The company takes a further step in ad-supported online gaming

Jul 10, 2008 15:55 GMT  ·  By

If, until now, Yahoo! Games was mostly based on a fee paying system for their users to have full access to the games displayed on the website, things are about to change. The company has announced two agreements, signed with Double Fusion and NeoEdge, which will allow users to freely download 400 ad-supported games, said to be available on Yahoo! Games and the webpages of its partners by the end of the year.

The two companies will provide technologies that will help both Yahoo! Games and themselves to better monetize their content. According to the representatives of the Sunnyvale Internet provider, the partnership can only offer greater products to the users. They will, further on, have the possibility to purchase some products, but the offer of free casual games will definitely improve. In the worst case scenario, the free trial period will expand, giving users more time to decide whether to buy a game or not.

The fact that the partnership serves everybody's best interests is underscored by Kyle Laughlin, head of games at Yahoo!: "In game advertising is a win-win for Yahoo! Games, our partners and our users [...]. Yahoo! Games will safely and simply monetize our games experience while providing the best and most popular games free to game enthusiasts."

Double Fusion's representatives are also convinced that the agreement will facilitate a market growth, because some of the Internet users that were reticent about finding something to take a shine to will finally have a wider range of choices. "We believe there is a game out there for everyone and our dynamic ad-serving solution and sales experience provides Yahoo! Games an opportunity to finally integrate ad campaigns on-the-fly to their mass audience of 18-49 year old game-loving consumers," said Jonathan Epstein, President and CEO of Double Fusion. NeoEdge's staff is also thrilled about the deal, having in mind the same market growing dynamics. "NeoEdge is delighted to partner with Yahoo! Games to roll out ad-supported premium casual games to the world's largest audience," Alex Terry, CEO of NeoEdge, stated.