Welcome to another episode of Founder's Funnel, where we bring you closer to the visionaries reshaping the Web3 landscape.
Today, we're featuring SuperGaming - a powerhouse in India's gaming revolution. We explore their journey of creating hit games like MaskGun and Silly Royale, and delve into their ambitious project, Indus - an Indo-Futuristic battle royale.
Get ready to be inspired by their innovative approach to gaming, commitment to community, and the fusion of creativity and technology.
SuperGaming's Core Mission and Game Portfolio
SuperGaming makes mobile games for you to play with your friends and family easily. These include Battle Stars, Silly Royale, MaskGun, and Tower Conquest as well as the official PAC-MAN game. We’re also building Indus. It’s an Indo-Futuristic battle royale that’s our most ambitious game to date. Our mission is to build India’s gaming revolution.
Building a Gaming Revolution in India
Our intent with SuperGaming is to build mass adoption of video games beyond the Innovators, Early Adopters and build deep into the Early Majority of Players in India to truly cross the chasm. This is something that games like Call of Duty Mobile, Fortnite, Apex Legends, Farlight 84 have not been able to breach in the Indian market. Based on our early experiments we believe we may have found a way forward with our focus on mass scale adoption via LiveOps, Streaming and the halo provided by esports.
While our backgrounds and experiences of the entire team are extremely diverse ranging from coding for mainframes to advertising and DJing, there’s one common trait: the willingness to roll up our sleeves and do the work. Our ability to dig deep and power through consistently has helped us tremendously in bringing our games to life.
Focus on Real-Time Multiplayer Games
Our focus on real-time multiplayer games stems from our strengths in networking and tech honed over years of development expertise. Here are some of the learnings from MaskGun, our biggest game to date.
Content cadence matters: We started shipping a whole lot more content and brought the game back to our original vision of what a modern mobile shooter would look like. One of the advantages of just having a little bit of success on the shooter team was that we’ve been able to scale our team. We soft-launched in 2016 with a ten-person team that’s now grown to 150 plus with all that experience in making a shooter game through various trials and errors.
Frame rate matters: We have this maniacal focus on ensuring that you’ll see for us if there aren’t 40fps on every [low-end] device we’re going to fix it.
Gains in retention: Our day 1,000 retention on MaskGun was three percent. What most companies think about as day 30 retention is a three-year retention for us.
Gameplay + social hooks = virality: If we got one Facebook user, we usually ended up with 5 more. That was our organic growth and how we grew to 80 million users worldwide. As per our formulas at the time: if I get you to play with a friend and you enjoy it, you’re going to keep coming back.
Gender split: We had 10 percent of the topmost players in the game as female. The top five countries for us were also non-obvious before the launch. The game did really well in countries like Mexico, Brazil, Indonesia and India though we had launched in these countries only after 3 years.
Building seamless communication tools + drop in/drop out multiplayer: I believe these communication tools allowed us to do two things. It allowed me, for example, to send player messages. But it also uses all of our automation. When you think of an FTUE [first-time user experience] in most games, it will tell you how to play the game for the first 30 minutes. But here we’ve built a communication system where we can do an FTUE in the form of inbox messages throughout the entire player lifecycle. Even if you’re at level 50 and not winning enough we’ll tell you what to do next.
End result: We had seen that 15 percent of our audience was Indian until July 2020. Just before the first PUBG ban, it was 20 to 25 percent. Now it’s around 40 to 45 percent. At that point in time we felt we should be promoting our game in the country.
Now: MaskGun has 80 million players and rolled out 1v1 and 2v2 game modes aside from its existing suite of multiplayer options.
Indus Engine: Enhancing Gaming Experience
The battle royale space is filled to the brim with games that have high device requirements. Be it PUBG/BGMI or COD Mobile, if you don’t have a good enough smartphone you’re left out. With the Indus Engine, we’re able to deliver a consistent and performant experience on low-end hardware. This allows us to tap into a wider audience that’s been left out of India’s flourishing battle royale craze.
Indus runs on a custom-built engine with our own netcode, rendering and low-footprint download size to run on 100$ Android devices. Our game currently runs on devices with at least 2Gb RAM, renders 30fps on lower-end Android devices and is less than 1GB in download size. At the same time, it scales up to deliver high-fidelity graphics and 60-120fps on higher end IOS Devices.
Tailoring Games for the Indian Audience
We’re a firm believer of building with our audiences and they’re at the center of everything we do. For example: our casual hero shooter Battle Stars, we launched it collaborating with India’s biggest Youtuber, Techno Gamerz. However this wasn’t a simple celebrity endorsement. Rather, we worked in tandem with him to bring his likeness into the game as a playable character and he even advised on making the game better.
With Indus, we recently revealed our closed beta trailer where each character was voiced by a major gaming content creator from India. They in turn brought their audiences into the game and allowed us to extend our share of voice.
Most importantly: our playtests. Indus would be nothing without our community playtests. These allow us to build our games for Indian audiences as well as let us test the feasibility of themes like Indo-Futurism. This also results in specific features being catered for i.e. ping systems, free look, evolved traversal options, and gyro — all of these found their way into Indus via community feedback early on.
Indus Playtests by the Numbers
We have seen tremendous interest from Indian gamers for Indian-themed games. In terms of theme: 90% resonated with the theme of Indo-Futurism, particularly the premise and characters, more so after they tried the game at our playtests in Pune, Bengaluru, and Surat.
Most entries for playtest invitations were from Pune followed by Delhi, Gujarat, Bengaluru, Mumbai, Uttar Pradesh, Haryana, Rajasthan, Tamil Nadu, and Kerala.
Over 50 percent of those at the playtest want more game development and behind-the-scenes content.
The average age of players is under 25. 60-40 gender split in terms of interest.
None of this is a one-way street. The community is rewarded for its efforts. From community playtest attendees having their names in the game’s credits to prizes for naming in-game vehicles like our dropship and buggy, we ensure they’re taken care of and treated well every step of the way, all while we maintain transparency on the state of the game’s development.
Venture into Web3 and the Metaverse
Our North Star always is our Player Centric approach. Hence to us, more than just Web3, we looked at Blockchain as an enabler of providing our players with ownership of in-game items. Having had many players, clans and communities engage in player-to-player trade in our previous games helped us understand how Web3 technology like the Blockchain and keeping all your transactions on a ledger would go in the right direction of providing players with ownership of Digital Assets. We did not engage in promoting tokens or NFTs because in our region these are still regulatory gray areas. The good news is that there is now a regulatory framework available in other countries that govern the management and ownership of Digital Assets and Trading. SuperGaming is looking at being compliant with regulatory requirements before we provide a view on how we see these technologies impact the gaming industry in India. What our players can expect as always is a player-centric, player-focussed approach that uses Web3 so that they play-and-earn (if they choose to) but one that is regulatory compliant.
Balancing Creativity and Commercial Success
To us, all of these go hand-in-hand. This is the rare industry where art, commerce, and tech converge and all of these aspects are crucial for our long-term success. While creative ideas like Indo-Futurism help us break through the clutter and innovative aspects of Indus like its unique guns and firing mechanisms help deliver a truly differentiated experience, they work in tandem to create player affinity that allows us to sell them on battle passes and cosmetic items.
Future Plans and Global Aspirations
SuperGaming's immediate focus is on the successful launch of Indus. Their long-term vision involves leading a game development revolution in India, contributing to a vibrant ecosystem where Indian-made games gain global recognition. They aim to create games that not only capture the imagination of players in India but also make a mark on the global stage.
SuperGaming: 推动印度游戏革命
深入了解他们多样的游戏产品、创新的 Indus 引擎，及其向 Web3 和元宇宙领域的战略扩展
欢迎观看《创始人视角》，本节目将带您近距离了解那些重塑 Web3 生态的创新者们。
今日我们聚焦 SuperGaming - 印度游戏革命的中坚力量。我们将一探他们打造如 MaskGun 和 Silly Royale 等热门游戏的历程，并深入他们最具野心的项目 Indus - 一款融合印度元素与未来风格的大逃杀游戏。
准备好被他们在游戏领域的创新思维、对社群的承诺以及创意与技术的完美结合所激励。
节目链接:
SuperGaming 的核心任务与游戏作品
SuperGaming 制作了众多易于与朋友和家人共同享受的手机游戏，包括 Battle Stars、Silly Royale、MaskGun 和 Tower Conquest，以及官方 PAC-MAN 游戏。我们还在开发 Indus - 这是一款融合了印度元素与未来科技风格的大逃杀游戏，也是我们目前最富野心的作品。我们的使命是推动印度的游戏革命。
打造印度游戏革命
SuperGaming 的目标是推动视频游戏在印度的大众化，超越创新者和早期采纳者，真正实现广泛普及。这是 Call of Duty Mobile、Fortnite、Apex Legends 和 Farlight 84 在印度市场尚未实现的成就。基于我们早期的尝试，我们相信，通过专注于通过运营活动、流媒体直播和电子竞技的影响力来实现大规模用户采纳，我们或许找到了前进的路径。
我们团队成员的背景和经验丰富多彩，涵盖从大型机编程到广告制作，甚至 DJing，但我们都有一个共同点：愿意迎难而上，全力以赴。这种坚韧不拔的精神在将我们的游戏从梦想变为现实的过程中发挥了巨大作用。
专注于实时多人游戏
我们对实时多人游戏的专注，源自于我们多年来在网络和技术方面积累的强大实力。以下是我们从目前最成功的游戏 MaskGun 中获得的一些洞见。
内容的更新频率至关重要：我们加大了内容更新的频率，使游戏回归到我们对现代移动射击游戏的初衷。射击游戏团队取得的一点点成功让我们有机会扩大团队规模。我们在 2016 年以十人团队软启动，如今已发展成为拥有超过 150 名成员的团队，他们在射击游戏的制作中积累了丰富的经验和教训。
帧率至关重要：我们极其注重帧率的优化，坚持在每一款 [低端] 设备上实现至少 40fps 的流畅体验。
用户留存的提升：我们的 MaskGun 在第 1,000 天的用户留存率达到了 3%。对大多数公司来说，30 天的留存率对我们而言相当于 3 年。
游戏玩法结合社交元素可以带来病毒式传播：我们发现，每当有一个 Facebook 用户开始玩游戏，通常会吸引另外五名用户。这种有机增长帮助我们在全球范围内吸引了 8000 万用户。根据我们当时的策略：如果我们能让你和朋友一起玩得开心，你们就会持续回归。
性别分布情况：我们游戏中排名最高的玩家中有 10% 是女性。而且我们在发布前并不清楚的前五大用户国家，像墨西哥、巴西、印尼和印度等国家，游戏表现非常出色，尽管我们在这些国家的推出晚了 3 年。
构建无缝的沟通工具和便捷的多人游戏模式：我认为这些沟通工具实现了两个目标。一方面，它们让我们能够向玩家发送信息；另一方面，它们也整合了我们的自动化功能。大多数游戏的首次用户体验 (FTUE) 通常只教你如何在前 30 分钟内玩游戏。而我们通过构建的沟通系统，可以在玩家的整个游戏生命周期中，通过收件箱消息提供 FTUE，即使你已经达到 50 级，我们也会指导你如何取得更多胜利。
最终成效：直到 2020 年 7 月，我们的玩家中有 15% 来自印度。在第一次 PUBG 禁令之前，这一比例上升到了 20% 至 25%。现在则达到了 40% 至 45%。那时，我们意识到应该在印度国内大力推广我们的游戏。
现状：MaskGun 目前拥有 8000 万玩家，并推出了 1 对 1 和 2 对 2 的游戏模式，以丰富其已有的多人游戏选择。
Indus 引擎：提升游戏体验
当前的大逃杀游戏市场上充斥着对设备要求较高的游戏，比如 PUBG/BGMI 或 COD Mobile，如果你的智能手机配置不够高，就无法加入游戏。而我们的 Indus 引擎则能在低端硬件上提供稳定且高效的游戏体验，从而吸引更广泛的受众参与到印度日益流行的大逃杀游戏热潮中来。
Indus 使用我们自主开发的引擎，具备独立的网络代码、渲染技术，并且下载体积小，能够在价格仅为 100 美元的安卓设备上流畅运行。我们的游戏能在至少配备 2GB RAM 的设备上运行，低端安卓设备上实现 30fps 的渲染效果，下载体积不超过 1GB。同时，游戏还能在高端 iOS 设备上提供高保真图形和 60-120fps 的帧率。
为印度观众量身打造游戏
我们深信需要与观众共同打造产品，他们是我们一切工作的中心。例如，在我们的休闲英雄射击游戏 Battle Stars 的发布上，我们与印度最大的 YouTuber Techno Gamerz 合作。这不仅仅是一次简单的明星代言，我们还与他合作，将他的形象作为游戏中的可玩角色，并且根据他的建议来改善游戏。
在 Indus 的开发中，我们最近发布了封闭测试的预告片，每个角色都由印度著名的游戏内容创作者配音。他们将自己的观众群体引入游戏，帮助我们扩大了声音的影响力。
最关键的是：我们的玩家测试。没有社区的参与，Indus 将寸步难行。这些测试不仅让我们为印度观众定制游戏，还让我们测试诸如印度未来主义这样的主题是否可行。这些反馈还促成了游戏中一些特定功能的开发，例如：ping 系统、自由视角、先进的移动选项和陀螺仪功能，这些都是基于社区早期反馈加入到 Indus 中的。
Indus 玩家测试数据
我们发现印度玩家对以印度为主题的游戏兴趣浓厚。在主题上，有 90% 的人对印度未来主义的主题感兴趣，尤其是在普纳、班加罗尔和苏拉特的玩家测试中，人们对游戏的前提和角色产生了更强的共鸣。
参与玩家测试的报名主要来自普纳，其次是德里、古吉拉特邦、班加罗尔、孟买、北方邦、哈里亚纳邦、拉贾斯坦邦、泰米尔纳德邦和喀拉拉邦。
超过 50% 的测试参与者希望看到更多关于游戏开发和幕后制作的内容。
参与玩家的平均年龄不超过 25 岁，对游戏表现出兴趣的男女性别比例为 60-40。
这个过程并非单向的。社区的努力得到了嘉奖。从在游戏字幕中展示社区测试参与者的名字，到为游戏内的交通工具（如投放船和小型越野车）命名的奖励，我们确保在整个过程中，社区成员得到妥善的关照和对待，同时我们也对游戏的开发状态保持透明。
探索 Web3 和元宇宙
我们始终坚持以玩家为中心的理念。因此，我们不仅关注 Web3，更看重区块链作为赋予玩家游戏内物品所有权的工具。在之前的游戏中，许多玩家、部落和社区已经参与了玩家间的交易，这帮助我们了解到 Web3 技术，比如区块链和在账本上记录所有交易，将如何有助于赋予玩家数字资产的所有权。
鉴于我们所处地区对代币或 NFT 还处于监管灰色地带，我们并未投入其推广。但值得欣慰的是，现在其他国家已经建立了管理和拥有数字资产及交易的监管框架。在考虑如何使这些技术符合印度游戏产业影响的监管要求之前，SuperGaming 正在审慎地遵守这些规定。
我们始终致力于为玩家提供以他们为中心的体验，运用 Web3 技术让玩家在游戏中赚取收益（如果他们愿意的话），同时确保这一切符合监管要求。
平衡创意与商业成功
在我们看来，创意和商业成功是相辅相成的。这个行业独特之处在于艺术、商业和技术的完美融合，这些因素对我们的长期成功至关重要。创意思维如印度未来主义让我们在众多竞争者中脱颖而出，而 Indus 的创新之处，比如其独特的枪械和射击机制，提供了独特的游戏体验。这些因素共同促成了玩家的忠诚度，使我们能够通过销售战斗通行证和装饰物品来实现收益。
未来规划和全球抱负
SuperGaming 当前专注于 Indus 的成功推出。他们的长期愿景是引领印度游戏开发的革命，为活跃的生态系统作出贡献，使印度制作的游戏在全球获得认可。他们的目标是创造出不仅能吸引印度玩家的想象力，也能在全球舞台上发光发热的游戏。