First Strike
Marvel Strike Force generates over $25m revenue in four months
Comic book RPG has been downloaded over 10 million times since its March 28th launch
Staff
Natalie Clayton
About Natalie Clayton is an Edinburgh-based freelance writer and game developer. Besides PCGamesInsider and Pocketgamer.biz, she's written across the games media landscape and was named in the 2018 GamesIndustry.biz 100 Rising Star list.
Articles by Natalie Clayton
Grand Job
Fate/Grand Order rakes in over $2 billion in revenue worldwide
97 per cent of the game’s revenue comes from a home-grown Japanese audience
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
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?
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
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
Chat Up
Warner Bros. acquires mobile games communication platform Plexchat
"Advancing the social aspect of our mobile games is a top priority for us"
Awards
BAFTA reveals this year’s winners of the Young Game Designers competition
Annual celebration shines a spotlight on young game development talent
Beep Beep
McLaren expands its esports program to include mobile racing games
Motor manufacturer wants Shadow Project to become more “open and inclusive”
Classic
Old-School Runescape comes to mobile with an open beta on Android
Subscription-paying Members to playtest mobile port of the venerable MMORPG
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
Excellent
Google Play Excellence program welcomes Animal Crossing: Pocket Camp and six other games
World of Warships: Blitz and Flutter: Starlight also feature in high-quality highlights list
Legal
San Mateo County drops charges against Vungle founder Zain Jaffer
Child abuse and assault against the former CEO cleared by district attorney
Not So Hollow
Nintendo Switch makes up a fifth of Hollow Knight's 1.25 million total sales
PC sales hit 1 million a day before the sidescrolling soulslike's switch launch
Milan Bound
505 Games taps up Ovosonico for a new and "ambitious" IP
Italian studio is moving its headquarters to a new Milan office
On Your Marks
International Olympic Committee to host esports-focused forum
IOC to start discussing the future of relationships between games and sports
Go Wild
170,000 Pokemon Go trainers flood Dortmund during Safari Zone event
Trainers from across the world caught over 28.6 million Pokemon in the city last week
Grand Strategy
Paradox expects 10 per cent of sales to come from mobile by 2020
Tencent-backed PC strategy giant has eyes set on mobile development and more acquisitions
Love Better
Failbetter Games sets up Love Indies Week to celebrate developers and communities
The week-long event looks to highlight the importance of reviews on indie games
Going East
Ad sales house Venatus expands east with new Seoul office
Venatus provides ad sales services to studios including Rovio, EA and Spil Games.
Catch Of The Day
Big Fish appoints 15 year industry veteran Jeff Karp as new managing director and president
Karp brings aboard executive experience from some of the industry’s biggest players
Quizzed
Indian publisher Nazara acquires minority stake in quiz studio Crimzoncode
Partnership will see Nazara publish the studio’s flagship quiz title in emerging markets
Skip, Jump
Super Mario Run leaps past $60 million worldwide revenue
American players account for nearly half of the revenue brought in since launching in 2016
Click
Nintendo Switch is played docked about as often as undocked
Individual games more likely to skew one way or the other
Loot Boxes
French regulator concerned about loot boxes but concedes it isn't gambling
Paris proves less hostile to the practice than its Dutch and Belgian counterparts
Sneak Peek
Niantic opens up preview of its AR Real World Platform
Pokemon Go developer looks to collaborate with third parties to advance augmented reality
Addition
Social casino dev KamaGames signs exclusive Unity Ads partnership
Irish social casino games company agrees to only provide in-app video monetisation through Unity Ads platform
Ruled Out
Judge halves Facebook’s Zenimax payout to $250 million in Oculus dispute
Headset sales won’t be blocked either, Judge rules
Accelerate
Google opens applications for its Indie Games Accelerator in Asia
Four-month program open for Indian and Southeast Asian games developers
Job News
Resolution Games brings Mogi creator Mathieu Castelli aboard as chief creative officer
Stockholm studio also expands with Mojang and Paradox alumni
Acquisition
Pokemon Go developer Niantic acquires London-based machine learning outfit Matrix Mill
AI research outfit join the augmented reality giant
Watch Out
Yo-Kai Watch World hopes to capture Pokemon Go-like success with Japan launch
GungHo works with Level-5 to location-based AR title
Keep It Clean
Nintendo’s Reggie Fils-Aime reinforces his commitment to storefront curation for Switch
“Their games are selling best on Switch because of that environment we're creating”
Critical Hit
World of Tanks Blitz hits 100 million downloads in celebration of it’s fourth birthday
Wargaming attributes success to loyal community, major tournaments and a successful Chinese launch
Mobile Masters
Amazon names the winners of its $100,000 Mobile Masters Seattle esports event
Participants competed in World of Tanks: Blitz, Power Rangers: Legacy Wars, Critical Ops and Survival Arena
Adjusted
Adjust launches open-source performance benchmarking tool for mobile apps
Free tool should help publishers track app performance
Worldwide
GungHo banks on colourful chaos to go big with Nintendo Switch release Ninjala
Japanese developer hopes the wider appeal will help the game land on a global scale
Pay To Play
Mobile is the most popular platform for gaming, but the least for paying customers
Newzoo study finds the platform has a lower player-to-payer ratio than console or PC
Digital Sports
Chinese esports market set to reach 350 million users by 2020
Experts also expect the scene to value at $1.5 billion
Job News
Kabam co-founder Holly Liu joins the Animoca Brands board of directors
Leading games entrepreneur sees potential in Animoca’s AI and blockchain endeavours
Monumental
Premium isn’t dead yet: Monument Valley 2 makes over $10 million in first year
A year on from the puzzling sequel’s launch, Ustwo releases an impressive infographic
Heading For Ipo
King of Fighters creator SNK and RPG dev Vespa set for South Korea flotations
Vespa joins the Japanese giant in going public in 2018
Market Data
Turkey’s mobile games industry brought in $372.4 million in 2017
Highlights from the Turkey Game Market 2017 report