• by Shankar Gupta , December 22, 2006

Casual game site ProGames this week began offering free, ad-supported game titles from mobile game company Greystripe. With the initiative, users will be able to either download them to their PCs and transfer them to their phones or visit a WAP site and download the games directly to their phones.

Under the partnership, ProGames will distribute Greystripe's roughly 350 free ad-supported mobile games--including casino games, shoot-'em-ups, puzzle games, and adventure games--from 40 publishers to their users.

The syndication deal is a first for Greystripe, which intends to use it to test future partnerships, said Andy Choi, chief technology officer and co-founder. "We're looking at it as a prototype for what we're going to do in the future," he said. "We can let anyone take our catalogue of mobile games and white label them, and put them on their sites."

The mobile games--which usually average in price around $5--are free with Greystripe's service, and are monetized by simple pre- and post-roll ads that appear every time the game is played. The spots are direct call-to-action ads, including click-to-call, click-to-browse, and click-to-survey, said Choi. Greystripe initially launched its ad network in May, with clients including Zagat Survey, Modtones, and GPShopper. New clients include Progressive Insurance and Atlantic Records.