Zynga buys knockoff-maker DNA Games, signaling market saturation
Zynga’s acquisition of DNA is fascinating, since DNA Games has been ripping off Zynga, which itself was heavily inspired by EA’s Sims line. DNA’s games (Casio City, Bar World, Slot City) are copies of copies; Zynga titles with different nouns. Manage a cafe shop farm acquarium casino…
So why would Zynga buy a company with such similar titles and skills?
They’d do so because in a mere 4 years the social gaming space has reached near saturation: most of the potential players are taken. And with saturation, growth comes from acquisition.
Zynga claims to have 250 million monthly active users on Facebook, roughly half of Facebook’s global user-base. With that level of penetration, each new user becomes harder and harder to find. All the easy acquisitions have already been converted, leaving only the hard-to-get on the table. When this happens, you lose users faster than you game them, stagnate, and slowly decline. This chart from All Facebook nicely sums it up:
This stall is why you buy a copycat.
Zynga’s shopping spree signals that the social gaming industry is maturing. No longer can games get by on novelty and border-line copyright infringement. As the pool of people who’ve never played a social game dwindles, companies will be forced to design better, more innovative and creative games to persuade users to switch titles.
Thank god.
