MY.GAMES Venture Capital (MGVC) and Google have launched the second season of their joint business acceleration programme for mobile game developers. The first season was launched in November 2020, offering EMEA developers free consulting services, including expert evaluation, key metrics analysis, recommendations on step-by-step improvements, as well as advice on scaling and international expansion. This season, MGVC has allocated $30m for potential investments in studios and projects that show promise during the programme and that – in the view of the jury – will be able to significantly improve their results with the help of funding.
MGVC and Google recognise that to succeed in mobile development teams need support in other areas like game design, infrastructure, user acquisition, data, analytics, and how to work with across the different platforms. The long standing partners have set up Game Drive with the core objective of developing the mobile gaming ecosystem and providing game developers with advice on best practice and expertise. The accelerator format will allow gaming studios to present themselves to a group of seasoned experts and get feedback and advice on how to grow further and faster. Game Drive will also allow MGVC and Google to identify untapped talent from anywhere in the EMEA regions.
Mobile developers with games in early access or MVP on Google Play based in any EMEA region can sign up, and up to ten successful applicants will secure a place on the 2021 Game Drive programme. MY.GAMES and Google will tailor their focus depending on each individual studios’ requirements and all the participants will take part in Game Drive Demo Day in November and receive one to one support sessions. Where relevant the developers could be in receipt of financial investment drawn from the joint pool of $30m USD provided by MGVC.
MGVC acting director and MY.GAMES chief marketing officer Elena Grigoryan explained, “As a company that today unites more than 45 studios and has many years of experience in bringing successful products to the market, we are well aware of the value of mentoring and consulting for new game developers. We know and love what we do, and together with our long-time reliable partner Google, MGVC will be happy to provide all the necessary opportunities for the growth of a new generation of mobile game developers. For this season of Game Drive, we have further expanded the business acceleration campaign by forming a series of educational sessions.”
Google in Russia sales director Maxim Braverman added, “Our Game Drive programme in 2020 showed how many promising game studios there are across the EMEA regions. At Google we strive to support such teams and help them achieve global success, and this second season is part of that mission. Participants in Game Drive’s second season will not only work on their games together with us and MGVC, but will also be able to participate in educational sessions and the AMAs. We hope that Game Drive 2.0 will allow them to improve their current projects and give them ideas for new ones.”
Other Game Drive support includes:
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Project evaluation by expert teams from MGVC and Google
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Mentorship – project feedback and improvement analysis
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Networking – expertise sharing with other studios and access to educational projects for game developers by MGVC and Google
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Investment – potential investments by MGVC
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Global Uplift support with scaling their businesses
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Project assessment and analysis of its business potential
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Consulting and recommendations for product improvement
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Google experts’ evaluation of the project, focused on launching in international markets.
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Attendance at the November 18th Demo Day
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Individual Feedback Sessions
The Game Drive programme launched in 2020 and helped numerous studios bring their titles into the mobile ecosystem. During season one, teams from MGVC and Google studied more than 40 applications from developers based in Italy, France, Germany, the UK, Kuwait, Spain, Russia, and other countries. After careful consideration, 8 projects were short-listed and their authors invited to take part in a closed-door conference, the Game Drive Demo Day. Experts from Google and MGVC provided their comments and gave advice on what to improve in the projects, and held private meetings with the developer teams for discretion.
The shortlist of Season One finalists included games like Warfronts: Battle for Toria (Sand Forge Games), Big 6 Hockey Manager (Big 6), Wasteland Punk (Try Hard Games), Order of Fate (Studio 3) and others.
