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Candy Crush Soda Saga splashes onto global top grossing chart

Crunching the data with App Annie

Candy Crush Soda Saga splashes onto global top grossing chart

This article is part of an ongoing series of data-driven articles from PocketGamer.biz and App Annie highlighting trends in the mobile games sector.

In previous weeks, we've been on a world trip, travelling from from the US to German, Japan and South Korea, to see what's been happening on those individual app stores in terms of the most popular, most engaging and top grossing mobile games.

But now it's time to reconnect with the global chart.

One trend that's occurred while we're been away is the rise of hypercasual slapping games.

The most downloaded mobile game globally is currently AppLovin/Lion Studios' Slap Kings.

Most of the other games on this chart are familiar however, with the likes of Voodoo's Draw Climber and Woodturning featuring alongside other casual fare like Focus' Brain Out and Unico's Brain Test.

Even WormsZone (from Crazy Games) is just another take on the Agar.io/Slither.io genre.

PUBG Mobile and Free Fire demonstrate core games can still compete against the hypercasual competition even in terms of downloads.

When it comes to the most engaging games in terms of weekly active users, despite a four-week gap - and everything else going on in the world - the list is also exactly the same as when we last looked at it in early February.

In fact, the only minor differences are Clash of Clans and Anipop, and Pokemon Go and Call of Duty: Mobile have swapped places.

In future, it will be fascinating to see if the large scale quarantine currently being undertaken will be an opportunity for new games to find popularity or whether people will find solace in the games they know they already love.

Game for Peace remains in the #1 spot, but Japanese hit Monster Strike is up from #9 to #2, while PUBG Mobile is a re-entry at #3.

And the most significant game on this chart is Candy Crush Soda Saga.

While the original Candy Crush Saga usually features as a top grossing global game, we've never seen the Soda Saga version on the chart before.

It's also interesting to see Gardenscapes at #7 and Coin Master at #9. Both these casual titles are already incredibly popular and profitable but having three such games in the global top 10 grossing chart together is not a common occurrence.

But perhaps we're falling into the trap of confusing correlation with causation. Either way, the coming weeks will provide more solid data about how players' behaviour is impacted by the worldwide Covid-19 pandemic.

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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.