Almost everything you need to know to enter mobile game development on 2013 - See more at: http://ww

Advocacy /

This is a list of useful resources to help you refine, define, execute and possibly reconsider your decision to enter mobile game development this year. The resources are a little more inclined to the business and game design parts of game development, except for a couple of ones linking other lists.

The executive summary version: It is a very attractive and fast growing market, but the odds are stacked against small, new and indie game developers. Successful games are usually paid, greatly innovative and highly polished casual titles -specially when working with a good publisher or a known brand- or free to play titles that operate as a service, seeing little revenue for a span of at least six months after launch, adding new content and/or further polishing, balancing and optimizing for retention and monetization. The former approach can be a logical step for studios that already have game development expertise, a team already in place and experience working with publishers. The latter is the approach that might yield the greater rewards, but requires a mid to long term vision, and also a tight and strong combination of resources and execution speed to actually pull it off.

What is mobile game development? We’ll consider it as any game focused development for smartphones or tablets running Android or iOS. What does this market look like? Let’s look at some numbers and insights:

[Source: eMarketer]

Looks promising, but it’s not all good:

So, how to make sense of the opportunity? Is it reasonable? Affordable? Worth pursuing? Let’s start with a list of general projections for gaming on 2013 and summaries for 2012:

This is a list of studies, articles and slides worth studying bit by bit to get a clearer picture:

[Source: Lostgarden]

Next, a collection of thoughts from established players in the industry:

Assuming you have a clearer picture now, and you are eager to learn more, what would be good resources to learn about all this?

Business links

[Source: Business Insider]

Game Development links

How does Rage of Bahamut monetizes? Analysing a Top Grossing Game: Rage of Bahamut and How Rage of Bahamut Monetizes.
Clash of Clans - the Winning Formula
Free 2 Play and the Four Currencies
7 Ways to Fail at Free-to-Play
The Free-To-Play Triangle [Game Economics]
The Principles of Game Monetization
The Design of Free-to-Play Games, Part 2 (Part 1)
5 tips for boosting your virtual economy
Which Types Of Mobile Games Are In The Engagement Sweet Spot?
The Ultimate Indie Game Developer Resource List (includes technical tools and software)
The Big List of Game Making Tools (includes technical tools and software)

[Source: What Games Are]

Going live links

[Source: GamesBrief]

Last but not least, Blogs, People and Websites worth following.

Blogs

Deconstructor of Fun: Monetization in Social Games, written by “the evil monetization guy @ Rovio”.
Extra Creditz: Not exactly a blog, but lots of fun and thought provoking videos about gaming, game design and game development in general.
Dr. Serkan Toto: Japan Mobile And Social Games Consulting.
Andrew Chen’s blog: Great insights about startups in general.
What Games Are: Great for game design and production.
Games Brief: Special focus on monetization.
Dave Sirlin’s blog: Great game design blog.
Gameconfs: a directory of game industry events.
Indiebits: Great tips for Indie Game Developers.
Game Design Concepts and Game Balance Concepts.
Raph Koster’s blog: The author of Theory of Fun.