2015
Company
Documents about 2015
China Walls Itself Off From Foreign Mobile Games: Market Share Analysis 2016
The mobile gaming landscape in China experienced a significant shift between 2014 and 2016, characterized by a marked decline in the market share of foreign-developed titles.
- Foreign-developed mobile games saw their share of top 250 downloads in China drop from 39% in 2014 to 25% in 2016.
- Domestically developed games dominated the Chinese market, increasing their share of top 250 downloads from 61% in 2014 to 75% in 2016.
- The decline of foreign games is driven by the rapid expansion of domestic giants like Tencent and NetEase, who produce titles better aligned with local cultural and aesthetic preferences.
Turnover Generated by Game Apps for Smartphones and Tablets: Germany 2017
The German games industry experienced significant growth in the mobile sector during the first half of 2016, with turnover from smartphone and tablet game apps rising by 27 percent to reach 208 million euros.
- Turnover for smartphone and tablet game apps in Germany reached 208 million euros in the first half of 2016, representing a 27% year-on-year increase from 164 million euros in the first half of 2015.
- The total German market for computer and video games grew by 10% in the first half of 2016, generating 971 million euros in total turnover.
- Microtransactions for virtual goods and additional content are the primary growth drivers for mobile game apps, with segment turnover rising 30% to 199 million euros, while direct sales of game apps fell from 11 million to 9 million euros.
German Market for Computer and Video Games: First Half 2017
The German computer and video games market experienced significant growth during the first half of 2016, with total turnover reaching 971 million euros.
- The German computer and video game market generated 971 million euros in revenue during the first half of 2016, representing a 10 percent increase over the 884 million euros recorded in the same period of 2015.
- Revenue from virtual goods and additional content, driven by microtransactions and free-to-play titles, grew by 20 percent to reach 317 million euros.
- Expenditure on fee-based online networks, such as PlayStation Plus and Xbox Live Gold, saw a significant 144 percent increase, rising from 21 million euros in the first half of 2015 to 51 million euros in the first half of 2016.
Approximately 9 Million Germans Pre-order Computer and Video Games
Pre-ordering computer and video games has become a significant consumer behavior in Germany, with approximately 9 million individuals—representing one in four gamers—securing titles prior to their official release.
- Approximately 9 million Germans, representing 26% of all gamers, pre-order computer and video games to ensure access on the official release date.
- Online platforms are the primary channel for pre-orders, utilized by 23% of gamers, while traditional brick-and-mortar retail accounts for only 4% of pre-orders.
- Digital download platforms accounted for 33% of all PC and console game unit sales in 2015.
New Digimeter Report: Mobile Gaming Takes First Place
The 2016 Digimeter report, conducted by imec and led by Professor Lieven De Marez of Ghent University, provides a comprehensive analysis of digital media adoption and gaming trends within Flanders.
- Mobile phones have become the primary gaming platform in Flanders, with 34% of the population playing mobile games as of 2016.
- Mobile gaming adoption grew from 30.4% in 2015 to 33.2% in 2016, while desktop/laptop gaming dropped from 31.2% to 24.4% and console gaming fell from 14.8% to 11.4%.
- The percentage of the population using mobile phones as their exclusive gaming device increased significantly from 6.9% in 2015 to 11.2% in 2016.
Top Mobile Games of 2016: Pokémon GO Conquered Clash Royale
The mobile gaming industry experienced significant growth throughout 2016, characterized by a 70 percent year-over-year revenue increase in the fourth quarter, which generated approximately $7.5 billion globally.
- Worldwide mobile game revenue reached approximately $7.5 billion in Q4 2016, representing a 70% year-over-year growth compared to $4.4 billion in Q4 2015.
- Mobile games accounted for over 80% of all revenue on the Apple App Store and 90% of revenue on Google Play throughout 2016.
- Pokémon GO became the highest-earning new launch of 2016 and the year's most-downloaded game, setting records for the biggest launch in mobile history.
Three Mobile User Acquisition Megatrends in 2017
The presentation titled Three Mobile User Acquisition Megatrends in 2017, delivered at the Pocket Gamer Connects conference in London on January 16, 2017, serves as a strategic outlook for the mobile gaming industry.
- The provided document serves as a landing page for a presentation titled 'Three Mobile User Acquisition Megatrends for 2017' delivered by Eric Benjamin Seufert at the Pocket Gamer Connects conference on January 16, 2017.
- The report content does not contain the specific text or data points regarding the three identified megatrends.
- The source material functions as a directory for industry commentary and resources rather than a standalone summary of the 2017 trends themselves.
Finding Lost & Found: Designer's Notes from the Process of Creating a Jewish Game for Learning
Lost & Found is a cooperative-competitive strategy game, later paired with a party-game companion, designed to teach medieval Jewish law, specifically Maimonides' laws of lost property in the Mishneh Torah (1180) and related Talmudic sources such as Sanhedrin 17b and Kiddushin 29a.
- The game Lost & Found, developed by Owen Gottlieb through ConverJent at CLAL starting in 2011, teaches medieval Jewish law on lost property drawn from Maimonides' Mishneh Torah (1180) and Talmudic sources such as Sanhedrin 17b and Kiddushin 29a.
- The central design challenge was balancing the law's tension between communal obligation and protecting individuals from undue burden, which the team judged existing cooperative and 'coopetition' models such as Pandemic and Shadows Over Camelot could not adequately capture.
- Key mechanics included win conditions requiring cooperative construction of communal goals alongside individual family goals, hidden progress tracks, multiple win states including an all-lose outcome, and redefining winning as 'living a good life' through secret 'Acts of Meaning.'
Collecting, Preserving, and Interpreting the History of Electronic Games: An Interview with Jon-Paul C. Dyson
The International Center for the History of Electronic Games at The Strong, a museum in Rochester, New York, has grown from fewer than 100 items in 2006 to a collection exceeding 60,000 games and related artifacts.
- The International Center for the History of Electronic Games at The Strong in Rochester, New York, has grown from fewer than 100 items in 2006 to a collection exceeding 60,000 games and related artifacts, and draws more than 550,000 visitors annually.
- Director Jon-Paul C. Dyson argues that electronic games are uniquely hard to preserve because they depend on obsolete hardware, fragile storage media, and social play contexts that are easily lost.
- The museum's five-part preservation strategy covers original hardware and software, published materials and archival records from industry figures, gameplay recorded on original equipment, and source code preservation with file migration, with digitization occurring only after items are stabilized and cataloged.
If You Are Feeling Bold, Ask for $3: Value Crafting and Indie Game Developers
Consalvo and Paul's paper examines how indie game developers manage the risks of making, marketing, and pricing their games, a practice the authors term "value crafting."
- Indie games have no industry-standard price point, with prices ranging from free to roughly $30 and developers debating between $5, $10, or free-to-play, often based on anecdote rather than consistent evidence.
- Indie success has shifted from simply making a good game toward "value-crafting," which relies on analytics, pricing research, community engagement, and sustained marketing.
- By 2014 and 2015 Steam dominated indie sales, often accounting for the large majority of units sold, with Valve taking 30 percent of revenue.
2017 Economic Impact Report
The 2017 Economic Impact Report serves as a comprehensive assessment of the United States entertainment software industry’s contributions to the national economy.
- In 2016, the U.S. video game industry generated over $24.5 billion in total software sales.
- The U.S. video game industry contributed more than $11.7 billion in value to the national GDP in 2015.
- The industry directly employed more than 65,000 people across the United States in 2016.
Gardenscapes: A Case Study in Incremental Growth
Gardenscapes demonstrates that mobile games can achieve significant commercial success through incremental growth and high retention rather than relying solely on massive marketing spend and top-tier download rankings.
- Playrix’s Gardenscapes achieved a Top 50 Grossing position on the US iPhone charts without relying on high-volume user acquisition or a top-tier download ranking.
- The game demonstrated that strong retention metrics can drive significant revenue growth, allowing for success without competing directly with larger, better-funded rivals on marketing spend.
- Data from September 2015 to August 2016 shows that only 21% of the 175 apps that reached a Top 50 Grossing position also spent time in the Top 50 Downloaded chart, highlighting that high download volume is not a prerequisite for sustained financial performance.