New Studio
New studio Wanderword to develop interactive audiobooks for mobile devices and smart speakers
Formed by Microsoft and Fatshark execs Peter Zetterberg and Thomas Lindgren
Marketing
AppsFlyer claims the app ad market will hit $64 billion by 2020
Ads market is set to grow 34 per cent annually on average between 2017 and 2020
Struck A Chord
Games chat platform Discord raises $150 million at $2bn valuation
Funding round led by Greenoaks Capital
Media Meets
Developers: book your appointment to meet journalists at Pocket Gamer Connects now
A chance to demo your game one-on-one with our consumer writers
Data
App Annie reports game and app downloads pushed 113 billion this year
The figure represents a 10 per cent year-over-year increase in mobile app downloads
Cash Cows
Pokemon Go world's top grossing mobile game in November
SuperData top 10 grossers includes Puzzle & D
Christmas Gift?
App Store users could soon gift in-app purchases
But functionality is not yet in place
Prime Competition
Pokemon Go dev Niantic opens $1m Beyond Reality Developer Contest for AR games
10 teams will get the chance to bring their projects to life using the Real World Platform
It’s Always Sunny
Keywords acquires marketing services outfit Sunny Side Up for $4.3m
Clients for Quebec City outfit include Ubisoft, EA and Eidos
Unstuck
China's big games freeze finally comes to an end after nine months
New licences set to be issued for fresh launches
Bold Buy
Zynga buys Empires & Puzzles dev Small Giant Games in deal worth over $700 million
Finnish indie snapped up
Family
Consumer group complains to FTC over 'inappropriate' kids apps
Children's games and apps were found to breach federal privacy laws in the United States
Nestling In
DoDreams brings aboard former Rovio marketing director Edvard Groundstroem
Drive Ahead developer brings yet another Angry Birds alum into its roster
Event
Bigger, better, newer: Meet Steel Media's 2019 event line-up
Which of the 45 events across 11 nations will you come to?
Vroom
Hutch races into a multi-year licensing partnership with Formula One
Racing organising looks to the mobile driving developer to help expand its global audience
Unity Icon Collective
Unity Icon Collective aims to offer ready-made triple-A assets on the Asset Store
First pack is free for Unity Pro users
Fresh Deal
Gameloft acquires SongPop trivia game maker FreshPlanet
CEO Mathieu Nouzareth will continue on in role
Gold Star
Brawl Stars nets Supercell over $5 million in opening week
Comparatively, it made $6m from its one and a half years in soft-launch
Bad Game
Esports organisations could be in trouble as experts fear market correction due to over-evaluation
There is a reported disparity between the valuation of esports organisations and their revenue
Virtual Birds
Rovio is bringing Angry Birds to virtual reality in 2019 with Isle of Pigs
A partnership with Resolution Games is bringing the long-running mobile hit to headsets next year
Game On
Candy Crush Saga was the top grossing mobile game on the US app stores in November
Supercell’s Clash of Clans and Roblox also featured
Advertising
Developer survey shows in-game ads are an increasingly lucrative monetisation option
The number of games making a majority of revenue through in-game adverts has increased 29 per cent
Jobs News
Splash Damage CEO Paul Wedgwood departs after 17 years
Chief marketing officer and fellow co-founder Richard Jolly takes on top job
Court Battle
Qualcomm insists Apple is in breach of Chinese court order it claims prohibits iPhone sales
“Apple’s statements have been deliberate attempts to obfuscate and misdirect”
Block In The Chain
Atari makes strategic investment in blockchain specialist and mobile publisher Animoca Brands
Hong Kong-floated publisher set to bring Rollercoaster Tycoon Touch and Good Squad to the blockchain
Branching Out
Reigns publisher Devolver getting ‘more serious’ about mobile, F2P and China
Hires ex-Appler Mark Hickey
Sell
Nintendo Switch is this generation’s fastest-selling console in the US
The Nintendo Switch has sold over 8.7 million units in the country over the last 21 months
Super Data Energy
How is Brawl Stars performing on the download and grossing charts for Supercell?
We chart Supercell's fifth release through its first week in the charts
Global Charts
Weekly global mobile games charts: Lion Studios' Popular Wars lives up to its name around the world
Rankings for the week of December 3rd to 9th
Spotted
Activision and Tencent’s Call of Duty Legends of War surfaces in Australia on Android
The classic shooter is currently in Alpha
In An Instant
CrossInstall’s Instant Playables tech powers Google Play app demos
Latest ad tech firm to support Google Play Instant
Calm Down
Honor of Kings skips past $4 billion in lifetime revenue
278 million downloads to date
Fund 'em All
Report: Pokemon Go developer Niantic eyes new $200m funding round
Would raise company valuation to $3.9 billion
Rest In Peace
HQ Trivia CEO Colin Kroll dies aged 34
"It's with deep sadness that we say goodbye"
Smashed It
Super Smash Bros Ultimate sold over 1.2 million copies in Japan during its first three days on sale
First-week figures for crossover brawler are Nintendo’s best ever in Japan, excluding Pokemon
Video
VIDEO: A Dead Cells post-mortem from Motion Twin’s Sebastien Benard
Benard tells an audience at PGConnects Helsinki 2018 how the developers “found the fun” in its roguelike
Royale
Knives Out out-earns both PUBG Mobile and Fortnite in November revenue results
NetEase’s battle royale is propelled to No.9 this November with over $52 million in player spending
Trade Union
'Gig economy' workers union IWGB opens branch for UK video games employees
"As part of the IWGB, we will have the tools to fix this broken sector and create an ethical industry where it's not only big game companies that thrive, but workers as well”
Report
Report: There's been an 80 per cent rise in Western game installs in East Asia
Research from Appsflyer shows a market dominated by midcore and strategy games
Legal
iPhone XS and XR could be banned in China amid Apple-Qualcomm battle
Though Apple maintains that its handsets are still for sale in the People's Republic
Oh No
Mobile ad intelligence platform SafeDK finds ‘thousands’ of in-app ads auto-direct users to porn sites
Firm claims to have used its User Ad Journey tech to track the ads and find their origin
Video
Shipyard Games’ Teemu Harju provides pointers on making location-based mobile games
“We really believe in location-based games, and we truly believe there’s an opportunity for way more cooler gaming.”
Huge!
Epic is sharing Fortnite's cross-platform system with developers for free
"We have put huge efforts into building services for Fortnite that reach 200 million players across seven platforms"
Insight
Execution Labs’ Jason Della Rocca: “No one is in the business of solving your lack of money problem”
Investment expert advises on the common pitfalls and best practices to acquire funding for your games
Competition
Win Indie Showcase space at Pocket Gamer Connects London - new closing date
You could demo your work to 2,500 games industry professionals free!
Soulful
Netmarble’s Blade and Soul Revolution tops iOS grossing charts in South Korea one day after launch
The MMORPG will launch globally in 2019
Hatched
Hatch set to bring games streaming service to Android TV as part of premium membership scheme
Premium scheme pencilled in for a Q1 2019 launch
Reach For The Stars
Supercell launches Brawl Stars globally
The next billion-dollar mobile hit?
Star Launch
Brawl Stars: “We at Supercell have never prepared more for a game launch”
Brawl Stars releases globally on December 12th
Funded
Analytics platform AppOnboard eyes up London and Seoul offices following $30m funding drive
Los Angeles-based company claim $15m will come in off the bat from Breakaway Growth