Evergreen games are ones whose core gaming loop is a repeatable action. However on each repeat the action, strategy or game play is slightly different.
Comparring Evergreen Game Genres
Card games are the best evergreen example. Let’s compare them to a typical racing game.
Let’s look at a classic card game, poker. Whether it is your first hand or your 100th, your game play will be almost exactly the same. You will be dealt 5 cards. You will have a chance to make a bet, raise, call, etc. At the end of the round you will show your cards and a winner will be determined. As your skill increases your strategy will change despite the game play being exactly the same.
By contrast, let’s look at a racing game. Your first race will most likely be on a very simple course. This course may have a few small curves and will be on a stable road such as asphalt. As you play this game your skill will increase and you will be able to finish this basic course with ease. You will soon need something more challenging. You will need a course that introduces more difficult (sharper) turns, maybe different terrain such as dirt, gravel, etc. The game play needs to adapt to your skill level.
Need for Differentiation
It may be easy to say that Evergreen games have it easy. They never need to change their game play. Well this unfortunately isn’t true. In some respects, evergreen games have a more difficult challenge in retaining their users and differentiating themselves from their competitors. Let’s look at this for a minute.
In our racing game example, we can easily add an additional upgrade to our game to add in more levels. This also gives us a way to stand out from the competition as we can advertise our game as having the most number of courses, the best course design, etc.
By contrast our poker game has little to differentiate itself from the hundreds of other poker games available on the market. In order to stand out from our competitors we need to introduce some other element into the game to stand out. Maybe we add abilities for tournaments, maybe we provide our users with the best graphics that allows them to feel as if they are in an actual casino, etc.
Are you creating an evergreen game? If so - what elements of your game is going to stand out from your competition to set you apart and draw your users in.
