Mobile reports and market data
Documents
PocketGamer.biz at BoBHack 2012
The Best of British game hack, held in 2012 at the Mind Candy offices in London, served as a collaborative initiative to showcase the creative talent within the British mobile gaming industry.
- The 2012 Best of British (BoBHack) event brought independent mobile studios together at Mind Candy’s London offices to develop a cohesive suite of interconnected mini-games within a 48-hour timeframe.
- Participating studios included Kwalee, Mobile Pie, Spilt Milk Studios, and Big Pixel, all of which collaborated to showcase British development talent during the summer of 2012.
- The project was designed as a series of games with increasing difficulty levels, intended to drive public engagement and app downloads for the collective suite.
Console Is the New Coin-Op - Monetizing Games in a Future Without Consoles - Extra Credits
The gaming industry is currently undergoing a structural shift analogous to the decline of the arcade era, where dedicated hardware is increasingly being superseded by more convenient, accessible, and cost-effective platforms.
- The home console is projected to become obsolete within two hardware cycles as cloud gaming, mobile devices, and web-based platforms achieve performance parity with dedicated hardware.
- The gaming industry is undergoing a structural shift similar to the decline of the arcade era, where specialized, stationary hardware is being displaced by more accessible and cost-effective digital distribution models.
- Rising AAA development costs and the superior reach of streaming ecosystems necessitate a move away from proprietary hardware to avoid relegating high-budget gaming to a niche market.
Gamesmonitor '12: Gamesindustrie Onderzocht
The Dutch games industry, as of 2011, functions as a dynamic yet maturing ecosystem comprising approximately 330 companies and 3,000 professionals.
- Amsterdam remains the leading city for the games industry in the Netherlands, with nearly 800 jobs in 2011, followed by Hilversum (over 500 jobs) and Utrecht (270 jobs).
- The traditional computer games industry, dominated by US and Japanese platforms like Sony, Nintendo, and Microsoft, is seeing limited growth (2% annually for console gaming) and a shrinking market for PC games, due to the rise of casual games.
- Mobile apps, particularly for iOS (iPhone 63%, iPad 60%) and Android (Phone 60%, Tablet 44%), are highly popular platforms in the Dutch games industry.
Game Developer Index 2010: Sweden
The Swedish game industry entered a period of significant expansion in 2010, characterized by a record turnover of 1.181 billion SEK and a 9.2 percent increase in total employment.
- The Swedish game industry reached a record turnover of 1.181 billion SEK in 2010, supported by a 9.2 percent increase in total employment.
- Market concentration remains high, with the five largest companies accounting for 60 percent of the industry's total revenue.
- The sector is successfully pivoting toward digital distribution and mobile platforms, utilizing diverse monetization strategies like free-to-play, freemium, and ad-funded models.
Mobile Audio Technology: Report and Recommendations
The mobile audio industry faces significant operational challenges due to extreme market fragmentation, characterized by the existence of over 50 file formats and 400 distinct device implementations.
- The mobile audio industry is hindered by extreme fragmentation, involving over 50 file formats and 400 distinct device implementations that inflate development and quality assurance costs.
- To achieve cross-platform interoperability, the industry must transition to non-proprietary standards, specifically adopting SP-MIDI, General MIDI, and the XMF format.
- Standardizing APIs such as JSR-234 and OpenSL ES is essential to provide developers with consistent access to advanced features like Digital Signal Processing and 3D audio.
GungHo Business Report Vol. 23
GungHo Online Entertainment’s business report outlines a strategic roadmap for 2016, centered on the goal of becoming a premier global entertainment company.
- GungHo reported 2015 financial results of 154.3 billion yen in sales and 72.4 billion yen in operating profit.
- The Puzzle & Dragons franchise remains the company's primary revenue driver, reaching over 53 million global downloads as of February 2016.
- The company is aggressively expanding internationally, including a collaboration with Tencent for a Chinese release of Puzzle & Dragons and a joint venture with Gamania for Taiwan, Hong Kong, and Macau.
GungHo Business Report Vol. 24
GungHo Online Entertainment’s business report outlines a strategic pivot toward long-term brand cultivation and market diversification in response to a maturing smartphone gaming sector.
- GungHo is pivoting from a mobile-only focus to long-term brand cultivation, aiming to transform core intellectual properties into cross-media franchises spanning console gaming, anime, and physical merchandise.
- As of mid-2016, the flagship title Puzzle & Dragons reached 42 million downloads in Japan and 10 million in North America.
- The company is actively extending the lifecycle of its core assets through initiatives like the GPS-enabled companion app Puzzle & Dragons Radar and expansion into new console titles such as Let It Die.
GungHo Business Report Vol. 27
GungHo Online Entertainment’s business strategy focuses on the global expansion of its gaming portfolio and the long-term maximization of its intellectual property.
- GungHo experienced a significant financial downturn between 2015 and 2017, with net sales dropping from 154.3 billion yen to 92.3 billion yen and operating income falling from 72.4 billion yen to 34.4 billion yen.
- The company is pivoting from a Japan-centric model to a global distribution strategy, specifically targeting expansion into North American and European markets.
- Puzzle & Dragons remains the company's primary growth pillar, reaching 47 million downloads in Japan by late 2017 and utilizing cross-media strategies like anime and e-Sports to maintain relevance.
GungHo Business Report Vol. 29
GungHo Online Entertainment’s business strategy focuses on four core pillars: maximizing the value of existing titles, creating new intellectual properties, expanding into new fields, and leveraging subsidiary business operations.
- GungHo’s flagship title, Puzzle & Dragons, reached 80 million global downloads as of early 2019, with consistent updates and e-sports initiatives successfully reversing a downward sales trend in late 2018.
- The company reported 92.1 billion yen in net sales for the 2018 fiscal year, maintaining consistency with the previous year despite a decline in operating income from 34.4 billion yen in 2017 to 26.6 billion yen.
- Growth is being driven by subsidiary GRAVITY Co., Ltd., which successfully expanded the international reach of Ragnarok M: Eternal Love across Asia, North America, South America, and Oceania.
GungHo Portfolio Overview: Teppen and Nagmaro
GungHo Online Entertainment focuses on a multi-faceted growth strategy centered on maximizing the value of existing intellectual properties while simultaneously developing new titles for the global gaming market.
- GungHo is executing a global expansion strategy to transition from a Japan-centric model to a multi-platform operation across mobile, console, and PC.
- Flagship title Puzzle & Dragons remains a primary revenue driver, having surpassed 80 million global downloads.
- The company is diversifying its portfolio through strategic collaborations, such as the card battle game Teppen developed with Capcom and the console-based Ninjala.
GungHo Business Report Vol. 31
GungHo Online Entertainment’s business strategy centers on maximizing the value of established intellectual properties while simultaneously cultivating new gaming experiences for a global audience.
- GungHo reported strong fiscal 2019 financial results with consolidated net sales of 101.39 billion yen and an operating income of 28.35 billion yen.
- The company maintains a robust development pipeline with nine new gaming titles currently in progress across mobile and console platforms.
- Flagship title TEPPEN achieved significant market traction, surpassing 4 million downloads by late 2019.
COLOPL Annual Report 2019
COLOPL pursues a strategic transition from a smartphone-centric mobile gaming model toward a diversified entertainment portfolio.
- For the fiscal year ending September 30, 2019, COLOPL experienced a 15.0% decline in net sales to ¥38,920 million and a 57.5% drop in operating profit to ¥2,952 million.
- The company is shifting its strategy from a smartphone-centric model toward a diversified entertainment portfolio, including virtual reality and location-based services, to counter volatility in the mobile gaming market.
- Financial performance was negatively impacted by a reduced volume of new title releases and diminishing returns from legacy products such as the Shironeko Project.