The people that brought you Kim Kardashian: Hollywood are going back to Hollywood in search of its next hit, and you’re going to hear it roar.
Katy Perry, who is coming off a halftime performance at the Super Bowl, is teaming up with mobile game developer Glu for a new game. The developer announced today that it will build a new free-to-play around the performer. It would feature her “voice, likeness, and personality,” according to Glu. The studio said it plans to release the Katy Perry game later this year on iOS and Android. The mobile gaming market is worth $25 billion, and Glu started making gains over the last year with the help of Kardashian’s app. The company wants to re-create that success with another starlet.
Glu’s experience with Kardashian makes it well suited to finding that success with Perry. The company took reality-television star Kardashian’s online popularity and turned it into a game that made hundreds of millions of dollars.
In a statement, Glu chief executive officer Niccolo de Masi said that Perry is “arguably the most recognized musician in America,” and he pointed to the artist’s Super Bowl show as the event that catapulted her to new heights.
“She is a cultural icon and we expect to translate key elements of her success into an innovative, highly entertaining mobile experience,” said de Masi. “We anticipate that Katy’s significant global audience, including more than 170 million fans on social media, will make her a strong gaming partner for Glu.”
Perry has 77.1 million followers on Facebook, 64.6 million on Twitter, 14.2 million on Instagram, and 14.9 million on Vevo. That kind of viral following makes her ideal for a game company looking to capitalize on fame.
More than 118 million people watched Perry at the Super Bowl — although, weirdly, I was watching for the football … or maybe Missy Elliott. And it’s hard to deny that Perry is an international superstar. She has had multiple No. 1 pop hits. She is the only female artist to have five No. 1 singles from one album on the Billboard Hot 100 chart.