Popularised in media terms by Wired's Chris Anderson, there's been some debate about the power of the long tail for mobile games.
Of course, running games as a service means that developers are thinking a lot more about the longevity of their games and their communities.
The top grossing charts are now pretty static in terms of titles sitting in the top 50, however, meaning they're sucking up the vast majority of revenue.
Still, it could be argued this is more about the power of a mass-market than a long tail.
Remember that the classic long tail is all about selling a small number of hard-to-find (hence valuable) items; i.e. maintaining a valuable niche market, not a mass-market.
Network effect
If the figures from DeNA are anything to go by, the long tail is certainly working for its Mobage platform.
Revealed as part of its Q1 2013 financials, this graph demonstrates that in its key Japanese market, the longevity of games can be measured in years.
As shown in grey, around a third of current consumption of the platform's MobaCoin currency (worth around $550 million per quarter) is being generated from games released in 2010 and before.
Difficult for even the largest publisher to match in terms of the sheer scale of titles required, it shows why a successful platform is worth ten of billions.
Chart of the Week
Contributing Editor
A Pocket Gamer co-founder, Jon is Contributing Editor at PG.biz which means he acts like a slightly confused uncle who's forgotten where he's left his glasses. As well as letters and cameras, he likes imaginary numbers and legumes.
Related Articles
Chart of the Week
Aug 18th, 2016
How changing one screen led Games2Win to increase Parking Frenzy 2.0's retention by 5%
Chart of the Week
Jul 22nd, 2016
20% of the 106 million US mobile gamers account for 62% of time spent playing
Top Stories
Events
LA Games Conference 2024 | North America | May 6th |
Mobidictum Meetup Berlin May 2024 | Europe | May 7th |
Valencia Indie Summit 2024 | Europe | May 16th |
Mobidictum Meetup Tallinn May 2024 | Europe | May 21st |
Israel Mobile Summit 2024 | Middle East | Jun 6th |
WN Conference Istanbul 2024 | Jun 11th | |
DevGAMM Vilnius 2024 | Europe | Jun 14th |
Develop: Brighton 2024 | Europe | Jul 9th |