What mobile developers think of Defold, the indie developer's guide to UA and Ubisoft acquires Ketchapp

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• 5 How a vibrant community is helping shape the future of 60-second RPG Exiles of Embermark

  

  Making an RPG experience that's deep enough to draw in the hardcore market, but fast-paced enough to attract the casual crowd too, sounds like a bit of big ask.

  But that's exactly what Gunslinger Studios is trying to do with its first game Exiles of Embermark, a game that CEO Tim Harris was very excited to talk about.

  "I'm crazy insane stupid happy," said Harris on how he feels about the game's progress over the last six months.

  "We're a smallish crew at Gunslinger, but we're hungry and evil."

  He goes on to talk about how the studio is growing a community around the game, and what interesting and potentially disastrous plans it has lined up.

  
  

• 4 What do mobile developers think of King's game engine Defold?

  

  King decided to make its internal Defold game engine freely available back in March 2016, stating that it wasn't selling or buying anything - it just wanted to help.

  Which is all well and good, but we wanted to know what our Mobile Mavens thought about all this, and if it is likely to pull developers away from bigger, more established engines.

  Rovio's Patrick Liu was fully on-board with the idea, saying that King is really just an alturistic company looking to help folks out, but that it also helps train up the next generation of King employees in a way.

  "It's like Adobe or Autodesk giving away free educational versions of their tools, and when those people become pros they are already trained in the tools King uses," he said.

  
  

• 3 Supercell made up 80% of all Finnish game revenues in 2015, report claims

  

  You could say that Supercell is doing alright for itself. It's only got four games out, but hey, it seems to be ticking along nicely.

  So nicely in fact that it accounted for 80% of all Finnish game revenues in 2015. That's 80% of €2.68 billion, if you weren't aware.

  That's about €2.1 billion, far outstripping fellow Finnish developers like Rovio, Unity Finland, RedLynx, Remedy and Seriously.

  That said, the report did warn that it should only be considered a "snapshot" of the industry, and there may be some errors within, so it's best to take the report with a grain of salt.

  
  

• 2 The indie game developers guide to user acquisition

  

  It's hard to be an indie sometimes, especially when you don't have the money to do a tonne of UA.

  If you're in that situation, you may want to take a look at Johannes Heinze's guide to UA for indies, which offers five quick tips on the subject.

  Tip one is to "know yourself and know your audience" - or more simply, know what kind of game you have, and what players you're going to attract.

  "Do the maths on budgeting for profitability, and be realistic by setting challenging but achievable UA goals," writes Heinze, who then goes on to talk about what data you should track and other useful hints.

  
  

• 1 Ubisoft acquires prolific mobile games publisher Ketchapp

  

  Ubisoft is having a bit of a troubled time at the minute, what with media corporation Vivendi breathing down its neck and looking to make a takeover bid.

  But that hasn't stopped it from acquiring prolific developer Ketchapp, best known for titles like 2048 and Stack.

  Terms of the deal weren't disclosed, but it's expected to close during Q3 of the 2016-17 financial year.

  "We are thrilled to become part of Ubisoft's international network of talented teams," said Ketchapp co-founders Antoine and Michel Morcos.

  "We founded Ketchapp with the intention of creating captivating gaming experiences, and we are looking forward to leveraging Ubisoft's creativity and resources to enrich our existing and upcoming titles."