The social gaming landscape in the country is witnessing a growth momentum driven by young and growing aspirational demographic that has increasing access to mobile and internet offering exciting platforms for expanding friend circles and indulge in informal interaction.
The growth of social networks sites, the time spent by users on them, the high entertainment value proposition and opportunity to engage in fun and casual interaction with friends, was fuelling the social gaming market, opine social gaming experts.
“Worldwide over 500 million play social games. In India more than 10 million (over 50 per cent) of the Facebook users play Social games”, says Deepak Abbot, Vice President-Product, Zapak.com, one of the leading social gaming players.
“Today conversations have found a new medium of interaction - Social Gaming. Social games now act as mini social networks. They have now become the conversation starters among two people active on the network.” said Rahul Razdan. President - Products & Operations, Ibibo web.
According to Rahul, on a social network site, only 10 per cent are really active posting their pictures or providing updates on social life, the rest only consumed the data.
But a social gaming format works differently. Here, a user could simply play a game, make a comment and respond to their friends’s moves and take active part without really bothering about whether they had something awesome to say or post pictures, as would be required in a social network site.
It creates reasons for interaction with every action of a player demanding a counter reaction. “It is an inclusive traction”, he said.
Gaming in India though dominated by men, has a sizeable women gaming population as well. Games that favoured aesthetic expressions, building, growing a farm witnessed traction among women, while games relating to mafia, violence and hard core action saw men gravitate toward them.
“The statistics were skewed towards women (55 per cent) when it came to word games”, he said. Surprisingly a game like Teen Pati (a game of cards) on Ibibo actually saw 30 per cent of women playing the game on Diwali night, said Rahul.
“The age profile of social gamers is usually 18-34”, said Deepak. “The Indian social gamer is a bit younger than the average international gamer”, he said.
“Women constitute 30 per cent of the Facebook and Internet users in India, the same per cent can also be assumed in the social gaming space. As the games are more related to building, collaborating and managing these games appeal to women too. There is hardly any skill required to play Social games therefore gender is not an issue”, said Deepak.
