Fast Company has dropped their Top 50 Most Innovative
Companies, including a Gaming Top Ten list. Who topped the list? Zynga. Why? Because they sell virtual goods and according to Fast Company practically pioneered the practice (it actually dates back to MUDs via Iron Realms Entertainment).
We all know better. Yes Farmville is played by millions and certainly sells a lot of virtual goods, but it was far from the first to do it. Fast Company is essentially awarding them the top spot based on sales from what it looks like. Here’s their write up:
For dominating--and monetizing--the social-gaming industry. The largest social-games developer in the world touts hundreds of millions of monthly active users on FarmVille, Treasure Isle, Zynga Poker, Mafia Wars, and more. But what’s truly innovative is its all virtual-goods revenue model: By creating immersive, addicting games, Zynga has roped gamers into paying real money for make-believe "virtual" goods that let them move up in the games or to give their friends gifts. Although small, those numbers add up: Zynga is already profitable, and it’s valued at more than $7 billion.
So domination and monetization are innovative. Seems like sort of a cop out. But then again, a lot of the list looks like that.
Number two is Apple for creating the iPad. Because apparently, tablets didn’t exist before it and so it’s totally innovative and makes for great gaming. Now I agree that tablets do in fact make for great gaming. But check out the image (left) of Alan Kay’s original idea for a tablet PC...back in 1968. So really, how innovative is the iPad?
Even 11 years ago there were tablets running Windows XP Tablet PC Edition in development to be introduced in 2002.
But the world wasn’t ready then. It wasn’t until the advent of iOS and the iPhone that made consumers in the US extremely comfortable with touch interfaces. That paved the way for the iPad and Apple’s Game Center, which are now revolutionizing mobile gaming because of the combination of great graphics, good interface and ease of development - all of which has spawned thousands of games for the platform in a very short time span. It’s also created a torrent of tablets with various operating systems like Google Android (not in the list) which will all revolutionize gaming.
It seems to me like Fast Company has either an extremely short memory, or is completely out of touch with games in general.
They did nail some easy ones that were obvious choices like the Microsoft Kinect, Valve’s Steam (love it or hate it), Angry Birds creators Rovio and Facebook, where many of you probably play your social games.
However, I don’t know that Facebook really deserves any credit because all they really did is allow you to play games on the site through iframes and other online tricks. They didn’t really develop anything and as for really tying into games all they did is create Facebook credits so that they could tap into the revenue stream by demanding all games on the site use the credits so they can take a cut or the profits.
Others are still sketchy and you might never have heard of them, like Emotiv (thought-controlled gaming), Scvngr (which tries to ’gamify your life’). If you want to read up on the whole list head over to the Fast Company site.
Somehow, NVIDIA didn’t make any of the lists I would have expected them to make with their Tegra 2 chips which will, I think, completely bust open mobile graphics. So like I said, Fast Company seems to have missed the mark in my opinion.
Who do you think should have been included in the Top Ten Most Innovative Gaming Companies list?
