Facebook @ GDC Europe: Developer Day Recap

In August, the Facebook games team hosted a Developer Day at GDC Europe, where we were joined by more than 300 game developers who build for mobile and desktop. For those of you who could not join us, we've provided a rundown of the day, as well as links to videos, presentations and code samples.

Growing Social Games with Facebook: Lessons from European Partners

Julien Codorniou, Head of Games Partnerships for EMEA, gave opening remarks on growth from the region. In fact, 5 out of the top 10 Facebook game developers worldwide are from EMEA (versus 1 out of 10 a year ago). Julien highlighted success stories from Wooga, King.com, Plumbee, Nordeus and FreshPlanet, and gave his insight on how to benefit from Open Graph and using Facebook as a growth engine for mobile.

Watch the video

Building your next generation social game with Facebook

Matt Wyndowe, Product Manager for Games & Apps, talked about the state of the Facebook games ecosystem. Matt noted that with more than 130 games with over 1 million monthly users and new features to improve app discovery, such as the App Center, that the games ecosystem is as diverse as ever. He also announced that the App Center has become a significant driver of installs to games and apps, second only to news feed.

Matt was joined on stage by Riccardo Zacconi, CEO of King.com, and Leonard Frankel, business development lead at Plarium, who each spoke about their experience driving growth for their games with Facebook. Zacconi explained how Facebook helped their new iOS version of Bubble Witch Saga quickly reach the Top 10 in the Apple App Store in many European countries without any promotion or marketing. Frankel discussed monetization strategies for Plarium's core game, Total Domination, which reached a seven figure annual revenue run-rate after two months on Facebook.

Watch the video

Simple steps to build & grow a social game on Facebook.com

With over 235M users playing games on Facebook.com every month, developers of all sizes are finding big audiences on Facebook. In his technical talk, Colin Creitz, Partner Engineer for games, walked through the essential steps to build and grow a social game on Facebook.com, including authentication, inviting friends to play, bragging through the feed dialog, and Open Graph built-ins for scores and achievements. Get started quickly with code samples for these features below.

Presentation . Code sample

How mobile games can plug into Facebook for massive growth

Facebook has helped many mobile apps grow and acquire new users. For example, in July, Facebook sent people to the Apple App Store and Google play more than 170 million times. In his talk, Ali Parr, Partner Engineer for games, walked through the basics of how to integrate Facebook into your native iOS game using our new iOS SDK. Ali shared best practices and code samples for using Facebook for login, reaching users via news feed, inviting and re-engaging users with requests, using the Open Graph built-in for scores, and optimizing for cross-platform. Get started making your mobile game social right away with the code sample below.

Watch the video . Presentation . Code sample

Driving installs and re-engagement with Open Graph

Open Graph has driven installs for fast-growing mobile games like SongPop and has been a source of significant re-engagement traffic for popular games like Marvel’s Avenger’s Alliance. In this talk, Gareth Morris, Partner Engineer for games, discussed techniques and best practices for using Open Graph to acquire new users and keep existing users coming back to your game. He also demonstrated how to differentiate your game by creating meaningful custom stories for news feed and Timeline.

Watch the video . Presentation

Advanced features for getting the most out of Facebook

Many game developers have found that building with Facebook results in growing their user base and keeping users engaged. In this talk, Gareth Morris and Namita Gupta, Partner Engineers for games, discussed advanced features you can use to accelerate your growth with Facebook. They covered best practices for using Insights to measure performance and guide development, using social channels to drive growth and retention, and how and when to use ads and other promotional tools to amplify your growth.

Watch the video . Presentation part 1 , part 2

Turning players into payers: best practices for monetization

The most successful games on Facebook aren’t always the ones with the most users. Developers like KIXEYE are outside of the top 10, 20, and 50, and are making millions of dollars a year by finding a meaningful and engaged audience. Colin Creitz, Partner Engineer for games & payments, discussed best practices for monetizing your game using features like subscriptions, displaying a user’s local currency, promotions for converting players into payers, among other techniques to grow your business with Facebook.

Watch the video . Presentation . Code sample

Thank you from the Facebook team

Thank you to everyone who joined us for a successful day of learning, coding and discussion.