CNN isn’t the first place one thinks of when looking for a popular browser-based game, however, a new set of game links has invaded the cnn.com index page. CNN has joined the ranks of many popular websites and now offers free, time-consuming and mind-absorbing browser-based games. CNN has dedicated an entire page for its readers to take breaks from reading the news and immerse themselves in titles like Mahjong Dimensions, Monkey Gem, and Pegland. Like Facebook and Google (Google+), gamers can sign up, record their scores, and participate in a gaming community. Will this be a successful move for cnn.com? Is this a good use of bandwidth for the news giant?
A large part of the cyber world has always revolved around free games. Even before browsers came along, Dungeons and Dragons fans scoured telnet realms and played games together via text message. With each new plugin (such as Flash, Java, etc.), developers and website builders have found ways to outperform the latest generation of games; a good example is the very popular Google Pacman that wasted many hours of work. It was built using the latest HTML and brought to the world a higher quality web version of the game with reduced download time.
Until recently, gaming was contained in its own slice of the web, and giant game publishing sites like pogo, miniclip, and addictinggames exploded in popularity. The larger, non-gaming sites took notice, and as technology increased and it became easier to create multiplayer communities, they started publishing games as well. Facebook didn’t take long to publish games. Will it work for CNN?
How does adding a gaming page to cnn.com affect CNN’s overall brand? In the past, sites like cnn.com have used video games as tools designed to communicate marketing messages to their audiences. For example, CNN has used news quizzes on its site to test readers on the information that can be gained from its articles. This use of a game reinforces the existing product and improves the overall user experience. With the addition of the new games page, how will a quick game of Mahjong help understand the results of the Iowa caucuses?
The move to put games on a news site may just be part of a larger media strategy. CNN is owned by Turner Broadcasting, which is owned by Time Warner. Ultimately, all the websites run by these empires serve as marketing channels. The implementation of diversified entertainment on the website is likely to be part of a broader strategy to keep users browsing through Time Warner’s and its partners’ network of websites.
Game publishing sites have always been easy to get started because developers are eager to spread their wares on the World Wide Web. In addition to the big media companies, independent webmasters from all over the web have started their own sites, compiling their own collections of browser-based games. CNN’s gaming page can be accessed by clicking here.
