March 2006

Telefónica I+D

Game ‘tools’ for Telcos

ACCELERATE TO INCREASE

OUR LEADERSHIP

Adolfo M. Rosas arosas@tid.es

Telefónica I+D

ACCELERATE TO

INCREASE OUR

LEADERSHIP

Telcos looking at the gaming business

There is no doubt about the great possibilities that the gaming market offers today. But, is gaming a business for Telecommunication operators?

The ‘Telco’ companies sell services as their basic product. Only sometimes they sell other goods as supporting and complimentary products.

Telcos own/exploit the network and are used to the financial facts of the networked businesses.

Games ‘in a box’ (not necessarily networked) should be considered by a Telco only as a complimentary product.

Networked games are playing in the Telco arena so they must be turned into services.

Telefónica I+D

ACCELERATE TO

INCREASE OUR

LEADERSHIP

Gaming features that may attract Telcos

Digital goods. Networked delivery of ‘non-networked games’ : has been used to promote broadband usage. For instance Telefonica sells digital goods to broadband users : videos, music, games,...

Networked games : usually these games are not designed to be exploited as a service. A networked game very rarely has a backend open to a service provider... But networked games generate network traffic, so they are good for Telcos.

‘Community generators’. Games are known to create ‘fan clubs’ or more generally speaking ‘groups of interest’. Even when a game is not networked, delivery of such a title to many users creates an increasing group of interested people, and groups need to communicate so services as forum lists, chats or ‘gaming experts advice’ are possible. Communities are good for Telcos.

Media phenomenon. Nowadays the launch of a great gaming title is a hit on the media comparable to the premier of a Hollywood movie. Marketing association of such titles to services, portals, etc... is a successful move.

Telefónica I+D

ACCELERATE TO

INCREASE OUR

LEADERSHIP

Telco’s influence over game development (I)

Turning the game into a service.

Every service needs a backend open to the service provider.

A backend facilitates the operator the following operations:

Classify the game experience in several billing concepts : time, matches, traffic, etc...

Monitor and account the usage of these concepts : matches, time, network traffic, purchase of game items, hostage of private matches, etc...

Spy the behaviour of the players ‘in public’ environments and possibly have censorship activities

Interact with gamers : through the use of avatars , automatic and not automatic bots, ‘gods’ and regular users with the purpose of helping them understand the game and have a better experience

Have marketing statistics

Enable side-services or ‘derived experiences’ based on the success of a community or a game

Telefónica I+D

ACCELERATE TO

INCREASE OUR

LEADERSHIP

Telco’s influence over game development (II)

Community games : a networked game (i.e: a FPS) may gather a small group of players in a single session, but RPGS and specially MMORPGS enforce the creation of communities

Technologies in game development :

Telcos are supposed to be agnostic about the technology used in a game apart from networking, but that is not always true...

3D and broadband networking are state of the art technologies but ...what about other network and media based technologies?:

Videoconferencing : a new possibility even for home gaming platforms: PS2/PS3, Xbox/Xbox360... Used in action and community games

Bidirectional audio, multiconferencing with SW mixed audio...

SMS, email, messaging, positioning,...

Telcos always ask for reliability and scalability

Reliability:

Use standards for communications between components

Have redundancy in the server side : nowadays this redundancy is commonly deployed as fault tolerant clusters of servers behind a 7 level (OSI model) switch that handles ‘sanity parameters’ of the server at the application level.

The service/game must be designed with scalability in mind:

Server must be distributable over a cluster and seamlessly multi threaded

Telefónica I+D

ACCELERATE TO

INCREASE OUR

LEADERSHIP

Examples of Telcos influencing game services

Mundo3D : 2002.

Developer : Silicon Artists. Owner : Telefonica

3D world. Interactive. Backend designed by joint team : developer & Telco.

Terra Games : 2003.

Integrator of lobby platform :Accenture. Owner : Telefonica

Online matches. Lobby service. Commercial titles hosted.

Telefónica I+D

ACCELERATE TO

INCREASE OUR

LEADERSHIP

Mundo3D

3D Virtual Community built for Telefónica ADSL platform

Fully integrated with other services:

Videoconferencing Audioconferencing Multi-videoconferencing Presence Instant Messaging SMS E-mail Payment System

Requires software installation

Pricing Part of 2€ / month package on top of

standard ADSL subscription Originally planned to charge for

game elements, virtual objects Quickly moved to same flat fee

package as other services

Information reproduced here with permission of the rights holders. Mundo3D is a product of Telefónica developed by Silicon Artists.

Telefónica I+D

ACCELERATE TO

INCREASE OUR

LEADERSHIP

Mundo3D

Information reproduced here with permission of the rights holders. Mundo3D is a product of Telefónica developed by Silicon Artists.

Interactive Content and Social activities

Virtual Objects For navigating (keys) For using Mundo3D features (party

reservations, real estate deeds) Games (packets of cards) Content (MP3) Marketing objects (leaflets, billboards) Bartering and virtual commerce built in

Avatar Personalization Sex Body shape Clothes Colours Textures

Reservation of party rooms Reserve room with built in multi-

videoconferencing Send out personalized fliers

House and Home Buy real estate with virtual money Buy virtual furniture and decorate Marketing opportunities

Telefónica I+D

ACCELERATE TO

INCREASE OUR

LEADERSHIP

Terra Games : online lobby service plus derivatives Terra Games features : online gaming in open rooms, on demand gaming

downloads, reservation of private rooms for online gaming, games ranking, statistics, news, forum lists, gamers contests and ranks, prizes, ...

Several Telco products in the same service : open ‘pay per play’ products designed to increase ADSL utilization and ‘closed’ ‘ARPU increasing’ subscription products.

Telefónica I+D

ACCELERATE TO

INCREASE OUR

LEADERSHIP

Author’s short BIO

Adolfo M. Rosas

Born in 1970 in Madrid SPAIN.

1995 : Graduated in Telecommunication Engineering by UPM (6 years engineering degree).

1995 : enters Telefonica I+D (R&D company in Telefonica Group).

1995-1997 : works in development of R&D projects dealing with real time interactive video services using MPEG(1&2), IP and ATM networks, 3D accelerated graphics for interactive services.

1997-2001 : Leads engineering projects at T I+D dealing with advanced video on demand services, educational interactive services using video and online gaming.

2002 : consultant at Telefonica Marketing team defining new content services for broadband users.

2003-2006 : project manager at TI+D organising projects dealing with: E-learning for the enterprise and UE e-learning programmes

Interoperable DRM : internal research programme at Telefonica