In February 2019, CasinoBeats journalists met with the director of games production at NetEnt. Bryan Upton spoke about the fact that the concept of "quality" is relative, and also answered questions about whether the developer traded quality for quantity, deciding to double the annual production. The text is presented not in the form of an interview, but something like an article with quotes from Brian. Read the translation below.
Beauty is in the eye of the beholder. So when you hear "quality" in relation to video slots, what does that mean? Bryan Upton speaks quietly in the small meeting room on the top level of the NetEnt booth at ICE London.
Dressed in jeans, an Ozzy T-shirt and Converse shoes, Upton just announced to a crowd of over 200 at the NetEnt booth the launch of the brand's latest two games, Conan and Ozzy Osbourne.
Brian's resume includes work at IGT, GTECH, OpenBet and Inspired, moving from online to land-based and back to online at the expense of NetEnt. CasinoBeats have suggested that the high quality standards that NetEnt is known for may be at risk as the company ramps up the volume of games it produces.
I've been in the terrestrial industry for the past three years, but when I got back online, I noticed that the games themselves hadn't changed much, but the players had. This is something that came as a surprise to me, because everything moves much slower in the ground business, so the production speed is not as fast,” said Upton.
“But online players have matured very quickly. Some customers don't want super sparkly games, others do. The definition of "quality" can be given by the person to whom you provide something. There are games that are fantastically well-received by players but that don't look pretty. And there are some slots that look absolutely great but are not in high demand.
For us, it means being smarter about what we do, what games we create and for whom."
NetEnt surveys the ICE pavilion and within the online casino sector does so from a unique position. Upton is quick to take the conversation away from the company's special status, but in terms of maturity - NetEnt is in its 24th year of operation - with a huge number of games, integrations and transactions, the developer has few, if any, equal competitors.
Upton agrees that this deep experience is of great value in being able to read the market and select the quality of the game that the player wants. "We've had about 45 billion transactions, and each of them has data that we use to learn about players," he says. "It's fair to say that we have more data than any single operator because we have a huge distribution network."
“The amount of data available to game developers at this company is of great importance. We can make reasonably informed decisions,” he explains.
“We use data to understand why. There are different ways to develop games, different approaches. The only way to do that is to be smart and think things through."
Having such a huge resource is, of course, priceless, but there are other measures by which companies are evaluated. And there are innovators in the sector who bring something new without analyzing two decades of data to create each game. CasinoBeats cites Megaways mechanics from Big Time Gaming as a recent innovation that has raised the bar.
"This isn't the first time something like Megaways has come up," says Upton. “They do a fantastic job - I take my hat off to them. They keep the rest of us on our toes and I love having these guys in our industry.
But for us, these things are just part of what we do. We have games that use similar devices. If we discover something startling, then we will react. But we are a slightly different beast than BTG. We have muscles that we have yet to use.”
The connection that Megaways plays on - when the developers talk directly about their strengths to the players - is nothing new. In fact, the enviable online and social footprint left by NetEnt is likely to exemplify this kind of interaction. "I don't think we're alone in this right now," says Upton. “A few years ago, that may have been the case.
Our players talk to each other on the forums etc and it's nice to hear them talk about the things we do. This is a kind of plank. I don't think there are many players who don't know who NetEnt is."
And this fame of the brand carries with it certain expectations? “Yes, it is a powerful brand. But we also need to watch over and nurture our core brands. Dead or Alive is a landmark slot, we will be launching a sequel. We care about our brands."
The roughly doubling of the number of games that NetEnt is set to deliver in a year seems to be paying early dividends, with revenue up nearly 10% in Q4 2018.
Quantity versus quality - which started the conversation with Brian - is a recurring theme, and here it is back. Taking what he says about perception and definition of quality, brand care is definitely becoming more of a challenge with more NetEnt games being released? “We have increased our productivity, it's true. Last year we announced Narcos and Vikings, and now Conan, Ozzy and Scudamore's Super Stakes.
We are quite open to licensed brands and are constantly being contacted about this. Sometimes we say no for whatever reason, and in some cases the brand owners can make the collaboration worth it. For example, the guys from The Conan are fantastic to work with.” he says.
“Working with brands is a kind of talent in itself. Choosing a brand carefully is very important, but working with them is the second part, can you do it well? Jumanji is a great example. We took the game that we made a movie about and really built it into the slot, which is why it was such a huge success.
We love games like this that have existing game mechanics."
Source: https://casinobeats.com/2019/02/19/netent-games-guru-bryan-upton-beauty-is-in-the-eye-of-the-beholder/
