Ilya Salamatov, Vice President for Business Development at 101XP, said App2Top.ru about the successes of his company over the past year.
Ilya Salamatov
How was 2018 for you personally?
Of course, the most important and big event is the birth of a daughter. Believe me, parenthood by far overshadows everything else in terms of emotions.
How was the year for your company?
It went great. We have now fully turned towards mobile publishing. We are very actively working in this direction, which is growing every month.
The key product in our lineup next year will be the Era of Legends game. It is known in China as MT4. This is the top MMORPG from Tencent in 2018.
We have very high expectations associated with this game. However, the responsibility to the developers here is gigantic. I am sure the project will help us strengthen our position in the niche of hardcore mobile MMO games.
Era of Legends
Browser games also remain an important part of our business. This year we launched the third part of the legendary browser “League of Angels”, which is perhaps the largest role-playing browser in principle.
Colleagues consistently develop the 101XPTeam HR brand, within which they conduct lectures, seminars and other educational activities, work on onboarding new employees. So I can seriously say that our attractiveness as an employer has grown significantly this year.
The direction of premium games is also developing. Wait for announcements in the new year.
What event of 2018 do you consider the most important for the industry?
It is difficult to be original in the choice here. This is finally a serious formation of new stores. First of all, the Epic Games Store. The industry has been waiting for a full-fledged alternative to Steam for a long time. So far, the Epic store looks like a serious bid for this title.
What trends of the outgoing year would you note?
Fortnite has successfully secured the title of the most popular game, significantly surpassing the previous leaders in key metrics, especially in MAU. And this is wonderful news, because only such hits are able to qualitatively push the entire industry up.
Switch is filling up with small releases very quickly, but it is still relevant as a platform for independent developers. While there is still time to jump into the last car and get the desired organic.
Problems with obtaining a state license are pushing Chinese game manufacturers to look for new markets and new niches — and this is becoming noticeable. Although this trend will be fully revealed only next year, so I advise you to follow this closely.
Writing about royal battles is not interesting. Everything is clear with them. The main intrigue here is who will be the first to modify the mechanics and blow up the market again.
What are the third-party projects of this year that you liked the most?
I still really love and appreciate single-player games. Perhaps even more than before. And 2018 has been very generous with them.
First came God of War, which deservedly received the Game of the Year award at The Game Awards.
In September, there was a wonderful, though not perfect Spider-Man.
And finally, RDR2. I seriously consider the first part to be the best game of the last generation of consoles, and it seems I’m ready to say the same about the second part. In my memory, there has never been a video game with such elaborate characters, love of detail and drama of a completely different level. Such projects undoubtedly move the entire industry forward.