Play Games
Company
17 documents in the library are about Play Games, from writers such as game – Verband der deutschen Games-Branche e. V., Mobile Dev Memo and Two & a Half Gamers. Each has a summary and key insights with the page they come from.
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Documents about Play Games
Google Play's New Era. Here's Why This is Important...
Google Play has introduced a significant restructuring of its service fee model, effective June 30, 2024, in the US, UK, and Europe, with a phased global rollout continuing through 2027.
- Effective June 30, 2024, Google Play is restructuring service fees for games earning over $1 million annually, charging 20% for new installs and 25% for existing installs.
- Developers can reduce these service fees by 5 percentage points by joining the 'Level Up' program, which requires meeting technical benchmarks like cross-screen support and high-performance rendering.
- Alternative billing methods are now formalized, allowing developers to use external links or web shops at a 20% service fee (15% with Level Up), effectively removing the standard 5% Google Play billing fee.
🚨📢BREAKING NEWS: 15% Google play fees, EA layoffs, Microsoft saving face 🤯
The gaming industry is currently navigating a period of significant platform adjustments, regulatory scrutiny, and cooling enthusiasm for artificial intelligence.
- Google is reducing Play Store commission fees to a flat 20%, with further potential reductions to 15% for developers who utilize Google Play Games and cloud-based synchronization.
- Electronic Arts is implementing workforce layoffs despite reporting record revenue from its live-service game titles.
- Newzoo projections indicate that PC gaming revenue is expected to overtake console revenue by 2028.
Unit Economics for Free-To-Play Games
Transitioning from hobbyist game development to a sustainable commercial enterprise requires a rigorous, data-driven approach to unit economics.
- Transitioning from a hobbyist to a professional game developer requires treating game development as a business model where revenue generation, scaling, and profitability are forecasted before or during development rather than hoping for success post-launch.
- Use an LTV (Lifetime Value) calculator to model financial assumptions, such as targeting $1.2 million in revenue, to determine if a game concept is viable before committing significant resources.
- Pricing strategies must align with the required LTV; for example, setting an 'Ad Removal' IAP at $3.99 may fail to meet business goals if the model requires a higher average revenue per paying user to achieve profitability.
Aream & Co. Gaming CEO Survey 2025
The survey, conducted by Aream & Co., gauges executive optimism regarding consumer spending on gaming in 2025 across multiple channels and functional areas.
- Industry sentiment for 2025 is largely stable or positive, with 98% of CEOs reporting that consumer spending will be either unchanged (49%) or more optimistic (49%).
- M&A activity is expected to accelerate, with 71% of executives anticipating an increase in deal-making throughout 2025.
- In-app purchases are the primary revenue driver, with 80% of respondents optimistic about growth compared to only 41% for in-app advertising.
Prototype Fund News: June 2025
The UK Games Fund has announced the selection of eighteen new portfolio companies for its sixteenth funding round, providing grants of up to £30,000 per project.
- The UK Games Fund has selected 18 new companies for its sixteenth funding round, awarding grants of up to £30,000 per project to support original intellectual property development.
- The Prototype Fund has reopened its Expressions of Interest phase for a limited time to accommodate high demand from the independent games sector.
- The current cohort includes a mix of emerging entities and established studios, such as White Paper Games, State of Play Games, and Draknek.
two & a half gamers session #29 - how to scale your mobile game, CPI vs LTV, Amazon gamescom rumours
The mobile gaming industry is currently undergoing a structural evolution defined by shifting ad monetization landscapes and the integration of cross-platform technology.
- Profitability in mobile gaming is driven by the ratio of lifetime value (LTV) to cost per install (CPI) and the target payback period, rather than marginal gains from creative or app store optimization.
- Successful monetization for non-hyper-casual titles requires a hybrid model that integrates in-app purchases with a high volume of rewarded video ads.
- Optimal player engagement with rewarded video ads occurs between four and fourteen views per session, with top-performing titles achieving four to five impressions per daily active user.
State of Free-to-Play Games on Steam
The state of free-to-play (F2P) gaming on Steam is characterized by extreme market concentration and the dominance of long-standing legacy titles.
- The F2P market on Steam is highly concentrated, with the top 10 titles capturing 88% of all engagement and Counter-Strike 2 alone accounting for 25% of total F2P concurrent users.
- New F2P titles struggle to gain traction, as the average age of top-performing games is seven years and only two new releases have entered the top 10 by average CCU since 2021.
- While F2P games accounted for 51% of total Steam playtime in 2023, their dominance is facing pressure from premium titles in early 2024.
Median Revenue and Player Count for Top Free-to-Play Games on Steam
The analysis examines the performance of free-to-play (F2P) titles on the Steam platform, addressing the inherent difficulty in tracking revenue and player metrics within the PC ecosystem.
- The median gross revenue for top-tier new free-to-play Steam releases is approximately $1.82 million, with a median player count of 763,000.
- The median revenue per player (RpP) is $2.02, though top-performing titles can achieve an RpP as high as $53.49.
- Library additions for free-to-play titles consistently exceed actual active player counts by a factor of 1.5 to 2.
AARP: 45% of People 50+ Play Games
The AARP’s 2023 survey on the gaming habits of individuals aged 50 and older reveals a steady increase in engagement among this demographic.
- 45% of individuals aged 50 and over in the US played video games at least once a month, based on a survey of nearly 7,800 people conducted in June and July.
- This represents an increase from 44% in 2019 and 38% in 2016, indicating a growing trend of older adults engaging with video games.
- The average weekly playtime for 50+ gamers increased from 8.5 hours in 2019 to 12 hours in 2022.
Two & a Half Gamers Session #29: Scaling Mobile Games, CPI vs LTV, and Amazon Gamescom Rumours
This podcast episode serves as a professional discussion among industry experts regarding the core mechanics of mobile game growth, user acquisition (UA), and monetization strategies.
- Sustainable mobile game growth requires a strict balance between cost-per-install (CPI) and lifetime value (LTV) to ensure viable payback periods.
- Optimizing ad monetization is a mandatory prerequisite for developers aiming to achieve significant scale in the current mobile market.
- Recent technical shifts in Google’s ecosystem, specifically updates to iOS tROAS bidding and Google AdMob, necessitate a strategic re-evaluation of UA diversification.
What Successful Product Managers Do Differently in Free-to-Play Games
Successful product managers in the free-to-play mobile gaming industry distinguish themselves by mastering five core competencies that bridge the gap between creative design and business performance.
- Successful product managers own the business side of a game by prioritizing metrics like LTV, retention, and monetization to balance the internal tension between CPI and LTV.
- Product managers can drive significant revenue growth through minor data tweaks; for example, allowing players to repeat events in Angry Birds Match increased baseline revenue by 20% without requiring engineering-heavy updates.
- When data is insufficient to justify a major feature, successful product managers use storytelling to sell the vision to leadership, such as when Clash of Clans successfully entered the Japanese market through culturalization and local partnerships despite a lack of initial localized data.
Google Stadia Highlights the Difference Between Gamers and People Who Play Games
The launch of Google Stadia serves as a case study in the fundamental disconnect between the gaming industry’s perception of its audience and the reality of consumer behavior.
- Google Stadia failed to gain traction because it targeted a monolithic 'gamer' audience, ignoring the distinct, conflicting needs of console enthusiasts and the larger, more lucrative mobile gaming market.
- Mobile gaming has overtaken the industry, with 203 million Americans playing games on smartphones compared to 160 million households owning traditional consoles.
- In 2018, mobile gaming revenue surpassed the combined total revenue of the PC and console gaming markets for the first time.