In any other form of storytelling, this would be a deal-breaker for audiences. Run out of energy? Pay up or come back later. Each time they reach a story beat, the action comes to a hard pause while players arbitrarily tap on parts of the scene to fill up bars until the game is satisfied that you're allowed to continue. By the very nature of the energy limit, players are unable to progress at their own pace. Sounds reasonable so far, but the Devil's Snare also epitomises a stumbling block of the narrative Jam City has tried so hard to craft. I'm hoping we can also measure our game by the same. If a film scene or even a television scene ends at a dramatic moment, and then the next episode or scene resolves that scary scenario, we're okay with it. It seems like if a book's chapter ends at a dramatic moment, sometimes a dangerous moment and then continues after that, we're okay with it. Without a doubt, we leave you at a cliffhanger. "I don't think our game is more violent or more scary than any of the other Potter. I don't think being in a perilous situation is unique to our Harry Potter game when you compare it to the films and the books. Yguado is confident this is narratively justified: "We've tried to create a game and write a story that has stakes, that has dramatic moments that reflect the level of drama and emotion that you see in the films and the books. "We're creating an experience people can enjoy for years - and frankly, we need to buy ourselves time to continue to create great content" That's an odd way to start a game targeting children (while Harry Potter's first fans are all grown up, it remains primarily a children's or family-friendly property). In Eurogamer's example, this means you are essentially forced to wait or pay to stop a child from being strangled. As with all free-to-play titles, there is a limit to how much energy you have available to refill it you either wait for the time to run down, or pay to top up.
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Our sister site Eurogamer ran an article shortly after launch, highlighting a prime example: your character becomes trapped in Devil's Snare early on, and you need to spend energy to complete the scene and free them. As of March 2019, less than a year after launch, Hogwarts Mystery had accrued 45 million downloads globally and exceeded $100 million in revenue - the fastest game to do so in the company's history.īut, as Yguado says, there have been questions about the way it monetises. Jam City's figures certainly seem to back that up. The depth of the content and the quality of the writing has really made for an experience that fans have really, really gotten into." After the game was first released, as people began to really get into the game and spend time with it, the reviews went from mixed to very, very good. "When the game was first released there were a lot of questions about free-to-play and the narrative structure, how that would all come together and whether it would deliver on the expectations of Potter fans," the studio's president Josh Yguado tells. At times, it feels like this could have been a premium title, perhaps in the vein of Telltale's games, but Jam City opted for a free-to-play experience to target the broadest possible audience - and this raised eyebrows in the run-up to launch. But with Jam City's Harry Potter: Hogwarts Mystery, there is another pillar at play: the narrative.įar from the only free-to-play title to take players through an ongoing story, the Harry Potter tie-in is arguably one of the more ambitious, styling itself as a full-blown RPG that stretches across an entire seven-year stint as a Hogwarts student.
The majority of free-to-play games are primarily a marriage of compelling game mechanics and monetisation options that give players the ability to enhance their experience. There is a delicate balance to strike when it comes to monetising mobile users - especially younger players - as too aggressive a tactic will see your retention plummet, and your revenues along with it. Like the goblins of Gringotts, free-to-play developers have to be both clever and calculating when it comes to handling people's money.
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