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Glu Mobile closes Brazil office; Washington and California studios hit with layoffs
Glu Mobile, the developers behind mobile versions of Guitar Hero and Call of Duty: Black Ops, has announced that it is closing its San Paulo, Brazil office and laying off employees in Kirkland, Washington, and San Francisco, California.A statement from the company says that it needs to hold its research and development investments flat over the next year, and to do that, changes are being made. Twenty-five percent of the Kirkland office and 5% of the San Francisco office are being let go today as part of the restructuring process.Glu's plan is to add "the necessary monetization and server-side research-and-development resources" to the company's existing titles, and "focus on increasing average revenue per daily active user company-wide." More monetization and more revenue per daily active user should help turn the company's financial future around, though game quality often suffers when those two elements are focused on. Joystiq hopes affected employees land on their feet soon.
Android's in-app billing makes a dent: Dungeon Defenders free on Android Market
Dungeon Defenders: First Wave cost $3 when it first came out. This week, the iOS version will cost you ninety-nine cents. But if you want to play the Unreal Engine-powered tower defense game today, you can have it for free -- developer Trendy Entertainment is now leaning on Android's new in-app billing system to pay for the whole thing. We can't give Trendy all the credit, of course, as Glu Mobile's Gun Bros and Tapulous' Tap Tap Revenge 4 are doing the same thing, but to our knowledge both of them were free to play from day one. Free-to-play gaming has been a controversial proposition in the console and PC gaming space -- most publishers would just like to sell a game once, and call it a day. On phone, however, where apps are expected to be cheap, it could indeed make more sense to charge users for items and upgrades than to have users "buy" the game. Either way, we penny-pinchers are pleased as punch with the idea. PR after the break.
2.8 million downloads for Gun Bros, 7.3 million for Zombie Farm
I am anxiously awaiting some stats on this past week's releases in the App Store -- over the past two weeks, we've seen some gigantic games released for iOS, and yet familiar names like Cut the Rope, Angry Birds, and Fruit Ninja are still topping the charts (along with some big EA titles benefiting from that price drop). But even if it takes a while for all of those releases to find their place on the App Store, here's news of a few more recent titles that have done well. First up, freemium shooter Gun Bros (featured as our Daily App choice a while back) has picked up 2.8 million downloads so far, and claims 175,000 daily active users so far. That's not huge, but it's a nice sizable audience for a freemium title, especially one that tends a little more towards the hardcore gamer. Glu is also supporting the app with updates, including a new planet to play on, special Christmas-themed gear, and some extra in-game currency rewards for users who update the app. Zombie Farm is doing even better than that -- the wacky cross between zombies and Farmville has earned 7.3 million downloads since launch, and is still growing at about 25% a month. Currently, the app's reviews section is full of complaints about some bugs, but nevertheless, Playforge has claimed 2.76 billion minutes of playtime, and while it hasn't shared actual revenue numbers, there's no question that players have probably spent plenty of money on the game's in-app purchases. I would call both of those solid hits for sure. We'll have to see what other big games rise to the top after this raucous holiday season on the App Store continues.
TUAW's Daily App: Gun Bros
Freemium has earned kind of a bad name on the iPhone -- a lot of people see it as a nickle-and-dime kind of thing, where if you don't pay out a buck or two to the game every once in a while, you don't get to have a full-featured experience. But there is a way to do it right: have a full game before the microtransactions, and then use those transactions to make the experience better, in an optional way. That's exactly what Gun Bros does. The free game that you get on the App Store is a more than excellent dual-stick shooter with some really nice RPG and social elements added into the mix. And even without spending any money, you can have a fun and full experience playing the game.
