We continue to summarize the results of 2021 together with top managers and experts of the gaming industry (and related ones). Next up is an interview with Dmitry Lust, executive director of Whalekit.
How did 2021 go for the company?
It was tense in places, but very cool. It was a positive mix of development of launched projects and new experiments.
In 2021, we managed to maintain the trend of last year and qualitatively develop our flagship project Left to Survive, which is already three years old. During this time, it has been downloaded more than 40 million times — it is very nice to see that it retains the potential for growth, is liked and appreciated by players. We have more game content, we have started to delight players with events more often. We took into account the wishes of users (corrected some game features and added a few new ones), to which the project responded with growth.
The experience of launching our games on new platforms turned out to be very interesting. In addition to the App Store and Google Play, the mobile version of the same Left to Survive is currently available in the Samsung Galaxy Store and Huawei AppGallery, and the PC version is available in the MY.GAMES Store and Steam. I am glad that the platforms rate the quality of our games very highly. For example, Left to Survive received the award as the best action game in the framework of the Best of Galaxy Store Awards 2021.
In addition, we experimented quite a lot. We have established the process of the emergence of new ideas. We tested them, including on studio game jams. In general, a game jam is an ideal format that gives you the opportunity to let off steam, distract yourself and try to realize your ideas. This spirit of experimentation allowed us to launch several prototypes in 2021.
What event or trend of 2021 do you consider central within your niche?
In 2021, the gaming industry was influenced by many factors. This is also the interest of investors in games, seriously fueled by the results of the industry over the previous year. And the emergence of many new developers. We must not forget about the change in the schemes of interaction of platforms with users and partners, which forced developers to experiment with marketing strategies.
At the same time, there was no serious dynamics in the box office charts — in December we saw there basically the same games and the same genres as at the beginning of the year. And this is interesting, because it allows us to think that many developers and publishers, like us, in 2021 focused on the qualitative growth of their launched projects. New projects and developers need time — not everyone is willing to take risks.
What will be the stake in the development of the company in 2022?
We will definitely continue to develop Left to Survive. We already have quite a few types of activities and content — there is something to offer each group of players. We will also continue jamming, trying and experimenting. At the same time, I hope that this year our new ideas will begin to move from the prototype stage to full-fledged development and prepare for launches. MY.GAMES has everything you need for this: free access to data, resources and expertise. We also have no fear of making mistakes, because we know that colleagues will always help us with tasks.