New Rules: Mobile Game Industry Adopting New Strategy

2018’s biggest gaming titles revealed evolutions in the iOS mobile gaming market. From subscriptions and intellectual property to ad revenue and cross-platform promotions, take a closer look at the changing gaming landscape, and see what the future holds for the industry.

THE BIGGEST YEAR

Whether you consider yourself a hardcore Fortnite player or you just enjoy a game of Candy Crush from time to time, it’s hard to deny that 2018 has been an incredible year in the world of mobile gaming. This year, more than 2.3 billion of us have tapped, shook, and flicked our smartphones and 46% of us - 1.1 billion have spent money paying for premium addons. That’s not all - for the first time ever, we’ve helped mobile gaming take over desktop and console gaming, with tablet and smartphone gaming increasing more than 25% and adding an eye-watering $70.3 billion to the coffers of big names and independents.

Interestingly, it’s not just the United States and Western markets that have been spending big money on their favorite games. China comes out on top of the Game Revenues Ranking, spending an incredible $37.9 billion on mobile games this year. The US and Japan follow in second and third on mobile spend, splashing out $30.4 billion and $19.2 billion respectively. European markets are catching up, too, with Germans spending close to $5 billion this year on iPhone and Android games, while South Korea spent $5.6 billion on mobile games and add-ons.

With smartphone adoption at its highest level (32.3% of citizens worldwide have a phone) since records began, and affordable smartphone manufacturers dominating the mobile market, more and more of us have access to the Google Play Store and App Store and are spending our hard-earned cash on entertainment. Huawei, for example, is set to grow to $100 billion in revenue before the New Year after investing in marketing around the world, and is not only challenging the likes of Samsung and Apple but is providing consumers in both Asian and Western markets with low-cost, high-powered phones suitable for gaming.