Ninja Bike Race Takes Off By Kim-Mai Cutler – Tech Crunch
A Bike Race of Ninja Temple iPhone Gameplay Video. Tech Crunch
Pre-reading Discussion Questions
Directions: Have students discuss the following questions regarding video games in their countries.
Are video gams popular in your country?
Are they expensive?
How many do you own?
New Vocabulary
See the answers at the bottom,
Word Inference
Directions: Students are to infer the meanings of the words in bold taken from the article. They may use a dictionary or thesaurus for assistance. Have the students write sentences using each word.
- It can be a tough life out there for mobile-social gaming platforms.
- Yet there are a few startups that are trying to do it by offering something differentiated.
- a breakout game called A Bike Race of Ninja Temple…
- Initially he used Game Center, but got feedback from players that they wanted to compete against others.
Excerpt:
“Nextpeer launched about a year and half ago as a way for independent game developers to add multi-player mode to mobile apps.
While building these gaming platforms can be slow-going at first, a breakout game called A Bike Race of Ninja Temple is helping to add about 100,000 users per day to the Israeli startup’s network.
Muoyo Okome, a Microsoft business manager who moonlights as an indie game developer, used some open source code for games that resemble last year’s hit Tiny Wings. Tiny Wings is an indie hit out of Northern Germany and a physics game that has you press the screen to roll a bird off different hills. He then re-skinned it with a ninja-bike theme…
Nextpeerlaunched about a year and half ago as a way for independent game developers to add multi-player mode to mobile apps.
While building these gaming platforms can be slow-going at first, a breakout game called A Bike Race of Ninja Temple is helping to add about 100,000 users per day to the Israeli startup’s network.
Muoyo Okome, a Microsoft business manager who moonlights as an indie game developer, used some open source code for games that resemble last year’s hit Tiny Wings. Tiny Wings is an indie hit out of Northern Germany and a physics game that has you press the screen to roll a bird off different hills. He then re-skinned it with a ninja-bike theme”.
Reading comprehension
1. While building these gaming platforms can be slow-going at first, a___called A Bike Race of Ninja Temple.
a-old game
b-different gam
c-breakout game
2. It is helping to add about___ users per day
a-20,000
b-100,000
c-10,000
3. The difference between it and Tiny Wings though is that you can’t play it in ___mode. You have to find someone else to compete against in real-time using Nextpeer’s network.
a-single-player
b-Double player
c-Triple players
4.Okome says he’s now making between___ per ___from advertising and in-app purchases
a-$50 and 600 per week
b-$2,000 and $3,000 per year
c-$2,000 and $3,000 per day
Discussion Questions:
- Why did Okome change his game from the original version?
- Okome says he’s now going to focus on creating more racing characters for the game and building out its freemium model. What is going to happen when he does this?
You Tube Sample of A Bike Race of Ninja Temple Free Racing Game – iPhone Gameplay Video
Group Project
Place students in groups and see if each group can think of new game that might entice people to buy it as an app.
Answer Key
Vocabulary
Word Inference
platform |ˈplatfôrm|noun• a standard for the hardware of a computer system, determining what kinds of software it can run.
start-up |ˈstɑr ˌdəp|(also startup |ˈstärtˌəp|)• a newly established business: problems facing start-ups and small firms in rural areas.
breakout |ˈbrākˌout|-adjective informal1 suddenly and extremely popular or successful: a breakout movie.
initially |iˈniSHəlē|adverb [ usu. sentence adverb ]at first: initially, he thought the new concept was nonsense.
Reading comprehension
Fill-ins
While building these gaming platforms can be slow-going at first, a___called… (c-breakout game)
It is helping to add about___ users per day (b-100,000)
The difference between it and Tiny Wings though is that you can’t play it in ___mode. (a-single-player)
Okome says he’s now making between___ per ___from advertising and in-app purchases. (c-$2,000 and $3,000 day)
Discussion Questions
- In the beginning, we didn’t have tons and tons of players,” Okome said. “You’d always just have to wait for people to come and play. We’d get reviews saying that the game was cool but that people wanted to play against somebody.”Okome says he’s now going to focus on creating more racing characters for the game and building out its freemium model.
- What is going to happen when he does this? (students’ choice).
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