Microsoft may be looking to move into the highly profitable social gaming business, having just inked a deal with one of that market’s biggest players. Hold onto your Facebooks…
The deal is between Microsoft and Arkadium, and represents a “strategic multi-year, multi-game partnership” that will bring the former onto the likes of Facebook with a range of social and casual titles along the lines of Zynga’s FarmVille.
Arkadium is no newcomer to this market. It’s social games currently attract around 10 million users via Facebook and its rivals. It also claims to have the world’s biggest library of Flash games.
Amazing Flash games you have to play
Zynga’s proved there’s big money to be made on social networks and Microsoft owns a stake in Facebook, so it makes sense on all fronts to plow forward with an attack on the gaming market.
But it might not end there. While the obvious target for Arkadium’s work is Facebook, Microsoft will also be thinking about Windows 8, which launches in the spring and will boast its own app store.
That The Windows 8 App Marketplace will need filling with apps fairly quickly and we’d be surprised if Arkadium’s not involved in some shape or form. Either way, it looks like Microsoft’s about to significantly expand its gaming catalogue.
