contest

È con grande piacere che annunciamo i vincitori dei mesi di Marzo, Aprile e maggio del primo Advergame Contest di Playyoo in collaborazione con Biscaldi S.r.l, l’importatore in Italia della birra giapponese più conosciuta e più venduta nel paese del sol levante: la birra Asahi.

Il gioco “Sushi and Asahi Please!” è stato sviluppato da Playyoo per Biscaldi.

Puoi ricevere il gioco direttamente sul tuo cellulare inviando “Asahi” al numero 00393399945642. Nota: l’invio dell’SMS e lo scaricamento del gioco sono soggetti alle tariffe del tuo operatore.

È con grande piacere che annunciamo l’inizio del primo Advergame Contest di Playyoo in collaborazione con Biscaldi S.r.l, l’importatore in Italia della birra giapponese più conosciuta e più venduta nel paese del sol levante: la birra Asahi.

Un advergame funziona in gran parte come ogni altro gioco che si trova su Playyoo, possiede una propria classifica e appare nel game stream come qualsiasi altro gioco Playyoo.

La differenza sta nel fatto che le pagina del gioco e quella dell’utente sul sito Web sono customizzate, le sezioni pre e post-roll del gioco contengono messaggi, immagini ed animazioni pubblicitari ed il gioco stesso manda un messaggio pubblicitario.

Leggi il Comunicato Stampa.

Il gioco “Sushi and Asahi Please!” è stato sviluppato da Playyoo per Biscaldi.

Questo Advergame mostra una delle vie percorse da Playyoo nell’intento di creare un mercato per gli sviluppatori Flash Lite che permetta loro di trarre guadagno dalle loro conoscenze. Siamo molto contenti del fatto che i nostri sforzi nel construire un ecosistema in cui sviluppatori Flash Lite, acquirenti di contenuto Flash Lite e ovviamente lo stesso Playyoo stanno portando a dei risultati concreti.

Se sei un utente Playyoo, trovi “Sushi and Asahi Please!” nel tuo game stream. Puoi anche provarlo ora direttamente usando il nostro web Flash Lite emulator.

Infine, puoi ricevere il gioco direttamente sul tuo cellulare inviando “Asahi” al numero 00393399945642. Nota: l’invio dell’SMS e lo scaricamento del gioco sono soggetti alle tariffe del tuo operatore.

We’re very pleased today to announce the launch the first advergame contest on Playyoo, in partnership with and on behalf of Biscaldi S.r.l, the Italian importer for the leading Japanese beer brand, Asahi.

An advergame functions pretty much like any other game on Playyoo, it has dedicated leaderboards, and appears in the game stream in the same way as any other game in Playyoo.

The difference is that the game and member pages on the web site are custom-branded, the game’s pre & post-roll sections carry brand-specific messages, and the game itself features some branding.

Read the Press Release (Italian).

The game, “Sushi and Asahi Please!” was developed on behalf of Biscaldi by Playyoo.

This illustrates one of the ways in which Playyoo helps to create a market for Flash Lite developers to monetize their skills. We’re very pleased that our efforts to build an ecosystem in which Flash Lite developers, Flash Lite media buyers, and of course Playyoo itself, all benefit, is beginning to come to fruition.

If you’re a Playyoo member, you should find “Sushi and Asahi Please!” in your game stream. You can also check it out now in the web Flash Lite emulator.

Finally, you can get the game delivered to your phone by texting “Asahi” to the number 00393399945642. Please note that standard operator tariffs on SMS and data apply.

One of the more challenging games submitted to the Playyoo launch contest was Think Fast by Izam. It’s an educational game that challenges players to solve math questions, quicker answers are rewarded with more points. Our initial reaction was "What a great idea!".

Now, according to ReadWriteWeb, a book has been released by MIT professor and director of MIT’s Scheller Teacher Education Program Eric Klopfer which makes the case that mobile games can augment other education tools.

Afzainizam Zahari currently lives and works in Singapore as a teacher, his game Think Fast came in 8th place.

The Game

About Izam

Izam has a strong desire to boldly go where no man has gone before (except maybe the depths of a volcano). He is a dreamer/artist/inspirer/performer/animator/game creator/mac user and an overall charming person. Before he became the fountain of knowledge to adolescents, he was busy creating animations for television programmes, web development and mobile games for PDA. All of which were done using Flash. More information about the man and his strange escapades can be gleaned from his blog

The Interview

WordRap

Tell us a little about yourself.
I am Afzainizam Zahari and I am from Singapore. I am currently teaching Science, Biology and Multimedia to secondary school students. I majored in Biology and did a minor in Multimedia in National University of Singapore. I have been involved in multimedia development since 1999 when I was first introduced to Macromedia Director. I learnt about Flash and immediately I fell in love with it.

How did you become a Flash Lite developer?
Back in 2000 I knew Flash was the way to go for rapid multimedia development for offline content as well as for the web. Flash 5 was released in 2001 and I never looked back. In 2002 I started to create mobile applications and games for the pocket pc platform. I enjoyed the experience tremendously.In 2004 when Flash Lite was introduced I got really interested in the possibility of having flash games on the Nokia series 60 platform. I decided to create a simple boxing game for the Nokia 3650. I was forced to re-learn Flash 4.0 Actionscript syntax. Flash 4.0 has quite a number of limitations but then Flash Lite 2 was released a year later. It was quite a relief because I can make use of Actionscript 1.0 and up. However the phones back then in 2005 was mostly able to support up to Flash Lite 1.1. So it was still quite a challenge for me.

You are interested in casual games, tell us why?
I am a strong supporter of casual games. Personally I find that I have very little time to sit down to play a full game on the video game console. Casual games that make me smile and tickle my brain cells work for me. I find it a rewarding challenge to be able to figure out the likes and dislikes of casual players and create a game that will interest them. These are the people that have very limited time to play, but once you catch their attention, you’ve got a winner.

Tell us how you came up with idea for this game.
The idea of Think Fast came from a personal situation in a chocolatier. My friend and I were calculating the prices of the various chocolates on the shelves. I challenged her to find out who is faster at calculating mentally. I lost.She’s a Mathematics teacher by the way. So..Anyway, that immediately gave me the inspiration to create such a game with cute and colorful characters trying to get chocolates from the Lollipop tree. It was a joy to create the game right down from drawing to scripting.

What other games do you like on Playyoo?
Playyoo attracted an amazing number of polished and well developed games. I was blown away by some of them. I really like Bog Frog. It was the kind of game I find it hard to put down until I solved the puzzle for each level. I also like Sketch Mini. It has that really cool animation which simply made me smile. It is a joy to play.

What are you currently working on?
I am currently working on a game called Journey Man. This game was conceptualized when I was 10 years old with 2 of my childhood friends. We never got around to creating the game because we went our separate ways ever since we went on to secondary school. I guess its about time I close that chapter of my childhood by creating the game that we have always wanted to create back then.

What do you think Playyoo can offer to you as a developer?
As a developer I really hope that Playyoo can be a platform for me to showcase the games I create to a large audience easily. And from there, maybe obtain a certain amount of revenue from players who really appreciate the games that I created.

Do have an advice for other game creators how to win a contest like this one?
You have to create an original game that captures people’s attention (in a good way). A great idea for a simple game, with simple user interface that people can simply jump in and play straight away. People don’t really like to be bogged down with too many instructions or having to learn so much just to play a simple game. Keep it really simple. User experience is very important.