Two buddies who worked as interns for the National Security Agency in high school are now turning their attention to mobile games. Their Seattle company, Happy Monster Games, is launching a new title this week for Android called Trickyleaks.
The $1 game is a play off WikiLeaks in which game players take on the role of “a big, bad evil mega-corporation” trying to hide secrets from the world. The companies include Pear (a play off Apple), Sawwit (a play off Reddit), and Mineshaft (a play off Minecraft).
“We looked around, and since everyone was talking about WikiLeaks, but no one had made any real effort at a game based on it, we decided that would be a good subject for our first game,” said Zachary Cohn, who currently works at social media agency Banyan Branch.
Cohn, 22, and co-founder Justin White, 23, are bootstrapping the new company, which is focusing on Android-based mobile phones and tablet computers. The goal is to try to build games that capitalize on trends in popular culture, and Trickyleaks is the first attempt.
“We knew we wanted to launch an Android gaming company, but there’s a lot of noise in the market and it’s hard for someone new to stand out and get talked about,” said Cohn.
“One thing we’ve learned is that if you can take something that is popular, or something that will be popular, and be the first to create content for it in a medium, you can dominate search terms and generate a lot of new discussion about what you’re doing in connection to the popular trend,” explained Cohn.
