Typically, developers of social games have one of the following reasons:
1. Create a game with a very new but simple and ingenious mechanics. Be the first to hit upon and get a quick-money, fame and adulation.
Cons: invent and then sell original idea is very hard. No one will give you a guarantee that if Tetris done today, not 30 years ago, it has also become a craze. Competition, after all.
2. Create a game with known gameplay but to implement it so to be addictive. Attract users. Add monetize and make money.
Cons: better idea in general, but another problem surfaces: why people will play in your new simulator of a farmer, not the one that is the first line in the catalog?
Note, the are a lot of popular games with just a little innovation in the projects, but the work on the run-in interfaces, graphics, audio and systems based monetization – is huge. Only very small percentage of customers will be agree to invest in such a risky and expensive projects. The rest – prefer to limit the transfer of all the familiar banal and simple gameplay into a social network.
3. Develop a branded game for the social network. The point of it – brand advertising within the game, getting the intangible profit in the form of communication (communication “brand-to-consumer”) and creating a community of loyal users through the game.
Cons: Branded game performs a little different, not a “mercantile” function. Its purpose – to increase trust in the brand and drive traffic. And then, for example, if you have an online store – you can provide him with an additional stream of visitors.
Branded applications and games on social networks are becoming more suitable for advertising. And it is advertising a “new level” – causing no negative, and unobtrusive – even enjoyable. A brand which has chosen the tactics of this “humane” way to the consumer – will always be the winner.