Keisuke Osone

ゲームの分析に関しての取材 Freemium game companies in Asia appear more willing to talk. Barcode Footballer was the top-grossing freemium game in Japan last summer. "There are many times that we have changed the game based on player data," says Keisuke Osone, who heads the team of data analysts at the game's developer, CYBIRD, in the Shibuya area of Tokyo. This can involve changing the location of menu options on the screen, or even adapting the game to when players have the most money jangling around their pockets. "People tend to time their spending in the game around the day their salary is paid, so we tend to run special offers and promote the most desirable in-game items around that time," Osone says. "In Japan payday is usually on the 25th of each month, so we generally run campaigns on that date." The team also tweaks its digital storefront to make the most of the fact that "people like to buy things on the first day of every month" because, Osone says, they have just been billed for the previous month's purchases by the mobile phone operator.