The AWOL It Game is a proposed geosocial multiplayer mobile game inspired by playground games like tag. It takes advantage of GPS and online technologies to allow gameplay over a wide area. Market research found that people are comfortable sharing locations and many would be interested in playing this type of game. There is potential in the emerging geosocial gaming market, especially among existing geosocial app users in the US. Developing the game has relatively low technical, capital and team risks that can be mitigated, but market risks are moderate to high depending on user adoption and potential competition from large companies.

1. AWOL > Game
AWOL It It GAME
Play Outside

2. OPPORTUNITY
Since mid-2000s Smart Phones have put the
combination mobile internet and GPS into
peoples' pocket around the world.
Little use of this has been made for either
gaming or geosocial marketing, although users
of geosocial applications grew at 300% in 2011
Provide business additional opportunities to
create and be part of their local community and
gamify their customer interactions.

3. Product Summary
The AWOL It Game is part of the emerging
market for geosocial multi-player online games.
Inspired by children's playground games such
as "It" or "Tag", but taking advantage of the
extended game-mechanics that can be
provided over a wide space using GPS and
online technology.
The AWOL It game is a refreshing concept: fun
and compelling to a wide audience.

4. Our Market
Starting with the total number of people using a
smartphone; consider revenue only from in-app adverts.
Total market, smartphone users:
1 billion players, $5 billion (ad revenue)
Served market, US iPhone users:
25 million players, $125 million (ad revenue)
Target market US, iPhone, geosocial users:
2 million players, $10 million (ad revenue)
That is just from google ads revenue, doesn't include in-app micro-purchases. (Multiply by 10
according to our previous model in document VL8)

5. Market Research - will it play?
Are people comfortable with sharing locations?
Yes, a growing minority are (300% y.o.y. growth of 4sq
from 5 to 15 million users in 2011), and geotagging of
facebook is introducing location sharing widely
Are they excited by the game?
Yes, survey results indicated 10 % of respondents excited
to play, and over 50% "would give it a go". 25% provided
an email address to receive more information
Is there a need?
Yes, this can help make online connections real -
"Integrate this with Facebook because I have facebook
friends I've never actually met"

6. Technology Risk - low
● Battery life of current phones may be a limitation
○ We must be aware of this and how we use the
features of the phone (eg, screen, sound, gps)
● Current technology allows us to develop our product
○ Type of data is well defined (locations)
○ Mobile devices are well specified to run the simple
application that our game requires
● Mobile company data tariffs
○ We must seek to minimise the amount of data used
to minimise additional costs to users

7. Team Risk - moderate
● Risks to this team are time commitments and
development skills
● All team members pursue this project in their spare time
and have other commitments
○ Minimise the risk here by ensuring that we work on
an exciting area with a fun project
○ Try to work towards a Minimum Viable Product that
is suitably constrained to be achievable
● Only one team member has strong development
experience
○ We could reduce this risk by recruiting another team
member, or paying for development resource

8. Capital Risk - low
● Developing the AWOL It game does not require large
investment of capital
● Costs (and revenue) both scale with the number of
users
● Tools for development are cheap or free, and initial
costs of hosting will be very low while we have a low
number of users

9. Market Risk - moderate/high
● Educating and developing our customers.
○ We will reduce this risk by initially targeting existing users of geo-
social applications, for example foursquare and Google Latitude
● From our research, there is an identified gap in the market for a simple fun
product as our It game. There are very few competing games (GeoSocials.
com comes closest, Qonqr.com is also a Geosocial MMO).
● Existing players in location and advertising (facebook, Google) could
develop similar applications
○ they seem satisfied to leave this to 3rd party developers at this time
● The game could not be as compulsive as we initially hope
○ we will provide simple variations of the game, and create a game
engine that is flexible enough to combine game elements in ways that
are found to be most interesting during early research

10. Early into this market, but not alone
Pleased to be competing against others to
show how we can add fun and excitement to
this brand new market.
Geosocial marketing has narrowed the gap between
businesses and their customers. By connecting brands and
consumers online through a casual and fun gaming
experience, businesses know when customers are nearby -
or even in - their physical business locations. Using
targeted geo-social marketing, businesses can then deliver
instant brand information and deals in the palms of their
customers' hands that will increase sales and online
referrals.