GREE expands platform partnerships with Vostu, Brainz and more — GREE has signed partnership deals with five more international studios. The company announced this week it has signed up Vostu, Brainz, Sun Dried Games, Pangalore and Vast Studios. Our readers may remember in October GREE announced it had signed deals with Enders Fund, Fathom Interactive, Fifth Column and FreezeTag.

Variable rate iTunes gift cards now available — Apple customers can now decide exactly how much their friends and family are worth to them. The company has introduced new gift cards that can come in denominations ranging from $15 to $500 reports 9to5 Mac. The new cards are already rolling out at major U.S. retailers.

SGN teams with Betable — Social and mobile game developer SGN is the latest company to sign a deal with London-headquartered Betable to bring real-money gambling elements to its mobile titles. The features will only be available in markets where mobile gambling is legal, such as the U.K. SGN expects to roll out the features in the first half of 2013.

iPhone 5, iPad Mini finally headed to China — The latest generation of Apple devices will soon be in the hands of Chinese consumers. The company announced today the iPad Mini and the fourth generation iPad will be available in China on Dec. 7. The iPhone 5 will be available on Dec. 14.

LINE integrates with Facebook — NAVER’s ultra-popular Japanese chat app LINE has started integrating with Facebook. Facebook users can now create LINE accounts using their Facebook credentials according to Dr. Serkan Toto. Users can also invite their Facebook friends to the service.

PlayPhone picks up Red Herring Global 100 award — San Francisco based PlayPhone has won the Red Herring Global Top 100 award in the mobile category. The awards are decided by Red Herring editorial team and honor promising private technology ventures.

Gameloft teams with Red Bull — Gameloft has signed a deal with Red Bull that will see the energy drink maker’s branded cars coming to Gameloft’s racing game GT Racing: Motor Academy. The F1 RB8 (driven by F1 world champion Sebastian Vettel) and the Red Bull editions of the Camaro SS and Hyundai Genesis Coupe will all be available in the next update of the game.

GREE picks up Best Social Games Service Provider award — GREE has picked up a Mobile Entertainment award for Best Social Games Service Provider, beating out the likes of DeNA, PapayaMobile and PlayPhone for the honor. Based on London, the Mobile Entertainment Awards honor excellence in publishing, services and operations.

Blackboard Mobile Apps hit 4.5 million downloads — Blackboard Inc’s line of educational and campus life apps have been downloaded more than 4.5 million times on iOS and Android.

Mobage network operator DeNA and renowned games developer and publisher Square Enix today announced that the companies will release the hit Japanese game Final Fantasy Airborne Brigade on iOS and Android in the U.S. and Canada. This will mark the first Final Fantasy free-to-play social game to be released in English.

Each player in the game pilots an airship and can form “airborne brigades” with friends to take down powerful bosses, gain experience and acquire skills, all in the signiture style of a Final Fantasy role-playing game.

As. Dr. Serkan Toto recently reported, Final Fantasy Brigade has hit the 3 million user mark in Japan since it launched on Mobage in January, no doubt contributing to DeNA’s record revenues for its Q2 2012.

It’s interesting to note that Square Enix also partnered with DeNA’s primary competitor GREE to publish The Worlds Ends With You and Final Fantasy X GREE in Japan.

DeNA and Square Enix didn’t announce a specific release date but said that the game was coming “soon.” Players who pre-register for the game will be alerted as soon as its released and will also receive a free three-month exclusive in-game card featuring Final Fantasy VII character Cloud.

Mobile developer Brainz today announced that it’s bringing its critically-hailed tower defense/strategy game Vampire Season to GREE’s new platform. However, the game for GREE’s platform will be an enhanced version and will carry the title Vampire Season-Monster Defense.

We liked what we saw when Vampire Season first launched, particularly its goofy narrative and high production values. Now, Vampire Season-Monster Defense will feature new graphics and content. Brainz tells us it’s rebuilt all of the game’s 30 levels and also established a new economy that features two different types of currency, coins and sapphires. Coins are earned via the story mode and can be used to purchase lower-end upgrades, while Sapphires are earned by playing against friends in Survival mode and allow users to purchase the best monster upgrades.

The Colombia-based Brainz originally teamed up with 6waves to distribute Vampire Season earlier this year, but the companies parted ways back in October after 6waves underwent another round of layoffs and dismissed everyone working on the game. As a result, Brainz took the game back, rebalanced its difficulty and changed it to a paid title in mid-October. The move proved surprisingly successful, providing higher player retention and average revenue per daily active user.

When asked if Brainz is planning to continue working with GREE, the company’s Head of Games Jairo Nieto won’t say for sure. However, he does note that, “both teams are working hard to bring a lot more value to our players by leveraging their tremendous experience and our creative approach.  I think we coincide philosophically that the next bets in the mobile ecosystem will be titles with high production values and richer story worlds.  In that sense, we certainly hope to continue working with such an amazing partner.”

A definite release date for Vampire Season-Monster Defense hasn’t been revealed yet, but we’re told the game will be released for both the iOS and Android versions of the GREE platform in the next few weeks.

The Inside Network Job Board is dedicated to providing you with the best social media job opportunities across social and mobile application platforms. Here are this week’s highlights from the Inside Network Job Board, including positions at: Green Dot, Aarki, BrightRoll and more.

Aarki Inc.

• Mobile Advertiser & Publisher Sales
• Ad Ops Campaign Manager & Trafficker

BrightRoll

• Manager, Mobile Business Development
• Campaign Manager (NYC)

GREE International

• Director of UI/UX, Game Studio
• Sr. Analyst, Social Game Platform

Green Dot Corp

• Senior Manager, Social Media

King.com

• Junior Game Designer – Level Designer
• C++ Game Programmer
• Data Scientist – Gaming Analytics
• Analytics Engineer
• Business Manager
• Product Manager (Producer) – Mobile

RadiumOne

• Affiliate Marketing Associate

Relay Network, LLC

• Front End Developer

Triggit

• VP of Product

Today, GREE announced it hired Jim Ying as its new Vice-President of Developer Relations & Business Development. This new position will see Ying overseeing the company’s Developer Relations team; this includes business development, account management, and heading up GREE’s consulting service for developers on GREE’s new mobile platform.

Ying’s a long-standing member of the video game industry, both in North America and in Asia. Most recently, he was with the social mobile developer and publisher 6waves as the company’s SVP of Publishing until he was phased out during the company’s most recent round of staff cuts. During his time with the company he helped oversee 6waves’ transition from social to mobile games, as well as its expansion into Asian territories.

GREE has been making a concentrated push into North American mobile markets recently, with its upcoming mobile platform about to launch and its high-profile “GREE Loves Indies” competition. The company is appealing to many developers right now because of the massive audience it has access to after it acquired OpenFeint for $104 million in 2011. As for OpenFeint itself, though, GREE caught many developers and users off-guard last week when it announced it would be shutting the service down on December 14.

Mobile-social gaming powerhouse GREE revealed last Friday that it will shut down the servers for OpenFeint, a social networking platform for mobile it acquired last year.

Developers were given less than a months notice that the social service would be shutting down on December 14 or slightly later. Basically, developers will have to remove any OpenFeint APIs in their games so there’s “no service disruptions or poor player experience.” All data stored on OpenFeint’s services will be lost if its not migrated. GREE recommends all developers using OpenFeint to migrate to the GREE platform, which the company claims that basic integration takes “less than a week.”

In April 2011, GREE acquired OpenFeint for $104 million. GREE’s competitor DeNA which operates the Mobage mobile-social network currently has some of the top grossing apps including Rage of Bahamut and Blood Brothers.  DeNA recently reported $627 million in revenue for Q2 2012, its highest ever revenues. GREE, on the other hand, released its Q1 2013 earnings that saw revenues drop for a second straight quarter with $466.7 million in net sales.

Mobile-social gaming giant GREE announced today that Tiny Utopia’s Epic Mech Wars is the first “Indie of the Month” contest winner, which is part of the GREE Loves Indies program.

Epic Mech Wars was created by Tiny Utopia founder Neal Nellans and will be available for mobile devices on GREE’s platform this December. The Austin, Texas-based independent studio’s Epic Mech Wars is a player-versus-player simulator where players can customize their own robots to use for battling with other players.

GREE first announced the program in October that’s meant to bring in independent mobile developers and offer them access to GREE’s “worldwide resources and in-depth expertise.”

The Indie of the Month contest is another part of the GREE Loves Indies program, which allows U.S.-based developers to submit their new games to GREE with the opportunity to have them launch on GREE’s platform.

Tiny Utopia will receive four to six weeks of hands-on support from GREE in the form of public relations, resources, game review and optimization, integration, launch and post-launch support.

Developers who submit games to GREE’s program should note that the games and IP control will remain with the developers. GREE will own the application forms, but not the games itself. Developers who want to learn more can read the terms and conditions for the contest here.

GREE will choose two more winners for the contest in December and January.

The heavy costs of GREE’s international expansion and the lingering effects of the kompu gacha ban have taken a bite out of the Japanese giant’s profits. The company’s net profit for Q1 2013 fell 26.3 percent quarter-over-quarter and 3.6 percent year over year to 9.06 billion yen ($111.5 million).

Q1 2013 is GREE’s second straight quarter of declining revenues. Net sales for the period were 37.9 billion yen ($466.7 million) down 5.4 percent from Q4’s 40.08 billion yen ($508.6 million), and 17.9 percent from Q3 2012’s record high of 46.2 billion yen ($578.1 million).

According to GREE’s earnings release, the company’s “monthly net sales bottomed in July” — the month that coinsides with complete phase-out of the kompu gacha sales tactic. The practice, which heavily incentivized the purchase of random virtual goods, was banned by Japan’s Consumer Affairs Agency for encouraging gambling like behavior. However, GREE also reports its monthly net sales are gradually recovering. GREE’s paid services sales were 34.6 billion yen ($426.1 million) for the quarter, up 26 percent year-over-year, with sales increasing month-on-month during the period.

The company’s net profit fell for the second straight quarter, hitting 9.06 billion yen ($111.5 million), down 26.3 percent from Q4 2012’s 12.3 billion yen ($151.4 million), and down 32.4 percent from Q3‘s 13.4 billion yen ($165 million).

The numbers also meant that GREE’s net sales and operating profit have fallen behind arch-rival DeNA, which reported record sales of 50.3 billion yen ($627 million) during the same period. GREE’s operating profit was 15.7 billion yen ($193.3 million) in the quarter ending on September 30, 2012, 23 percent lower than the 20.4 billion yen ($254 million) DeNA earned during the same period.

The company’s advertising sales were 3.3 billion ($40.6 million) during Q1 2013, an increase of 14 percent year-over-year, but lower than they were in Q4 2012, a factor GREE blamed on declining feature phone sales.

GREE’s overall costs were also dramatically higher year-over-year, a factor the company attributed to its aggressive international expansion. GREE’s cost of sales for the quarter was 4.6 billion yen ($56.6 million), up 123 percent year-over-year. Sales, general and administrative costs were 17.4 billion yen ($214.3 million) for the quarter, a 50 percent increase year-over-year due to increased staff and marketing costs.

The company’s forecasts for the 2013 fiscal year are unchanged. GREE expects to see net sales of somewhere between 195 and 205 billion yen for the full year ($2.4 to $2.5 billion), with net profit in the range of 46 to 52 billion yen ($566 to $640 million).

The company’s shares fell 3.65 percent after the news. They are currently trading at 1,373 yen ($16.91).

iPad gamers more likely to convert than iPhone gamers — Mobile cross promotion network Chartboost reports iPad users are twice as likely as iPhone users to download an app after seeing an interstitial ad for it. iPad gamers also play 10 percent more daily sessions than iPhone gamers.

Mobile now 20 percent of Zynga bookings — Zynga’s social gaming business may be struggling, but mobile is growing fast. During this week’s earnings call, CEO Mark Pincus revealed mobile is now responsible for 20 percent of the company’s business.

92 percent of Gogobot users on Facebook — Social travel service Gogobot has revealed 92 percent of its users connect to the service using Facebook. According to our traffic tracking service AppData, the app has 940,000 MAU and 60,000 DAU logging in with Facebook Connect, meaning in total, the service now has somewhere north of 1 million registered users.

MoPub cuts fees for publishers – Real-time mobile advertising bidding service MoPub no longer charges developers a fee when they use the service to broker deals with ad networks, according to TechCrunch. The service, which delivered 18 billion impressions last month, still charges developers that use its service to sell their ads directly.

Red Ronin debuts with Amazing Flying Machines — Former King.com and Atari executive Owais Farooqui has taken the wraps of his new company, bootstrapped mobile developer Red Ronin. The company’s first game is Amazing Flying Machines. The free-to-play game is exclusive to iOS.

Whale Trail devs reveal game is making £250 a day — UK developer ustwo’s quirky indie title Whale Trail has been downloaded more than 1 million times and is making £250 ($402) a day reports The AppSide. That’s roughly $12,000 a month — not a chart topping amount, but nothing to sniff at either.

More currencies supported in the iTunes App Store — Apple has added support for eight new currencies to the iTunes App Store. Developers can now take payments in Rubles, Lire, Rupees, Rupiahs, Israeli New Shekels, the Rial, the Dirham and the Rand.

HTC profits fall 70 percent year-over-year — Taiwanese OEM HTC has posted its Q3 2012 results. The company saw revenues of $70.2 New Taiwan dollars ($2.4 billion) and a net income of NT$3.9 billion ($133 million) — down 79 percent year-over-year. The company predicts its Q4 revenues will be approximately NT$60 billion.

GREE grabs two Square Enix titles — Dr. Serkan Toto reports Square Enix announced two new mobile social games for GREE based on its Final Fantasy and The World Ends With You franchises. Previously the only Final Fantasy branded mobile-social game was the popular Final Fantasy Brigade, an exclusive title on DeNA’s rival Mobage platform.

Toca Boca’s children’s apps hit 16 million downloads – Swedish studio Toca Boca’s line of child-friendly games have been downloaded more than 16 million times, according to The AppSide.

DeNA partners with Yahoo!Kimo to hit Taiwanese market – DeNA announced this week it has signed a partnership with Yahoo!Kimo to create a dedicated mobile games portal where Yahoo!Kimo users will be able to download Mobage games for iOS and Android devices.

[Launch] DeNA gets into the chat market – DeNA is broadening its portfolio. The company has launched a voice and chat application called Comm, available on both iOS and Android. The app is similar to NHN’s popular utility Line, which just passed 90 million users.

[Launch] Square Enix debuts Wizardlings – Square Enix’ newest mobile game is the free-to-play exploration title Wizardlings. The game was developed for Square Enix by Liv Games.

[Launch] Ngmoco’s Quests & Sorcery goes live — DeNA subsidiary Ngmoco has released its latest game, the fantasy-adventure title Quests & Sorcery. The game is free-to-play and available on both iOS and Android.

[Funding] iZettle expands Series B round for American Express — European mobile payments provider iZettle has added an undisclosed amount of funding from American Express to its Series B round, reports TechCrunch. iZettle has raised more than €42.6 in venture capital.

Japanese mobile-social gaming giant GREE has released its first major sports game MLB: Full Deck for iOS, featuring officially licensed Major League Baseball teams and players from MLB.com and the Major League Baseball Player Association.

MLB: Full Deck allows users to build a team of superstar major leaguers from all 30 MLB teams with more than 650 MLB players and challenge their friends, a similar concept to traditional fantasy sports titles. The game also features a Season Mode where players can play against all 30 MLB franchises, train players to improve stats and receive player boosts based on current MLB stats.

Other baseball games in the mobile app ecosystem include Gamevil’s Baseball Superstars 2012, Hothead Games’ Big Win Baseball and Com2uS’ Homerun Battle 3D and 9 Innings: 2013 Pro Baseball.

Com2uS’ 9 Innings: Pro Baseball franchise, in particular, has been a success for the developer with three entries in the series and shares some similarity with MLB: Full Deck in that both titles have officially licensed players from the MLBPA, but 9 Innings: Pro Baseball 2013 doesn’t have the official license for MLB franchises like GREE’s game. According to our traffic tracking service AppData, 9 Innings: Pro Baseball 2013 is ranked No. 75 in the top free app games genre on iOS and ranked No. 4 in the sports game genre on Android.