A Night with PlayRaven and Aalto Game Executive Programme

Lasse Seppänen, CEO of PlayRaven, started the night by explaining to us why strategy matters. Going into game design is a serious business. Saying we "just want to make games" is like saying "I just want to drive a car": it's vague and directionless.  Lasse's piece of advice is to work out the details and have people who can actually handle managing all these decisions:  It's not enough to just make games without this foresight.
 
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The Game Executive programme at Aalto University: an intensive three-part "bootcamp" for game developers that combines insight on such topics like Financial Planning, Free-to-play, Asian markets, Branding, and Pitching.  During the evening, Saila Laitinen, Co-founder of Sfonge Ltd gave us a breakdown on the facts about China as a mobile market:  China has had the largest number of active smartphones in any country since 2013.  China's mobile game market is expected to maintain growth over the next three years, while the global game market growth drops slightly.  But what Laitinen warns us about is that the Chinese market is much different.  Here, there are four times more Android devices than iOS users, and double the revenue.   The channels for distributing Android games is fragmented between many different providers, including China Telecom's own channel, Play.cn, and almost a third of iOS players derive games from third party platforms instead of the official AppStore.  Because of expensive mobile data tariffs and bandwidth limits, and the popularity of low to middle end devices, games developed for the Chinese market need to take this limitations into account to deliver the smoothest game experience possible.

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To conclude the talks for the night, Anca Agapi, program manager for Aalto University Executive Education gave a run through of the full programme and prices of the education program, open to all game developers, which is starting on October 29th 2014.  Afterwards, the participants enjoyed mingling and sponsored drinks courtesy of PlayRaven.

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IGDA Finland Presentations & October Gathering with PlayRaven

That time of the month again! Be prepared for another night of good times with fellow developers. This time we not only have a fun gathering for you, but also intriguing presentations right before: Introducing The Game Executive program by Aalto University Executive Education! Presentations: Lasse Seppänen CEO, PlayRaven “Why strategy matters in a gaming company”

Saila Laitinen Co-founder, Sfonge Ltd. “How to break into China Market”

Anca Agapi Program Manager Aalto University Executive Education “About Game Executive program”

IGDA Finland Presentations Time: 07.10.2014 at 18:00-19:00 Place: Club Adams, Erottaja 15-17, Helsinki


Recently, the world's first and only WW2 spy manager game totally surprised PlayRaven by rocketing up the charts and became a Top-10 strategy title in 99 countries! So this month, you're warmly welcome to celebrate the global launch of Spymaster with the devs.

IGDA Finland October Gathering Time: 07.10.2014 at 19:00 Place: Club Adams, Erottaja 15-17, Helsinki Finland

As usual, the cloakroom service is offered free of charge on behalf of Club Adams. The event is restricted to adults only.

IGDA Finland March Gathering with Lexia and PlayRaven

One month gone by and we had again a cool and exciting night at Club Adams. The March Gathering of IGDA Finland was a success, a big thank you to our sponsors Lexia and PlayRaven! This time we had not one or two, but three amazing speakers from game industry: Applift, DeNA and Level3.

Applift is a mobile games marketing platform developer, and their presentation was about monetization through native ad-units.

DeNA is a mobile services developer and operator and they talked about mobile game design for Asian users. They compared the differences between China, Japan and Korea, i.e. what kind of games people are playing.

Level3 is one of the world's' six Tier 1 operators, and they talked about showcasing early doors co-operation of studios and Internet providers for online gaming business.

After the super interesting presentations the sponsors had their time on stage as well. Lexia Attorneys presented the company's high professional insight of legal sides of financing, with a smart attitude.

The CEO Lasse Seppänen from PlayRaven asked "Do you want to talk about art?" and the audience answered with cheering yes. Seppänen presented the company's design philosophy and a world premiere sneak peek to the art of their soon-to-be-published game Spymaster. Seppänen also had the current version of the game with him and the most eager ones were able to test it out. And there was a queue.

What a great night! Big thank you to everyone, and see you next month! Stay tuned!

IGDA Finland March Gathering with Lexia and PlayRaven

It’s almost time for the March Gathering! This month we’ll have three awesome speakers for you in IGDA Finland Presentations. These guests of honor represent the mobile games marketing platform developer Applift, mobile services developer and operator DeNA and one of the world’s six Tier 1 Internet operators, Level3. More details about each of their topics will be announced later this week on Facebook and in the reminder email. The presentations start at 17:00.

As always, we also have sponsors who make sure everyone can enjoy the gathering to the fullest! This month our fun time is boosted by one of our rising startup stars, PlayRaven, and the legal superheroes at Lexia. They’ll have some words to share with us around 20:00 so keep your eyes fixed on the stage at that point.

PlayRaven is a Helsinki-based mobile game studio on a mission to serve uncontested gaming audiences in app stores worldwide. PlayRaven has just completed a $2.3 million seed investment round and is backed by Creandum as well as early-stage Supercell investors Jari Ovaskainen and London Venture Partners.

Lexia has advised several Finnish games developers on significant investment rounds, including the $2.3 million seed funding round of PlayRaven. Lexia offers its clients a business minded approach and attitude that brings competitive edge.

For Lexia legal is not just about avoiding problems – it is also adding value by ensuring business goals are met efficiently.

About Lexia:

Lexia Attorneys is a Finnish law firm offering high-quality expertise in all areas of domestic and international business law. Lexia is internationally recognized as one of the leading Finnish law firms in the field of Technology & Media, Intellectual Property, and Finance. Lexia’s international networks enable effective and reliable execution of assignments worldwide.

Lexia also provides the Lexia Growth Program (LGP) for supporting new potential growth companies. LGP includes different elements that are coordinated by Lexia and provided by us or by our exclusive partner network for fixed and project based fees.

IGDA Finland Presentations Time: 11.03.2014 at 17:00-19:00 Place: Club Adams, Erottaja 15-17, Helsinki Finland

IGDA Finland March Gathering Time: 11.03.2014 at 19:00 Place: Club Adams, Erottaja 15-17, Helsinki Finland

 The lovely people of Club Adams offer the cloakroom service free of charge!