Tim Cook's Apple legacy | Week in Mobile Games podcast

Hello, welcome to the Pocket Gamer.biz Podcast Week in Mobile Games, where we chat about the week's news and provide some insights. I'm Craig Chapple, head of content at Pocket Gamer.biz. With me as ever, associate editor Paige Cook and our news editor Aaron Astle. We missed a week, so welcome back everybody. How are you both doing? Paige, what have you been up to? I had a friend over at the weekend. I think I might have mentioned on another podcast that it's like an online gaming friend and we met like a month back in person, which was nice. And obviously made a good impression because she came back again, so didn't scare her off. But she she brought down like the Resident Evil 3 board game with her. And it's it's very hard to learn, but like once you understand it, it's really fun. So I think we spent basically an entire day playing this board game. That was pretty cool, so that was a lot of fun. And then this weekend I'm finally going to see Project Hail Mary at the cinema cuz I finished

the book and I wanted to like reread the book before I watched the film, so yeah, I'm going to go finally see it. It's so good. So how does how does the board game work? It's kind of like that you can play it in just like short missions, but it's definitely more designed for you to play it in one very long sitting. So there'll be like different tiles that you put down and you do the kind of like quests you each play. It's a cooperative game that you all work together to find certain objectives on the map and then when they're done, you can leave. But along the way there's like zombies that react to things that you do, so that's the part that's hard. You have to kind of figure out like, oh, if I do this, how does this zombie react? How many tiles does it move towards me? So at first it's a little bit complicated, but once you kind of get the knack for it, it's quite good. And then things that you get in like one mission will unlock the next part of the map and you keep progressively going until you get to the end of it. So I think we did like the first five scenarios, but I think we have like maybe like seven or eight more, but we redid the first scenario. We did it once, we were like I feel like

we got a few things wrong, so we redid it. We watched a YouTube video. Turns out everyone seems to do it a little bit their own way. It's obviously that confusing, but our way works, so we're going to stick with it. But yeah, it ended up being really fun. It's quite addictive. It's one of those games that like yeah, the hours just sort of fly by and you're like, "We just spent an entire Saturday playing this board game." That sounds pretty awesome. All right, thanks for that, Paige. Aaron, what have you been up to? I've been playing some more Pokémon Champions, which I talked about on the last podcast. So, yeah, I've ended up playing a lot more of it than I expected, cuz I've never really been into like competitive Pokémon. I don't really do much online gaming in general. Has it Has this turned you to online games and competitive play? I don't know. I have enjoyed it most the time, but um I think part of it
competitive and online play in a nutshell, isn't it? I still I think I enjoy it. I think part of the issue is cuz um I can be quite stubborn when I decide to do something. And so I've then been through a lot of trauma trying to

get into Master Ball rank. As I generally it has been fun, but like obviously I I guess this is how most on you know, competitive games work. If you win, you slightly move up the rankings, and if you lose, you move down the rankings. So I've had the odd day where it's like, I would have been better off just not playing today. Like my ranking has ended worse than it started. But finally, after a lot of kind of team building and rejigging my Pokémon around, I've made it into Master Ball tier, and then not dared play again in case in case it goes badly. So I think I will try in that ranking, but yeah, I was just like, I want to get into Master Ball tier. Apparently it's going to like reset every month um and they're going to change up which Pokémon you can use like each season. So I was like, by the time I got to like Ultra Ball, it's like, well, this has taken however many hours. Like if I'm going to get to Master Ball, I want to do it in this season before everything gets reset. And so I finally done it, taken a load of screenshots just to prove it was real. I

did it as well just with like a team that I put together over time and working out like well, a lot of people are using this. I'll try countering with that. And then finding, okay, they know that that's the counter so they've also done this to stop, you know, stop the counters. So what can I use to counter what they think I could counter with then it all gets very complicated. But yeah, I'm I'm quite glad that I managed to get to Master Ball rank just like with my own team rather than following like meta guidance and stuff. Good show. Uh that's good. I look forward to hearing more as long as you play it again. Not afraid to lose your rank. All right, thanks then Aaron. As myself, last week I was at London Games Festival for a few days so we didn't have time unfortunately to do the podcast. But I did a few things there. I went to what's it called? Screenplay, uh which is quite interesting. It was like a transmedia sort of event. They had like people with a crossover between kind of film, TV and and games. Had the story kitchen there.

Which I think I'm doing too later. And a bunch of other stuff. So that was that was pretty cool. And then I did I hosted a panel at Games Beat Music, which is a great event hosted by uh Analog, which is run by a guy called Alex Boucher who used to work with Develop magazine. So we did a a special mobile music games panel. That was great. Uh it was recorded so I need to write that up. So so everyone can actually know what was said. And then after that I was invited over for the first time to the BAFTA Games Awards. So I went to that. That was very cool. Very much a who's who of the UK games industry and and bit broader in the room. Obviously Ilkka Paananen, Supercell CEO, he got the BAFTA Fellowship. We talked about that last time in our interview. But he gave a fun speech. He he was joking about like why why was he there cuz he hasn't actually made a game. And then he also jokes like his talk must be one of the most boring ones ever on that stage as he talks about the team structure and cells, the culture of Supercell. But, you know, he said the the award was actually recognition of of the teams

he's worked with. But yeah, but good for Ilkka, he deserves that he deserves that award and it's it's so good for mobile as well that that he picked that up. As we said, doesn't always get that much recognition. It's a little bit strange to see the the Google Play like headline sponsorship there and there isn't like a little bit about mobile other than Ilkka's big award. There was one other funny bit. I don't know for anyone listening to this or watching this, I don't know if you felt the same thing if you watched The Game Developers Choice Awards. So, there's this there's this moment when um a guy called David Arnold who I think composed five James Bond films, done a lot of other stuff. He comes on stage, I think it was for the music award, but then there's this bit where he's like, "And we've got a world exclusive for you." And it was basically they're going to show the opening credits to the 007 First Light James Bond game that's coming out I think in about a month. It's sung by Lana Del Rey and the exclusive was you get to see the video. And the way it was teased up and then stuff was happening on stage on

stage. It starts going dark, they start putting instruments out. There's a singer with the like behind the microphone and you're like, "Oh my god, is this Lana Del Rey actually here?" And then everyone's sitting and then as like a couple minutes into the video you're like, "I mean it's a bit weird she's singing in the dark or like or is she going to sing something else after? Is she going to do it again?" It was it was all very strange and then eventually it was just like someone else singing something. I don't know if that was when they did the Final Fantasy song or something like that. But it was very it's yeah, I don't know if anyone else had the same feeling. But yeah, Lana Del Rey was not there. But it was a good video, it was a good song. So, yeah, it was interesting. Right, we will uh get into things. As always, quick few shout-outs for our events at Pocket Gamer Connect Summit Malmo is on May 27th and 28th. Got Barcelona, June 15th and 16th. Going to Shanghai, July 29th. Going to Helsinki for PGC Nordics, October 20th and 21st. Bangkok, October 27th. And we're looking at going to Gran Canaria later this year as well,

and maybe a few other events. Speaking of awards, the Mobile Games Awards will be back. There There is an imminent announcement coming up around that. That will be in August at Gamescom in Cologne once again. And also quick shout out, I'm off to Gamescom in town. So if you're in town, hit me up. Love to chat. Right, onto the news. The big news of the week, I would say, Apple CEO Tim Cook is to step down. And he's been in the top job there for 15 years. Apparently, he will continue through the role through the summer before becoming executive chairman. Apple said that he will assist with certain aspects of the company, quote, including engaging with policy makers across the globe, which I actually thought was quite interesting given all the regulatory stuff. Apple senior VP of hardware engineering John Ternus has been named as Cook's replacement and he'll assume the role from September 1st, 2026. He has been there since 2001 and he's basically credited, as his role would suggest, working on hardware and including overseeing hardware engineering work

across the iPad, AirPods, iPhone, Mac, and Apple Watch. So, huge news for mobile, huge news for the mobile games industry even if Apple doesn't see it itself as a a key part of how that functions. So, I guess there's two things to look at. How How will we look back at Tim Cook's tenure? And then how What What What's next? What's coming next? Why have they appointed this new guy? So, a couple of things I wanted to mention. I guess if you simply looked at share price, Tim Cook has been a good steward. He's built up a services business. And I've seen on LinkedIn a bunch of people talking about that's possibly how he'll be remembered as kind of like maybe Well, it depends what happens next. But after the Steve Jobs, like kind of known as the innovator with the iPhone and all that. Did a like a steady job kind of having the company and growing its value like insanely. But there's not been that many new products. So, I think if you look a bit deeper in in like in my opinion, the

and again, the company is in no way failing. It's doing extraordinarily well, incredibly profitable. I think Tim Cook's Apple has been highly aggressive with regulators and has failures in new hardware and tech. So, if you look at through app tracking transparency, like under the guise of privacy, which is a load of BS, right? Uh although that is something that they did tap into a real kind of concerns that consumers have. But Apple has used that to build up its ads business at the expense of the mobile game sector, which is basically built on user acquisition. And a key part of that was already there. We'll see the industry's kind of coming out the other side of that bit, but you etc. You got some rise to it. Apple's been super aggressive defending its monopoly along with Google over the mobile market and while kind of not really offering anything in return. Like AT&T is not a help. And I think the Apple games that they announced hasn't really done anything notable since the announcement as far as I know. If you look at hardware, the Vision Pro headset was just complete disaster. Uh that that investment may come back if

AR glasses take off, but I guess we'll see. Ultimately, his big hardware play during his tenure has failed. Apple does seem to be behind in the AI arms race as it were. Like it launched that iPhone, I can't remember which version where AI was front and center and that was kind of the whole point of that iPhone. And then they delayed it. They delayed all the AI stuff. So, you just have this kind of crap phone. And now it's been doing deals I think with like OpenAI if I remember right. So, it feels like it's pretty behind where you would think it would have could be quite far ahead. But you know, they have money to burn on that I guess in future, but so do other companies. I guess all that said like I say, I can't say the company is a bad place, but I think its reputation has been hit quite hard at least among like games developers. Whether that matters to Apple, probably not really. Uh I think the aggressive attitude towards its revenue sharing and anti-steering policies. While Apple, I understand obviously, does have to defend its position. It needs to take something, but the aggressive plays that

it's done, I feel like it's ultimately actually made it worse off uh in the long term in some cases. Like for example, the App Store is completely cracked open in the US. And looking forward, I think people are assuming that it's a hardware person coming in. Maybe they'll eventually start innovating again with with hardware. I guess we'll see. I guess probably I mean, I have no idea, right? I'd expect to see sort of some sort of innovations or further progress in AI. So maybe it'll come in that the innovation that people are after will come in the form of like software. It's just massive news. It's like the biggest games platform on Earth, the App Store, even though Apple doesn't care. Any thoughts on on that?
Yeah, for me it's more I'm I'm curious like what comes next. Like I had a little look around at just like the general sort of opinions on what they feel that like that Apple needs. And most people are just saying how like it needs more innovation. I think mainly just like with maybe like their main line phones. But I feel like that's kind of the case for like all all of phones.

I feel like I mean, usually I mean, the big names have a new model each year. And that's like being honest, there's not really a a big leap between the models. But when it comes to Apple, I still feel like maybe that's true. Maybe there's not a lot of innovation between each one, but there's still plenty of people lining up to get them. Yeah. Um yeah, I'm just kind of curious to see if if there's any change in that or if that just kind of remains the same really. Cuz yeah, it might not be as innovative as some people want it to be, but it's still technically working. I also think it's it's kind of funny timing how everything's landed that like Nintendo of America got a new president, like Xbox obviously like Phil Spencer stepped down and retired. They've got new leadership, Apple leadership's changing. There's a lot of these big kind of tech and games companies potentially going through quite radical shifts at the moment. Whether whether we'll see big changes as a result. I think you might be coming up on one of them page with Xbox. But yeah, be interesting to

see what comes of it. Yeah, that's a good point. Platform like big platform holders making key changes. All right, thanks for that. So, Paige, what else have you got?
Uh so my first story isn't so much news. It's another one of our mobile mavens that we did. So, we reached out this time about government funding and incentives that you get and I kind of asked, you know, what the impact of that is now and how much it influences where studios actually choose to settle up. You know, kind of like what you mentioned a little bit as well, you know, like you know, the general stuff, you know, rising development costs, hard to get investment, you know, it's just a tough market in general. So, you know, government incentives and backing can be really important on the decision to start somewhere or, you know, whether you completely relocate and things like that. Um to to kind of like summarize a little bit of what the mavens went into the cuz obviously there was a broad range of opinions and some of them went into like quite a lot of detail on, you

know, different regions and what they do offer, but I would say the general consensus was very much so in agreement that government support has kind of shifted from, you know, it it was always important, but a lot of the time it felt of like it was a nice bonus, it was this, you know, nice thing to have, it was like a helpful, you know, part of the process, whereas now it seemed like a lot of them were saying it's actually a critical factor, like very important. You know, some mentioned how like private investment still hasn't fully recovered and you know, like UA costs are high. So, like government incentives aren't just for further growth anymore for some studios, literally the thing that's helping them survive long enough to actually ship a game in the first place. So, yeah, uh obviously like some of them talked about like these incentives not being, you know, the only reason to choose a location and then, you know, a few of them did say that obviously it is more of a, you know, it's an enabler and it lowers the risk. So, yeah, it's it's not the be-all and end-all, but I felt like

you know, that those are probably the ones that were sort of being a little bit more down the middle, whereas quite a lot of the comments were really heavily leaning on no, like some some studios 100% need this or, you know, certain places that they wouldn't even choose to set up there if it didn't have the right sort of structure in place. So, yeah, it just seemed pretty pretty huge like how many of them were saying that I they literally wouldn't choose to set up in a certain place if that wasn't there. I'll read just like two quick quotes. So, we had Clara Azevin and she her a lot of hers was a lot to do with the incentives that they have in France, but she also was just talking about it generally as well and she said, "When your margins are thin and your KPIs are rising, a 30% tax credit isn't a nice to have, it's the difference between sustainability and shutting down." And then, we also had Brian Baglow. He said that a lack of competitive incentives doesn't just encourage relocation, it practically mandates it for studios looking to scale. And yeah, I feel like

those opinions were sort of two that were like re-arrayed throughout most of the comments that we got. So, yeah, um yeah, very heavily towards not so much just this nice thing to have anymore, it's actually pretty critical for a lot of studio survival. It's a really interesting debate. I mean, obviously it's a big pleasure to read the Maven's article. I did a newsletter about the the same subject as well. Remember many many moons ago, obviously Canada with his big tax incentives which still exist in various provinces. There was a famous Develop magazine cover of I think World of Warcraft. World of Warcraft developer or the last person to leave the UK, please turn out the light. Which is based on a a famous UK newspaper headline. But it was because people were ultimately actually leaving because of the tax incentives were insane. If you use Ubisoft in Canada and and other developers there. I think there's a bit of a debate I guess potentially here and I think at least one person did kind of bring it up to me in Finland where they lost some incentives. It's like, well, you know, you see if I guess if an industry is

established, how much government incentives should it get because in theory those incentives are used to grow an industry and establish it. So, do you just forever give games that kind of same backing? I thought it was interesting. I guess now that things are so competitive across the globe with Turkey, with in the Middle East you've got the UAE and Saudi Arabia you were mentioning there offering such great incentives that you might decide to set up there. I guess in that context, maybe you just have to stay quite aggressive with what you're helping studios with. But obviously there's a lot of politics involved. Yeah, really interesting topic. Aaron, what else have you got? So, first up for me is some Mario movie news. So, the Super Mario Galaxy movie is now the highest grossing film of 2026 so far. Uh it's apparently earned more than 755 million dollars at the box office globally. That's largely being led by the US which has accounted for 300 361

million so far. Um and also adding that kind of global sum to how the first Mario movie did which made 1.3 billion. And that's pushed the franchise as a whole past 2 billion, which is very impressive from just two films. Uh, so yeah, clearly, you know, it's done very well. It's obviously a huge IP. Like transmedia is something we we talk about a lot these days. Clearly, Mario is a franchise or IP that's doing that very well. I also finally got around to seeing the film. I don't know whether either of you have seen it.
I've not seen it yet. What do you think? So, I I really enjoyed it, actually. I kind of tried to avoid spoilers and reviews as much as possible, but I sort of noticed that from headlines and things, people were quite a bit more negative about this one than the first one, but I liked it. I think there were some sections that maybe felt like these are cool references. And like I like the

set piece, you know, I'm enjoying watching this, but it also doesn't really need to be here. Like it's not really doing anything for the story. It's just an opportunity to put another reference on the screen. Right. So, like in a way, I suppose that's a criticism. I can see people disliking that. I didn't really feel like there were pacing issues. It's not as if you're sitting in like a 3-hour film and just constant bombardment of stuff, but there were certainly sections that was like, oh, cool, you know, they're they're referencing this game now and, you know, using this mechanic and things. But in terms of, I guess, the narrative, it didn't really add much. But nonetheless, yeah, I very much enjoyed the film. So, I went into the first one with quite low expectations. I was just kind of curious as to what it was like, and I was quite impressed with what they did. So, I was a bit more excited for this one, and for me, it's delivered, at least. And contrary to obviously how well it's doing at the box

office, um, so I went kind of midweek, and obviously after the Easter holiday, when I guess a lot of kids and parents would have gone. So, it was actually just me and my friends and we were the only people in the cinema. So, um we got an exclusive showing, you know, three 20-somethings getting an exclusive viewing of the new Mario movie.
Wow. That's my favorite cinema experience when nobody else is in there, which is really bad. But, I feel like cinema used to be different where like you enjoyed there being a group. Now, the more people in there, I'm like, "Oh, no." Cuz it's just one extra person that's going to be on their phone or be loud or something. So, when there's nobody in there, I'm like, "Yes." Yeah. So, yeah, I think that added to it. Yeah, it was uh quite a unique experience. You know, they they put this on for us, you know? And yeah, I actually I managed to drag someone along who didn't watch the first one, but kind of likes Mario. You know, he plays the games. And so, he quite enjoyed it as well. So, you you can watch it without you know, watching the first one. Obviously, you know, he knew

who Mario was already, so that that probably helped. I would be interested to find out like how many people went to watch the movie that has actually played any of the games. Cuz I have like um like a few friends and then like my sister loves like taking like her kids and stuff. And they haven't played the games. Uh so, my niece wanted to go. She's She's She's never played a Mario game in her life. But, I guess because it's like cool and vibrant and animated and that kind of style, it's just like cool looks cool, I guess. So, yeah, I I would love to know I would assume it's mostly you know, game nostalgia and stuff. But, yeah, I would love to know how many people have seen it that actually have never played a Mario game. But, I feel like Mario is one of those franchises that even if you're not a gamer, you you know who Mario is, right? It's actually inspired me to So, I've mainly been playing Champions, but I've started playing Mario Galaxy cuz they re-released that on the Switch. And obviously, that's the main inspiration for the new film. Uh cuz I never played it on the Wii. And

so, it's been funny playing that after seeing the film. And then, cuz like the film has references to like all across the Mario franchise. Obviously, a lot come from Galaxy. Um so, yeah, it was quite cool of like, oh, the the first like threat that attacks them in the film is the first boss in the Mario Galaxy game. So, when I saw him in Mario Galaxy, it was like, that that makes sense, you know? So, it's yeah, kind of doing it back to front there, but I guess, yeah, vaguely to your point. Like that is one of the games I hadn't played, but it's it's got me checking it out now. That's really interesting, yeah. Finding new audiences. All right. Uh thanks for that, Aaron. So, really interesting. Another interesting story from the week was about Al Media and Freecash. If you don't know what that is, it's one of those rewarded platforms. So, people download the app Freecash. They play companies like, say, Scopely might have Monopoly Go listed in there. Users will play that game. They might have to

They'll have challenges. They might have to complete so many levels, etc. They might even have to spend some money. And then, the idea is that user, for doing those actions, gets a reward. Uh and that can come in the kind of I I believe that comes in like gift cards or, you know, actual cash. And for the for the publisher, it gets them a a new user. It's a new engaged one that might continue playing afterwards. So, the news, and this was a TechCrunch article which has followed earlier articles from Wired and Malwarebytes. Basically, Freecash has been removed from the App Store, and then I think it was also removed from Google Play. Although, it's kind of back in some other form. We'll get to that. Over false marketing claims on TikTok about financial gain. They I think Al Media claimed that this was not actually like them saying it. It's like an affiliate. Um it wasn't sanctioned by the company itself. But I guess, whether they whether they knew or not that was happening, that we don't know. The TechCrunch report on this, again, like I said, which has been investigated by Wired, said, "If you've been on TikTok

this year, you were more likely to have encountered ads for Freecash. The app has been marketed as a way to make money just by scrolling TikTok and jumped to the top of the App Store in recent months, peaking at the number two position in the US App Store." And then it said, "In truth, Freecash pays users to play mobile games, all the while collecting a heaping amount of sensitive data, according to cybersecurity company Malwarebytes." This story confused me a bit for a number of reasons. And there is a reason I think it would have actually got removed, but I don't think this should be one of them, because yeah, that is how the this is how it works. You get money, like I said, for playing games, and it's a value the proposition is, I you play it to get money, and then the publisher might get a new user out of it, and that's that user acquisition. That that that's how that rewarded you a works. I don't I don't know. I I didn't I never thought like, "Oh, this is really nefarious." I don't know, it's just a way to try like some people just gave it, right? And like my sister used to do it just to make money. Although, I guess I can't just say that, you know, apparently get this podcast uh delisted. But but that

that's how she saw it, and sometimes payouts come, occasionally they don't for whatever reason, I don't know if it breaks or something. And then a report from Malwarebytes highlighted, as I said, like the the the the user data it takes. So, that includes categories such as health, religion, and sexual orientation. This is a bit kind of goes back to the privacy thing earlier as well. I can see why this is a problem, but you would be I'm not saying this is a good thing, but you'd be surprised what information data companies have and how they get it. I mean, you'd be surprised and not surprised. I guess some of the stories from the stories over the years, firms, for example, might have apps to get panel data. So, the users of say a weather app or a productivity app or something else, something like that, and they might have like a couple of million users, say, or less or more. They they use those apps to then, basically, it will differ from company to company, but this is just sort of a random how it could be used. And it might be listed in the permissions when you download it, but no one really pays attention to these, right?

For better for your own detriment, maybe. But that means like it it actually tracks like all the the other apps you're using, the other things you do on your mobile phone. Not just It's not just like within that app and you've said, "Oh, you can have my age, etc." It's like proper tracking like if the other things that you do on your phone. I think that's how I think it used to work. There's some stories out there on that. I'm just curious if if this was the reason they got banned, um how other apps will be impacted by this decision. And also whether Google and Apple have the tools to even discover if this was happening anyway in apps unless it gets reported by the media. Cuz I think in this case, TechCrunch itself went to Apple and then it got banned. So, and then the report also alleged it had another app. I don't know if I got this right. It's 256 rewards or rewards or something, and it renamed that to Free Cash, which the article says maybe it's a kind of an a possible bid to avert a ban. That'll be really bad. So, you can't do that if

that if that's what's kind of occurred. But it's also not that unusual for apps to be renamed, but in this case, it's pretty bad. Anyway, in response, Omedia CEO and founder Moritz Holländer said in a statement, "As many of you are aware, our iOS and Android apps were removed this week from the App Store and Google Play following media coverage that contained a number of inaccurate and misleading claims about our business. Articles like this show that there is still confusion in the wider public about how the general space of rewarded user acquisition works and the actual value apps like Free Cash or Omedia deliver to users and advertisers. So, I think this is potentially a big moment for rewarded UA as a thing as well. Uh it was quite a big trend a couple of years ago. We did an interview with Mis Plays, another player in the space uh recently why is that buzz died down and to check that out. But basically it's a slight I guess there's probably too many players in the space at the moment a bit competitive. But yeah, like if that could be

I don't know if this sticks this ban it could ruin that whole user acquisition channel for publishers. So we'll see. Hey Jules, have you got? Um yeah, I think Aaron mentioned that I would be going on to this subject. So some Xbox stuff. So they've made some more some more changes to Game Pass. I think maybe a first across the board not just for Xbox that subscription price is going down instead of up. Uh so yeah, Xbox Game Pass is basically a little bit cheaper. I think it's across uh PC Game Pass as well. When we say dropping in price obviously they had a quite significant price hike last year in October. So it's not as low as it was then, but it's not as high as it was when they increased it. So it's kind of in a middle ground now. So I guess in general on the surface that seems like a a positive. You know, the October price increase did not land well. I'm sure it had a lot of people canceling their subscriptions or at the very least but like changing what tier they were in thinking of at least my own sort of pool of gamer friends and stuff. That was

kind of the the breaking point for a few of them where they were like, well, I'm not paying for this anymore. So yeah, this kind of feels like Xbox trying to maybe win over some of those players and try and make Game Pass even a little bit more accessible again. But then the other big part of this is that they also said that future Call of Duty games will no longer launch on Game Pass on day one. So that seems kind of huge when you consider the fact that I feel like obviously the whole, you know, acquisition of Activision Blizzard a huge part of that, you know, 68 billion acquisition was to not only get a hold of Call of Duty, but to also be able to say, "Look, we've got Call of Duty on Game Pass. So, I suppose you know why why that big change. The only thing I can think it comes down to is perhaps that, you know, putting Call of Duty straight into Game Pass is obviously hurt its traditional sales, you know, like its first year sales. I think Black Ops 7 had the weakest performance that the franchise has seen in like many many

years. And I'm sure part of that comes down to the fact that the game wasn't received particularly well in general. I don't think it was very well regarded in the series, but you know, it it's obviously not hard to wonder how many people simply just played it through Game Pass rather than buying it how they traditionally would usually just buy it outright on day one. So, yeah, it seems like a little bit of a rebalance there, you know, trying to make Game Pass cheaper to make it seem a little bit more attractive whilst also trying to let, you know, this big franchise name maybe rebuild its premium launch, you know, so they're saying that they these games will join Game Pass, but it'll be a year later. So, I'm also then wondering are they going to change cuz usually Call of Duty's tend to come out like one a year. I believe that's been the case for quite a long time now. So, you know, it will people be as bothered about playing it on Game Pass a year later if the new one is coming out say within a few months of that. So, I guess we'll have to see if they change that. I think a while ago they did say they

might consider stop doing them like one a year, but I guess we'll see. And then another thing interestingly that I've been seeing of today is the sort of rumor mill that they may be experimenting with making Game Pass more customizable in the future and letting people pick like what they feel adds value to them, which is really funny because I did something to do with the price decrease for my week in views last week. And I kind of said something along similar lines because, you know, gaming tastes are incredibly personal. So, if you add things in a subscription that just has no interest to that player, it instantly for me, at least, kind of devalues it. But, the thing that might devalue it for me is the exact thing that somebody else wants. So, a really easy example is So, for me, in my Game Pass, I get Fortnite Crew. I don't want Fortnite Crew. I don't play Fortnite. You giving me Fortnite Crew is not going to go and make me play it. So, when I saw that, I was like, "Oh, like you've you know, you've increased my

subscription, and part of the incentive to make it seem worth while the money is by giving me something I don't want, like this doesn't interest me. And, you know, if that kept happening, it would probably push me over to the edge where I'm like, "Well, now I'm paying for too many things I don't want, so I won't pay for it." But, there could be other people who their favorite thing about Game Pass is, "Oh, I get Fortnite Crew." Part of it. So, yeah, I feel like that idea could be interesting if, you know, you could almost customize your tier. But, yeah, I feel like there'd be a lot of gray area in how that works. And, you know, if you click a certain thing, you know, yeah, I want Fortnite Crew, and you specifically see how much that adds to your subscription, that could maybe get That could be interesting, but also strange territory if it seems like not quite the right price for that. So, yeah, um definitely seems like a big rebalance of what they're trying to do with Game Pass. I feel like it's gone too far, they can't just give up on it, right? So, they've got to find a way to make it work for players and from a business sense. So, yeah, uh we'll see what happens. And, yeah, definitely

intrigued to see if this customizable thing actually manifests, or if it's just a an idea that never actually turns into anything. That's quite interesting idea. I don't I don't know about that, so that's quite I like I don't know I'm trying to decide if I like it or not. I feel like at the moment they're just looking for any like quick marketing marketing PR moves wins they can get to to re- recover the brand. Like, there's obviously a reason that the price went up in the first place. There's not enough people were using it. And, the reason, I guess, you would put it down is to attract more users, but they couldn't do that in the first place, and the price is still above the previous uh what it was before the previous rise. I feel like it's like a kind of another example of this Game Pass as it stands isn't working at all, and it just feels like a massive waste of $69 billion. The whole thesis behind the acquisition gone. Ridiculous. But, you know, new leadership, new ideas, new plans. We'll see We'll see where they go. It could It could go somewhere. I don't I don't know. Give Give them a chance.
The um the customization thing, yeah, I haven't I hadn't heard about that

either, but it would be interesting, as you say, if cuz if there are things kind of in the package currently that don't interest you, whether they like broaden that out and say you know, it's like there's I don't know, 10 like premium games that you'd normally have to buy separately to Game Pass, but you can have like you can choose three of them to have included in your package or something would be kind of an interesting approach rather than just saying, yeah, you get this cool game for free that you're not interested in. Um you know, if you got to pick a couple of them. Um so it reminds me a little bit, although it's not really subscription-based, like when Nintendo were kind of struggling in the Wii U days. Um and I think they did it with They did this with Mario Kart, which was probably the one game they didn't need to, but if you bought Mario Kart, you had like 10 other games you could choose from, and you just got it for free, and they were like first-party games where you could get the Zelda game for free if you bought

Mario Kart, or you know, the new Pikmin, or Sonic, or the Olympics, or whatever, and you just got to pick another like, you know, full-price game that you wanted to get alongside it, which is how I got into the Pikmin series, uh cuz I got three for free. So, yeah, that it just kind of Maybe it'll be totally different to that, but you've just kind of unlocked a memory there from like 10 years ago of that being kind of a thing they tried out. So, yeah, I wonder whether something similar might work in the subscription world. Yeah, I think it's very much so. Like, I only saw it just before we came on the podcast and I was reading it thinking, I swear I kind of mentioned something about this last week in my my week in views because me and this pesky Fortnite crew, I can't get over it. Like, I don't want this. Like, if I could deselect that from my tier, I 100% would deselect it.
The extra. Yeah, I don't want it. You've seen the future, Paige. It's good. It's good about this one. All right. Thanks for that, Aaron. Round us out. What else have you got? Yeah, so

my other one's a little bit random, I guess this week. Still kind of transmedia related, but I noticed that so a new like poster has come out for the next arc of the Pokémon anime and it immediately stood out because it's basically packed full of Pokémon mobile game references. So, I kind of put a story together going through it all, but basically it looks like the next arc of the anime is going to yeah, be utilizing Pokémon mobile games potentially in a big way. We don't really know. They're big enough to be on the poster for the new the new arc. Um so, like you've got PokéStop, which is what you'd spin in Pokémon Go to get PokéBalls and things as you walk around. And then there's also a like goal from Pokémon Unite with Pikachu like about to score a goal into it. And the Snorlax from Pokémon Sleep sleeping next to like this little cooking pot cuz I think

cooking's quite a big part of Pokémon Sleep to get different like rewards, basically. Yeah, as as someone who's long followed the anime up to like them writing Ash out anyway cuz they've moved on to new characters in the past few years. Yeah, mobile was sort of not really referenced very much in the series. It's It's always really built on, you know, whatever the latest main series game was. Obviously, the original, you know, '90s series was set in Kanto, which where Red and Blue are, and Ash did the same gym battles from the game. And then Gold and Silver came out, so you went to Johto and did the gyms from Gold You know, it's always been kind of tied in to promote the main series game, basically. Um and generally every kind of generation with the new region and Pokémon and gyms and things is roughly every 3 years, but I guess as as development times get longer, we're

we've sort of broken that trend now. So, the last of new generation was 2022 with Scarlet and Violet, which got quite a lot of criticism for being a bit Well, a bit of a mess. Um they There were a lot of sort of glitches and issues with it. So, I think, you know, they've taken that feedback on board, and they're spending longer developing the next main series game, which wins and waves, and that doesn't come out till 2027. Uh so, that's, you know, like a 5-year gap instead of three. And obviously, they still want anime episodes to roll out, and perhaps this indicates they didn't expect to take 5 years. Otherwise, they might have kind of put more filler in, you know, earlier on in the show, maybe. But whatever the case, you know, now they've kind of got potentially another year to fill extra, maybe. So, without the next main series game to kind of build on, they're looking for other sources, and among them, obviously, Pokémon has a lot of mobile games. So, um yeah, whether they're going to be kind of dedicated

episodes or, you know, multiple episodes for each one, it looks like, you know, there's going to be episodes themed around Pokémon Go, Unite, and Sleep. Maybe they'll do others as well. Masters is has its own little like island called Pasio that they might go to. There's no indication of that on the poster, but no reason why they wouldn't in this scenario. I don't know if they'd do a TCG pocket reference. I'm not sure if that would be a bit too kind of meta-breaking to have Pokémon cards in the Pokémon world, but that that would be interesting to see if they went that direction.
Thanks for that, Aaron. That brings us to the end of the week in mobile games. So, thank you everybody for listening. Thank you, Paige Aaron, for being on the show. Great to have you. You had no choice, but it's great to have you. And so, yeah, we'll end it there. So, thanks again for everyone. I'll be at Gamescom again. Hopefully, we'll make room for we'll make time for the show, and I'll report back on my findings from there. Cuz I think I did that last year, so I can do it again this time. Right. Have a good weekend, everyone. See you soon. Thanks. Bye.