Despite passing the 20 million mark in Japan at the start of October, mobile phenomenon Puzzle & Dragons found itself in a difficult situation, with growth slowing in its home territory.

How do you progress when you've hit the peak, reaching near saturation point in your territory?

Naturally, developer GungHo looked to the west to broaden its audience, rolling out Puzzle & Dragons across the US and UK on iOS and Android, and the firm's latest stats suggest said strategy is beginning to pay off.

Keeping the fire burning

Numbers released by the firm suggest Puzzle & Dragons has now hit 2 million downloads in North America, with the game serving as another example of a distinctly Asian game finding success in the west.

"To date, Puzzle & Dragons has collectively reached 23 million downloads in Japan, North America and Korea alone," the company said in a statement.

"Puzzle & Dragons continues to see tremendous growth thanks to the game's addictive combination of puzzle, dungeon-crawling and monster-collecting gameplay."

News of the game's growth in North America comes days after its unofficial sequel – Divine Gate – passed the 1 million user mark in Japan.

The company was also recently acquired a stake in Clash of Clans developer Supercell, with speculation suggesting GungHo will work closely with the Finnish studio to help expand its hand in western markets yet further.