Small Giant Games
Company
Documents about Small Giant Games
How Zynga Executed Its Stunning Turnaround
Zynga’s corporate turnaround, initiated under the leadership of CEO Frank Gibeau in 2016, serves as a strategic blueprint for revitalizing stagnant companies within the highly competitive mobile gaming industry.
- Under CEO Frank Gibeau, Zynga’s stock price more than tripled between early 2016 and April 2020, while quarterly mobile bookings grew from $139 million in Q1 2016 to $387 million in Q4 2019.
- Zynga achieved its turnaround by acquiring proven, high-performing titles like Gram Games' 'Merge Dragons!' and Small Giant Games' 'Empires & Puzzles' at a premium rather than attempting to build unproven games from scratch.
- The company abandoned the industry-standard practice of centralizing shared services, instead devolving publishing power and operational control to satellite studios to maintain agility.
Empires & Puzzles Storms Past $500 Million in Lifetime Revenue
The match-3 RPG Empires & Puzzles, developed by the Finnish studio Small Giant Games, has achieved a significant financial milestone by surpassing $500 million in lifetime gross revenue.
- Small Giant Games' title Empires & Puzzles has surpassed $500 million in lifetime gross revenue, reaching approximately $507 million from over 41 million downloads.
- The game has become Zynga's strongest-performing acquisition to date, significantly outpacing other titles like CSR Racing 2 ($311 million) and Merge Dragons ($287 million).
- Android platforms drive the majority of the game's financial success, accounting for $340 million (67%) of total revenue and 34 million (83%) of total downloads.
Deconstructing Empires & Puzzles
Empires & Puzzles serves as a primary case study for the success of the Puzzle RPG genre, specifically analyzing how Small Giant Games achieved sustained market dominance following its 2017 launch.
- Zynga acquired Small Giant Studios in January 2019 primarily to secure the success of Empires & Puzzles, which has become a dominant title in the Puzzle RPG subgenre.
- The game achieves high retention by utilizing a conservative, accessible match-3 core loop that appeals to a broad audience, avoiding the complexity that caused similar titles like Legend of Solgard to fail.
- Strategic depth is driven by a complex meta-game involving base building and a hero collection system featuring 182 unique heroes across 5 rarity levels and 10 classes.
Zynga's Acquisitions Drive Record Q1 Earnings
Zynga achieved record financial performance in the first quarter of 2019, reporting total gross mobile game bookings of $278.4 million, representing an 85 percent increase over the same period in 2018.
- Zynga reported record Q1 2019 gross mobile game bookings of $278.4 million, representing an 85 percent increase over the same period in 2018.
- The acquisitions of Gram Games (Merge Dragons) and Small Giant Games (Empires & Puzzles) were the primary growth drivers, accounting for approximately 46 percent of total mobile bookings in Q1 2019.
- Combined revenue for Merge Dragons and Empires & Puzzles grew nearly 200 percent year-over-year, while the remainder of Zynga's portfolio experienced largely flat growth.
Publisher Market Share 2018 Infographic
The mobile gaming industry in the United States experienced a period of relative stability in 2018, characterized by a concentrated market share among top-tier publishers.
- The top 10 mobile game publishers in the US controlled 42.9% of the market in late Q4 2018, a slight increase from 42.1% in Q4 2017.
- While the overall top-tier publisher landscape remained stable, several major established names experienced a decline in market share compared to the previous year.
- Epic Games significantly impacted the market in 2018 through the success of Fortnite.
Top In-App Advertisers of Q4 2017: Android, Game Category
This analysis identifies the leading mobile game advertisers on the Android platform during the fourth quarter of 2017, focusing on in-app advertising impressions.
- In Q4 2017, the mobile gaming advertising landscape on Android was dominated by the Puzzle and Role Playing (RPG) genres.
- Block Puzzle Jewel by Hua Weiwei and Empires & Puzzles: RPG Quest by Small Giant Games maintained stable, leading positions in in-app advertising impressions throughout the quarter.
- New major advertisers entered the top 10 rankings in December 2017, including Coin Master (Moon Active), Lords Mobile (IGG.COM), and Lineage 2: Revolution (Netmarble Games).