Casual game developer MumboJumbo has acquired games developer Ritual Entertainment, which has now migrated to the casual games market. This acquisition will help make it one of the bigger casual gaming studios in the country. The company sells its games through RealNetworks, Microsoft, Yahoo and Big Fish, online, or offline at retailers. Some more details in the release.
David adds: Meanwhile, in a related story, AOL Games is testing ads in the one-hour trial version of its fee-based deluxe games, the NYT reports. About 95 percent of people who try games on the site do not end up paying for the deluxe version, and AOL would like to reach those users in some way. AOL games is second only to e-mail and IM as far as time spent per user, so the audience is considered significantly engaged. Last year, advertisers spent about $150 million buying space on casual game sites or in the games themselves, up from $74 million in 2002, according to DFC Intelligence.