There’s a deluge of new data and research to wade through in the mobile games business. Our regular data digest column breaks it all down into digestible chunks.
Read on for the numbers you need to know about minus the fluff.
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Squad Busters hits 4.3m downloads after two weeks of soft launch
Data firm Appmagic estimates that Supercell’s Squad Busters has already accumulated over 4.3m installs from a little over two weeks in soft launch. It has hit the total despite only being available in Canada, Finland, Denmark, Norway, Sweden, Spain, Mexico and Singapore currently. The game’s global launch is set for May 29.
Moon Active buys $50m stake in Spyke Games
Tech.eu reports that Turkish studio Spyke Games has scored around $50m in investment. This cash has come from Moon Active, who will own 15.86% of the developer. This follows a $55m seed funding round that the Tile Busters firm had secured from Griffin Gaming Partners in January 2022.
51% of players allow iOS tracking
AppsFlyer reports a substantial increase in the number of gamers allowing data firms to track them, three year’s after Apple rolled out App Tracking Transparency (ATT).
51% of gaming app users have given their approval to allow the iPhone giant to track them when prompted, a 10% increase from when the initiative was first rolled out in April 2021, says AppsFlyer.
Meanwhile – as of Q1 2024 – 84% of game developers in the iOS ecosystem have adopted ATT and have shown the prompt to their users. That’s a 16% increase on the number of studios that were on board when ATT was released.
Priest spends $40k of church money on Candy Crush and Mario Kart
A Pennsylvanian Catholic priest has found himself in hot water after it was revealed that he spent over $40,000 of his church’s money on mobile games.
As spotted by Pocket Gamer, The Philadelphia Inquirer reports that Reverend Lawrence Kozak splashed out this sum over three years on the likes of Candy Crush and Mario Kart. He has been charged with theft, among other crimes.
40-49 year-olds are the most engaged mobile gamers
Adjoe’s newly released Mobile Games Index 2024 report predicts that the industry will bring in $166.1bn in 2024, a figure that is set to rise to $227bn by 2028. This annual revenue growth is due to increased time spent playing games.
Adjoe reports that on average, people are spending 21.5 minutes playing games on their phone, compared to 17.3 minutes in 2022.
40-to-49 year-olds are the most engaged demographic, who now play for an average of 23 minutes per day – that’s a 33% increase year-on-year. Adjoe’s research also estimates that revenue from card games could double between 2024 and 2028, driven mostly by the success of solitaire titles.
Apple drops Core Technology Fee for EU devs earning under €10m annually
Apple has made some changes to its Core Technology Fee (CTF) initiative to include some exemptions for smaller developers.
Developers whose apps don’t generate any revenue now don’t have to pay the fee, and smaller developers making less than €10m in annual revenue, can have three ‘free’ years before they have to pay the CTF.
Apple’s new App Store terms were announced in January, and were created to satisfy the EU’s Digital Markets Act, which has forced Apple to allow alternative app stores and payments outside of its own ecosystem.
Apple made $23.9bn in Q2 services revenue
In other Apple news, the iPhone giant saw overall revenue dip 4% year-on-year for its second quarter running, but services revenue, a large chunk of which is IAP revenue from games, is soaring.
The company brought in $90.8bn in total revenue during Q2, while services clocked in at $28.87bn, a 14% increase year-on-year.
This offset declines in almost every other vertical; iPhone revenue saw a 10.4% decline, falling to $45.96bn, while iPad revenue dipped 16.65%. The only other division to see growth was Mac, which rose 3.9%.
Liberty Pixel lands $1m in pre-seed funding
GamingOnPhone reports that Israeli studio Liberty Pixel has scored $1m in pre-seed funding. Spring Ventures led the investment with Journey Ventures also participating. Liberty Pixel says it will use this cash to fund the development of premium casual mobile titles.
App Store feature drove 1.5m impressions to Run Legends
According to a LinkedIn post by Talofa Games CEO Jenny Xu, being featured on the App Store twice drove 1.5m impressions to the newly-released running game. Appmagic estimates that the game has seen around 108k installs so date, so the conversion rate here is very low.
Rush Royale pays creators $500k
MyGames has announced that it has now awarded creators around $500k as part of the Rush Royale Content Creators Program, which launched at the end of 2022. The scheme rewards creators with early playtests, a closed Discord server, developer access and other perks.
EA Mobile down in FY24, with cautious outlook
As we reported earlier today, EA revealed mobile net bookings of $1.187bn in its FY24 results, down 5% year-over-year, with $298m in net bookings for Q4 24 (down 10%).
EA’s net bookings for FY24 overall were up 1% year-over-year to $7.430bn (up 3% in constant currency). Q4 24 net bookings were $1.666bn, down 14% YoY.
