HTML5 Games Next Frontier - Casual Games For Brands

If you’re a brand or business, you’re probably figuring out how to get more attention. Getting more attention is correlated to having more success, and hence paving the way for more opportunities. Why is attention valuable?

Ask Kim Kardashian or Kendall Jenner, who spend every ounce of their online lives touching up photos on Instagram. Every picture tells a story. Every picture is done tastefully, with a matching zeitgeist and image filter.

Or, ask the Facebook user experience team, who constantly think of ways to get you to scroll through the news feeds. If they can capture more of your attention, they hold the keys to the castle. There’s only 24 hours in a day, and if they can get a good slice of it via Facebook, Whatsapp or Instagram, that’s a lot of hours for over 1 billion users!

As it turns out, games are a great way to get attention too. The act of playing a game itself, and getting rewarded for your actions is a great hook for attention. 

Brands license HTML5 games to help them get more attention. The attention can manifest in a few ways, including time spent in the game, social media mentions, leads generated and possibly even revenue down the road.

Why use HTML5 games? The answer is simple: cross-platform interoperability. A HTML5 game can be sliced and diced in many ways and redistributed across the internet. It can be packaged 

Each channel has the potential to reach millions of users. Here are a few examples:

WeChat ( WeiXin )

WeChat, the biggest messenger platform in Asia, launched a HTML5 game called Tiao yi Tiao, as part of its mini games program. It’s a simple endless jumper game,, where players try to jump from one platfom to the next. It’s powered by HTML5 and WebGL, embedded within WeChat’s container app. Over 100 million people played the game in the first 2 weeks.

Facebook Instant Games

Remember the days of the Nokia 3310? Yes, the phone that you could literally throw at someone and it would hurt a lot. Nokia launched a re-imagined, HTML5 version of Snake game within Facebook Instant Games. The was embedded within a WebView element of the Facebook app. It attracted 100 million plays.

Airline Industry

We launched a series of HTML5 games for Air Asia, the top budget airline in Asia. Passengers are able to watch movies, tv shows, read a magazine or play casual games at 35,000 feet. The games are served to over 50 million passengers per year.

Schools and Educational Institutions

We launched a series of casual games for a client in the education space. The games are designed as rewards for kids who successfully complete their homework. The games are deployed in over 25,000 schools and 7,000 districts in the US, reaching 20 million students.

Hospitality Industry ( Hotels )

We launched a series of family oriented HTML5 games for a few hotel chains in the US. With in-room tablets being adopted by the hospitality industry, hotel guests can now browser the internet, order room service and also play casual games. With over 55,000 rooms, our games reach over 20 million guests each year. 

Food and Beverage Industry ( Restaurants and Bars )

In the food and beverage industry, our games are served in over 50,000 tablets across restaurants and bars in the US. Over 30 million diners per year engage with our branded games. Using restaurant tablets, diners are able to consume news, order food and also play games to win prizes.

Playable Ads ( Performance Marketing )

We helped develop and launch a series of highly engaging playable ads for games in the Top 10 App Store and Google Play charts. With playable ads, it’s all about getting reducing the Cost Per Install and getting the best ROI for ad spend. Our playable ads were played by over 100 million people, generating over 300% yield for advertisers.

What are the next steps?
If you’re a brand, you’re probably wondering, “Wow that’s a big number of users. how do I get my brand out there?”

For brands that already have an existing channel, you would find a company or agency that builds HTML5 games. In our case, we would work together to determine your requirements. Some brands require additional brand integration such as branded characters and logos, while others wish to run contests to collect leads. Some may require a higher degree of customization. We cater to all your needs, and we’ll help to think through the entire process to provide the best ROI for your marketing spend.

For brands that wish to explore additional channels, we could work together to determine a possible marketing or licensing campaign, where we push your games out to our existing channels of over 200 million people.

Typically, campaigns that succeed are ones that stay authentic to the brand values. Rather than launching a generic game and slap a brand logo on it, the game becomes an extension of the brand. No matter how simple the gameplay is, the brand messaging is clear, and the game keeps the user engaged enough to deliver the message.

A word on messenger HTML5 games
With the rise of messenger app platforms such as Facebook Instant Games, WeChat Mini Programs, KiK, LINE and Telegram, it becomes increasingly easier for a brand to spread the message.  All you need is to partner with the right developer that can build the game, and have someone handle relationships with the messenger app operators. Note that each messenger app platform itself is a walled garden and requires a lot of relationship management. Hence, risk management is crucial especially if you have limited resources.

Summary
I hope this article sheds light on why brands license HTML5 games. There a perfect game for each brand, and the challenge is figuring out the right one.