Hot Five

Hot Five: Miniclip buys Ilyon, Nifty Games goes on recruiting spree, and how Riot avoided backlash from going mobile

The hottest stories of last week

Hot Five: Miniclip buys Ilyon, Nifty Games goes on recruiting spree, and how Riot avoided backlash from going mobile

To help you keep on top of a busy news cycle and the latest hot topics in mobile gaming, each week we round up the five most-read stories on PocketGamer.biz.

Read on and digest...

5. 32 notable mobile games released in December 2019 you may have missed

It's tricky keeping up with every single game that launches on mobile in a given week, let alone month, but Gameloft producer Maxon Pugovsky has been doing exactly that.

Neatly broken down into easy-to-follow categories, including licensed games and hypercasual titles, it's a great way to catch up on everything you may have missed, even if you've been keeping your eyes firmly on the ball.

4. Digit Game Studios founder Richard Barnwell on life after Scopely acquisition

It wasn't a huge surprise when Scopely picked up Digit Game Studios back in May 2019 - the two had been working together on Star Trek Fleet Command since it first launched.

But we still felt it would be a good time to catch up with the developer's founder Richard Barnwell to see how the partnership has fared over the last half of 2019, and what it plans to do in the coming years.

3. Riot Games reveals how it "avoided backlash" when announcing mobile titles

PC and console developers moving into mobile can be a tricky business - especially when their fans decide that opening up their favourite franchises to mobile players is apparently on par with genocide.

That said, Riot Games managed to avoid a lot of the fire and fury when it announced its raft of League of Legends mobile titles in 2019. The game's global communications lead, Ryan Rigney, explained all on Twitter, which we rounded up for you.

2. Sports developer Nifty Games recruits EA, Warner Bros. and Zynga veterans

Venture funded games developer and publisher Nifty Games unveiled a host of new employees that have joined the firm last week.

Seven new staff members have been brought into the company as of January with the former head of QA for Warner Bros. Games, Age of Learning, and Rockyou, Johnson Lee, being appointed director of studio operations. With 18 plus years' experience, Lee has worked on titles such as The Sims, Harry Potter: Wizards Unite and SimCity 4.

1. Report: Tencent-owned Miniclip purchases Ilyon Games for $100 million

In a slightly surprising move, casual games publisher Miniclip has acquired Israeli firm Ilyon Games for $100 million.

Or so we hear - there's been no official confirmation from Miniclip, Ilyon, or the former's owner Tencent about the deal. But we'll know for sure when Miniclip starts attaching its logo to Ilyon's games.

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Ric is the Editor of PocketGamer.biz, having started out as a Staff Writer on the site back in 2015. He received an honourable mention in both the MCV and Develop 30 Under 30 lists in 2016 and refuses to let anyone forget about it.