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Next Games

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Next Games is mobile games developer and publisher based in Finland, specialising in games based on entertainment franchises, such as movies, TV series or books. Next Games was founded in Helsinki in 2013, and is best known for developing ‘The Walking Dead: No Man’s Land’, a mobile game downloaded over 16 million times.[1], and based on the popular AMC TV series.

Next Games develops free-to-play mobile games that are created in close cooperation with the IP owners, ensuring cohesion between the game and the underlying IP. The developer’s games are distributed through the Apple App Store and the Google Play platforms, and offer in-app purchases.

In March 2017, Next Games floated on the NASDAQ First North, becoming Finland's first publicly-traded game developer. The studio's IPO was significantly oversubscribed, giving the studio gross proceeds of €32.8 million and a market cap of €143.5 million.[2]

History[edit]

Next Games was founded in May 2013 by co-founders Joakim Achrén (Product Manager) Kalle Hiitola (Chief Technology Officer), Jaakko Jumisko (Lead Game Programmer) and Mikael Achrén (Creative Director), who between them share extensive experience in mobile gaming. Soon after, Teemu Huuhtanen (Chief Executive Officer), who has extensive experience in the entertainment and gaming sector, joined the four founders to take lead over building the company’s strategy. The management team have on average 16 years’ experience each at leading companies such as Disney, Nokia and Rovio. The management team of Next Games [3] consists of CEO Teemu Huuhtanen, CFO Annina Salvén, CMO Saara Bergström, CTO Kalle Hiitola and Head of Games Sami Nurmio.

In 2014 Next games acquired Helsinki GameWorks [4] and in February 2017 acquired Lume Games Oy, [5] providing it with access to game technologies based on location data.

Investment[edit]

Next Games secured its initial seed financing in 2013 [6] from investment entities controlled by angel investors Jari Ovaskainen and Moaffak Ahmed. In February 2014, Next Games completed its €6.3 million Series A financing, led by Jari Ovaskainen, with U.S. venture capital funds IDG Ventures and Lowercase, Chinese venture capital fund IDG Capital Partners, and U.S. media and entertainment companies AMC Networks and LionsGate Entertainment Inc., all investing.

During the last quarter of 2015, Next Games completed its €9.1 million Series B funding round, [7] with existing investors all participating.

Next Games went public [2] successfully in Finland on the NASDAQ First North marketplace as the first Finnish games company on March 2017.

Games[edit]

The Walking Dead: No Man’s Land[edit]

The Walking Dead: No Man’s Land has been developed in collaboration with AMC, [8] the owner of The Walking Dead TV series franchise, following a 2014 license agreement between Next Games and AMC, which gives the gaming studio exclusive rights to develop mobile games based on the original ‘The Walking Dead’ TV series.

The game reached #1 position in the U.S. Apple App Store free downloads ranking [9] after it was launched in October 2015 and reached the top 50 grossing list in the U.S. in App Store ranking for iPhone games in November 2015, and again in the U.S. in December 2016. The game has been downloaded over 16 million times globally.

The game is closely tied to the ongoing television series, with missions relating directly to the most recent events on the show. The television series is now on its eighth production season and has managed to maintain its position as one of the most popular cable television series in the United States [10].

The Walking Dead: No Man’s Land Gameplay - "Stay Human. Survive"[edit]

The Walking Dead: No Man’s Land is a role-playing, tactical turn-based strategy game. Users are able to play as Rick, Daryl, Michonne and other iconic characters from AMC’s The Walking Dead. The game’s features include fighting through hordes of “walkers”, collecting and upgrading characters from the television series, selecting the right team and equipment for each battle mission, and joining other players in weekly challenges and player-versus-player combat. Additionally, players have to solve strategic puzzles while building a group and developing a safe refuge [11]

The game includes multiple streams of playable content including player-versus-player, weekly challenges, quick missions, episodic content and missions based on the TV series. The Walking Dead: No Man’s Land features over 70 in-game achievements [12], with new content continually being delivered via updates.

Types of Walker[edit]

Walkers are the main enemy/enemies in the game, and are present in most episodic missions. Walkers are attracted by the noise made by the survivors and the survivors' proximity to them.

  • Camp walkers - Harmless walkers that gather outside camp walls. Camp walkers can be shot as part of farming duty to gain XP or supplies.
  • Outpost walkers - Can be used to protect outposts from other players when raiding.
  • Normal walkers - Don't have any special abilities but are dangerous in large numbers.
  • Armored walkers - Protected by bulletproof armor, making ranged survivors less effective.
  • Burning walkers - Similar to normal walkers, but they are on fire. They lose 10% of max health every turn due to the fire.
  • Exploder walkers - Carries grenades and damages everyone within the explosion radius.
  • Tank walkers - With huge health, their attack stun survivors for 1 turn and are immune to being stunned.
  • Spiked walkers - A massive warrior that is pierced with rusted metal spikes. They are bullet proof, stun-resistant and the the most difficult opponent.

Episodes[edit]

The Walking Dead: No Man’s Land has 14 playable episodes [13], each containing 5-7 missions that must be completed in order to progress to the next level. To complete the mission, players have to control a group of survivors with the only objective being to keep them alive. Players are presented with weekly challenges, story missions, outposts and a PVP mode.

Story Missions[edit]

Each title below is referred to as an Episode within the game [13]. Each Episode is replayable upon completing all missions, and each play increases in difficulty. Once this feature becomes available, a symbol will appear next to the title and all missions within that episode become re-playable.

Missions[edit]

  • Road to Terminus
  • Military Rations
  • Prison Voices
  • Shadow of Eden
  • American Pastoral
  • Lakeside
  • Proving Grounds
  • Rendezvous with Eden
  • The Pursuit
  • Escape Distractions
  • The Descent
  • Black Forest
  • The Factory
  • The Church

Weekly Challenges[edit]

Weekly Challenges start every Wednesday, and last for 5 days with two days off between new challenges. The player must collect Stars to earn rewards and take a place on the hall of fame leaderboards. [11]

Outposts and player-versus-player content[edit]

Outpost are bases created by players which are raided for goods and brings the player-versus-player (PVP) element to No Man’s Land. Players can use walkers to defend outposts and can be trained to high levels, in order to keep outposts safe.

Guilds[edit]

Guilds are the collaborative and social feature in The Walking Dead: No Man’s Land game. Players can apply for a place in any selected guild and, if accepted, will contribute stars to that specific guild. Users can leave the guild at any time.

Guilds can hold a maximum of 20 players and each one is searchable with a non-unique name and a guild description. XP is required to start a new guild and players can visit the official guild forum available on the app, to either search for a guild or recruit members.

Playable Characters[12][edit]

Each playable (fictional) character, name of the actor and class on The Walking Dead: No Man's Land:

  • Rick Grimes (Andrew Lincoln) - Shooter
  • Daryl Dixon (Norman Reedus) - Hunter
  • Glenn Rhee (Steven Yeun) - Scout
  • Maggie Rhee (Lauren Cohan) - Hunter
  • Carl Grimes (Chandler Riggs) - Shooter
  • Michonne (Danai Gurira) - Warrior
  • Carol Peletier (Melissa McBride) - Scout
  • Merle Dixon (Michael Rooker) - Shooter
  • Philip Blake aka The Governor (David Morrissey) - Assault
  • Abraham Ford (Michael Cudlitz) - Assault
  • Morgan Jones (Lennie James) - Bruiser
  • Sasha Williams (Sonequa Martin Green) - Hunter
  • Tara Chambler (Alanna Masterson) - Shooter
  • Rosita Espinosa (Christian Serratos) - Assault
  • Eugene Porter (Josh McDermitt) - Bruiser
  • Negan (Jeffery Dean Morgan) - Bruiser
  • Gabriel Stokes (Seth Gilliam) - Scout
  • Paul "Jesus" Rovia (Tom Payne) - Warrior
  • Dwight (Austin Amelio) - Hunter
  • Ezekiel (Khary Payton) - Warrior
  • Rufus (Created by Chris Hardwick) - Assault

Game Updates[edit]

Since the launch of the game, the most significant developments and upgrades have included the introduction of the player versus player (PVP) features in March 2016, the introduction of the main characters from the TV show into the game in July 2016, and subsequently additional characters at regular intervals. Since October 2016, the possibility to play missions directly related to the TV show and new character introductions have been timed so that they closely track the developments and cycle of the show. For example, when the program airs on Sunday, Next Games unlocks new features, including characters and weapons, on the following Monday. This also allows Next Games to continue events in the game that have just occurred in the show.

Reviews[edit]

Mashable’s Chelsea Stark was impressed with the game, as players could dive in and play missions for a long time. She concluded with “Each aspect of survival on AMC's The Walking Dead has been parallel to the series' official mobile game”[14]

Gamezebo’s Tom Christiansen gave the game an initial 3.5 stars upon launch and summarised it as “Imagine your favorite mobile base-building strategy game, mix in a dash of XCOM, and then paint on a fresh coat of AMC’s The Walking Dead. That’s No Man’s Land in a nutshell.”[15]

Pocket Gamer’s Alysia Judge praised the game and complimented the graphics, describing them “swish”. She would recommend it to any Walking Dead fan as a “must-play”. Alysia also encouraged those who weren’t familiar to the franchise to play the game, as it’s “a solid introduction to the series and a good strategy game in its own right”.[16]

Compass Point: West[edit]

In March 2015, Next Games launched Compass Point: West, [17] initially on iOS with an Android launch in March 2016. Rather than being based on a third-party IP, the game is a proprietary Wild West-themed strategy game where players battle outlaws and other players, collect cards that allow players to build a band of heroes, join posses with friends and engage in joint battle, and build and protect towns. The game achieved approximately 3 million downloads globally [18] as of 31 December 2016.

Blade Runner 2049 and games in development[edit]

In June 2017, Next Games announced it was partnering with Alcon Entertainment to create a mobile game for Blade Runner 2049, [19] the upcoming sci-fi thriller directed by Denis Villeneuve and executive produced by Ridley Scott.

Starting in 2018, Next Games aims to launch one game or more every 12 months. In July 2017 Next Games published its half-year 2017 report [20] which disclosed that one of the three new games in the development pipeline is an innovative mobile game that utilises location-based and augmented reality (AR) technology.

Acknowledgements[edit]

In August 2014, Next Games was listed as one of the top-20 most promising startup companies by WIRED Magazine [21] and in February 2016 Talouselämä magazine listed it as one of the top 20 most promising startups, [22] and in February 2017 as one of the top ten hottest Finnish companies [23]. Next Games was named as the number one growth company of 2017 in Finland [24] by leading business publication Kauppalehti.

The Walking Dead: No Man's Land has won the prestigious LIMA International Licensing Award for Best Licensed Product in Digital Apps/Software/Video category [25]. LIMA (the International Licensing Industry Merchandisers' Association) is the leading trade organization for the global licensing industry.

The Walking Dead: No Man's Land won a People's Voice Webby Award in April 2017.[26]

References[edit]

  1. Editorial, Reuters. "Finnish mobile game start-up Next Games plans listing".
  2. 2.0 2.1 "NXTGMS, Next Games Oyj, (FI4000233267) - Nasdaq". www.nasdaqomxnordic.com.
  3. "Next Games looks to €30 million IPO".
  4. "Next Games acquires mobile game studio Helsinki GameWorks". 30 October 2014.
  5. "Walking Dead dev Next Games acquires Lume Games".
  6. "Walking Dead Game Dev, Next Games, Lands $6M Series A From IDG & Early Supercell Investor Jari Ovaskainen – TechCrunch". techcrunch.com.
  7. "Next Games secures $10m in new funding".
  8. Spangler, Todd (24 October 2016). "'Walking Dead: No Man's Land' Mobile Game Syncs Up With AMC Hit Show".
  9. "Login - App Annie". www.appannie.com.
  10. "Data reveals the 20 most popular TV shows of 2016".
  11. 11.0 11.1 "The Walking Dead: No Man's Land guide - Tips and tricks for upgrading your equipment - 148Apps". www.148apps.com.
  12. 12.0 12.1 "Achievements".
  13. 13.0 13.1 "The Walking Dead: No Mans Land available now on iOS and Google Play". www.thewalkingdeadnomansland.com.
  14. Stark, Chelsea. "'The Walking Dead' on iOS: You'll need a plan to survive the zombie apocalypse".
  15. "The Walking Dead: No Man's Land Review: Familiar Territory - Gamezebo". 14 October 2015.
  16. "The Walking Dead: No Man's Land Review".
  17. "Next Games reveals Compass Point: West, first in four-part mobile-game series". 18 November 2014.
  18. "Login - App Annie". www.appannie.com.
  19. "Finnish Zombie Specialist Wins Deal to Build 'Blade Runner' Game". 14 June 2017 – via www.bloomberg.com.
  20. "Next Games pushes into AR and location-based games with Lume Games acquisition".
  21. "WIRED UK - Future Science, Culture & Technology News and Reviews". www.wired.co.uk.
  22. Lappalainen, Elina. "Valoa myrskyssä: Tässä ovat Suomen 20 lupaavinta uutta yritystä". Talouselämä.
  23. Mäntylä, Juha-Matti. "Next Games kolminkertaisti liikevaihtonsa, kaksi uutta peliä tulossa". Talouselämä.
  24. https://www.kauppalehti.fi/uutiset/pelialan-konkareiden-perustama-next-games-on-suomen-kovin-kasvaja/7PaqBSbZ
  25. "Next Games' bestseller wins licensing prize". 29 May 2017.
  26. "The Walking Dead: No Man's Land Is Awarded the Webby People's Voice Award for Best Mobile Game".

[1]


This article "Next Games" is from Wikipedia. The list of its authors can be seen in its historical and/or the page Edithistory:Next Games. Articles copied from Draft Namespace on Wikipedia could be seen on the Draft Namespace of Wikipedia and not main one.

  1. Rosendahl, Jussi. "Finnish mobile game start-up Next Games plans listing". Reuters. Retrieved 22 July 2017.