With World Cup (WC) just around the corner, one of the oldest game developers in the country, Games2Win has created a real-time multiplayer cricket game. The game currently available only on the Google Play store, it will be out on the Apple App store soon. It is also betting big on the WC for the game to pick up in the cricket crazy nation. ‘Cricket Battles Multiplayer’ is the world’s first synchronous multiplayer cricket game that has been developed for smartphones.
Speaking exclusively to AnimationXpress.com Games2Win CEO and Co-founder Alok Kejriwal explained, “Cricket games have seen a massive lift on the Indian app stores, with our own games being downloaded several millions of times. We felt this was the perfect time to launch a ‘synchronous’ multi-player cricket game in the beginning of the holiday season, leading into the World Cup.”
Alok further said, “Most of the successful cricket games on the App stores are 3D or legacy games. The odd one or two ‘multi-player’ games on the stores are ‘async’ or turn-based. We wanted to delight consumers with a real time, multi-player experience and hence our unique offering in Cricket Battles Multiplayer.”
In Cricket Battles Multiplayer, players get instantly paired with other players based on their ‘XP’ or experience level so that the competition is evenly matched. In the beginning, any one player gets to bat while the other watches in real time. And that’s the unique feature of the game – watching real time as the opponent bats! After an over of six balls, the first player switches sides and the waiting player gets to chase his opponent’s score. The core loop of the game is infinite as players constantly get a chance of a ‘rematch’ after every game.
The game has been in development since July 2014 and Google Play Services has been the backbone for the real time synchronous play which the game has achieved. Alok explains, “We really have Google to thank for their Google Play Services Platform that we have fully leveraged to launch this game. A real time multiplayer experience in a distorted bandwidth market like India would have been impossible to render if we had not gone with Google.
Also, in future updates users can expect to play the game offline and once they are connected to a Wi-Fi or mobile data connection, the usage data will automatically be submitted. The peering and real time sync that Google Play offers is magical! Making a turn based multiplayer is easier as compared to a real time synchronous game.”
The game was developed with a core group of nine people with one product manager, two developers, three artists and three testers which has now been reduced to five people belting out updates which Alok has said will be on a weekly basis. “We are thinking of this game as a ‘service’ and not a ‘stay on the shelf’ product. We will keep improving the game bit by bit, day on day,” says Alok. “Players can also expect to bowl to opponents in future as against staying idle now. Overs may also be increased by allowing the players to bat alternatively, one over at a time.”
Commenting further on the updates and how the game could shape in the future, Alok said, “We have received a tremendous response from the audience and in the 96 hours of launch, the game has already reached #73 in India in the Sports Category on the Android App Store solely on the basis of viral and organic momentum. The internal metrics of the game are looking very positive – players are playing 7-8 matches per game play and returning to play 2-3 times a day. Our user retention rate for the first seven days is low but compared to 30 days the retention rate jumps significantly and rises by 10 per cent to 15 per cent.”
The game will be cross promoted in different cricket games in the app store but not much has been planned for promoting the app outside of digital forums. Alok is pretty confident that the game will break even within one year as the WC and IPL will be a big boost to the game downloads.
Alok further comments on the state of the Indian gaming scene, “Not many games in India have done really well and we want to change that. Indians in general have not have been open to in-app purchases and advertising is the biggest way to monetise. Even the big companies like King have been resorting to ads for the revenue generation in the country.”
On further probing on how would he want the synchronous multiplayer games to expand, he states, “We are still understanding this genre and would like to expand this format to different sport based games which are doing really well in the country. Football is one of the sports that has picked up in the country and we definitely would want to develop something around it.”