First Strike
Tropico dev Kalypso acquires classic Commandos IP
Plans to develop new games in the franchise, remaster old titles for new hardware
Event
New venue for Pocket Gamer Connects Helsinki 2018
FInland’s biggest B2B games event outgrows its home from home, moves waterside
Card Draw
How Supercell uses machine learning to automate monetisation in Clash Royale
Mobile hit uses multiple factors to target the right cards at the right users
Constructive
Roblox creator community on track to earn over $70 million this year
Active creator count has grown over 250 per cent in the last year alone.
Pocket Money
Ubisoft Berlin receives $1.84m in subsidies from city senate
Newly formed studio hopes to use funding to expand up to 150 staff
Gold Chest
Fortnite’s first major esports tournament boasts an $8m prize pool
Epic begin digging into the $100m set aside for this season’s competitions
Jammin’
Jam City signs up ex-EA creative director Chris Tremmel
Tremmel will provide design direction for Genies & Gems and Wild Things: Animal Adventure
Valor
Tencent’s Arena of Valor breaks $3 million in revenue in the US
Tencent’s MOBA hits one million downloads
Winner Winner Second Dinner
Former Hearthstone game director Ben Brode opens new studio Second Dinner
The ex-Blizzard dev took to Twitter to reveal the news but details are sparse
Lovin It
AppLovin launches publishing division Lion Studios
The developer is also putting up $300K in prizes for the four best mobile gaming apps submitted
Event
Call for speakers for Pocket Gamer Connects London 2019
Do you have expertise or insights to share with the mobile games industry, as well as PC, blockchain and VR/AR? We’d like to hear from you
Payday
Epic Games' new 88/12 revenue-share split will give more back to Unreal Marketplace creators
Creators will be issued retroactive payouts to match the new 88/12 split
Dead Ringer
AR tie-in The Walking Dead: Our World launches worldwide today
But will the adaptation be enough to mend Next Games’ revenue woes?
Collaboration
Playgendary teams up with ad platform Appodeal to publish casual games
Appodeal to lend its expertise and exclusive monetisation tools to the publisher's titles going forwards
Closure
Final Fantasy XV: A New Empire dev MZ lays off 125 staff as it shuts down ad-tech branch Cognant
The entire Cognant team and about half of its in-house media buyers are said to have been laid off in June
Big Switch
Nintendo Switch sales set to eclipse PlayStation 4 and Xbox One in the US for the year
The Switch is also expected to generate the most software revenues at retail
Page Turner
First UK Games Fund Awards set for November
Comic and newspaper publisher teams up to showcase fresh talent in the UK games scene
Branded
Mobile publisher Animoca Brands raises $4.5 million through over-subscribed share placement
The Hong Kong-based publisher also entered a partnership with HTC
Job News
Venatus appoints Tom Briant as new head of business development
Briant brought on board to strengthen the sales house’s global development strategy
Expansion
Swedish mobile developer Funrock raises $2.5 million for expansion in the Middle East and North Africa
Funrock has already opened a new studio in Alexandria, Egypt
Sirius Business
Harry Potter: Hogwarts Mystery drops in Hong Kong and Taiwan
The narrative adventure game is available on both iOS and Android
Chat Up
Warner Bros. acquires mobile games communication platform Plexchat
"Advancing the social aspect of our mobile games is a top priority for us"
Ah Ah Ah
FoxNext and East Side Games team up to bring It’s Always Sunny in Philadelphia to mobile
Planned for release on both the App Store and Google Play in 2018
Tilted
Tilting Point out to invest $132m in mobile games user acquisition annually
The mobile games publisher is out to solve fundamental challenges in the free-to-play mobile games marketplace
Royalty
Supercell’s Clash Royale plunders $2 billion in revenues in just over two years
It’s the first mobile publisher to have more than one multi-billion-dollar title on the App Store and Google Play
Awards
BAFTA reveals this year’s winners of the Young Game Designers competition
Annual celebration shines a spotlight on young game development talent
Moneyscape
RuneScape generates more than $800 million in lifetime revenue
Racked up over 250 million player accounts, experiencing consistent user growth
Company Values
Jade Raymond on why company culture isn't just words on the wall
The EA Motive Studios GM on the importance of consistent values
Beep Beep
McLaren expands its esports program to include mobile racing games
Motor manufacturer wants Shadow Project to become more “open and inclusive”
Secret World
Netflix to air Niantic’s Ingress in October 2018
Ingress: The Animation set to release alongside a sequel to Niantic’s debut title
Classic
Old-School Runescape comes to mobile with an open beta on Android
Subscription-paying Members to playtest mobile port of the venerable MMORPG
Hub
Google Play testing news and trending hub features with Google Play Games
News and trending features make up the new additions
That’s A Lot
Nintendo targets 20 to 30 indie releases per week on Switch
Senior executive officer Susumu Tanaka and former president Tatsumi Kimishima were on hand to take questions at the latest shareholders meeting
Job News Klaxon
Keywords shakes up senior management structure with new chief commercial and marketing roles
EA vet Efremov is Keywords Studios' new CCO while Coke and Activision Blizzard alum Andrew Brown coming on as CMO
Toying Around
EA snags Industrial Toys
The mobile development studio is headed up by former Bungie CEO Alex Seropian
Handy Deal
THQ Nordic picks up German developer HandyGames
Giebelstadt-based studio to act as international publisher for small to mid-sized projects and devs
Grand Revenue
Sony-owned Fate/Grand Order publisher Aniplex's sales surpassed $1.8 billion in last fiscal year
Net profit came in at $312 million
Whew-two
Niantic's Pokemon Go catches $1.8 billion in revenue in two years
US players splash out $607 million on title
Cashed Out
Monopoly Towns goes straight to jail as Backflip cans soft-launched title
Support will cease September 3rd
Weekly Charts
Weekly UK App Store charts: Pokemon Quest jumps into top 10 download rankings for iPhone and iPad
Rankings from June 25th to July 1st
Event
Join us for The Big Indie Pitch & Big Indie Drinks @ Develop:Brighton 2018
Software by the seaside with sponsors Space Ape, Jagex, The Games Hub and G-STAR.
Doors Open
The Big Indie Fest @ ReVersed consumer games expo kicks off in Vienna
Around 4,000 visitors expected across two days
Gotta Catch ‘em All
Pokemon Quest passes 7.5 million downloads across iOS, Android and Nintendo Switch
It captured 3.5 million downloads on mobile alone within days of launching
Big Indie Pitch
Experimental collaborative drawing game Mish Mash wins Big Indie Pitch at The Big Indie Fest @ ReVersed
Hamsterdam comes second as Golf Club: Wasteland takes third
Shiny
Disney releases Moana production assets for public use
Cloud data and island geometry released to provide an insight into CG production techniques
Tip Top
Global Top Round’s $300,000 accelerator program is open for submissions
Accelerator invites small studios to apply in its fourth consecutive program
Live Drop
Live.me’s new streaming app Fluxr will promote Playerunknown’s Battlegrounds esports
Streaming platform’s new app is looking to grow the mobile esports market
Localisation
5 reasons to localise your game as an indie
Applanga CTO Steffen Romer discusses why translating indie games for various markets is worthwhile
Data Klaxon
Taiwan’s pool of 14.5 million players to spend $1.3 billion in 2018
The Taiwanese games market is the 15th largest in the world
Simple
The Sims Mobile builds up $15 million in revenues after four months
59 per cent of revenues come from the US