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Social Mobile Game Design Principles Presented by Duke Wong
Social Mobile Game Design PrinciplesPresented by Duke Wong
Agenda
Principle #1: Friends
Principle #2: Ranking
Principle #3: Competition
Principle #4: Donation
Principle #5: Society
Principle #6: Case study
Social mobile games studied
Friends (1/3)- connecting with Facebook (Candy Crush)1
• Posts Facebook updates on player’s behalf when progressing in levels• Shows the progress and score of players of Facebook friends on level map
Friends (2/3)- helping online friends (Puzzle & Dragon)1
• Pal point system drives retention by encouraging several logins per day• Further, it drives players to progress, as the better the helper they have to offer, the
more often it will be used
Friends (3/3): meeting new friends (Pokemon Go)1
“The lure was supposed to bring more Pokemon. Instead it brought together people who would've never met otherwise.” -Top Reddit post
Ranking (1/2)- leaderboard (Clash Royale)2
• Relevant leaderboard- global and local; clans and friends• Leaderboard spotlight- bringing streaming to the masses
Ranking (2/2)- leagues and badges (Clash of Clans)2
• Leagues incremental milestone as players climb the leaderboard • Games constantly add in new leagues to fill in gaps when players drop off
Competition (1/3): matchmaking (Hearthstone)3
• The system tries to balance the precision of the match with the length of time to find• When there is not enough live players, some companies use “shadow players”, which is a
pre-recorded gameplay action of another real player, but not in real time
Competition (2/3): emotes (Hearthstone, CR)3
• Hearthstone has removed the “Sorry” emote likely due to the spam frequency it is used• Clash Royale has insisted to not implement a mute emote option to “evoke strong emotions”
Competition (3/3): reputation (Vainglory)3
• In team-based competition, reputation system encourages better sportsmanship• “All you have to do is finish your matches—in victory, defeat or surrender—and you’ll
progress into higher and higher Karma tiers.” -SEMC
Donation (1/2)- 1 to 1 (Hay Day)4
“It means that on our platform not only can you visit other players, but you can help them.” - Hay Day Game Product Manager
Donation (2/2)- 1 to all (Game of War)4
• Alliance city in Game of War is a super empire to be build by all members• “I feel a sense of achieving something bigger than myself together with my alliance”
Society (1/2)- alliance politics (Clash of King)5
• Alliance replicate an in-game political system and features leadership, diplomacy, loyalty, spies, etc.
• Clash of Kings built in real-time language translation to promote global interaction
Society (2/2)- clan wars (Clash of Clans)5
• Clan wars incorporate both the element of collaboration and competition together• The tie-in with Youtube recap has brought mobile games to the social media spotlight for
the first time
Case study (1/2)- Brain Wars6
• One of the few education games receiving world-wide adoption• BrainWars relies mainly on individual users for marketing; the app incorporates features
such as sharing and inviting to take advantage of social network
Case study (2/2)- Magitech6
• Magitech is a mobile fantasy game that teaches business analytics and management• Magitech incorporates leaderboard for single-player mode, a multiplayer competition
mode, and social sharing of learning progress
Recap of social mobile game principles
Social mobile principles could be applied to
serious games
Games could bring in existing friends and enable
new friendship in both online and offline world
Make leaderboard relevant to the players (e.g.,
among friends, local) and institute incremental steps
Multiplayer mode itself is not enough- designers need
to consider matchmaking, emotes, and reputation
Donation is one of the warm spots of social gaming and
could be leveraged in 1 to 1 and 1 to all fashion
Society is the most complex form of social gaming
but if done right could boost games to wide adoption
