Gree's OpenFeint hires ex-Glu Mobile exec, more social games coming?

The mobile social game wars are heating up, as OpenFeint just took on former Glu Mobile executive Sarah Thompson (pictured) as its director of developer relations, SocialTimes reports. In other words, OpenFeint, owned by Japanese mobile social gaming powerhouse Gree, hired Thomson to strategically acquire build relationships with independent developers.

Namely, SocialTimes's Azam Khan guesses those developers will be primarily social and mobile social game creators, given Thomson's past exploits in the industry with Glu Mobile and IUGO Entertainment before that. And frankly, we couldn't agree more. Considering OpenFeint is a social network for mobile games at heart, and Gree's existing status, it simply makes sense.

"OpenFeint is going through an exciting phase of growth right now and Sarah is exactly the kind of person we need to keep up the momentum," OpenFeint SVP Marketing and Developer Relations Eros Resmini said in a release. "Sarah's deep history in mobile gaming paired with her connections to the developer community made her a great fit for OpenFeint."

We can't help but recall what just went down between OpenFeint and Gree: The former's co-founder and CEO Jason Citron resigned, and Gree CFO Naoki Aoyagi took his place. (Though, VentureBeat reckons the move was less ... cut-and-dry.) But back to Gree and OpenFeint's future plans, the simple fact is mobile social games are growing at an exponential rate on iOS and Android devices.

"I've always admired OpenFeint for its constant innovation in the mobile gaming space," Thomson said in a release. "As the company continues to change with the market, I'm excited to help OpenFeint continue growing." And we think we have an idea of just where Thomson would like to go. It starts with an "S" and--oh, forget it. You get the point already.

Resident Evil producer to board social game bandwagon in Japan

"Next stop, money!" said the questionable man in a gold-threaded suit as he yanked the social games bandwagon away from Street Fighter-creator Capcom's offices in Osaka, Japan. Keiji Inafune, one of the many ingenious minds behind iconic franchises like Resident Evil and Mega Man, revealed to Bloomberg that he has a social game set to release in Japan this summer.

Inafune joins Tecmo Koei, Square Enix and Sega as Japanese game developers that decided to board the social games train in hopes of making some serious cash. Not to mention executives from companies like Tecmo Koei getting up and running to money makers such as Zynga for the same reason.

The dejected developer claims that the shortsightedness of traditional publishers and developers (ahem, Capcom?) to not include developers in big decisions will cause them to fall behind social game giants like Zynga, Bloomberg reports. If you hadn't guessed already, Inafune left Capcom in Oct. 2010 due to managerial disputes, and has since founded two game companies: Comcept and Intercept.

One of which, we imagine, is working on this social game. And if we had to guess, it will release either on Gree or DeNA's MobageTown mobile network. And according to Bloomberg, the developer could release the game as early as this, so consider us here in the states "jelly," Japan.

[Via/Image Credit: Siliconera]

How do you think Inafune will fare on his own not only with his two companies, but in social games? Do you this trend of traditional developers fleeing to Facebook continuing much longer?

OpenFeint looks more like Facebook with GameFeed update on iOS

There are some things that Facebook just does right, and it shows in every social network since. The 115 million player-strong mobile social gaming network, OpenFeint, got the hint, too. The company of the same name just released the GameFeed to its iOS SDK (software development kit), TechCrunch reports.

This will allow mobile game creators to include OpenFeint's GameFeed into their iOS games along with all the other social game-like features OpenFeint offers.The GameFeed will appear as a news ticker of sorts in the OpenFeint hub of games that support it, providing players with updates on their friends profiles and progress in other games like achievements.

While the GameFeed has been available to Android game creators since around June, this sure does sound a lot like the Games Ticker on Facebook. (At least it does on paper, anyway.) According to TechCrunch, OpenFeint claims that during beta tests with 24 people, GameFeed increased sessions-per-user by 25 percent, and that some developers are experiencing a 60 percent in sessions-per-user.

OpenFeint GameFeed
This seems to imply that the existence of the GameFeed increases players' tendency to return to their games multiple times. Surely, this technology will come in handy for Japanese mobile game publisher Gree's upcoming global mobile social games network, powered by OpenFeint.

Have you ever played an iPhone game using OpenFeint? What do you think of the live news feed approach to (mobile) social gaming these days? Sound off in the comments. Add Comment