Big Deal
Israel’s Taptica acquired US digital ads firm RhythmOne for $176 million
Deal expected to close in April, taking RhythmOne off the London Stock Exchange
Jobs In Games
Jobs in Games: Hutch's James Levick on how to get a job as a director of technology
"Be persistent and don’t worry if you get rejected - you’ll get there"
Charts
Weekly global mobile games charts: Western developers find premium success in China
Charts from January 21st to 27th
Invested
Bristol dev Auroch Digital raises investment from Miniclip and Bristol Private Equity Club
Equity firm fronts over $200,000 for Auroch’s new projects and local dev scene work
Jobs In Games
Working in video games: It's dangerous to go alone
Kixeye chief marketing officer John Getze on getting a job in games
Well?!
What industry trends do mobile indies see on the horizon for 2019?
Our mavens weigh in
Sports Stars
Sports games score big sales for Konami as revenue tops $1.76 billion for last nine months
Yu-Gi-Oh Duel Links set to launch in China on mobile
Jobs News
Ex-Flaregames head of PR Jon Howard lands at Rovio
He'll head up communications and PR at the Angry Birds developer
Nintendo Tokyo
Nintendo set to open its first official store in Japan
Set to open its doors in autumn 2019
Partner Up
Nintendo partners with Line and NHN for Dr. Mario World mobile game this summer
Will launch across 60 countries including the US and Japan
Consolidation
UK's Sumo Digital acquires Red Kite Games
Follows purchases of CCP Newcastle and The Chinese Room in 2018
Jobs In Games
How to rethink your dream and pursue a career in games
Mobalytics.gg head of marketing Erik Reynolds
Indie Spotlight
Mountains' Ken Wong on moving on from Monument Valley to Florence
"I felt like I wanted to grow on my own and I wanted to see what they could do without me"
Financials
Keywords anticipates revenue to grow to $287m in 2018
Unaudited financials claim strong growth following aggressive M&A strategy
Nex-marble
Netmarble forming consortium to acquire Nexon
Serious contender for $9bn-valued publisher
Switched On
Nintendo posts strong quarter despite lowering Switch sales estimates to 17m for the year
Mobile spurs on approximately $300m in sales
Blame The Blue Shell?
Mario Kart Tour for mobile delayed until summer 2019
Was expected to launch by end of March
Swiss Cheers
3 reasons you need to be at Ludicious in Switzerland this week
Tobias Kopka iInterview: how and why to visit the Zurich games festival ASAP
Ofcom
Ofcom reckons almost 90 per cent of gamers aged between 12 and 15 are playing online
UK report finds young gamers are increasingly online and social
Location, Location
Israeli publisher Playtika has opened new R&D office in Bucharest
Qualitest partners with the Israeli developer to launch the new testing and QA location
Touchdown
EA Sports mobile games score $1 billion in revenue
Madden franchise has generated sales of $490 million
Financials
iPhone revenue drops 15% year-on-year as Apple looks to services
But iPad revenue is up
Demonic
DENA and Platinum's World of Demons possibly canned after App Store removal
The hack and slash game had initially soft-launched in Philippines, Singapore and Malaysia in June of last year
Analytics
FanAI acquires esports analytics and middleware firm Waypoint Media
FanAI gains access to Waypoint Media’s range of trackers, data and APIs
Destination Iran
Low CPI and high ARPU: Iran, the fastest growing mobile apps market in the Middle East
Delving into market data
Creation
Cocos-BCX on how to create a truly interoperable game
“Developers need a way to simplify the process of coding for very complicated game concepts, while also allowing for ease of trade regardless of the kind of digital asset”
Deal
Unity acquires games chat platform Vivox
Text and audio comms tool has been used in Fortnite, Playerunknown’s Battlegrounds, and League of Legends
$$$$$
Report: Global games company investment more than doubled to $5.7bn in 2018
More than double the year prior
Deal
Codemasters and NetEase are making a mobile game together
UK firm to make $8m in revenue over the next three years
Unity
Unity Playground aims to open game development up to kids
Scriptless asset suite seeks to provide a stepping stone for young users looking to get into the engine
Shutdown
Updated: Behaviour claims Westworld Mobile shutdown unrelated to Bethesda lawsuit
Game to go offline for good on April 16th
Big Indie Pitch
Run An Empire Sprints it's way to 1st place at Pocket Gamer Connects London 19's Very Big Indie Pitch
The Big Indie Pitch gets 2019 off to a flying start by hosting it's flagship London pitch
Squawk
Angry Birds 2 revenue grew 47 per cent in a record-breaking 2018
Bird-flinging sequel brought in revenue over $116 million last year
Region Focus
Region Focus: Inside Vancouver's top games companies
Interviews with the key players
Subscription Gaming
Report: Apple plots subscription service for games
But how will it work?
Big Move
Ex-PlayRaven CEO Lasse Seppänen joins Supercell
Spymaster studio was acquired by Rovio in November 2018
Switch
Nintendo president: "We certainly want to release mobile games across a wide variety of genres"
Nintendo president Shuntaro Furukawa believes the Switch is strong enough as-is to meet the company's ambitions
Glad
GLAAD Awards to celebrate queer-inclusive video games for the first time in 2019
Five games head up the inclusivity organisation’s first Outstanding Video Game award category
How To
Adapt or disrupt: A practical guide to surviving in a golden age of games
Oscar Clark offers astute business and game design tips
Charts
Weekly Global Mobile Games Charts: PUBG Mobile breaks into US top 10 grossing slots
Charts from January 14th to 20th
For Sale?
Chinese owner of RuneScape developer Jagex considers sale of RuneScape developer
Company bullish that MMO, mobile and publishing initiatives will continue to fuel further growth despite news
Hot Five
Voodoo racks up 1.5bn downloads, mobile user retention and session data, and Pocket Gamer Mobile Games Awards winners revealed
The hottest articles from the mobile games industry over the last week
Best Ever
PG Connects London 2019 breaks all records, with over 2,350 delegates, 1,200 companies and 8.5k organised meetings
We’re going to need a bigger boat…
Locked
NetEase is enforcing an 11-hour curfew of mobile gaming for kids
New limits will also severely restrict daily playtime for young children
Game On
Gamemaker Studio 2 gets Amazon GameOn support enabling cross-platform competitions
YoYo Games and Amazon have released an asset to get GameMaker devs onto the GameOn service
Hot News
Hothead Games takes a step into the third-party publishing business
"We know what it’s like to be in their shoes, and we are just as committed to their success as they are”
Changing Infrastructure
Facebook set to integrate Messenger, WhatsApp and Instagram apps
Users to be able to message each other across services
Substance Deal
Adobe picks up Substance Designer firm Allegorithmic
Tools to be integrated into the creative cloud
Unreal Ads
Appodeal brings free in-game ad monetisation plugin to Unreal Engine 4
Offers access to more than 60 ad demand sources and features analytics, A/B testing and other capabilities
Big Spender
Fortnite developer Epic acquires Agog Labs and 3Lateral
Company continues to splash its cash