THE BRIDGE

Gaming

Japanese startup Translimit raises $100,000 to launch social quiz app

SHARE:

Tokyo-based startup Translimit announced today that it has raised 10 million yen (about $100,000) from Genuine Startups [1] and Skyland Ventures. The funds will go towards launching a mobile quiz app with social competition features. The app will be called BrainWars, with an iOS version coming in mid-April, and an Android version to follow in June. BrainWars pits players against one another, playing three sets of mental exercise games (15 seconds each) to see which player performs better. Since these games require no verbal response [2], and users around the world can play and compete against each other regardless of language. The match is arranged to let you to play in real time, but if you can’t find anyone available to compete with, you can compete with someone you know according to their past results. In this space, we’ve already seen US-based Plain Vanilla Games, the startup behind trivia app QuizUp, which secured series B funding of $22 million from Sequoia Capital late last year. Here in Japan Namco Bandai has been selling a brain exercise app called Zen Notore. There’s Colopl Quiz RPG which has seen some success as well (iOS/Android). Translimit was initially launched back in January by Hiroki…

hiroki-takaba
Translimit CEO Hiroki Takaba

Tokyo-based startup Translimit announced today that it has raised 10 million yen (about $100,000) from Genuine Startups [1] and Skyland Ventures. The funds will go towards launching a mobile quiz app with social competition features. The app will be called BrainWars, with an iOS version coming in mid-April, and an Android version to follow in June.

BrainWars pits players against one another, playing three sets of mental exercise games (15 seconds each) to see which player performs better. Since these games require no verbal response [2], and users around the world can play and compete against each other regardless of language. The match is arranged to let you to play in real time, but if you can’t find anyone available to compete with, you can compete with someone you know according to their past results.

battlehome

In this space, we’ve already seen US-based Plain Vanilla Games, the startup behind trivia app QuizUp, which secured series B funding of $22 million from Sequoia Capital late last year. Here in Japan Namco Bandai has been selling a brain exercise app called Zen Notore. There’s Colopl Quiz RPG which has seen some success as well (iOS/Android).

Translimit was initially launched back in January by Hiroki Takaba and Takuma Kudo, both of whom previously worked at CyberAgent companies. They have been involved in several game projects together, including the virtual avatar service Ameba Pico (which shut down back in 2012) and mobile social game Girl Friend BETA. The Translimit team is participating in Movida Japan incubation program here in Tokyo.


  1. Genuine Startups is an investment fund spun off from Movida Japan.
  2. It could be a mathematical equation where you have to fill in the operator, for example.

Filmmaker Freddie Wong gets lost in Puzzle & Dragons

SHARE:

Filmmaker and famous YouTuber Freddie Wong has just released a fun short film over on his RocketJump channel called Cave Quest. The video puts him in the role of a cave explorer, who encounters one of the baddies from GungHo Online Entertainment’s Puzzle and Dragons along the way. Interestingly it’s shot at Bronson Caves, a location used for the old 1950s Adam West Batman series. This looks to be part of a GungHo promotional effort for Puzzle & Dragons, and given that Freddie has nearly seven million subscribers on that particular channel, it’s a smart tie-up for GungHo with over 160,000 views in just a day [1]. Check out the clip below, or the accompanying behind-the-scenes video. Puzzle & Dragons recently surpassed 3 million downloads in the North American market, and GungHo no doubt wants to grow that number further through efforts such as this one. ) Freddie thanks GungHo “for making the video possible.”  ↩

Filmmaker and famous YouTuber Freddie Wong has just released a fun short film over on his RocketJump channel called Cave Quest. The video puts him in the role of a cave explorer, who encounters one of the baddies from GungHo Online Entertainment’s Puzzle and Dragons along the way. Interestingly it’s shot at Bronson Caves, a location used for the old 1950s Adam West Batman series.

This looks to be part of a GungHo promotional effort for Puzzle & Dragons, and given that Freddie has nearly seven million subscribers on that particular channel, it’s a smart tie-up for GungHo with over 160,000 views in just a day [1]. Check out the clip below, or the accompanying behind-the-scenes video.

Puzzle & Dragons recently surpassed 3 million downloads in the North American market, and GungHo no doubt wants to grow that number further through efforts such as this one.

)


  1. Freddie thanks GungHo “for making the video possible.”  ↩

Bringing projection mapping to billiards, OpenPool is now on Kickstarter

SHARE:

OpenPool, the very clever interactive DIY billiards kit from Japan that uses projection mapping, is currently on display at SXSW in Austin, Texas. Coinciding with the conference, they’ve launched a Kickstarter campaign to help promote their open source kit. The project has been nominated for the SXSW Interactive Award, and we’re looking forward to hearing about their experience when they get back to Japan. You can check out their video promotion below to see how it works.

OpenPool, the very clever interactive DIY billiards kit from Japan that uses projection mapping, is currently on display at SXSW in Austin, Texas. Coinciding with the conference, they’ve launched a Kickstarter campaign to help promote their open source kit. The project has been nominated for the SXSW Interactive Award, and we’re looking forward to hearing about their experience when they get back to Japan.

You can check out their video promotion below to see how it works.

Tengami: A stunning Japanese style pop-up paper puzzle game

SHARE:

Tengami is one of the most stylish mobile games that I’ve seen in a long time. With a graphic aesthetic that mimics a Japanese pop-up book, it’s a puzzle game with wondrous sights and sounds. It’s a little tricky to understand at first, but there are subtle glowing callout cues that tell you where you should trigger a paper fold. If you find the initial rounds difficult (I confess, I did!) there are some hints over on the official website that will get you through the first few stages. Since the game’s initial release a couple of weeks back, Japanese fans have apparently taken a liking to the title, as the game briefly broke into the top ten overall apps late in February in the Japanese app store. And it was featured in Apple’s spotlighted games section today, which will surely give it some great exposure. Interestingly, the game was developed by the UK-based team, Nyamyam, but they’ve apparently made the extra effort to appeal to Japanese users, and have been featured in various Japanese media like 4gamer and Famitsu. For now Tengami is iOS only, and can be purchased for $4.99 (or 500 yen here in Japan). I’m enjoying…

tengami_winter_cherry_tree

Tengami is one of the most stylish mobile games that I’ve seen in a long time. With a graphic aesthetic that mimics a Japanese pop-up book, it’s a puzzle game with wondrous sights and sounds.

It’s a little tricky to understand at first, but there are subtle glowing callout cues that tell you where you should trigger a paper fold. If you find the initial rounds difficult (I confess, I did!) there are some hints over on the official website that will get you through the first few stages.

Since the game’s initial release a couple of weeks back, Japanese fans have apparently taken a liking to the title, as the game briefly broke into the top ten overall apps late in February in the Japanese app store. And it was featured in Apple’s spotlighted games section today, which will surely give it some great exposure.

Interestingly, the game was developed by the UK-based team, Nyamyam, but they’ve apparently made the extra effort to appeal to Japanese users, and have been featured in various Japanese media like 4gamer and Famitsu.

For now Tengami is iOS only, and can be purchased for $4.99 (or 500 yen here in Japan). I’m enjoying the game so far, and if you have the patience for puzzle games and a preference for Japanese style art, you might want to check this one out.

The company is planning to release the game for Windows and OSX later on as well, so stay tuned for those. You can check out the trailer for the game, as well as screenshots below.

tengami_mountain_pagoda

tengami_forest_toriGate

tengami_forest_wolf_island

tengami_ocean_lighthouse

tengami_ocean_maze

tengami_mountain_bell

tengami_mountain

Line’s latest mobile game is great, but for the wrong reason

SHARE:

Japan’s Line continues to impress in the gaming space, with its recent title Cookie Run accumulating 10 million downloads in its first 30 days. But personally, I was more interested to try out the company’s latest game Line Rangers, which features the company’s own repertoire of characters. I’ve only spent a little time with this game so far, but I really like it a lot. Yet at the same time I’m a little conflicted. Line has completely ripped off one of my favorite tower defense games, Battle Cats, made by another Japanese company Ponos, based in Kyoto. So on the one hand, I’m really disappointed in Line for its “me too” approach. The similarities between the games are especially apparent if you compare the interface/controls in the pictures below. But on the other hand, two cool games are better than one cool game! Get Line Rangers as a free download for iOS or Google Play. I’ll hopefully have more to say about it after I’ve spent a week or so playing with it.

line-rangers

Japan’s Line continues to impress in the gaming space, with its recent title Cookie Run accumulating 10 million downloads in its first 30 days. But personally, I was more interested to try out the company’s latest game Line Rangers, which features the company’s own repertoire of characters. I’ve only spent a little time with this game so far, but I really like it a lot.

Yet at the same time I’m a little conflicted. Line has completely ripped off one of my favorite tower defense games, Battle Cats, made by another Japanese company Ponos, based in Kyoto.

So on the one hand, I’m really disappointed in Line for its “me too” approach. The similarities between the games are especially apparent if you compare the interface/controls in the pictures below. But on the other hand, two cool games are better than one cool game!

Get Line Rangers as a free download for iOS or Google Play. I’ll hopefully have more to say about it after I’ve spent a week or so playing with it.

line-rangers
Line Rangers
Battle Cats
Battle Cats

Puzzle & Dragons reaches 25 million downloads

SHARE:

GungHo Online Entertainment has announced that its hit game Puzzle & Dragons has surpassed 25 million downloads. This comes just shortly after the two year anniversary of its initial launch. The game needed 29 days to acquire its most recent million, which is pretty consistent with its performance over the last six months or so. [Via Gamebiz]

puzzle-dragons

GungHo Online Entertainment has announced that its hit game Puzzle & Dragons has surpassed 25 million downloads. This comes just shortly after the two year anniversary of its initial launch. The game needed 29 days to acquire its most recent million, which is pretty consistent with its performance over the last six months or so.

[Via Gamebiz]

Mixi partners with Tencent to expand into Chinese gaming market

SHARE:

Tokyo-based Mixi announced today that it has partnered with Chinese internet giant Tencent to bring its popular Monster Strike game to mainland China, Hong Kong, and Macao. Mixi’s Monster Strike is an RPG for iOS and Android, and since its launch last October, the title has acquired over three million users. Our readers may recall its rapid growth has helped the company return to profit, with Mixi’s game department general manager Hiroki Morita moving up to take on the CEO role. Coinciding with the Tencent partnership, Mixi will start an aggressive promotion of Monster Strike in Japan tomorrow, including a new TV commercial (see below) broadcast on many networks.

monsterstrike-mixi-tencent-logos

Tokyo-based Mixi announced today that it has partnered with Chinese internet giant Tencent to bring its popular Monster Strike game to mainland China, Hong Kong, and Macao.

Mixi’s Monster Strike is an RPG for iOS and Android, and since its launch last October, the title has acquired over three million users. Our readers may recall its rapid growth has helped the company return to profit, with Mixi’s game department general manager Hiroki Morita moving up to take on the CEO role.

Coinciding with the Tencent partnership, Mixi will start an aggressive promotion of Monster Strike in Japan tomorrow, including a new TV commercial (see below) broadcast on many networks.

Kamcord localizes SDK to Japanese, Namco Bandai first to use its game recording technology

SHARE:

Late last year in Kyoto we happened to run into Adi Rathnam, the co-founder of of Kamcord, who at the time was speaking to potential Japanese gaming partners for his company’s game recording platform. As you may recall, Kamcord offers an SDK that enables game developers to put a ‘movie’ button in game, and when it is pressed, they can then share video clips/replays of their game play. These can be shared directly to Kamcord where they can be viewed by other gamers, or they can be shared to places like YouTube, Facebook, Twitter, or even email. Back in December Adi informed us of plans to localize their SDK into Japanese, as well as a number of other Asian languages. That localization has now been realized, and Kamcord is also announcing that Namco Bandai’s title Gregg is the first game that takes advantage of that Japanese localization. Kamcord also tells us that they have also localized their SDK into Chinese, with Korean soon to follow. Unreal growth Adi says that they are experiencing huge growth right now, with a new video uploaded once every five seconds, and a total of two billion videos recorded in total. “We’re working hard to…

Late last year in Kyoto we happened to run into Adi Rathnam, the co-founder of of Kamcord, who at the time was speaking to potential Japanese gaming partners for his company’s game recording platform. As you may recall, Kamcord offers an SDK that enables game developers to put a ‘movie’ button in game, and when it is pressed, they can then share video clips/replays of their game play. These can be shared directly to Kamcord where they can be viewed by other gamers, or they can be shared to places like YouTube, Facebook, Twitter, or even email.

Back in December Adi informed us of plans to localize their SDK into Japanese, as well as a number of other Asian languages. That localization has now been realized, and Kamcord is also announcing that Namco Bandai’s title Gregg is the first game that takes advantage of that Japanese localization. Kamcord also tells us that they have also localized their SDK into Chinese, with Korean soon to follow.

Unreal growth

share_tab_japanese
Kamcord’s share tab

Adi says that they are experiencing huge growth right now, with a new video uploaded once every five seconds, and a total of two billion videos recorded in total. “We’re working hard to ensure our servers will scale,” he explains. “Our growth has been pretty exponential.”

Kamcord is also announcing today that it has joined the Unreal Engine 3 Integrated Partners Program. That program includes 25 other leading companies like Oculus VR, NaturalMotion, and Intel. The founder and CEO of Epic, the company behind the Unreal game engine, had this to say about the tie-up with Kamcord:

The Kamcord integration with Unreal Engine 3 provides awesome real-time video recording and social sharing functionality that developers can drop into their mobile games for added appeal. We’re proud that Kamcord has joined Epic’s Integrated Partners Program to bring their technology to Unreal Engine developers as seamlessly as possible.

This is an important step for Kamcord, because games using the Unreal engine typically have pretty stunning graphics (Infinity Blade is one of the best known examples), as well as a tendency to attract more hardcore gamers. It stands to reason that video recordings of such games would be extremely sharable.

Kamcord will also be making an effort to bring independent developers into the fold as well, and to that end they have already landed Limbic’s Tower Madness 2 (shown in the video above) and PennyPop’s Battle Camp as users of their technology.

Why Japan’s top money-making games don’t forget you on Valentine’s Day

SHARE:

It’s a very snowy Valentine’s Day here in Tokyo today, and I expect many of us will be spending the evening indoors with our significant others. If you find yourself alone this evening, however, don’t despair – because your favorite mobile games probably have something special in store for you. It’s not unusual for game and app developers to hold special Valentine’s Day campaigns. In fact it’s pretty common these days. But some of the most successful campaigns are the ones that prompt you to give some love back. And by love, I obviously mean money. Two of Japan’s most successful video game publishers both have interesting Valentine’s campaigns currently ongoing, and I’d like to take a quick look at them right now. Let’s start with GungHo Online Entertainment, whose ‘Hearts-a-flutter’ event in Puzzle & Dragons (promo pictured above) began on February 12 and will go on until February 19th. GungHo will be rewarding players with a number of goodies, including: a free magic stone on February 12th–13th, 18th–19th a free Tamadra every day from February 14th–17th (used to awaken new skills in your collected monsters) [1] What’s smart about this kind of campaign is that it sucks you deeper…

puzzle-dragons-valentines

It’s a very snowy Valentine’s Day here in Tokyo today, and I expect many of us will be spending the evening indoors with our significant others. If you find yourself alone this evening, however, don’t despair – because your favorite mobile games probably have something special in store for you.

It’s not unusual for game and app developers to hold special Valentine’s Day campaigns. In fact it’s pretty common these days. But some of the most successful campaigns are the ones that prompt you to give some love back. And by love, I obviously mean money.

Two of Japan’s most successful video game publishers both have interesting Valentine’s campaigns currently ongoing, and I’d like to take a quick look at them right now. Let’s start with GungHo Online Entertainment, whose ‘Hearts-a-flutter’ event in Puzzle & Dragons (promo pictured above) began on February 12 and will go on until February 19th. GungHo will be rewarding players with a number of goodies, including:

  • a free magic stone on February 12th–13th, 18th–19th
  • a free Tamadra every day from February 14th–17th (used to awaken new skills in your collected monsters) [1]

What’s smart about this kind of campaign is that it sucks you deeper into the game. You have a chance to level up your existing monsters, and with the free stones you’ll be closer a chance to try the Rare Egg machine (requires five stones), which you normally have to pay for. And maybe it’s no coincidence that GungHo is giving out four magic stones, expecting that users might be willing to pay the extra 100 yen (or $1) for the fifth one, so they can try the Rare Egg machine [2].

GungHo regularly holds holiday campaigns like these for Puzzle & Dragons, most recently with a New Year’s campaign that yielded great results in North America in particular.

valentines-line

Another Japanese company, Line Corporation, is holding a Valentine’s Day promotion in many of its casual games. The company’s ‘Love is Priceless’ event is featured in three games — Line Pop, Line Pokopang, and Line Bubble — running from February 13th until February 15.

For a span of 62 hours, players will have access to free in-game items which usually require payment to use. So much like GungHo’s tactic, Line is hoping to bring you into the item-purchase process, giving you a taste of fun gameplay that they hope you will pay for later on after the event concludes. Both Line and GungHo have been active promoting these and other holiday events on their respective Facebook pages, realizing that its a necessary part of connecting with with global fans.

Like holiday sales in retail stores, such promotions are always a popular way to connect with customers, and they certainly appear to be working for both GungHo and Line. The two companies were among the top app publishers in sales in 2013, with GungHo ranking number one, and Line not too far behind at number six.

As in app purchases become more and more important to app revenue, game publishers in particular should take note of these holiday tactics and capitalize on such opportunities whenever they can.

So what’s your favorite Valentine’s Day game promotion this year? Do feel free to let us know!


  1. Note that I’m playing the North American version of the game, and the promotion may differ in other regions.  ↩

  2. There are other ways to get magic stones in the game, but they do require some time.  ↩

How Puzzle & Dragons connects with Japan’s commuters

SHARE:

People often look at GungHo Online Entertainment’s hit game Puzzle & Dragons and wonder why it’s such a strong mobile title. I’ve already written much about exactly why I like it personally, but there are some other reasons that I think have really contributed to its success here in Japan. I started thinking about this recently when I saw someone complaining about Dungeon Keeper on Twitter, and how it kicks you out of the game when you lose a connection [1]. Lots of games require persistent connections, and that’s certainly fine provided your day doesn’t take you through a maze of underground subway tunnels like many of us who live in urban centers such as Tokyo. But it really got me thinking about Puzzle & Dragons, and how and where I have been playing it over the past year or so. What’s remarkable about the game is not just that it doesn’t require a persistent connection, but that it only really requires a sporadic connection. During my own subway commute here in Tokyo, there are certain blind spots on my route where I usually can’t get a network connection. And because I’ve traveled that route so often, I can usually…

tokyo-game-show-201303

People often look at GungHo Online Entertainment’s hit game Puzzle & Dragons and wonder why it’s such a strong mobile title. I’ve already written much about exactly why I like it personally, but there are some other reasons that I think have really contributed to its success here in Japan.

I started thinking about this recently when I saw someone complaining about Dungeon Keeper on Twitter, and how it kicks you out of the game when you lose a connection [1]. Lots of games require persistent connections, and that’s certainly fine provided your day doesn’t take you through a maze of underground subway tunnels like many of us who live in urban centers such as Tokyo.

But it really got me thinking about Puzzle & Dragons, and how and where I have been playing it over the past year or so. What’s remarkable about the game is not just that it doesn’t require a persistent connection, but that it only really requires a sporadic connection.

During my own subway commute here in Tokyo, there are certain blind spots on my route where I usually can’t get a network connection. And because I’ve traveled that route so often, I can usually anticipate when I’ll lose my connection and when I’ll get it back [2]. P&D will always handle these drops like a champ. The actual dungeons (or rounds/levels) don’t need a connection at connection at all. So if you suddenly go offline, you won’t even realize it until you finish the level and the data tries to sync. So in reality, the game only really needs a connection during times when it phones home to sync data, such as:

  • The initial start screen
  • Entering or exiting a dungeon
  • Powering up or evolving a monster

If you happen to run into network issues during those times, you’ll typically see a ‘Connecting’ message, followed by either a ‘retry’ option or an error message (see below).

puzzle-dragons-connection

So very often I’ll find myself beginning a dungeon before going through a long underground stretch that has no signal, just so that I have something to do during that blacked out period. You’ve no doubt done something similar at some point, perhaps downloading all your podcasts or syncing an RSS reader before a flight.

The end result for P&D is a pretty frustration-free gaming experience, far removed from the likes of Dungeon Keeper mentioned above. And of course, a game that does not need a persistent connection is not unique to by any means, but I think the lesson to be learned here is that you want to make a game that’s a mainstream hit in the Japan market (or for a similar urban population with developed public transport), you need to make sure it doesn’t frustrate users when they suddenly lose a connection.

Thumbs up, but no more than necessary

I probably don’t need to point out that in addition to handling sporadic connections really well, P&D is a really easy game to play with one hand – again, a great advantage for Japan’s legions of train commuters who stand hanging one-armed from a strap during rush hours. You only really need your thumb to play, and since all the puzzle movement is in the lower half of the screen, you never find yourself reaching uncomfortably to the top half during gameplay (see lower left). No fingers necessary!

When Apple rolled out Control Center with iOS 7, it did lead to some unexpected problems for P&D players however (and probably many other games too). If you’ve played the game for any length of time, you’ll notice that sometimes when you try to bring an orb up from the very bottom row, you will sometimes inadvertently launch Command Center. It’s a huge annoyance (see lower right), and as much as I love the convenience of Command Center, I’m sure the folks at GungHo we’re not too pleased when it came out.

But overall, Puzzle & Dragons is still a pretty amazing little mobile game, one that I regularly see people playing during their commute – provided that I don’t have my head down playing it myself.

puzzle-dragons-thumb
Command Center sometimes gets in the way :(

  1. I have not confirmed whether the game actually does this or not, but given that it came from Richard Gaywood, a super smart dude from TUAW (where I once briefly blogged), I’m taking this as a certainty.  ↩

  2. Usually my network ‘blind spot’ is between Omotesando and Futakotamagawa. Coverage has improved much over the years, thankfully. I should also point out that this is also a great game if you’re annoyed by the tunnels on the bullet train!  ↩