After its popular Rock Band franchise saw sales dwindle last year, MTV Networks has sought to find other ways of building up its gaming holdings. The Viacom company is now looking to capitalize on the social gaming trend and has acquired developer Social Express to continue to build up Nickelodeon Digital’s offerings. Terms weren’t disclosed.
San Francisco-based Social Express, which is only eight months old, will be folded into Nickelodeon Digital, MTVN said in a statement. Social Express co-founder and CEO Tony Espinoza will oversee social gaming strategy and development as VP and GM of Social Gaming for MTV Networks’ Nickelodeon Kids & Family Group. Neil Souza, co-founder of Social Express and FoulPlay Media, will be VP of Technology, Social Games. Both will report to Dave Williams, SVP and GM of Games, Nickelodeon Kids & Family Group. Williams continues to report to Stephen Youngwood, EVP for Digital, Nickelodeon/MTVN Kids & Family Group. The news was first reported by Venturebeat.
Aside from Rock Band, for the past three years, MTVN has been heavily concentrating on building up its gaming offerings, mostly on casual online games and virtual worlds. When Nickelodeon unveiled its major push into gaming in July 2007, it pledged $100 million to develop and acquire nearly 5,000 games by 2009. A month later, MTV said it would invest about $500 million on developing games to match its programming.
The strategy doesn’t seem to have changed much. Social Express, which has been operating in stealth mode since opening its doors in December, will be charged with developing social games based on original shows from MTV, Nickelodeon, and other Viacom-owned brands. Nickelodeon has been at the center of MTVN’s gaming strategy. Its AddictingGames division has sought a balance between ad support and the sale of virtual goods and has explored paid subscriptions in the past.
In addition to AddictingGames.com, MTVN’s other gaming properties include Shockwave.com, Nick.com Games, Nick.com Arcade, Neopets, GameTrailers, and Xfire. Citing May comScore figures, MTVN said its game sites drew over 22 million uniques and ranked as the number one destination in the online gaming segment. (See the press release for more)
