Interviews

2011 in review: Gary Gattis, CEO, Spacetime Studios

Play with anyone, anywhere, anytime

2011 in review: Gary Gattis, CEO, Spacetime Studios
|
| Spacetime Studios news

Formed by member of NCsoft's old Austin, Texas office, Spacetime Studios has quickly build a reputation for its cross-platform mobile MMOGs.

To-date, it's released two - Pocket Legends and Star Legends - building up a strong community for both. It also has its vampire-themed Dark Legends in the works.

We caught up with CEO Gary Gattis to get his view on the year past and ahead.

PocketGamer: What do you think was the most significant event for the mobile games industry in 2011?

Gary Gattis: I think the most interesting thing for Spacetime Studios has been the rise of the Android devices.

Globally we've seen them surpass iOS devices for installed users, and internally we've seen them monetise as well if not better than iOS users. We love our Apple devices (I have one in my pocket right now), but Google, with its stellar developer support, has won our hearts.

What was the most significant event for your company?

Our games are unique in that they are mobile MMOs that play across both iOS and Android devices on a global server set.

Earlier this month, we launched also on Chrome to become the first 3D MMO to have unified mobile and desktop gameplay. We now have the ability to simultaneously release, update, and support global products across iOS, Android, Windows, Mac, and Linux. It is extremely cool!

What was your favourite mobile game of the year?

The coolest thing I have played this year is an indie game called Inertia. It has that magical quality of a couple of interesting mechanics that combine in some incredible ways.

What do you predict will be the most important trends in 2012?

I think we will continue to see the expansion of mobile social games. Our motto is "Play with anyone, anywhere, anytime" and we think people want just that.

Also, tablet devices are very much on the rise. The number of players we see on tablets seems to be increasing exponentially. That, coupled with the availability of new technologies and networks like Verizon's 4G LTE probably means game developers can explore deeper gameplay on mobile devices such as synchronous, online, multiplayer gameplay.

What's your New Year's resolution and what resolution would you enforce on the industry?

The mobile world moves at a hyper pace … orders of magnitude more than what we have been used to, and it is only accelerating. My personal New Year's resolution is to take more deep breaths.

My industry enforcement would be to stop the Crunch. It is not an acceptable solution to throw bodies at problems to solve them. We, as an industry, should strive to do better than that.

Thanks to Gary for his time.
Jon Jordan
Jon Jordan
A Pocket Gamer co-founder, Jon can turn his hand to anything except hand turning. He is editor-at-large at PG.biz which means he can arrive anywhere in the world, acting like a slightly confused uncle looking for the way out. He likes letters, cameras, imaginary numbers and legumes.