In late October, Electronic Arts launched a streaming demo of FIFA 12 on YouTube using Gaikai's live demo network. The posting marked the first time a 3D game demo was playable via YouTube. According to Gaikai the YouTube demo is part of the company's broader strategy to help publishers push game demos out to potential new gamers wherever they gather on the Internet. YouTube was significant for EA because those potential new FIFA 12 fans are already on YouTube searching for and watching soccer videos.
Analysis
Gaikai is providing publishers with one of the few venues for attracting new players to core games. Most core game publishers have looked outside of the category, to causal or mobile, for growth. In the process most have reduced the number of core games they publish each year, taking fewer risks on new IP.
The playable demo, combined with the concept of going where the potential new gamers are on the Internet, makes Gaikai's strategy one of the few ways to attract new business, and not just rely on the same customer base returning to new iterations of the franchise year after year. YouTube was one of the obvious choices for EA to tempt new gamers to a sports title. On any given day there are likely millions of soccer fans searching for videos of their favorite teams and players. That is an existing audience of targeted fans, primed to be introduced to FIFA 12. The YouTube demo format is translatable to nearly every sports title the company publishes. When it comes to other genres, such as first person shooters, or fantasy worlds without such obvious new communities to target publishers have to get creative. Demos on social networking sites where fans can introduce their favorite games to their non-gamer friends could also allow publishers to reach people who would have never picked up a controller and tried series such as Mass Effect or Call of Duty.
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