The Game Layer

Probably the dominant and emergent theme at SXSW (and one you will be hearing way too much about soon) is "The Game Layer". Our own Adam Puchalsky notes: " If social media was the emerging focus of the 2000s, gaming will be the focus of the ‘10s."

What is it? Succintly, it is the principles of gaming not merely imitating the real world through virtual reality. But living in and over the real world—gaming let out of the box.

Think about it as the descendent of the social layer. If digital socialization was the last chapter, game mechanics operating in the real world will be the next chapter.

The Game Layer high priest is Seth Priebatsch who secured funding from Google to launch SCVNGR (http://scvngr.com/). SCVNGR is a location based app available on iOS and Android that literally makes a game out of everywhere you go. Check-in is only the most basic act of game-playing on SCVNGR. Today's game challenge (for example) is to snap a photo of the places you visit and post them to SCVNGR.

The reward structure is no different than most games. Badges, points etc. But the tectonic shift Priebatsch suggests goes well beyond badges.

His conclusion is pretty simple: Game mechanics in the real world are the most innovative tools for motivating human interaction. Though I suspect what he means by "interaction" is actually "behavior". Which, I'll concede, has a more sinister ring to it.

So what's priming this? Augmented Reality. Smartphone adoption. Increased bandwidth. 4Square. Facebook's supernova expansion. All of the above really. But one watershed event this year gets more talk than anything is one that we (as marketers) can really understand: Sales.

Released this past November, Call of Duty: Black Ops sold over 7 million copies in it's first 24 hours generating $360 million in sales. Stack that against the biggest movie opening of all time ("Twilight") of $72 million. CoD shot to $650 million in 5 days. And topped a $1 billion in a year's time. To date, 600 million hours have been logged playing CoD. And the modern warfare franchise has generated over $3 billion in sales. Gaming is now a larger industry than Hollywood.

It's pretty simple math. But look beyond the math and what you see is one startling conclusion: Adding a game layer to something can motivate and change human behavior.

It's not without it's pitfalls. Adding badges to a crappy user experience is no miracle elixir. But understanding that game mechanics (well conceived and designed) can be more motivating to a consumer than giving them free swag in exchange for consideration, is a pretty huge thought.

The implications beyond marketing are significant as well. Imagine our grading system in schools being replaced by a system of leveling up. Gone is the idea of "failing" and "dropping" in status. Here is the idea of education sped by a rewards system closer to the style of "World of Warcraft".

Gaming is a tested trigger. For a whole new generation of consumers, this is what incents them. Clearly there will be bad and good practitioners of game mechanics in advertising. But, by any assessment, gaming will emerge as a constant refrain in our industry for the next few years.

LINK: Seth Priebatsch's TED talk:

http://www.ted.com/talks/seth_priebatsch_the_game_layer_on_top_of_the_world.html