Apex Legends Mobile
Game
20 documents in the library are about Apex Legends Mobile, from writers such as GameMakers, GameRefinery and Deconstructor of Fun. Each has a summary and key insights with the page they come from.
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Key figures from the reports
Electronic Arts cancelled Apex Legends Mobile despite the title achieving a $100 million annual run rate and winning critical industry awards.
Deconstructor of Fun, 2023 · What Really Happened with Apex Legends Mobile
Japan is the most lucrative market for Apex Legends Mobile, generating 42% of lifetime revenue with an average revenue per download (RPD) of $3.70, significantly higher than the $0.75 RPD in the United States.
Naavik, 2022 · Apex Legends Mobile: Fighting the Competition
Apex Legends Mobile achieved over 5 million downloads within its first five days of release, split between 2.4 million on Google Play and 2.9 million on the App Store.
Apptica, 2022 · Apex Legends Mobile Success: Genius Marketing or the Power of a Name?
Subway Surfers experienced a major resurgence, recording over 80 million downloads—its strongest performance since 2014—while new mid-core titles like Apex Legends Mobile and Diablo Immortal successfully entered the market.
Sensor Tower, 2022 · Store Intelligence Data Digest: Q2 2022, p. 23
Documents about Apex Legends Mobile
In the Hot Seat: Mattel163 COO Devin Nambiar on Uno and life after the NetEase deal
Mattel163, a mobile game publisher, recently transitioned from a joint venture between Mattel and NetEase to a wholly-owned internal development and publishing division of Mattel.
- Mattel acquired NetEase's 50% stake in their joint venture, Mattel163, in February 2024 for $318 million, transitioning the studio into its internal game development and publishing division.
- Mattel163 has achieved over $1 billion in lifetime revenue, nearly $250 million in annual recurring revenue (ARR), and 20 million monthly active users (MAUs) across its four live titles.
- Successful cross-border game expansion requires significant product tailoring, as evidenced by the failure of major titles like Honor of Kings and Monster Strike when launched globally without sufficient culturalization.
2023’s Most-Read Stories: Unity’s Runtime Fee Fiasco, Playtika, Apex Legends Mobile and More
The mobile games industry experienced a tumultuous 2023, characterized by significant corporate controversies, studio closures, and shifting monetization strategies.
- Unity’s 2023 'Runtime Fee' policy triggered a massive developer backlash, resulting in a partial pricing reversal, a decline in its ad exchange business by up to 30%, and the eventual departure of CEO John Riccitiello.
- EA signaled a broader industry trend of studio closures and layoffs in January 2023 by canceling 'Apex Legends Mobile' and shuttering the 'Battlefield Mobile' developer Industrial Toys after the game's revenue flatlined.
- Playtika suspended all new game development in early 2023, citing an unfavorable marketing landscape and poor ROI, reflecting a wider industry shift toward consolidation and optimization of existing assets.
Is It Time to Rethink the “Game of the Year” Award for Mobile?
The mobile gaming industry’s current approach to "Game of the Year" (GOTY) awards is fundamentally flawed due to a disconnect between creative recognition and actual business performance.
- Current 'Game of the Year' awards for mobile games fail to correlate with sustained spikes in downloads or revenue, as performance trends are primarily driven by seasonal content and marketing events.
- Analysis of Marvel SNAP, Apex Legends Mobile, and Genshin Impact between 2021 and 2023 shows that award wins are additive at best rather than causal drivers of commercial success.
- The existing awards framework is criticized as a marketing vehicle for platforms like Apple and Google rather than an objective measure of creative quality or business performance.
Market Wire: February 6, 2023
The February 6, 2023, industry update provides a critical analysis of the current state of the video game market, focusing on the challenges facing AAA development, the characteristics of high-revenue mobile titles, and the strategic rationale behind recent mobile game shutdowns.
- AAA game development faces a profitability crisis as titles require massive player bases to succeed while competing for limited attention, leading to a significant decline in market value for companies like Ubisoft, whose stock fell from 82.40€ in January 2021 to 18.59€ by January 2023.
- Industry experts suggest a shift toward 'AA' tier games or the 'Rockstar model' of hyper-successful, long-term engagement titles as potential solutions to the current AAA development challenges.
- EA CEO Andrew Wilson attributed the shutdown of Apex Legends Mobile to a failure to translate complex, team-based gameplay to mobile and an inability to retain casual users, rather than a lack of cross-platform connectivity.
What Really Happened with Apex Legends Mobile
The cancellation of Apex Legends Mobile and Battlefield Mobile represents a significant strategic pivot for Electronic Arts, signaling the end of its recent mobile shooter ambitions.
- Electronic Arts cancelled Apex Legends Mobile despite the title achieving a $100 million annual run rate and winning critical industry awards.
- The decision to shutter the game was driven by a failure to meet internal financial expectations and a strategic pivot away from mobile shooter ambitions.
- Apex Legends Mobile struggled to gain traction due to market saturation from entrenched competitors like PUBG Mobile, Garena Free Fire, and Call of Duty Mobile.
Market Wire: February 2, 2023
The February 2, 2023, market analysis examines the strategic failures leading to the cancellation of Electronic Arts’ mobile titles, specifically Apex Legends Mobile and Battlefield Mobile, alongside the closure of the Industrial Toys studio.
- Electronic Arts has canceled both Apex Legends Mobile and Battlefield Mobile, resulting in the closure of the Industrial Toys studio.
- Apex Legends Mobile, despite winning Apple’s and Google Play’s Game of the Year awards for 2022, failed to sustain revenue growth and will shut down within 90 days of the February 2023 announcement.
- Data indicates that Apex Legends Mobile suffered from poor monetization, with revenue per download significantly trailing top-grossing titles like Call of Duty Mobile.
EA’s Respawn to Shut Down Apex Legends Mobile in May
Electronic Arts and Respawn Entertainment announced the discontinuation of Apex Legends Mobile, effective May 1, 2023. The decision to sunset the title came just one year after its global launch on May 17, 2022.
- Electronic Arts and Respawn Entertainment will shut down Apex Legends Mobile on May 1, 2023, at 4 p.m. PDT.
- Respawn cited a failure to maintain the necessary standards for content quality, quantity, and update cadence as the primary reason for the game's closure.
- The mobile title, which was co-developed with Tencent’s Lightspeed Studios, operated for only one year following its launch on May 17, 2022.
Market Wire: December 5, 2022
This market analysis provides a comprehensive overview of the video game industry as of early December 2022, focusing on performance trends, platform dynamics, and emerging technological shifts.
- Mobile gaming revenue is cooling after its pandemic-era peak, with worldwide consumer spend dropping from a high of $7.73 billion in July 2021 to $6.5 billion in September 2022, though it remains above pre-pandemic levels.
- Apple and Google named Apex Legends Mobile their game of the year, a decision driven by the title's ability to showcase high-end hardware performance and avoid the negative PR associated with aggressive monetization seen in competitors like Diablo Immortal.
- The gaming industry saw significant consolidation in 2022, marked by major acquisitions including Microsoft’s bid for Activision Blizzard, Sony’s purchase of Bungie, and Take-Two’s acquisition of Zynga.
Apex Legends Mobile: Fighting the Competition
Apex Legends Mobile serves as a high-fidelity, squad-based battle royale experience designed to translate the core mechanics of its PC predecessor into a mobile-first environment.
- Japan is the most lucrative market for Apex Legends Mobile, generating 42% of lifetime revenue with an average revenue per download (RPD) of $3.70, significantly higher than the $0.75 RPD in the United States.
- Apex Legends Mobile utilizes a hero-based system that differentiates it from competitors like PUBG Mobile and Call of Duty Mobile, allowing for deeper lore-based immersion and unique character-specific perk trees.
- The game employs a generous onboarding process that uses AI-controlled bots for the first 8 to 14 levels, ensuring new players have 4 to 6 hours of gameplay before facing real human opponents.
Bungie Reportedly Working on Destiny Mobile in Partnership with NetEase
Bungie is reportedly collaborating with NetEase to develop a new first-person shooter (FPS) mobile title based on the Destiny intellectual property.
- Bungie is developing a new, original first-person shooter mobile game based on the Destiny intellectual property in partnership with NetEase.
- The project has been in development for over two years and represents a strategic effort to expand the Destiny brand into the high-growth mobile gaming market.
- This collaboration builds on a 2018 financial relationship where NetEase invested $100 million in Bungie.
The Rise of Midcore Mobile Games Snapshot Report July 2022
The midcore mobile gaming sector is experiencing a significant shift as AAA developers and high-fidelity titles increasingly challenge the historical dominance of casual and hyper-casual games.
- Midcore mobile games were the only category to achieve revenue growth in the US iOS market between Q1 2021 and Q1 2022, now capturing 36.73% of total mobile gaming revenue.
- New midcore titles are outperforming casual games in long-term retention, with nine midcore releases from the past year remaining in the top 200 grossing chart compared to only three casual titles.
- Top-performing midcore titles like Diablo Immortal, Genshin Impact, and Apex Legends Mobile prioritize console-like manual controls over autoplay mechanics to drive engagement.
The Rise of Midcore Mobile Games
This analysis explores the significant growth and evolving landscape of midcore mobile games, particularly in the United States market as of mid-2022.
- Midcore mobile games accounted for 37% of US iOS mobile game revenue in Q1 2022 and were the only category to experience year-over-year growth.
- Top-tier midcore titles demonstrate superior retention, with nine midcore games maintaining top-200 grossing positions over a 365-day period compared to only three casual titles.
- Monetization in top-grossing midcore titles is heavily standardized, with 75% of games utilizing Battle Passes and over 65% incorporating five or more distinct gacha mechanics.