@CTIA: Interview With Paul Maglione, President of Vivendi Games Mobile

With people like Vivendi, EA, Disney, the big entertainment companies getting into this, you’re no longer in a situation like four years ago where it was mostly cash strapped start ups doing mobile gaming, now it’s the biggest entertainment companies on earth. Paul Maglione, Vivendi Games Mobile

I caught up with Paul Maglione, president of Vivendi Games Mobile, in the Vivendi Games Mobile Party Bus, and of course launched straight into the decision behind buying Centerscore. He refused to reveal the purchasing price, but said that Vivendi had been looking for a publisher which specialized in original IP, on the basis that if a company specializes in licensed products the catalogue becomes worthless once the licences expire. Also, “Centerscore brings a very solid understanding of brew and how to maximise brew games “, and also beefs up Vivendi’s presence in North America as well as its casual games portfolio. Vivendi plans to export Centerscore’s games around the world (right now they’re just in the Americas). Paul said Vivendi was also on the prowl for other acquisitions, as well as licensing deals.
“It’s absolutely our intention to be among the very top players over the course of the next couple of years,” said Paul. “It will be a combination of our own production and publishing…Vivendi has a mountain of great gaming IP from the Sierra archive (and from the console and PC operations)” and acquisitions. After adding the 20 people from Centerscore Vivendi Games Mobile has 140 employees in studios the west coast and Japan.
“Connectivity will be a bigger issue going forward, I think games which connect back to a server and update information (high scores, community games etc),” said Paul when asked where mobile games are heading. “And then you’re starting to see some interesting things happen in 3D.”
He also thinks the marketing of games is starting to pick up, although he pointed out that electronic gaming has always been supported by very strong marketing campaigns, so the industry needs something like the Crazy Frog ads (but with out the dodgy subscription practices).
“I think generally speaking the market is opening up in terms of sales channels,” said Paul. “As the portals and retailers and even handset manufacturers figure out how to get more games to more people in more ways then you get that sort of ubiquity where you do an impulse buy because you see something in a supermarket or on a magazine or on a website instead of only going through the carrier.”
He also said that with the handset upgrade cycle there is more content preloaded on the handset and more invitations to use up mobile entertainment credits (a la Sprint)…in fact, he suggested that games could be preloaded to a handset and the consumer merely buys an unlock key, which would alleviate data issues.
Vivendi has also signed a distribution agreement with Boost Mobile.

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