Every Wednesday we break down the latest data, research and financial results into digestible chunks.
Read on for the numbers you need to know about minus the fluff.
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Mobile net bookings down again at EA
EA’s mobile business posted a third consecutive drop in its quarterly and full fiscal year net bookings yesterday.
The publishing giant’s Q4 and full year FY25 results show steady decline in its mobile portfolio, as above, with Q4 mobile revenue coming in at $288m, down 3% YoY. FY25 mobile revenue was $1.15bn, down 3% compared to FY24.
EA did, however, mention FC Mobile as a bright spot, stating that new player acquisition and daily active users were up over 20% year-over-year due to “hyperculturalization” and a web store launch last quarter.
Roblox DAU up 26%, net bookings rise 31%, losses shrink
Roblox’s latest financials show the UGC platform’s continued growth, posting rises in DAU, net bookings and shrinking losses. But it’s still posting modest profitability as measured by EBITDA of $58m for the last quarter. The numbers in short:
- Revenue was $1.035bn, up 29% YoY, up 30% YoY on a constant currency basis
- Bookings: $1.206bn, up 31% YoY, up 33% YoY on a constant currency basis
- Net loss attributable to common stockholders was $215.1m; consolidated net loss was $216.3m
- Adjusted EBITDA was $58m, excluding $147.1m in deferred revenue and deferred cost of revenue
- Net cash and cash equivalents of $443.9m, up 86% YoY; free cash flow of $426.5m, up 123% YoY
- Average DAU of 97.8m, up 26% YoY
- Average monthly unique payers of 20.2m, up 29% YoY
- Average bookings per monthly unique payer of $19.92
- Hours engaged of 21.7bn, up 30% YoY
- Average bookings per DAU (“ABPDAU”) was $12.34, up 4% YoY, up 6% YoY on a constant currency basis
Roblox said investments it has made in its virtual economy, search and discovery were the main factors driving revenue growth.
Merge-2 revenue up 110% YoY
The worldwide merge-2 market saw Q1 revenue growth of 110% year-over-year and 21% quarter-over-quarter.
That’s according to a market overview published by Appmagic, which also reveals the top 10 merge-2 games by revenue in the first three months of 2025.
Gossip Harbor took the top spot with quarterly earnings of $105m (+35% QoQ), ahead of Travel Town – Merge Adventure with $68m (+9% QoQ) and Seaside Escape: Merge & Story with $58m (+33% QoQ).
TV celebs driving 2x the IPM of movie stars
Marketing and analytics firm AppsFlyer’s latest State of Creative Optimization report includes an analysis of the impact celebrities have in mobile game advertising.
While movie actors capture 80–90% of celebrity spend across all channels, they were outperformed by TV and music personalities in several key metrics. For example, TV stars delivered 2x the IPM (installs per 1,000 impressions) of film stars. And influencer-led creatives saw up to 28% D7 retention versus up to 19% for movie stars.
When it came to gender, male accounted for 61.3% of celebrity spend on ad networks, 51.1% on DSPs, and 75.4% on social and search. Despite this imbalance, IPMs between genders were comparable, and female stars actually achieved slightly higher D7 retention on social and search.
Looking at role type, brief celebrity appearances drove the highest IPM by far on ad networks at 9.8, despite receiving just 9% of overall spend. In contrast, main focus celebrity roles commanded 59% of spend but delivered IPM of 2.5.
On social and search, supporting roles accounted for 55.9% of celebrity spend and delivered D7 retention of 13.2%. Main focus roles accounted for 24.6% of overall spend but drove D7 retention of 17.5%. And brief appearances made up 19.5% of celebrity spend and achieved D7 retention of 8.7%.
After Dream Games launched what is likely the most expensive celebrity mobile game ad campaign ever, we looked into how much stars are getting paid for their appearances, with one source suggesting LeBron James could have earned up to $4m for his Royal Kingdom ad.
Liftoff valued at $4.3bn after General Atlantic investment
General Atlantic is to acquire a minority stake in Liftoff from Blackstone for an undisclosed sum.
The deal values the growth platform at $4.3bn and is expected to close in mid-2025. Following its completion, long-time investor Blackstone will remain Liftoff’s majority shareholder.
D30 ROAS for casual games is 47% on iOS, but 15% on Android
Liftoff has published the latest edition of its Casual Gaming Apps Report, based on data collected by Singular from February 2024 to February 2025.
It found that the average D30 ROAS for casual games (including hypercasual titles) was 47% on iOS and 15% on Android.
The highest D30 ROAS for any genre was 80% for sports games on iOS, followed by kids games (66%) and strategy titles (60%), also both on iOS. Action was the only genre where the D30 ROAS was greater on Android (35%) than it was on iOS (16%).
Elsewhere, Singular found that casual games had the highest CTR of any genre, at 9.4% on Android and 8.8% on iOS.
CTR rates were also higher on Android for simulation titles, kids games, strategy titles and tabletop games. iOS led when it came to puzzle, action, sports, casino and RPG.
Average IPM were higher on Android than on iOS across the board, with casual games leading the way. IPM for casual games was 7.1 on Android and 3.5 on iOS.
IPM for kids games came in at 6.1 on Google’s platform and 4.3 on Apple’s. And IPM for simulation titles was 6 on Android and 1.4 on iOS.
Average CPI was found to be higher on iOS for all genres. The highest CPI on Apple’s platform was for casino games at $21.03, and on Android the highest CPI was $4.29 for RPGs.
The average CPI for casual games was $1.41 on iOS and $0.14 on Android.
Based on Liftoff’s own data from the same tracking period, approximately half of casual game installs came from ads placed in hypercasual (29%) and puzzle (21%) games.
Tabletop (13%) was the next largest source for causal game installs, followed by match and simulation (both 10%).
Krafton posts record quarterly sales of $633m
PUBG maker Krafton has reported record high quarterly sales of ₩874.2bn ($633m) for Q1. That’s up 41.6% quarter-over-quarter and 31.3% year-over-year.
The firm also posted record high quarterly operating profit of ₩457.3bn ($331m), an increase of 112.2% quarter-over-quarter and 47.3% year-over-year.
Mobile accounted for approximately 60.9% of total sales, PC for 37% and console for 1.5%. Mobile revenue for Q1 came in at ₩532.4bn ($384.8m), which was up 47% quarter-over-quarter and 32.3% year-over-year.
Krafton attributed the record results to the ongoing strength of PUBG, which surpassed 1.4m concurrent users in March. The Sims rival inZOI also became the South Korean firm’s fastest-selling title ever. During the quarter, Krafton acquired a majority stake in Nautilus Mobile, the Indian gaming studio behind the Real Cricket IP.
