🎮 Full Steam Ahead: The Q1 Steam games that should hit mobile

Yeah, we also forget that GTA is coming out on October. So all the audience is going to go away.
Ah
man like [laughter]
the legend the myth
the GTA like people said will stop working. People will stop working they will just don't do anything else. Okay, Felix, let me just say this. You know that GTA is not coming on PC and it's on only [music] the [music] two and a half gamers. The midnight crew talking UA adverts and game design too. Mat Felix Shak bringing the insight. We're rocking those vibes till the early day [music] master eyes on the prize tracking data through the cyerspace skies. Felix stacks colors like a wizard [music] in disguise. Jacks lift us to the highest. Two and a half gamers talking smack. Slow hockey stick got your back. Ads are beautiful. [music] They like the way. Click it fast. Don't delay. Uh-huh.

Uh-huh. [music] Ah. Ah. [music] Ah. Ah. from Kinoa. Look, most mobile games leave serious revenue on the table and it's almost never the game. It's live ops and game ops. Kinoa is the AI operating system for mobile game operations, flows, live segments, inner messages, push notifications, AB testing, all in one place. Real time run by the operators who actually own the numbers. No dev tickets. K first pulled plus 43% Arabdo play studios plus 31% revenue on Trist block party same players more revenue integrated hours that's Kinoa I personally invested as well thank you very much for sponsoring this episode and we can go full steam ahead

this is my favorite segment it's so good
it's [snorts] so funny as well I mean it's usually it's it's great so yeah we're doing steam Steam. What is this? Steam scanner. Steam.
Full steam ahead.
Full steam ahead.
Full steam ahead. That's full steam ahead is better.
So, let's go full steam ahead and start.
Actually, actually, dear listeners, we're doing it exactly on time because the previous scanner we did exactly 3 months ago. So, we're keeping up.
Oo. And you know what?
Like last one when we did two quarters in one episode.
It was That's why it was fun. That's why it was fun. But before we start, my name is Mate Laric.
I'm Felix Broberg.
And I'm Yakub. Full steam ahead.
Very good. We are your hosts. And Yakob, please put the [ __ ] mic in front of your mouth.
Yeah.
And we can then we can start because you I don't think you can speak with your eye.

Um maybe
maybe
maybe
maybe because your your your daughter can't speak. I can I can I can hear her.
Yeah, I can hear her, which is fine.
Full steam ahead.
And this is just always [clears throat] reminds me these episodes how all the creativity has been outsourced to Steam and the Zest pool that is mobile. There's just no creativity. It's just copied.
Yeah, let's just say that there's uh stuff there. So as always thanking guys from VG insights uh now own by sensitile for giving us the their enterprise platform uh to kind of check the stuff. So for clearance what we're doing we're checking the top uh games for last quarter being in Q1. So the release date goes from 1st of January till end of March this year. Uh the limit is at least 2,500 reviews which Felix wanted. And then uh it's on revenue basis and we're excluding AAA out of the mix and all

those stuff. And then I just handpicked basically three pages of games basically. So we go and we think that these games could be doing pretty well on mobile later. So let's start with one of my favorite ones of the mix. It's called Dialogue. And you won't guess this game.
I see some some chicks. So, it's waifu. Whatever. Of course, it's waifu. Whatever.
This is actually uh cyberpunk this topic. Waifu puzzler.
What?
[ __ ]
Yes.
That's never been said before.
Uh
yeah, I don't think you you Yeah.
So, what's happening here? And like uh man, I'm really hating when Steam Steam thing freezes. So you have the waifuss and they are actually all androids and they come to your shop and you repair them and you repair them through this very interesting dial puzzle and this is basically the game like it's

just a puzzler and by the way it's free for now.
What?
Oh ad
no because there probably be like a full version something later or whatever. Let me just go to actual game play. So the whole game is pretty much for what 3 hours something. But again, let's not even care about like what what's happening here with the story and narration and whatnot. Like it's just like, you know, for fun basically. Uh that's what's happening here.
But what's really interesting is the puzzle that's here within this dial because again it has not only physics
but also like as you see the game play. So, it's not only you moving the dial to kind of merge these things together, but also move stuff around. So, it's quite good and I would say unique.
I could see this on mobile.
Yes, I could see
I can see I can see this in creatives.

[laughter]
Exactly.
I could see it on mobile and in creatives immediately. So disregarding all the waifu kyber cyberpunk [ __ ] whatever story thing that's like in in behind of this, the core of this looks quite interesting. I haven't seen like this kind of a puzzler before. So this this looks good. Uh as I said, it's completely free. We don't really have numbers here to kind of go from there. Uh launched 5th of February, 1,00 something reviews. So it's not that big yet. But again, I don't care really. Like we've seen smaller games have bigger impact on like UA creative. So what's there?
Anyway, continuing. Yeah, there's hosy, which is an upgrade basically on dreamy rooms.
But this looks very cool.
Yeah, this looks really cool because
it's like highend version, you know.
Yeah, it's high room because what's happening here? You're not only decorating it, you're also cleaning it and you're also repairing it on top all

of it. and looks very very nice because as you see here it's extremely satisfying as always.
So they are having pretty much upgraded version of dreamy rooms. Um it looks quite as I said unique and very polished as you see here. You you can do like a lot of different mechanics here which are exactly the ones that mobile wants which is like this cleaning repairing whatever like this one. So, it's it's not only the usual dreamy room where like it's just like a mess needs to be put in there. It's much more let's say like the rooms are interactive. See, you literally need to paint the walls and stuff like that. So, yeah, this looks quite I would say new numbers wise again quite small because this was literally released 30th of March which is end of the quarter cutoff that I was looking at but it's already the 2 million revenue.
Did anyone say web revenue? Oh yeah, this episode is brought to you by Fastpring, the no drama D2C partner

that's been scaling with mobile publishers for over 20 years. They're fast growing, profitable, and seriously reliable, which is more than you can say about most vendors in this space. Anyway, whether you're launching a new web store, replacing your current D system, or adding a backup plan, FastPring is here for you. Visit fastpring.gg to set up your web store today. Fastspring.gg. Hello, Fastpring. Thank you very much, guys, for sponsoring this episode.
So, okay, nice.
It's Yeah, it's not bad. It's Indian 15 game. So [clears throat] that's there. Then we have raccoon coin pusher rog like this is extremely unique.
What?
Coin dozer. Okay.
Yeah. So it's a coin dozer coin pusher

game basically and it's a rog like so. So again you have your run, you upgrade your coins, you like pretty much have the mobile meta right there and it's just a coin pusher. the [ __ ] who is coming up with these ideas like this is amazing combination
see it's perfect and uh if I understand correctly the meta of the [laughter]
the meta of this is kind of similar to balatro so you unlock different things and upgrades to your rog light runs therefore you can have more stronger runs and as you see more coins more whatever upgrades and more of these kind of
points that you can can score on the coin pusher and yeah Looks quite amazing to be honest. This is already
Yeah. Yeah. Again, this is at the end of the cutoff. So, released 31st of March literally and it's already did 5.2 million because this is a $10 game and they have quite a big unit sold thing like

625,000. So, yep. Looks proven and good. Like you can go, guys. This this this one is very solid. Then we have uh screechy scratch
scratchy.
Yeah, it's not nothing to do with the you know the Simpsons comic. Uh so
of course
what's happening here is that this is just the intro where like you're doing your shitty uh whatever cleaner job and we have a [laughter] perfect job for you which is like scratching uh these scratch cards.
Oh
yes. So what you're doing basically again it's like a rog like where you just scratch these different cards and you see again there's meta with upgrades and stuff
and then you have a scratch bot which will automatically scratch them for you also like it's idle based basically but uh yeah it's as you see this is again similar to balato so you upgrade more stuff gets more uh I don't know like

upgrades mechanics so on so forth so looks really really really cool And again uh what we are really looking for here is the game the core game play because that was again never done.
Who plays this [ __ ]
Huh?
Who plays this game?
Lots of people plays this [ __ ] This has 5k over millingly positive reviews. 95%
already did 5 million in
the thing is I'm just going to say [laughter] this. This is popular in Asia because one thing Asians love is gambling.
Yeah. This the cat is Chinese themed, but I'm guessing that this is not really just only Asia. It's just like
it's fun day. Uh yeah, I don't know.
Holy [ __ ] Was it funday?
Funday is Finnish game.
Funday games publisher.
The [ __ ] is from Finland?
That's amazing.
Yeah, I guess so.
Same. It's the same logo.
It is. It It's there. Yeah. Yeah. Okay. Nice. Great. Great stuff, guys.
Looks really good. And again, like it's already already did like 5 mil, so I'm

guessing like it's
going to be quite positive quite soon. So that's there.
Then we have the usual car service together, the carual. I think we had like three of these.
Yeah, we had actually.
Yeah. So this is just like one other of them where I think Yeah, it's it's your usual like you have these kind of different mechanics. Otherwise, Steam keeps crashing.
Who cares me? Who cares?
Yeah. Yeah. So, you repair the cars, you change them, you do this, you do that, and you do it in
Looks exactly like Chrome Valley Customs Creative.
Yeah. Yeah. Basically,
it looks exactly like that at least.
Yeah. But, but the gameplay is pretty much like a set of these different mini games where you have like, you know, you need to choose this, choose that, d uh mostly positive. Uh, and then we have what, 4.2 million revenue. So yeah, but these games just work like we know these games just work. Then we continue again with another proven format retro rewind

video store simulator.
Ah we had that before.
Yeah. So again we know that store simulators work and uh again different team just add more flavor and different audiences. So what's happening here? you are running the old '9s video store of, you know, selling VHS cassettes and so on so forth. Uh, it seems completely non-licensed. So, I guess everything is kind of from Wish. So, that's there. But again, seems like it's the usual like pretty much uh a themed upgrade of the My Supermarket Manager or how was the game game called?
Yeah. So, looks good. Um, these things work like we know it work. Again, the question is if it would work on this specific team because it already did 4 million revenue. Then we go and continue with Quarantine

Zone and you tell me which game does this game remind you of. Oh, this is a stoy.
How is it called?
Uh, club promoter or something like that. Or
no, no, no, no, no.
They had two games that came at the same time called security. Security. Yes. Yes. So, this is I'm security basically the high high version.
But they had another game when it's like I am like when it's like uh
I'm cat.
I'm cat.
No. No. When when it's like the zombie apocalypse, you have to decide who you're letting in.
Really?
What?
You're just making a game about zombie apocalypse where you decide who you get in.
Let me check.
Yeah, check.
Yeah, but yeah, again, this is pretty much I'm security on high def version.
Yeah,
we know it works and I guess it could work also quite well in this setup because zombies and and [ __ ] I'm security is more like club stuff and whatever the team, but maybe.
Yeah. Yeah, but I [clears throat] think

they had like maybe few more MVPs,
more variations of the concept.
Yeah. Yeah, I guess so. But
again, this this like whole thing just works. Like I know it just works because again we saw it.
You were right. I was wrong.
Okay. Uh so this did what? Let me get
unheard of.
This is loaded. Uh so it's out from start with 13 and a half million. [snorts]
Yeah. For this kind of game. So again, I guess good job.
Tell me again,
you're letting people in and that's it.
Or you don't let them in. And that's it.
You have all these mechanics like how to search them and like stuff goes off. Blah blah blah.
That's the game.
Yeah. Like it's all this checkpoint. Yeah.
[ __ ] hell.
What? What is crunching? Like how do I
like No, no, no. I'm I'm not not really interested like how do I do this? Just like
like so simple.
Yes. [laughter] Yes.
Simplicity. Simplicity isn't isn't hard.

What's hard is execution as always. Don't worry.
Like you can have this great idea but actually how to execute it into like because you see there's other things of course on
course. Yeah. Yeah. Of course it's not necess the mobile version of security where it's literally just like people standing in front of you. You see that you have these whatever events or encounters that are on top of.
Yeah. Okay.
Still insane.
Yeah. Yeah.
Then we have Star Rupture. Ah yeah. Yeah. I know why. Um, so what's actually happening here? Uh, you tell me. What do you think?
It looks like uh from Marvel.
Zombie apocalypse on another planet.
I guess zombie.
What's the [ __ ] Netflix show?
Whatever. Uh, watch from now on. Oh, Deadlock.
No.

Oh, I pick Epics Legends. No.
The [ __ ]
Factorio.
Yeah, it's the if you remember the game we covered called Art Knights Enfield.
Yeah.
So, this is pretty much it without the waifuss and Asian kind of theme. So I guess these games work. That's why we again seeing some of these factory based games.
Uh it's uh something like 6K reviews in already 10 million revenue in. So I guess this specific iteration of like giant open world and and factory building it works on mobile but you need to be act. So what I'm trying to say here that factory uh building core works and
definitely works. I mean the factory is like the biggest [ __ ] game ever. So

still people still play it.
People need to understand how to execute this score in mobile because it will work. It will definitely work. Just matter of time.
But it's very complex.
I know it's very complex but that's the thing. You need to execute it so it's approachable and then you pull on the
Sure. But that would you know for Steam I guess like the total addressable market is bigger than on mobile. No,
of course, but again wider, right? Mobile's bigger but this is wider.
Oh, hello. Hello there. I didn't see you. Thank you very much for coming to this episode. Uh it's brought to you by our sponsors PVX Partners, the simplest and most effective credit line for marketing. If you're scaling your business uh and need funding, here's the deal with PVX partners, you can grow your game easily and your business. There's no equity dilution. You can repay as you get paid and it's flexible and fully tailored to your growth. So, you can secure funding in 30 days and get a term sheet in just 24 hours. Don't you wait. Take control of your UA budget

without giving away uh a piece of your company. Visit pvxpartners.com and uh see how they can help you grow your game faster and stronger. Don't wait. Go to pvxpartners.com.
Yeah. Same with mobile. Like you do know how how hard is to like create a mobile and then you have Brawl Stars that makes
it's one example.
I know but uh ah it's No, it's like mobile edges bang bang and so on so forth. You have mobile mobile. Um, then we continue with uh
Super Battle Golf.
Super Battle Golf.
This was This was pretty nice.
Super battle golf.
So, what's happening here is that you play golf and you kill
in an online one to eight player golf game where everyone plays at the same time. Swing, shoot, sabotage, and finish first by enemies necessary.
That's amazing, man. I already I already [ __ ] love this game. [laughter] Yeah,
man. Like we've said that's amazing now

for like half of these games. Like it's just
creativity of creativity. [laughter]
Yeah.
Because again, like you know how how great it is if it's like all real time, not turnbased. [laughter]
Yeah. Absolute chaos.
Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. So
wait wait wait. Don't don't [ __ ] change. No, [laughter]
I guess not. So it's the this this segment I guess a winner of the friends slop.
Absolutely man.
These games just work. They they they just work well. And again the key is finding the new team, new flavor, new whatever of the month, which this time is like this is definitely it. Oh my god, this is so great.
Yeah. [laughter] Looks looks really amazing.
Again, this is this is exactly the category. I can't play this game because I would destroy half of my flat. Yeah. Yeah. But again on mobile, you know, like you have stuff like Fall Guys and

like all these, you know, the Kitka game and like
Yeah. But how would you do this on mobile? Like it's already like you need to do so many stuff at the same time. Although you have also Fortnite on mobile.
You can't do this like it just takes time.
What happened to your voice?
You can like it's just like
I mean yeah
these games needs to be built different because it's social social first. Like it's built social first. That that's that's the point here. And like you need to care about stuff like voice chat. You need to care about all these other things which you don't care at all in most of the games. So you can do that. So 6K reviews as I said already nearly 8 million in revenue. Pretty good run till now. So
that's there. Um then we go in roadside research. What the?
Which is another store manager, this time teamemed by aliens preparing for their invasion in the store and stocking up the shelves in the meat.
What?
Like I [laughter] don't know who the [ __ ] is these ideas, but it seems it

works. [laughter]
What did you say about mushroom budget? Magic
mushrooms. Yeah, mushroom budget. Went way overboard with this one. So yeah, again, very very familiar core. It's the Supermarket Simulator one, but with the giant twist that, by the way, there's an alien invasion happening in the meantime. And by the way, they have perfect masks.
Quite funny.
Yes, it's really funny.
Yeah. So, this is uh quite fresh. Not that big yet, but already 6 mil in. [snorts] So that's there looks looks quite good.
That creative that's so good.
Yeah. Yeah. And then we have Mugenics.
Ah yes, we have Mugenics which their trailer is literally outrageous [laughter] to to say the least.

I was talking about this in the news like for like two or three times like how is like they're killing it in terms of the revenues out of the out of the get-go like after after launch. One of the things is that needs to be said which is quite important is that this is a game by the guys that did Binding of Isaac which is now like indie god basically.
Yeah.
Like whatever this guy touches people will just follow. It's just like
that's there. Uh, and what's what we have here is basically a turnbased rogue light where the main spin or flavor of this is you breeding the cats. And by breeding, what's happening is they're inheriting different traits. They're getting new mutations. They're getting
Where did I see where did I see that Mr. Busume?
Just wait. This trailer gets better by every second.
Yeah. Yeah, I see. Yeah. [laughter] So the the like turn-based part or whatever fight battle part like it's

kind of a you know bread and butter nothing really is to it. What's really interesting and what's what's like why this game I guess has its like USP is that uh yeah these cats breed a lot and you need to breed them a lot and there's like different mutations and stuff that you've been doing there and eventually what's happening like you're breeding these super cats that are pretty much undefeable but also there are uh like you know harmful effects like inbreeding or whatever like that the game tracks and there's like special abilities which you can get only through inbreeding and da da da da. So that's there. Let me show you a little bit of uh yeah, choose a create a video. Anyway, so this is the the house where you have the cats. You can uh put them around. If they live together, they will breed anyway. Uh then you have their abilities, lots of stuff. They can die which is also guess kind of a good tradeoff where if they

can die they cannot breed and they get all their genetics to their grave. So you kind of are risking it so on so forth. This is the game play. So it's a turnbased like this kind of one whatever backyard battle that you like decide what to do who to kill like this would needs to be heavily like probably in auto combat or something. But then as you see uh if we move from here they have a lot of abilities to learn which is the rog light part. They have a lot of equipment like lots lots of progression layers basically. So yeah this is currently trending a lot. This game is already 27k reviews on 91% positive pin and it's 46.7 million
amazing
on uh 30 euro game. Yeah, basically
she this this looks great and I'm guessing that it's not that easily

adaptable if at all but I just have to speak about it. Yeah, it's just good to see it because this is like one marvel of a game. So very very nice. And then we go to our last winner of the quarter which is to slay the spire.
Hey,
because we have a talk about this or something.
Yeah,
because there's this other uh Two and a Half Gamers episode which we already did on Slay the Spire which we fully covered uh on our channel. And uh where is it? Here it is which was done on March 19 as this game was released on March 5th. And in this episode again we go through all of it. And again this is my
I was [ __ ] on this game a lot. I remember it.
Yeah. You were [ __ ] a lot on everything. That's that's on like
see how tanned I am after after I came

back from M
feelings title session now. [laughter] Anyway, uh why this game is important? Why like what's the context? So, Slay the Spire first one is like indie leink. It's like one of the most influential deck builder game in in the world. Uh this one is it's basically true continuation which [ __ ] ton more content.
If you need to learn about the games, go [ __ ] see the episode.
Yes, the game is great. Go buy it. It's perfect. So, what we're going to say
Yeah. What we're going to say, uh, that when we were looking at it back then, it was
5 53 million in
and this was March 3 months ago.
Three months ago.
Three months ago. Now it's 140 million. [sighs]
This episode is brought to you by Potencus. And if you're a mobile game publisher tired of leaving money on the table, listen up. Potencus is a premium

ad network built by people who have actually been on both sides of this industry. Game publishers, agencies, successful exits. So, they get it. Here's the thing. Potencus has direct deals with Amazon, Apple, Coca-Cola, Vodafone. It's not programmatic. It's direct. Those budgets land in your game at premium CPMs. No middleman tax. And they handle everything with their in-house team in terms of the critics. Plus, they've partnered with playable maker VWing. So, they will take brands YouTube videos or static images and actually turned into playable ad or revert video. Proper interactive format built for gaming inventory. Brands getting a gaming native creative publishers are getting a higher CPMs. Everyone wins. Head to potencus.com to get started or check their creative portfolio in the link in the show notes. Thank you very much Potencus for sponsoring this episode.
Yay.

Closer to 250 rather than 500.
Yeah, which I will most probably win because at the end of the episode I said the prediction for me is 250 by the end of the year and Matt is at 500. But we'll check this in December anyway.
Uh not it's not going to be above 250 at all. I I think they they most probably if they do some solid updates like DLC or something they they can I think can easily hit two two 200
200 at least maybe even 250. So but let's see
yeah it could be yeah I I would say 250 by
500 as you said it's too much
mostly with mobile port
but not even that not even that many
not even that because it need to be free to play which this game isn't so
yeah we also forget that GTA is coming out in October so all the audience is going to go away. Ah
man the like [laughter]
the legend the myth
the GTA like people said we'll stop working people will stop working they will just don't do anything else
okay let me just say this you know that GTA is not coming on PC and it's on only

on consoles
I can't hear you I'm sure you're saying something interesting
GTA is not coming on PC [laughter] and it's on consoles and this is a PC game the audiences don't even see each each other. [laughter]
That's true.
And don't worry, we're going to be fine. We're going to be
going to [laughter] be fine.
I got to take care of you.
Anyway, uh yeah, Slay Despire is the winner, of course, after Mugenics and go play it. It's perfect. And I'm always encouraging anyone to go check deck builder or deck builder as a metag game engine or however you want to call it because it's very very good engine not used that much in current mobile era.
That was it. Um thank you so much.
I hope you're all energized with [ __ ] ton of creativity that we don't have in mobile space. We can continue our miserable journey there for next three months.
For next three months. Exactly.

Thank you very much guys for coming and see you next time in the next full steam ahead episode. Bye-bye. Byebye.