DEC. 7, 2011 • Amongst the slew of new start-ups in the social network and mobile game space during 2011, Funzio stood out for several reasons. First, there was the $20 million in funding through IDG Ventures in the U.S. and IDG Capital Partners in China. Next, came the hiring away of Jamil Moledina from Electronic Arts last November.  Moledina was director of business development at EA Partners, the publisher’s third party digital publishing business.

Landing Moledina as vice president of business development at Funzio drew a great deal of attention to the fledging enterprise. EA has seen other high-profile defections to the online game space in recent years, but usually at larger outfits like Zynga or Playdom. Perhaps not so surprising after all given that Funzio first title, Crime City, launched in September and shot to the top of the iOS game charts.

With Crime City, Funzio is jumping on a similar trend as Kabam – crafting more involving gamer experiences than have been the normal on Facebook or mobile platforms. So DFC went to Jamil Moledina for a briefing on what we can expect in 2012 from Funzio.

DFC: Funzio is focused on developing next generation games for an audience that seems more like the hard-core console and PC game players.  How big is that audience currently on social and mobile platforms?  How much do you expect it to grow?

JM: That’s a great observation, and something that reflects a deliberate focus of our attention. Our games are created to appeal to a mid-core market, to audiences that prefer a more grown-up look and feel, but don’t have hours to dedicate to complex play. At this early stage of mid-core social games, an estimate of that market size would have a very wide range. On the smaller end of the scale would be the worldwide audience of current console/PC gamers, lapsed gamers, and social gamers, and on the wider end of the scale, we should include fans of epic film and television properties and smartphone owners who don’t like waiting in line.

DFC: Only two years out of the gate with a respectable hit on its hands in Crime City, plus bringing in $20 million in funding last May, what’s next for Funzio? What is the strategic vision? Where does management want to take the company from here?

JM: Crime City was the first graphically-driven gangster game on Facebook. It offers a variety of play, including a single-player campaign, ganging up on bosses, and player battles. This keeps engagement high, which we think is key to its success. We then brought Crime City to Google+, iPhone, and iPad, and the game was a hit on all of them again.

Our next game Modern War follows a similar design and commercial response, as the first realistic social military action game. It was just released on iOS, and hit a whopping 1M installs in 5 days.

Our next titles advance our game design and crossplatform strategies, while presenting similarly pioneering themes, visuals, and play. Ultimately, Funzio’s vision is to invent a future where people can play immersive games together, whenever and wherever they are. Our goal is to leave today’s barriers of platform and technology in the past, and bring games to people’s fingertips. We are growing rapidly to get there.

DFC: When you were considering jumping to Funzio there was an obvious hit in Crime City. Yet someone doesn’t leave an EA based on one success alone. What did you see coming down the pike with Funzio that made you say, “Yes, I am going there.”

JM: Hah! That’s very true. The interesting thing is that Crime City isn’t just one success, it’s four successes, on all four platforms it was released on. That is very unusual. In meeting with the executive team, they’re a smart, accomplished, visionary team that has this great rapport with each other and their rapidly growing team. Their vision of a cross-platform future is identical to my own, as articulated at a conference earlier this year. And they did show me the roadmap, including Modern War and future games. Everything Funzio is doing is pioneering. In a market where copying and optimizing is the norm, Funzio is originating and optimizing. That’s a leadership position.

DFC: A lot of prominent executives have left some of the top established publishers in the last few years for social network start-ups. Why do you think that is?

JM: There are a number of reasons that I’m sure are unique to each of the execs you’re thinking of. I can’t necessarily speak for them, but I can tell you that for me, on the continuum of work styles between hierarchy and anarchy, I prefer the anarchy side. There’s more risk, but you have a better chance to change the world.

DFC: We have read that Funzio was founded based on the desire to distribute games simultaneously across mobile and Internet platforms. Please describe how Funzio has been structured to reach that goal.

JM: Funzio currently has two full teams with a couple of smaller teams working on new projects. Each team is working on a different platform, but develops a game designed to work on multiple platforms. Everyone works very closely, and has the benefit of having figured out the alleged cross-platform challenge.

DFC: When you talk about mobile and social platforms is that basically iPhone and Facebook?  How deeply do you want to go on Android and Google+, and what other platforms do you see on the horizon?

JM: Yes, we absolutely have a broad, platform-agnostic vision, which we are implementing today. Crime City is already on Google+, and we are developing titles for Android right now. Moving forward, we are very open to any platform that allows us to present our high-fidelity, free-to-play games to a broad audience.

DFC: Crime City was released for iOS devices in August, 2011, almost a year after the title was launched on Facebook. Why did it take so long?

JM: It was our first time, and we wanted to do it right. We were figuring out a lot of the cross-platform design, community, and monetization aspects, which many said were not practical.  But as you can see by Crime City hitting No. 1 on the iPhone and iPad, it was worth the wait.  The rapid adoption of Modern War on iOS shows that we’ve applied what we learned. But even now, we won’t release a game until we know it’s great.

DFC: Funzio started off with 12 employees in 2009, passed 50 staffers by mid-2011, and plans to have 100 on the rolls by the end of 2011. What are all those new people working on?

JM: Pioneering, amazing things!

DFC:  Since Crime City was released in September 2010 on Facebook, it has reached more than 7.5 million monthly users on that network, and the game has attracted a peak of 1 million daily active users. How many daily active users are playing regularly now, and what percentage of those active players purchase virtual items?

JM: Well it’s definitely down from that point, but retention is double that of similar games. A very high percentage of our players are purchasing items.

DFC: What feature of Crime City do players sink the most time into?  The game employs both  RPG and city building features. Where are they spending their time: exploring or building?

JM: It’s interesting, players spend most of their time in the PvE and PvP modes. Between building and exploring, they spend a lot of time exploring maps and doing jobs.

DFC: Blending genres like RPGs and city building is a little novel for social network games, which tend to be simple in design. Is this blending in Crime City something of a hallmark of what a Funzio game should be?

JM: That’s exactly right. We call this genre RPG+, which includes building simulation, exploration, boss battles, and also two multiplayer modes, cooperative and competitive. We find this mix of features gives players the option to play at their own speed, with a level of depth that suits their interest.  Modern War features this, and you can expect all Funzio games to offer a balance of flexibility and optional depth.

DFC: Crime City is monetized primarily through the sale of items.  Does that make it a numbers game where it is all based on how many users you have?  Are there ways to generate more revenue per user among your active users?

JM: Sure we want more users, the game is social, getting to a critical mass is important. It’s essential to get people into the game. But our approach is more respectful to the player. You can get into the game slowly at your own pace, without being forced to pay.

DFC:  What was learned from the experience of monetizing Crime City that will be applied to Funzio’s next title?

JM: For Modern War, we augmented PvP, aspirational items, and social features. For example, we’re introducing a greater sense of risk to the battles by losing units even if you win, like real war. These aren’t so much lessons from the first game, but more like fun new gameplay features we’re adding.

DFC: What differences have you found among Facebook users and iOS users in terms of their willingness to spend real money in the game?

JM: iOS users are more Western traffic, more English-speaking. They also seem to be battling more, and spending more per user. They’re connecting up with each other faster than on Facebook, which seems a bit counterintuitive, but they’re more dedicated to those connections.

DFC: What are Crime City’s top geographic markets for for users and revenue?

JM: Crime City’s top markets in both categories are the US, Canada, and U.K., and then other English-speaking territories. Our game isn’t localized.

DFC: Crime City was one of the first games on Google+ last August. What has the experience been like on this new network, how have users responded to the game, and what are the similarities and difference’s to Crime City’s run on Facebook.

JM: Our games are very social, and Google+ is still growing as a social network. We see that users are monetizing at a high rate, but it’s still a growing market. It’s not an apples to apples comparison yet.

DFC: Anil Dharni has said it took about a month to adapt Crime City to Google+. What had to be done to the game to make the transition?

JM: We didn’t have to do much to adapt the game to Google+, it was just about porting it to the new platform. We didn’t make any gameplay changes.

DFC: Funzio decided to concentrate on Flash for development because HTML5 was “too slow” for games. What does too slow mean exactly?

JM: We’re focusing on the high end of graphics animations for our games. Flash is simply more mature at this point in time, we can better realize our vision with the technology. In the future, that may be different. Our focus is our games, not the technology.

DFC: How does Adobe’s decision to suspend Flash platform development affect your future development plans? Are you rethinking HTML5?

JM: We are keeping a close eye on HTML5 performance, and are bullish on its long term potential.

DFC: Moving forward, what development environment gives Funzio the best foundation to reach the platform-agnostic strategy behind the company?

JM: Right now it’s Flash. Who’s to say what it will be moving forward. But our game design is a much more powerful factor than technology in reaching the cross-platform future.

 

Company Name	Funzio, Inc.
Headquarters	San Francisco, CA
Founded	2009
Employees	88
Parent Company	N/A
Subsidiaries	N/A
Website	www.funzio.com
Executives	Ken Chiu	CEO & Co-Founder
	Anil Dharni	COO & Co-Founder
	Ram Gudavalli	CTO & Co-Founder
	Andy Keidel	VP Engineering & Co-Founder
	Rick Thompson	Chairman & Co-Founder
	Jamil Moledina	VP Business Development
Business Model	Free to play, virtual goods
	Social and mobile crossplatform
Number of Products	2
Type of Products	Advanced social action games for iOS, Facebook, and Google+	Crime City and Modern War
Top Products	Crime City and Modern War
Revenue	Crime City on FB had 7.5M MAU, 1M DAUCrime City on iOS was the #1 Free App on both iPhone and iPadCrime City on Google+ consistently ranked by press among best games on the platformModern War on iOS just launched, but hit 1M installs in 5 days