Wooga Games Attracting 10 Million Monthly Players

Developer Wooga ("World of Gaming") announced that its three Facebook games currently bring in more than 10 million monthly active users, a feat it accomplished in just a year since it began releasing titles on the social network. The Berlin-based studio says these numbers rank it as the eighth top social games developer in the world (according to audience size) and the largest in Europe. Wooga also claims it is the only Facebook developer doing full localization of its games with fan pages, local virtual goods, and customer care. Wooga's catalog includes Brain Buddies, its first launched title with over 2.5 million monthly active users; Bubble Island, which debuted last February and has 5 million monthly players; and Monster World, a May 2010 release with an audience of 2.8 million gamers. The developer notes that Monster World's userbase has doubled in just the last 30 days, and says it is "the only farming-principle game on Facebook which is growing." It also points out that of its total 10 million user audience, only 3 percent joined through advertising. Founded in January 2009, Wooga raised some €5 million (around $7.5 million) late last year in a new round of funding led by Balderton Capital. The company said it was putting that financing toward increasing its headcount, continuing game development, and further growing the company. "Not only have our games grown – just one year ago Wooga was a small handful of people working in a backyard," says Wooga founder and CEO Jens Begemann. "Today we have an amazing team of 50 people from 12 countries working hard out of cool offices in an old baking factory in Berlin to create the best social games in the world." Begemann adds, "I look forward to delivering more fun gameplay to you in the next 12 months." The studio is currently working on a fourth game, which is in its closed beta phase and will be announced and launched "soon."