Everything is a games platform: Part two

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Everything is a games platform. 

I wrote about this in a newsletter last year, highlighting moves and performance from LinkedIn, Discord, The New York Times, Telegram and WeChat Minigames.

The trend hasn’t slowed down. Duolingo, which in industry circles is well known for its presence at games conferences and hiring of industry talent, is the latest to make moves in the space. It’s not strictly providing games as an addition to its learning platform. Rather, it’s making gamification a core part of its offering across education in language, maths and music.

For the latter, it just made its biggest move yet: the company has acquired the majority of the team at UK studio NextBeat, a spin-off from Space Ape Games following its full acquisition by Supercell.

Through the deal, Duolingo is establishing its first official UK presence and cementing its credentials in the games space. We spoke with the now former NextBeat CEO Simon Hade about the deal here.

Worth noting, too, that late last year Duolingo appointed the former head of the Halo franchise Bonnie Ross as an independent board member.

Music streaming platform Spotify expanded into games last month with the release of Happy Gilmore 2 Tournament, coinciding with the new Netflix movie.

The official comments from marketing bingo mention “more than a game”, “true to the moment”, “one-size-fits-all executions”, “high-impact experiences” and “creative canvas”. Cool. In normal speak: games on Spotify based on popular things.

The game consists of three holes which takes about 15 seconds and felt impossible to find outside of a direct link. But hey, the intent is there to experiment.

Elsewhere, since our last article Netflix has continued to pivot its strategy, intent on making a go of games through its streaming platform. Co-CEO Gregory Peters claimed last month the company aims to ramp up its gaming investment, but also suggested this will be based on performance.

The New York Times Games app has continued to grow in revenue, rising to $35.7 million in H1 2025, up close to 39% year-over-year according to AppMagic data.

LinkedIn has added a new game to its lineup in Zip, and just this week, Mini Sudoku. Discord, meanwhile, continues to offer Activities, which was opened up to all developers last year.

YouTube Playables now has more than 200 games, including Trivia Crack, Pac-Man SuperFast, 8 Ball Pool, Basketball FRVR, Fruit Ninja, Ludo King, Angry Birds Showdown, and many more. 

In China, WeChat Minigames is growing at a rapid rate. The platform generated $2.3 billion in the first half of 2024. In H1 2025, sales surged to $3.2bn, up approximately 40% Y/Y.

I’ve spoken before how big audiences for non-gaming platforms don’t always (or even often) translate to big revenue opportunities for games. But that hasn’t stopped companies trying to reap potentially big rewards. And in some cases, the battle for your time, not just your money, is just as big a prize.

We’ll be highlighting this trend and developments in the non-gaming space to adopt games mechanics at Pocket Gamer Connects London on January 19th to 20th, 2026. Stay tuned for more announcements!