A Talk With President of Arkadium

I had the opportunity a while ago to speak with Jessica Rovello, the President and co founder of Arkadium about the growth of their company, and the casual games market.

Arkadium, and their subsidiary game site, Great Day Games, were founded in 2001 by a husband and wife team with their own 401K and a little bit of “elbow grease.” This means that they have no one (i.e. investors) to answer to in terms of design, process, or product.

They specialize in making custom advergames – a term which describes a broad group of games such as a focus around which advertisements are built, or games that are advertisements themselves. They are great tools for advertisers because people stay with the ad longer when it’s a game.

Arkadium creates advergames for some of the bigger media conglomerates, such as NBC, Lifetime, ESPN, CBS, ABC, National Geographic, and Hearst Publications. Ad agencies approach Arkadium, wither with an idea of what they want themselves, which may work with one of the 350+ titles in their inventory, or they know what they want to achieve and the Arkadium team of programmers brainstorm and create custom games to accomplish that, be it driving up sales, membership, registration, etc.

In an economy like this, Arkadium is one company that is still growing and expanding, “I mean we have definitely been affected by it, luckily not deeply,” keeping all of their staff working – in what sounds like an extremely fun environment. .

When I asked her if she plays, she said, “Yeah, definitely. I talk to a lot of women who would never classify themselves as gamers because they don’t have a console, but may play Mahjongg for upwords of forty hours. Just because it’s Sudoku doesn’t mean it’s a game.“

They have a little gaming lounge in their office with a big couch and a big screen TV, and every console so, among other reasons, they can stay abreast of the casual games constantly being released on consoles.

When I asked how she felt about being a woman and a leader in this industry, and whether she thought that made a difference, she said, “I hope that it makes a difference. I don’t know off the top of my head if it does. I find it interesting that I am in a segment in the market that caters to women, and yet, the vast majority of CEOs or top level position holders… are generally run by men.” It’s good to know your market. And, at least in the casual game space it is a slight advantage to be a woman. “The market is still expanding. Casual gaming is breaking out of the browser.” With casual titles dominating consoles like the Wii, and crossing over more and more into the rest, it is an exciting time to be in this industry, “I’d much rather be in games than any other sector.”

Both Arkadium and Great Day Games have undergone some updating in the past month. Check out Mahjongg Dimensions, an innovative way to play – I can’t stop! Advergaming in and of itself continues to evolve and become a growing angle for companies, developers, and gamers alike. I expect we will be hearing more and more from Arkadium in the near future.