Facebook really wants games to succeed, makes welcome changes

What? You say, "the 30 percent cut Facebook takes from in-game sales might have something to do with it?" That's just probably true mean! Facebook announced Thursday night a few changes to its games and apps platform to increase game play time and, one of our favorite buzzwords, retention. The most noticeable change is that the amount of games you've played last, featured above the Games Ticker, has been upped from four to six.

According to Facebook's early tests, this boosted number of bookmarks has increased referrals to previously-played games by 20 percent. Speaking of bookmarks, those numbered game-related bookmarks on the Facebook home page now clear automatically once a user clicks on them, much like notifications do. The idea behind it: "This update should make it clearer to users when they have a pending action and drive greater re-engagement."

In short, players will play their favorite games more. Facebook has also merged the Games and Apps dashboards into one destination. The updated dashboard shows all app and game requests and notifications in one place, as well as recommends new apps and games to users based on what your friends are playing. Changes like these bring Facebook closer to Google+ in terms of how it promotes new games.

Finally, game stories have hit Facebook on smartphones. Now, players will get to see what games their friends are playing most, regardless of whether they play social games. Facebook hopes this will inspire users to play more Facebook games through their mobile devices. But depending on who you ask, game discovery is far from Facebook's biggest problem.

[Via VentureBeat]

[Image Credit: Facebook]

Do you have trouble finding new games to play on Facebook? Do you think these changes will help foster growth in new games from smaller game makers? Sound off in the comments. Add Comment.