like trash. About the only defence Zynga has right now is that most of the instigators have taken their money and run.
What do you work for Zynga or something, they are the most disgusting company I have ever heard of. I hate them as both a consumer of games (making shitty games) and stealing from indie developers
This is a site for people working in the industry. I'd expect you to know better than to go all "oh, this studio is owned by a company i hate, well then fuck these guys and their work, whatever they're doing". There's constructive criticism and there's this.
I've NEVER said anything positive about Zynga, don't try putting words in my mouth. I couldn't care less that you hate the company. I'm just saying you're full of shit for being assholes towards guys at November and their work, having zero knowledge about what they're doing, just because you hate Zynga.
Again, i'd expect people who work in the industry to know better. Thanks for proving me wrong.
Say what you want about EA, Ubisoft, Activision - Even Bobby Kotick hasn't been as brutally, proudly, player hostile as Pincus has. I certainly support game creators making money. But as soon as you start thinking that your primarly goal is exploiting people, you're the telemarketers who call old people after a disaster to scam them out of their money. And you're not making fun games.
So now that November is part of Zynga, it doesn't matter how great they were or what lofty plans they had, they're Zynga. I had some more elaborate prose and literary references here, but it wasn't any more effective than 'Zynga'. Any ambitions or noble intentions November had are dead. They cashed out.
It's also not an elaborate analogy, I was just borrowing Schopenhauer's Law of Entropy - I certainly don't want to claim ownership on that!
@Justin: "[zynga] they are the most disgusting company I have ever heard of."
I hope you're just talking about video gaming companies, otherwise you need to get out more. ;)
(Sorry for the snark, but I've been recently reminded of the Bhopal Disaster [ http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bhopal_disaster ] which puts a lot of things into perspective).
I hope they continue to follow to there CEOs advice and get sued into bankruptcy.
"I don't fucking want innovation," the ex-employee recalls Pincus saying. "You're not smarter than your competitor. Just copy what they do and do it until you get their numbers."
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