Netflix has made it clear that it no longer wants to be a platform for series and movies exclusively. The streaming giant which is also working on a “cheap” plan with adshas decided to enter strongly into the industry of mobile video games.
Although only a negligible portion of your subscribers are playing, the company is confident in its strategy and continues to be strongly committed to it. The last move? Announce your own video game studio “world class” in Helsinki, Finland.
In the midst of the storm, Netflix bets on video games
Netflix’s foray into this new world began last year with the purchase of three studios with some experience who were in charge of feeding the initial catalog of the platform. We are talking about Next Games, Oxenfree Night School and Boss Fight Entertainment.
Now, however, the company wants to create its own video game development studio from scratch. It will not be located in the United States, but in the capital of Finland, Helsinki. In that place, according to Netflix, are some of the best talent in the industry.
Precisely, the company has signed Marko Lastikka as director of his new studio. It is a talent with years of experience in the sector that until September of this year was part of Zynga and previously worked at Electronics Arts and Digital Chocolate.
With these four studios in its orbit, Netflix plans to fulfill its promise to have a catalog of 50 titles (now more than 20) by the end of this year, a catalog that is presented as a free alternative to its subscribers, without ads or in-app purchases.
The company’s strategy, as mentioned above, is clear: it wants to diversify its content strategy. However, this maneuver still seems to be far from bearing its first fruits. According to data from Apptopia, less than 1% of Netflix’s 220 million subscribers are gaming.
To attract the public, and as expected on a streaming platform, Netflix has decided to launch games related to its most successful series, such as ‘Stranger Things: 1984‘, ‘Stranger Things 3: The Game‘ Y ‘The Money Heist‘. It also has planned the release of ‘queen’s gambit‘, among others.
The series and movies are still important for users.
Clearly, at the moment, games are a plus to the subscription paid by users. The reason why they choose the platform it is for its contents, not for its games. And here the company has also been focused. The key? Better and bigger budget productions.
The truth is that, despite its efforts, the company is not going through its best moment. In the first quarter of this year lost users for the first time in a decade, situation that was repeated in the second trimester. After the earthquake, the changes deepened.
In a market where competition is increasingly fierce and Netflix is no longer the king of streaming, Reed Hastings has opened the door to something unthinkable months ago: a cheap subscription with ads, possibility that will become a reality thanks to a partnership with Microsoft.
In Xataka | Netflix partners with Microsoft to develop its new cheap subscription with ads
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Netflix gets serious about video games and announces its own studio: its subscribers continue to ignore them