A New Way to Promote Your App on Google Play

Posted by Michael Siliski, Product Management Director, Google Play

Google Play now reaches more than 1 billion people on Android devices in more than 190 countries, helping a growing number of developers like you build successful global businesses. In fact, in the past year, we paid more than $7 billion to developers distributing apps and games on Google Play. We remain as committed as ever to making Google Play the best place to find great apps, games and other entertainment.

App discovery plays a critical role in driving your continued success, and over the past year Google has provided best practices to enhance app discovery and engagement, as well as app promotion tools to get the most out of search and display advertising for developers. We are always looking for new ways to help you get your apps in front of potential new users. That’s why, in the next few weeks, we will begin piloting sponsored search results on Google Play, bringing our unique expertise in search ads to the store.

With more than 100 billion searches every month on Google.com, we’ve seen how search ads shown next to organic search results on Google.com can significantly improve content discovery for users and advertisers, both large and small. Search ads on Google Play will enable developers to drive more awareness of their apps and provide consumers new ways to discover apps that they otherwise might have missed.

In the coming weeks, a limited set of users will begin to see ads from a pilot group of advertisers who are already running Google search ads for their apps. We’ll have more to share in the coming months about the expansion of this program as we look at the results and feedback. We believe search ads will be a useful addition to Google Play for users and developers alike, and we hope this will bring even more success to our developer community.

Bringing apps to the workplace with Google Play for Work

Posted by Matt Goodridge, Google Play team

Work doesn’t just happen in an office from 9 to 5 anymore. Today’s workers are mobile workers, and they need to be able to get things done as efficiently and collaboratively as possible, at any time. That’s why the Android for Work initiative is bringing together partners across the ecosystem, from device and app makers to networking and management solutions, to provide businesses with a secure, flexible and reliable mobility platform that users already know and love.

Google Play for Work allows businesses to securely deploy and manage enterprise-grade apps, across all of their users running Android for Work. Google Play for Work simplifies the process of distributing apps to employees and ensures that IT approves every deployed app. For developers, this is an opportunity to reach a new audience at scale through bulk installs or purchasing, which enables easy installation of your app across enterprises.

How to join Google Play for Work

Free apps will be available on Google Play for Work at launch with no action needed on your part. If you have a paid app, you’ll soon be able to opt-in to make your app available for bulk purchase on Google Play for Work in the Developer Console during the app publishing process. Find out more about publishing in the Google Play Developer Help Center.

Designing great apps for Android for Work

Apps that are installed from Google Play for Work will function without code changes. However, please note that some of the controls that Android for Work offers IT admins could affect how your app works. To ensure the best possible experience for your users, watch the first in our series of Android for Work DevBytes below to understand the best practices you should be following in developing your app.





More DevBytes will be posted to our YouTube channel soon. Find out more about Android for Work.

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SBK14 Official Mobile Game 1.4.4 APK

Dorna WSBK and Digital Tales has released a brand new racing game SBK14 for Android. The game was first announced on the iOS App Store and now available on Google Play Store. It's a realistic racing game with 3D graphics and offers the player with 27 real-world racers, 13 recreated tracks, and 16 teams including the likes of Kawasaki Racing and Ducati Superbike.

SBK14 Official Mobile Game is the official mobile game of the Superbike World Championship. If you're a fan of FIM Superbike into digital video games, then this new Android mobile game may just appeal to you. And if you've had a secret dream to become world’s elite riders, then all the more you should have this on your mobile device. Get ready for SBK14, where you'll riding the most powerful bikes from the best motorcycle brands in the world and compete on real tracks.

Here's a quick look at the features of the game, which you can download on the Google Play Store:
• 27 life-like riders competing for their countries and 16 racing teams, including Aprilia Racing, BMW Motorrad Italia, Kawasaki Racing, PATA Honda and Ducati Superbike
• 13 faithfully recreated tracks featured in the eni FIM Superbike World Championship
• 9 control sets, offering a highly customizable gaming experience
• Console-quality graphics with dynamic lighting

EXCLUSIVE ANDROID OFFER: unlock the full version of SBK14 and get SBK15 for free when it is released later this year!

So are you ready to become the best rider in the SBK14? While the game is free to download and play, be aware that it also contains in-game purchases. And if you can't grab this racing game, there’s an SBK14 APK below for those of you who don’t download it from the Play Store.

Download APK
Requires Android: 4.0.3+
File: 13MB (SBK14 APK)

We'll see you at GDC 2015!

Posted by Greg Hartrell, Senior Product Manager of Google Play Games

The Game Developers Conference (GDC) is less than one week away in San Francisco. This year we will host our annual Developer Day at West Hall and be on the Expo floor in booth #502. We’re excited to give you a glimpse into how we are helping mobile game developers build successful businesses and improve user experiences.

Our Developer Day will take place in Room 2006 of the West Hall of Moscone Center on Monday, March 2. We're keeping the content action-oriented with a few presentations and lightning talks, followed by a full afternoon of hands on hacking with Google engineers. Here’s a look at the schedule:

Opening Keynote || 10AM: We’ll kick off the day by sharing to make your games more successful with Google. You’ll hear about new platforms, new tools to make development easier, and ways to measure your mobile games and monetize them.

Running A Successful Games Business with Google || 10:30AM: Next we’ll hear from Bob Meese, the Global Head of Games Business Development from Google Play, who’ll offer some key pointers on how to make sure you're best taking advantage of unique tools on Google Play to grow your business effectively.

Lightning Talks || 11:15AM: Ready to absorb all the opportunities Google has to offer your game business? These quick, 5-minute talks will cover everything from FlatBuffers to Google Cast to data interpolation. To keep us on track, a gong may be involved.

Code Labs || 1:30PM: After lunch, we’ll turn the room into a classroom setting where you can participate in a number of self-guided code labs focused on leveraging Analytics, Google Play game services, Firebase and VR with Cardboard. These Code Labs are completely self-paced and will be available throughout the afternoon. If you want admission to the code labs earlier, sign up for Priority Access here!

Also, be sure to check out the Google booth on the Expo floor to get hands on experiences with Project Tango, Niantic Labs and Cardboard starting on Wednesday, March 4. Our teams from AdMob, AdWords, Analytics, Cloud Platform and Firebase will also be available to answer any of your product questions.

For more information on our presence at GDC, including a full list of our talks and speaker details, please visit g.co/dev/gdc2015. Please note that these events are part of the official Game Developer's Conference, so you will need a pass to attend. If you can't attend GDC in person, you can still check out our morning talks on our livestream at g.co/dev/gdc-livestream.

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Android Developer Story: GinLemon - Breaking through with Google Play

Posted by Letitia Lago, Google Play team

It’s not often that a developer is born from a summer holiday joke and a parent’s love of furniture making. But this is exactly how Vincenzo Colucci started GinLemon, a successful app business on Google Play.

The choice of Android was an obvious one to Vincenzo, although he didn’t have experience with Android development at the start — he learned it by downloading the tools and playing with the examples.

From his original scratch card app, to the global success of Smart Launcher, Vincenzo is proof that great apps can come from personal passion and the willingness to do something a little different.

Find out more about Vincenzo’s journey in this video.

Vincenzo and the team he has built around Smart Launcher are working on a major update, which will be free and they hope to release in March. They also have Smart Locker, a series of lock screens with some unique features, in development and other projects in the pipeline.

To learn about creating apps for Google Play and building your own app business, check out The Secrets to App Success on Google Play [ebook], a detailed playbook on the best practices and tools you can use to maximize the reach, retention, and revenue of your new app.

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Need for Speed No Limits 1.0.13 APK

Electronic Arts (EA) has released Need For Speed: No Limits for Android. The game is coming exclusively to mobile, and it's already available for Beta in Netherlands and The Taiwan. You can check it out on the Google Play Store now, and there’s an APK below for those of you who don’t grab it from the Play Store.

If you like racing games on your mobile device, this new Android game may just appeal to you. Need for Speed No Limits lets you drive real-world cars to through rush-hour traffic in Car Delivery, Time Trial and Duel modes, as you work your way up the street racing career ladder.

Need for Speed No Limits is free to play and promises player with over 250 million combinations of parts, including the latest licensed body kits from Rocket Bunny, Mad Mike, and Vaughn Gittin Jr. You can use it to build your dream machine and dominate the competition.

While the game is free to download and play, be aware that it also contains in-game purchases. The game launched a few days ago and is about 15MB in size of APK file with as many as 5,000 installs. The current version for Need For Speed: No Limits is 1.0.13. Android 4.0.3 or higher is required to play.

Download APK
Requires Android: 4.0.3+
File: 15MB (Need for Speed No Limits APK)

Jolly Jam 3.1 APK

The creators of Angry Birds, Rovio have launched a new fruity Match 3 game called Jolly Jam to the Google Play Store. The game is similar to the popular Candy Crush, where you have to a grid of candies, or in this case ‘jellies’, to connect together to eliminate them from the board. You can check it out on the market now, and there’s an APK below for those of you who don’t grab it from the Play Store.

Much like the puzzle game out there with a grid of candies series, this new entry in the franchise allows you to match 3 of the same jellies to get points and move to the next level. It's not too easy which makes you think cause it's not like candy crush where you swap candy. You actually have to find pairs and line then from corners.

A great game of jelly 'wipeout' that gives a different and challenging twist of matching jellies to wipe them out. The game itself has colorful graphics and effects that get you hooked on this game. Here's a quick look at the features of the game:
• Strategically match your fruit jelly in a box and battle monsters to advance to the next level
• Create epic combo attacks and boosters to unleash colorful explosions
• Travel across Jelly Kingdom, from Lemonade Lake to Chocolate Mountains and beyond
• Challenge friends and other Jam Masters worldwide
• Hundreds of succulent levels; with more planned in the future

So, let's play Jolly Jam! Just match jellies of the same color to complete a square or rectangle. On some levels, you even got to stay within the lines of a section of jellies.

While the game is free to download and play, be aware that it also contains in-game purchases. You can download Jolly Jam APK by clicking the download button below.

Download APK
Android version: 4.0+
File: 19.7MB (Jolly Jam 3.1 APK)