An Irvine company has launched a second Web site with simple, diversionary games as part of its bid to grab a slice of what’s seen as a growing market.
Future Ads LLC’s PlaySushi.com is geared toward young guys looking to take a break from e-mail or otherwise pass the time while on the computer.
PlaySushi.com offers free, simple video games, including an early, arcade version of “Donkey Kong” and “3 Foot Ninja,” where players become a tiny ninja battling enemy fighters.
The site is the second from Future Ads. Its first, Gamevance.com, gets about 12 million visitors a month, many of them younger women and soccer moms.
“More people are going online and using casual gaming as entertainment,” said Jared Pobre, cofounder and chief executive of Future Ads.
The company’s sites are part of what’s known as the online casual games market, where advertisers pay to get their messages before players drawn by free games.
The market is expected to grow from an estimated $280 million in 2008 to about $1 billion in 2011, according to San Diego-based DFC Intelligence, a video game market research company.
Future Ads’ rivals include some of the biggest names in technology, including Microsoft Corp., RealNetworks Inc. and Electronic Arts Inc., which has amassed more than a million subscribers to Pogo.com, its online casual game service.
Online casual games are a counterpart to Internet games geared toward hardcore players. Those include “World of Warcraft” by Irvine’s Blizzard Entertainment Inc., part of Vivendi SA’s Activision Blizzard Inc.
“World of Warcraft” has about 12 million subscribers worldwide who each pay about $15 a month to play.
The market for casual games is growing during the downturn, according to Pobre.
“Casual gaming is kind of countercyclical,” he said. “More people are going online and using casual gaming as entertainment.”
As more people play, casual games have helped create a captive audience for advertisers.
Display advertising for online games was up about 30% last year as advertisers pulled back on traditional media to target the Internet, according to Pobre.
“There has definitely been a trend toward budgets going from traditional (advertising) to interactive,” he said.
Future Ads employs about 40 people in Irvine. Pobre declined to say what Future Ads’ yearly revenue is.
Advertisers include Sony Corp.’s Sony Pictures Digital Inc., Lowe’s Cos., Experian Group Ltd., Electronic Arts and Konami Corp.
Future Ads started early this decade as an interactive advertising agency building Web sites for companies and buying and selling digital ads.
The switch to casual games came in 2005 after Pobre went to the Electronic Entertainment Expo in Los Angeles, the game industry’s biggest trade show.
“I was standing on a three-story booth from Xbox that cost several million dollars to build amongst other million dollar booths,” he said. “I decided this is a business I want to be in.”
Initial Foray
Future Ads’ first venture into casual gaming came in 2005 and evolved into Gamevance.com, which has been a draw for women.
“These are women who go online and read blogs, and when they are done they play these casual games for 15 to 20 minutes at sporadic times throughout the day,” Pobre said.
Soccer moms are prized by advertisers, he said.
“They are very responsive to the offers that are presented to them,” Pobre said.
Future Ads at first came up with all of its casual games itself with one game developer producing about a game a week.
“It’s much easier to produce a casual game than a hardcore game like ‘World of Warcraft,'” Pobre said.
Future Ads now works with Germany’s Bigpoint GMBH, a developer of casual games.
Game developers get a cut of advertising revenue from Future Ads’ sites.
History
Early on, Pobre worked for Irvine’s Local.com Corp., which hosts two Web sites that help users search for local businesses. He was a director of business development before leaving for some Internet startups.
In 2001, the startup he was with failed to raise a second round of funding and shut down.
“I had two options: get a job or start a new company, so I did a little of both,” Pobre said.
Pobre went to go work with Irvine-based Autobytel Inc., an automotive Internet marketing company, as a senior media buyer. He started Future Ads on the side with a $500 investment.
“I worked for Autobytel and quit after 90 days to focus on my business,” Pobre said.
Future Ads could be a possible acquisition target for larger companies looking to get into casual games.
“We have been contacted,” Pobre said. “If something happens down the line, we’ll entertain conversations. But our goal is to continue to grow.”
