zGames

BACKGROUND

Please describe your company and your position there.

I am the CTO of VolleySim, LLC and we've created the game VolleySim in order to help train volleyball players with specific, difficult-to-practice aspects of the game of volleyball.

VolleySim is a virtual training product for Volleyball players and coaches in order to visualize decision-making aspects of the game. Our top priority is to ensure the accuracy of a training simulation to empower motivated athletes to train no matter where they are. VolleySim will train athletes to reach their potential and increase their level of play. Many players want extra practices, more coaching, and more help to improve, but at a point, the body must rest. VolleySim is designed to allow those athletes who crave more knowledge and more practice a way to practice reading the game, anytime, anywhere.

OPPORTUNITY / CHALLENGE

For what projects/services did your company hire zGames?

After our previous developer underwent a management change, we were feeling frustrated by a lack of professionalism and technical capability. We sought out zGames to utilize their extensive experience with mobile app development and customized solutions.

What were your goals for this project?

We needed custom solutions to implement never-before-seen functionality in our game.

SOLUTION

How did you select this vendor?

I underwent an extensive examination of game development companies who had expertise in Unity, previously-launched well-designed games, and a reputation for great customer service. I reached out to many companies and narrowed down the field based on technical capability. I ultimately selected zGames based on their previous work, their general excitement to work with us to achieve our goals and the fact that they're great people.

Describe the project in detail.

We provided the previous design documents and design improvements we required for the next version of our mobile app. They were able to ingest the previous work and design documents, and our desired changes to create a new fully-functional version of VolleySim. The two main changes for VolleySim were the addition of a meta-cognitive prompting module for displaying prompts and clickable banners for advertiser support.

What was the team composition?

As a very small business, my wife and I are the sole people working with zGames to accomplish our updates to VolleySim. I primarily interfaced with zGames over email and phone.

RESULTS & FEEDBACK

What outcomes or results can you share that demonstrate progress and/or success?

An average of 225,000 meta-cognitive prompts are displayed every month. An associated research team was able to use VolleySim to determine statistically significant improvements for player performance based on these prompts. 2,000 users clicked on displayed banners driving a significant amount of traffic to volleyball and US Military related charities.

How effective was the project management?

While mainly through email and phone calls, communication, collaboration, and project management was, and continues to be, fantastic. When clarifications were required, the zGames team didn't just guess or assume, they made sure to seek our input and then find a mutually agreed upon solution. This definitely made our product much stronger in the long run.

What did you find most impressive about this company?

As an educational app that focuses on a very small aspect of Volleyball, the zGames team sought to understand our vision, how we were trying to train volleyball players, and what made our app unique. Speaking to them was a breath of fresh air with their enthusiasm and excitement for the project when it was so easy to get bogged down in the inevitable issues that come up when creating something new.

What tips or recommendations do you have?

I would recommend zGames without reservation and know they would deliver an incredibility well-designed product, on-time, and on-budget.

BACKGROUND

Introduce your business and what you do there.

We are a game developer primarily in the social casino genre. We have around 15 employees. I am the founder and chief executive officer.

OPPORTUNITY / CHALLENGE

What challenge were you trying to address with zGames?

I needed someone that had both front-end Unity experience and backend experience. The project that I was looking to do was technically challenging and also a somewhat high risk. I was looking for a mix of technical skill sets and flexibility.

SOLUTION

What was the scope of their involvement?

They’ve produced a high-quality product with little bugs. I act as the lead project manager and watch the resources closely, which has been a bit of a challenge.

How did you come to work with zGames?

In my previous role, I ran a very large digital games company and we had a team with a competitor of theirs in Belarus. I knew of zGames from that prior team. I still talked with three organizations when I was putting together my own team, and they were by far the easiest to work with from a business perspective. They were flexible and understood my needs.

How much have you invested with zGames?

I have spent more than $200,000 in the year I’ve worked with them.

What is the status of this engagement?

We’ve been working with them around a year and now we have an ongoing relationship.

RESULTS & FEEDBACK

Could you share any evidence that would demonstrate the productivity, quality of work, or the impact of the engagement?

The product hasn’t done as well as I’d hoped but their work has been good.

What did you find most impressive about zGames?

Firstly, their overall work quality was excellent.  Very few bugs and release issues.  They were real professionals with high-quality output.  I was also looking for English language proficiency and there were several key team members that had good English.  Finally, we have a big time zone difference and they’ve been good at accommodating that.

Are there any areas zGames could improve?

Generally, the team met deadlines with a couple of exceptions. They could improve this by notifying the client earlier of possible delays.

BACKGROUND

Introduce your business and what you do there.

I, along with other educators and IT professionals, have tried to push the trade through a language-teaching app. It's the first app we've built, and it was done in order to gauge if there was a market that can be tapped.

I am a part-owner of the company.

OPPORTUNITY / CHALLENGE

What challenge were you trying to address with zGames?

We were looking for development at reasonably low costs, given that ours is a young company and this is our first project.

SOLUTION

What was the scope of their involvement?

zGames has developed our word-association game. It's a simple concept and can be enjoyed by anyone old enough to handle an iPhone who wants to learn English. The app could be adapted to other languages quite easily.

zGames was in charge of the artistic side of our product and gave us ideas and different ways of looking at it. We were willing to leave many of the gameplay elements to zGames' expertise, but the concept is very much ours. zGames' holistic understanding of our needs has had an impact into how we've looked at the app.

How did you come to work with zGames?

zGames was selected by one of my business partners after we both looked at a number of options in London. Realistically, it would have cost far too much money to pursue the project locally, so my partner looked in other places. He has worked in IT and could reach out to a few people for pointers. After looking through the options he did find, zGames seemed the most viable.

How much have you invested with zGames?

The total cost of the project is around $22,000.

What is the status of this engagement?

The whole project has stretched over the course of 2 years, mainly because of our side. We wrapped it up in May 2017.

RESULTS & FEEDBACK

Could you share any evidence that would demonstrate the productivity, quality of work, or the impact of the engagement?

Our work with zGames has been good. There have been a few issues, but because none of us have expertise in programming, I couldn't say how much of this was an inevitable part of the process. Overall, things have been good, and there was some progress with each iteration.

We noticed some glitches in the system and the gameplay with later iterations when there were none earlier. zGames' team acknowledged this as their responsibility, so we weren’t very concerned over this. Though it was frustrating at times, zGames dealt with these issues once we raised them.

Beyond that, the process had a fluid trajectory in the right direction. In the last six months, as we’ve tried to finalize the project, they’ve really excelled in terms of their response to our issues, requests and demands. They’ve really pulled out all the stops to ensure we’ve got exactly what we were expecting.

The game was tested on a couple of focus groups, but most of the bulk testing has been conducted by our company's 5 members over a number of hours. As things moved on, we came to discard metrics tracking, so I couldn't provide any exact numbers. There was only one occasion where we identified a significant setback.

How did zGames perform from a project management standpoint?

On our end, it was a much slower process than anticipated, so it was difficult at times for zGames to rally its resources quickly and push on with the work. The flow wasn’t always smooth, but we take the bulk of the responsibility for any tardiness. At times, we spent a few months before making a decision, either because we had to analyze things in detail or needed to reassess some of our plans.

We've generally had productive conversations with zGames and were able to take things forward. zGames listened to our criticisms willingly and acknowledged when there was an issue associated with their end. The only issue came when we wanted to get the process moving during the last stage of development. Because we'd let the work sit for a very long time, there came a long lag on zGames' end as well in finding the resources to allocate.

Another issue is that we don't have a point of contrast for the work. From our point of view, it's very hard to look at the project in relative terms, but zGames has been professional overall.

What did you find most impressive about zGames?

Previously, when we went to them with a glitch or error, they would rectify one error and another one would appear. But, they assigned someone else to the development who brought a fresh approach to it and maybe a different way of looking at the whole project. I was quite glad they had the flexibility to do that. Suddenly everything started falling together. Admittedly, things sometimes took longer than anticipated on our end, for various reasons. It was somewhat delayed largely because of us. In the earlier stages, they were feeling that as well, and they weren’t able to operate with a client who was unreliable in a certain way.

They then got the gauge of what we were about and what we were doing. They seemed to respond to that effectively, and they really went above and beyond what we thought they were offering to get this done and finalized. They really stood out in their flexibility and their willingness to adjust to us. We realized that we’re not the smoothest outfit around in terms of getting this stuff produced. When they assigned someone else to it, that maybe just brought a fresh perspective. Things seemed to really fall into place. We found that we were starting to move forward with things.

zGames certainly has a good vision for the concept of making a playable and potentially addictive product, and of what games should entail in general. When we received a new iteration, there was a significant improvement from the previous version every time. Every step was a big step forward, whereas before it had been almost cyclical—Something would be rectified, and then something else would be slightly problematic. I think they did a very good job for us, and I wanted to give an updated reflection on things in the past 6 months to a year ago.

Are there any areas zGames could improve?

At one point, we did feel that the finance element was going out of control, and wanted a bit more of an itemization for the work done. This was dealt with and we're still pretty much on budget. It wasn't a serious problem, and we perhaps should have demanded this approach in advance.

What tips or recommendations could you share that might increase the likelihood of success with zGames?

If the client has done this type of work before, they'll have a much better idea of how to approach it, and work much easier with zGames. If we ever do this again, we will have a better idea of the process ourselves, but we've had a massive learning curve. I would tell someone delving into a development project for the first time to be better prepared. zGames gave us some good input, and we've been frustrated with our own lack of command for the general direction. This necessarily had an impact on zGames as well.

At times, there may also have been a slight language barrier. Even though zGames' team speaks English competently and there were no serious issues, we have still wondered if the process was made slightly more difficult because of language. Clients should have clarity and focus for this reason as well.

BACKGROUND

Please describe your organization.

My company is a digital creative agency. Clients come to us with various goals ranging from engaging customers on their website to converting followers into clients. 

What is your position?

I'm the director of operations.

OPPORTUNITY / CHALLENGE

What business challenge were you trying to address with zGames?

At the time, we didn't have the in-house staff to develop applications fully. Initially, the goal was to find a partner who could help carry out the vision we had for a game application.

SOLUTION

Please describe the scope of their involvement in detail.

The game is available on iOS.

How did you come to work with zGames?

Our developer had done some work with zGames previously. We reached out to them when we had the idea, and the partnership worked out quickly. We didn't do a whole lot of research due to the prior relationship.

Could you provide a sense of the size of this initiative in financial terms?

Our project with zGames was $50,000 to $200,000.

RESULTS & FEEDBACK

Could you share any statistics or metrics from this engagement?

The response to the game has been very positive. It's not a widely released app on the App Store. It was more like a new initiative for a client. Everybody likes it. It hit all the requirements they had and then some.

What distinguishes zGames from other providers?

zGames is very quick to respond and very easygoing. They work until the job is done right, which I appreciate.

Is there anything zGames could have improved or done differently?

My experience with them has only been positive, so I don't have any specific constructive feedback.

BACKGROUND

Please describe your organization.

We are Gamiker. We produce gambling games. 

What is your position?

I'm the product manager.

OPPORTUNITY / CHALLENGE

What business challenge were you trying to address with zGames?

We were trying to make a good game.

SOLUTION

Please describe the scope of their involvement in detail.

zGames handled the whole development process. The game was for iOS.

How did you come to work with zGames?

It was a while ago when the initial decision was made. There were quite a few people involved.

Could you provide a sense of the size of this initiative in financial terms?

The project was in the range of $10,000 to $50,000.

RESULTS & FEEDBACK

What distinguishes zGames from other providers?

I absolutely adore zGames. I think they're great. They're very responsive. They have a rapid turnover time. I would give them high marks.

BACKGROUND

Please describe your organization. What is your role and responsibilities?

I’m the owner of a tech consultancy firm. We build business applications and games for clients in the biotech space.

OPPORTUNITY / CHALLENGE

What was your goal for working with zGames?

We had a client who wanted to make a game for patients of an incurable condition. We were looking for additional resources to help us deliver for our client.

SOLUTION

What was your process for selecting zGames with which to work?

I personally evaluated several suppliers. I looked at every provider’s price and portfolio of work. I really liked zGames’s portfolio, and they had a very good value proposition.

RESULTS & FEEDBACK

Do you have any statistics or metrics to track improvement from the project?

We had very good results with zGames. They put a game designer on my project, and he was very forthright. He made recommendations even though they may have been contrary to my initial suggestions. Turns out that he was right on. Their coders were very good.

Is there anything unique or special about zGames that really makes them stand out compared to other business partners?

They have quite a bit of intellectual property that is reusable and well designed. I was able to see the architecture of their proposed work. The game looked very professional and was very well done. Other partners were going to create a lot of code from scratch, and I liked that these guys had a lot of core code in place that they could take advantage of and that made it cost effective. 

Looking back on the work so far, is there any area that you think they could improve upon or that you might do differently?

No.