In Mark Pincus’ book Life at the Speed of Play, the Zynga founder talks about his many interactions with Bing Gordon, the longtime gaming executive who helped build Electronic Arts and franchises like Madden.
Zynga created some of the defining social games of their era, including FarmVille and Words With Friends. At their peak, hundreds of millions of people played these games, often with people they already knew, or got to know through playing.
Bing once told Mark that the success of Zynga’s social games should be measured in marriages.
How many couples built relationships through these games, and eventually got married?
I spent a decent amount of time on Yahoo! Games back in the day hanging out with my wife (my girlfriend then), so I can relate.
We at Nex are also among the lucky bunch who get a slice of Bing’s mentorship. Naturally, Bing has a measurement of success for Nex, too.
Our success should be measured by the number of Nex kids going to college.
A game console with the hope of contributing to kids’ growth. That’s bold.
And as the first person in my family to go to college, that idea carries weight for me.
The Timeless Family Need of Growth
As parents, we feel a special kind of happiness witnessing our kids grow.
Learning to walk. Talk. Ride a bike. Swim. Dribble a ball. Make a basket.
And then come the bittersweet moments when they begin to surpass us: running faster, beating us in basketball one-on-one.
I’ll forever remember the proud look on my daughter’s face when she first beat me in a 50-meter swim.
Many of those moments happen through play.
Nex exists to serve timeless family needs: move, connect, grow, have fun.
We make moving fun. We make connecting fun. We make growing fun.
In our marketing, we primarily talk about how Nex Playground gets everyone moving and brings families together.
We haven’t talked as much about growth.
Games as Catalysts for Growth
Our Rubik’s Cube game is building toward one day teaching kids how to solve the cube (still working on that). NFL FLAG Football Heroes introduces kids to flag football. Dude Perfect Trick Shots Challenge teaches persistence. Mindful Tales explores emotions. Cookie Monster’s Cookie Factory is about cooperative problem-solving.
Many of our games deliberately put challenges just above the player’s current ability and encourage them to improve.
The role we want to play is clear: help kids get more ready for the real world.
Training Ground
Arron Mollet, our game designer and coach, has yelled at more than a million basketball players through HomeCourt, asking them to dribble a little faster.
Now he gets to do that with Playground families, too.
Training Ground takes what we learned from HomeCourt and applies it to reaction, footwork, coordination, explosiveness, balance, and sport-specific skills.
The idea is simple: challenge yourself, measure yourself, and see yourself improve.
Turn your living room into your Training Ground.
Maybe some will get better at a sport they love.
Maybe some will simply discover that they are capable of getting better at something.
Maybe some will understand a skill well enough to appreciate it in a new way.
That’s growth.
Kids Taking Playground to College
When we founded Nex, my daughters were 6 and 1. Now they are 15 and 10.
They’ve grown up with what we create. When I close my eyes, I see my daughters’ little fingerprints all over our products.
In three years, my older one will go to college, fingers crossed.
I hope she brings Nex Playground with her.
She will outgrow a lot of things. I don’t want her to outgrow Playground.
I have to be honest: I don’t think the product is there yet.
Training Ground is a first step.
We have three years.