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How Habbo Succeeded

Posted by Zonk on from the oh-those-wacky-fins dept.

The other keynote on Thursday at GDC Austin homed in on the growing collusion between Web 2.0 site and online gaming, with an examination of the wildly successful Habbo Hotel by world creator Sulka Haro. Habbo is more of an online hang-out space than a game, thought it does have many game elements. The service grew from humble origins to now offer a home to almost 7.5 Million unique users per month. From Gamasutra's coverage: "Globally, the game attracts around 51% boys and 49% girls. '13-16 seems to be the predominant age group we're getting.' But in different territories the story may be different. For example, in Japan there are a lot of younger kids playing, but there's also a hardcore cadre of housewives who play in their own cliques. When it comes to the U.S., Haro posited, 'I guess in the States the tipping point is when you get your driver's license and you can actually go somewhere to meet people.' A big concern of Habbo players is to create a private space where their parents don't know what's going on -- and this extends to when they get in trouble."

23 of 57 comments (clear)

  1. nothing to see here... by Dance_Dance_Karnov · · Score: 5, Funny

    pool's closed. due to aids.

    1. Re:nothing to see here... by ins0m · · Score: 1

      DASU?! kekeke

      --
      Never attribute to Hanlon that which can be adequately attributed to Heinlein.
  2. Raids by _bug_ · · Score: 5, Insightful

    and i wonder how many of those visitors are a result of raids from other websites. it is a popular place to go harass users.

    1. Re:Raids by Bieeanda · · Score: 1

      The Path is Grey.

  3. Fond memories by Solra+Bizna · · Score: 1

    Habbo Hotel has a fuzzy place in my heart. Even I sunk about $20 into it a few years back. I furnished a whole room, then stepped back and realized how pointless my life was and did more worthwhile things. :P

    -:sigma.SB

    --
    WARN
    THERE IS ANOTHER SYSTEM
  4. That's easy. by Minwee · · Score: 4, Funny

    Habbo succeeded because the kids liked him much more than Hrusty the Clown.

  5. This is how ... by Baby+Duck · · Score: 5, Funny

    So how *did* Habbo succeed?

    1. Post an article on Slashdot entitled "How Habbo Succeeded"
    2. Have 99% of visitors wonder WTF is Habbo?
    3. 1% of viewers click on said article, read it, decide they want to try it
    4. Realize 1% of Slashdot users is a sizeable number.
    5. PROFIT!

    I can't wait to makeup something called Yuiroppo, get a front page Slashdot article entitled "How Yuiroppo Succeeded", and sit back and rake in the dough.

    --

    "Love heals scars love left." -- Henry Rollins

    1. Re:This is how ... by Fozzyuw · · Score: 1

      2. Have 99% of visitors wonder WTF is Habbo?

      ROFL, and here I thought I was totally out of it. Despite having tried many free and obscure online games, I never heard of Habbo. Though, I didn't bother to click the link and I won't bother given how your post confirms my thoughts.

      cheers,
      Fozzy

      --
      "The past was erased, the erasure was forgotten, the lie became truth." ~1984 George Orwell
    2. Re:This is how ... by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 1

      Oh, shut the fuck up! This is about a presentation at a game conference and I've seen this presentation covered on a site geared towards developers. What the fuck is the point in advertising a game which primarily appeals to 13-16 and old Japanese housewives on Slashdot of all places? Home to 40 year old man-children who will only point their Cheeto stained $90 gaming mice only to sites that stink of testosterone and desperation. Like CGI rendered pornographic Elvin cartoons.

      Since you hate slashdot I urge you take your shitty spelling and horrid compound bullshit terms (spamvertisement? that's a fuckwit word you waste of afterbirth) and head over to some stink hole like digg. They have pictures of kittens. On your way over there, be sure to fuck yourself, get Super AIDS and die.

      P.S. You embody everything wrong with humanity.

    3. Re:This is how ... by kat_skan · · Score: 1

      This is a great plan until a month later when you get the bill for the bandwidth used by the 99% who didn't sign up. :D

    4. Re:This is how ... by Vexor · · Score: 2, Insightful

      Actually Habbo Hotel succeeded was due to "bobba". Lot's and lot's of bobba. For those of you who don't know what bobba is I'll use it in a sentance and let you read between the lines: "Hey nice shoes, wanna bobba?"

      --
      ~Vexed and loving it!
    5. Re:This is how ... by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 1

      don't fool yourself. slashdot doesn't have that many unique visitors and frankly it's just not as potent of a tech site as it was just a few years ago. slashdot has become the new digg to the point that the upper management has started to emulate digg.
       
      but considering the subject matter i guess being a good tech site doesn't really count for all that much either. i wouldn't be surprised if slashdot went heavy into a second life clique. that's about the speed of slashdot today.

    6. Re:This is how ... by Frozen+Void · · Score: 1

      Check Alexa stats.
      http://www.alexa.com/data/details/traffic_details? site0=habbohotel.com&site1=slashdot.org&site2=&sit e3=&site4=&x=0&y=0&h=300&w=610&h=400&w=700&z=3&ran ge=3m&size=Medium&y=r&z=3&url=usopen.org

    7. Re:This is how ... by OldeTimeGeek · · Score: 2, Funny

      So "bobba" means shine?

    8. Re:This is how ... by Fozzyuw · · Score: 1

      And you have AIDS.

      Noooooo!

      --
      "The past was erased, the erasure was forgotten, the lie became truth." ~1984 George Orwell
  6. Re:sage by TriezGamer · · Score: 3, Funny

    Sage goes in the e-mail field...

  7. Re:sage by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 1, Funny

    #fortune goes in the email field...

  8. Re:lamer than myspace by gorbachev · · Score: 1

    Habbo Hotel preceeds MySpace.

    --
    In Soviet Russia, I ruled you
  9. Worthwhile by PixelScuba · · Score: 3, Insightful

    Like comment on Slashdot about spending money on Habbo Hotel :P

  10. Re:sage by deftcoder · · Score: 1

    #fortune goes in all fields!!!

    --
    Peace sells, but who's buying?
  11. Re:lamer than myspace by IpalindromeI · · Score: 2, Funny

    "Precedes" means "came before;" it does not mean "cannot be lamer than."

    --

    --
    Promoting critical thinking since 1994.
  12. Re:sage by TriezGamer · · Score: 3, Informative

    Bauman steals from a lot more than just 4chan. The man is both a brilliant opportunist and needs to be offed for being a thief.

  13. Re:sage by xyph0r · · Score: 1

    lol wut

    --
    SQL programmer goes to a bar. Walks up to two tables and says 'Excuse me, may I join you?'.