Wazap!

For the Budweiser commercial, see Whassup?.
Wazap!
Public
Industry Gaming, Search Engine
Founded Berlin, Germany (April 2004)
Founders Andreas Rührig & Timo Meyer
Headquarters Los Angeles, California, U.S.
Divisions Wazap DE. Wazap JP, Wazap CN
Slogan All about Games
Website Wazap!

Wazap! is a vertical search engine, video game database and social networking site to distribute gaming news, rankings, cheats, downloads and reviews. As a vertical search engine, it indexes gaming sites and categorizes the information as news, reviews, cheats, downloads, previews and articles. Wazap uses a search algorithm, developed internally, to rank indexed pages according to their relevance. Further relevance to the Search engine results page (SERP) is obtained from user interactivity. Users can "Top" or "Flop" any of the results on the SERP and influence its relevance. Wazap's "bot" or "crawler" finds gaming related sites across the internet and tags pages according to the pre-defined categories. They also use a user submission tool. Wazap combines internal proprietary information with their indexed gaming-related information from the web. The results obtained are then accessibly displayed according to the derived quality, publisher submissions, user popularity and preference.

History

Wazap first launched in Japan as a community website for gamers. Initially a mix of gaming news and user generated content, Wazap was then brought into a larger, more global role of gaming search and information distribution. Wazap AG had two regions at launch, Wazap (JP) and Wazap (DE). Both officially launched in 2004 with Japan first and then Berlin, Germany shortly thereafter.[1] In November 2006, Wazap launched Wazap (CN) in China. The US version of Wazap launched in June 2007.[2][3]

Origin of the name

The origin of the name "Wazap" has historical relevance to both Japanese and English languages. "Wazap" is a combination of the word "Waza" and the English word for "up." In Japanese, "Waza" means "technique." Judokas, apprentices of the martial art of Judo, may connect the term with another word. For example, "waza-ari" means "technique existent." The two words "waza" and "up" were similarly combined to create a new word which means "to improve, to reach/aim higher."

Features

Wazap's ranking system works dynamically with user-generated content. Results are presented based on quality and user popularity.

Gaming Web Search

Wazap's Gaming Web Search uses two methods to find video game content on the web. Firstly it uses an automated web crawler to find and index gaming content. It gathers information from gaming content sites, from gaming blogs, forums and independent news sources. Secondly, Wazap accepts user submissions. Each user submission, pending approval by the content filter, is added to the search index. Once a page is indexed, it is tagged for content and type. Wazap's web search algorithm determines whether the page is a gaming review or preview, a media item like a demo, video, mod or patch, a cheat or a news item. Based upon these tags, a search query will automatically filter the search results and display them on the Search engine results page (SERP). This Site has been closed now and re-directs to Japanese page.

Wazap uses a dynamic XML structure which generates an automatic RSS feed based upon the search query. When users search Wazap's web search, they can add the RSS feed to any RSS reader. As Wazap indexes gaming content that's relevant to their search query, that new information will be distributed to the user's RSS reader.

Game Database

Wazap's Game Database contains over 10,000 video games. As new games are announced and as older games are cataloged, the game database is a constantly growing feature. Wazap organizes the database by game console and genre.

Platform Genre Sorting Field
PC games Action games Popularity
Xbox 360 RPG Sales
PlayStation 3 Strategy games Name
Wii Entertainment Games Release Date
PlayStation 2 Adventure games Recently Released
Xbox Sports games Available Soon
Nintendo GameCube (GC) Simulation games
PlayStation Portable (PSP) Platform games
Nintendo DS Racing games
Game Boy Advance (GBA) Children's games
PlayStation (PS)
Macintosh
Linux
Sega Saturn
Game Boy Color (GBC)
Nintendo 64 (N64)
Dreamcast DC
Nokia N-Gage
Game Boy (GB)
Sega Genesis

Each game is organized to display the cover art of the game, an aggregation of ratings from multiple review sources and user rankings. Users can then comment on the game, find related games and browse the top results from Wazap's web search organized into cheats, news, articles, downloads and natural web results.

Community

Registered users can create profiles noting their games of choice, game ratings given and bookmarked favorites.

Another social component of Wazap's site is the commenting feature. Registered users can provide opinions, commentary, reviews, previews, evaluations and analysis.

User Influenced Search

Wazap also uses user activity to determine the order of the search results. As users search for information, they select "Top" or "Flop". Based on the user's response to the search result, multiple "Flops" could result in the site's decrease in the order of search results. Similarly, multiple "Tops" from users can bring more relevant content to the top of the page.

Algorithmic Search

Wazap uses an algorithm to determine the order of results on the search page. This algorithm measures multiple aspects of the individual page to determine the page's content. The algorithm then determines what the applicable keywords on the page are and what position the page will result when those keywords are searched.

Reviews and rating system

Games are categorized on a sliding percentage scale ranging (0-100%). This rating method is applicable to specific game titles across multiple platforms and the registered user can only vote on any chosen item once to ensure unique results.

News items, articles and search results are categorized and ranked using the top 'TOP/FLOP' voting feature.

Two types of scores are displayed within the Games Database. The first is the aggregate of various gaming publication reviews while the other is solely the aggregate of Wazap! users' scores and votes.

Executives

Awards

In 2007, Wazap AG (Germany) earned a 2007 Red Herring Award - European Division.[5] The Red Herring award is noted as a valuable tool in measuring companies that will serve as leaders of innovation in the field of technology.

References

External links

This article is issued from Wikipedia - version of the Saturday, April 30, 2016. The text is available under the Creative Commons Attribution/Share Alike but additional terms may apply for the media files.