Amazon secures Fieldrunners HD as two week exclusive on Appstore for Android
Android Market pricing policies dictate strategy
The latest in a series of timed exclusives on the marketplace, Subatomic Studios has announced it will launch the Android version of Fieldrunners HD first on the Amazon Appstore.
The developer has siged a deal with Amazon that ties the game to the store for two weeks before rolling out on Android Market, though pricing issues also had a role to play in the decision.
Switching strategies
"Amazon has worked with us to launch our game the way we want to launch it, which is something all independent developers want," said CFO Sergei Gourski.
"They are acting like true partners in the launch of Fieldrunners HD, which is exactly the type of thing we want in a distribution relationship, and we know the game will have even greater success from our launch together."
Subatomic Studios admits it had intended to launch Fieldrunners HD for Android on June 30.
However, it 'reconsidered its launch options' and "decided that launching the game on the Amazon Appstore for Android was a perfect opportunity to deliver the game for free for the first 24 hours and leverage Amazon's significant marketing and promotion capabilities to ensure the widest possible audience".
Indeed, Google's rules for Android Market do not allow developers to launch games for free before raising the price at a later date.
Flexible and free"Working with Amazon makes a lot of sense for us and our fans," added PR and marketing manager Alec Shobin.
"Launching Fieldrunners HD in the Amazon Appstore for Android gives us the flexibility to make the game free for the first 24 hours, and although we have to push the release date back to accommodate even more rigorous testing, it will ultimately enable us to deliver a thoroughly polished game that works on even more devices."
A release date has not yet been made public, but Subatomic claims it will be "announced in the near future".
