Playfish’s recent acquisition by Electronic Arts is great news for the company itself (it was purchased for up to $400 million in cash, stock and earnouts), but also for the social gaming industry as a whole. Playfish is the most respected social games company — every developer we talked to brings up their user experience as the benchmark. With this acquisition, one can imagine a whole new set of possibilities for both companies.
It “validates the social gaming business model overall,” said Playfish COO Sebastien de Halleux in a PaidContent interview.
What’s important to remember here is why Playfish — a company just two years old — was worth so much to EA. Playfish set the bar high with games like Pet Society, Restaurant City, Country Story and Who Has the Biggest Brain?.
These titles are noteworthy because of their quality. Their popularity alone can attest to that; instead of the standard array of promotional techniques used by many social gaming companies, Playfish relies primarily on word of mouth. Its games are successful because the company pays attention to the qualitative feedback (both solicited and otherwise) it receives from players. It tracks gamers’ tendencies to see what works and what doesn’t.
Most of all, it cares more about delivering an authentic user experience than it does the bottom line, and people flock to that mentality. (Look no farther any of the large number of companies that fail to make such a clear distinction; chances are, they’re not nearly as successful.)
The reason for this is simple: When it comes to social games, people are buying an experience. Whenever they spend real money on virtual goods for games, it’s to enhance their experience with those games. Playfish prioritizes that experience, and it shows.
Eric Ries hit it on the head when he wrote on his blog that everyone — not just social gamers — buys virtual goods. His real-world examples include $200 designer jeans that sell for four times the amount of a comparable pair without the label. It’s the experience of buying and wearing the jeans — the feeling one gets from the process of owning them — behind the bulk of the purchase price.
Successful companies are able to promote that feeling, especially when it comes to social gaming. As Playfish just proved, giving users an authentic, differentiated experience that they feel good about isn’t just integral to the bottom line — it is the bottom line.
Congratulations to the Playfish team for their success!
