The Top 30 Iberia Game Makers of 2026

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• Blades of Fire
• Metroid Dread
• Metroid: Samus Returns
• Castlevania: Lords of Shadow 2

Spanish studio MercurySteam has been entrusted with some of the biggest IPs in games over the years. It’s worked with Konami on the Castlevania: Lords of Shadow series and has also teamed up with Nintendo on Metroid: Samus Returns for Nintendo 3DS and Metroid Dread for Nintendo Switch, the latter released in 2021.

Metroid Dread was a major success. Developed in collaboration with Nintendo, it became the best-selling entry in the franchise, surpassing 3m copies sold worldwide and bringing new life to a series that had previously seen relatively modest lifetime sales compared to some other Nintendo IPs.

More recently it launched dark fantasy adventure game Blades of Fire, published by 505 Games, which has attracted mostly positive reviews on Steam so far.

The studio remains highly regarded for its success and ability to adapt top IP.

ASSOCIATED COMPANIES

Nordisk Film

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• Luto

Broken Bird is a small independent studio based in the island of
Gran Canaria. Its debut game is psychological horror title Luto, in which players take on the role of someone unable to leave their home. Launched in 2025, the title received positive reviews, and even secured coverage on entertainment trade website Variety – something even top US Silicon Valley execs crave.

The site praised the title for “punching above its weight” and said its breakout “signals that the region’s video game sector could follow the trajectory of its live action service production and animation”. Meanwhile, Gamespot said that the “spirit of P.T.”, a popular Hideo Kojima Silent Hills project, lives on with the game’s unpredictable ghost story.

As Spain clamours for homegrown IP, Luto is another example of the region’s talent and indie creativity – even on islands technically just outside of the Iberian Peninsula.

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• Ice Scream
• Evil Nun
• Mr Meat

Basque Country-based Keperians is one of the world’s premier horror game developers on mobile, producing numerous titles that have hit 10s of millions of downloads over the years. The games typically follow a central theme: you must explore the environment while evading the central antagonist.

The most successful to date, by downloads, is 2019 release Ice Scream 1, which has surpassed 100m installs, per AppMagic estimates. Other popular games include Evil Nun, Ice Scream 2 and, surprise, Ice Scream 3. Overall, the studio says its games have been downloaded more than 600m times.

In 2025, the Keplerians Network was launched to connect the company’s games and player progress in one place. And by the time you read this, the studio will have launched a new Ice Scream story through the platform: The Missing Guard.

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• Infinity Loop
• Maze
• Idle Flight Manager
• Idle Dot Shooter

Portugal’s capital Lisbon is home to a number of the country’s top mobile games companies. One of those is developer Infinity Games, which makes games across mobile, HTML5, and XR platforms.

It ranked as Portugal’s third top mobile publisher by global downloads in 2025, accumulating some 8.9m installs. It also took sixth spot for top grossing mobile games company.

Its biggest title for downloads to date is puzzle and logic game Infinity Loop, picking up more than 50 million installs. In 2026, the company seems to have found its specialism, hitting record revenue in April.

Idle tycoon games like Idle Flight Manager and Idle Dot Shooter have shown early promise, pushing the publisher to new highs. Give it a few more months and the company could start challenging at the top of Portugal’s top grossers.

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• Idle Theme Park Tycoon
• Prison Empire Tycoon
• Hotel Empire Tycoon
• Idle Town Master

Spanish mobile games developer Codigames is widely recognised for building a large portfolio of idle and tycoon-style management games, establishing itself as a significant player in Spain’s mobile free-to-play market.

The studio’s most recent release, Idle Town Master, launched May 2026, while another 2026 release, Fix & Rent: Home Renovation, further expanded the company’s extensive portfolio.

The studio is best known for long-running hits such as Prison Empire Tycoon, Hotel Empire Tycoon, and Idle Theme Park Tycoon. Released in 2019, the latter remains one of the studio’s biggest successes, surpassing 100 million downloads worldwide across iOS and Android and continues to receive frequent content and live updates. Not just a download driver, Codigames ranked as third top grossing Spanish mobile games publisher in 2025. With an active catalogue of more than 35 mobile titles, Codigames continues to strengthen its position in the idle and tycoon genres.

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• Solitaire
• TripleTile

Since its formation, Tripledot Studios has operated as a successful, fast-growing games publisher, with a largely ads-focused business. But in 2025 it became one of the world’s premier mobile games companies with the acquisition of AppLovin’s games business in a deal worth $800 million. Suddenly, the company brought in 10 new companies and employed over 2,500 staff across 23 cities.

One of those cities Tripledot operates in, which actually predates that mega deal, is Barcelona. The company’s LinkedIn page says that the studio has a growing team of 70+ staff after opening up shop in 2021.

The developer was said to be working on brand new games, as well as existing titles such as TripleTile and Solitaire, which AppMagic estimates to have accrued 88m and 51m downloads, respectively. It’s one of a plethora of top global game companies to have a presence in Spain.

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• My Talking Tom Friends 2

Talking Tom developer Outfit7 opened a mobile games studio in – you guessed it, if you’ve read other entries in this list – Barcelona in January 2019.

If you’re not quite aware just how big the Talking Tom franchise is, at the time of the Barcelona office’s opening, Outfit7 claimed it had officially accumulated more than 8 billion downloads. The Talking Tom franchise is now said to have surpassed 26 billion installs. So a company operating at this scale forming a team in Spain is a big deal – though it’s by no means alone in making such a move.

The studio was tasked with producing new Talking Tom and Friends projects, as well as new mobile titles. Since then, Outfit7 has released My Talking Tom Friends 2, which AppMagic estimates has accumulated 65m installs to date.

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• Delicious World
• Gamehouse+
• Heart’s Medicine

Gamehouse has been developing, publishing and distributing games for over 25 years and considers itself a pioneer in the subscription gaming space. According to its website, the company has reached 160 million lifetime players and 3.5m monthly active users.

Gamehouse has a web games platform, releases on mobile and other subscription services, and also has its own Gamehouse+ subscription, which features over 100 ad-free games. What sets Gamehouse apart further from its competitors is that its target audience has always been female.

The company has a firm presence in Spain, with offices in Alicante and Barcelona. Gamehouse sums up how the country’s industry has expertise across all platforms and a mix of genres – though Gamehouse stands out with its successful subscription business (a rarity in games) and its focus on making games for women.

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• Cut the Rope
• Cut the Rope 2
• Cut the Rope 3
• My Om Nom

Anyone who’s been around since the early days of touchscreen games has played Cut the Rope. And anyone who wasn’t solving puzzles way back in 2010 has probably encountered this long-lasting brand through Cut the Rope 2 or the Om Nom series.

The original title is on the edge of 1 billion downloads alone. Across Zeptolab’s broader portfolio, this developer has captured the imaginations of almost 2bn players.

Having a quarter of the world playing your games is no mean feat. It’s been achieved by not only utilising Cut the Rope “nomstalgia” to the fullest, but also through experimentation with fresh IPs: single-player hit Evo Pop and multiplayer titles Bullet Echo and King of Thieves, to name a few. Pudding Monsters is just the icing on the cake.

The Barcelona-based studio’s latest launch was Cut the Rope 3, released on Apple Arcade in 2023. An Apple Vision Pro version followed in 2024.

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• Dune: Awakening
• Conan Exiles

Back in 2019, Norwegian-headquartered developer and publisher Funcom acquired a 50.1% stake in work-for-hire studio Zona Paradoxal (ZPX), establishing a presence in Portugal’s capital Lisbon as a result.

ZPX had previously worked on Funcom titles like Conan Exiles and Mutant Year Zero: Road to Eden. At the time, it was said that ZPX would continue to be independent and work with other customers – though Funcom will be its key client.

According to its website, Funcom ZPX is said to house approximately 70 staff from 11 countries, while also supporting the developer’s remote employees of around 50 people from 14 countries. It operates as a full-range development studio, covering programmers, artists, animators and a variety of other roles.

Funcom launched open-world survival game Dune: Awakening in 2025, the biggest release in the company’s history.

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• Call of Duty: Warzone Mobile
• Call of Duty: Black Ops 7
• Call of Duty: Black Ops 6

You might notice a lot of Barcelona studios on this list. One of the OGs is Digital Legends Entertainment, founded as a mobile game outfit way back in 2001.

The studio is perhaps most famous for its 2012 shooter Respawnables. It’s also worked with IPs, including bringing Battlefield: Bad Company 2 to iOS and working on Bruce Lee: Dragon Warrior.

In 2021, Digital Legends, like some other top studios in Spain, was acquired by a major global publisher, in this case Activision. The team worked on Call of Duty: Warzone Mobile. Despite picking up 45 million downloads and grossing over $21m, the title was shut down after failing to hit the highs of its predecessor: Call of Duty: Mobile.

Still, the team has worked across multiple other major titles, including CoD: Black Ops 7 and Black Ops 6.

ASSOCIATED COMPANIES

Activision

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• Moonlighter 2
• Moonlighter
• Cataclismo
• The Mageseeker: A League of Legends Story
• ReVamp

Digital Sun is an independent Spanish studio with a strong reputation across its game portfolio.

Its most recent release, Moonlighter 2: The Endless Vault, launched in early access on PC and has since built a loyal playerbase, surpassing 3,000 concurrent players at launch.

The original Moonlighter released in 2019 to both critical and commercial success for the studio. It began as a Kickstarter project, far surpassing its initial $40,000 funding goal by raising over $134,000. It eventually sold over 2m copies worldwide.

Alongside this, Cataclismo fully launched on PC in March 2025. The game surpassed 250,000 copies sold by April 2025, with 120,000 of those sales happening within just its first two weeks, making it the fastest-selling game in the studio’s history to pass 100,000 units.

Digital Sun is currently developing its new game, ReVamp.

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• Ninja Gaiden: Ragebound
• The Stone of Madness
• Blasphemous
• Blasphemous 2

The Game Kitchen is a Spanish independent studio best known for its blend of action and narrative-driven indie games. Earlier work, such as The Last Door, established its reputation in the point-and-click horror space, but its modern identity is more defined by its action-focused titles.

The studio’s breakthrough came with the Blasphemous series, beginning in 2019 and followed by Blasphemous 2 in 2024, which sold over 100,000 copies on Steam within its first month.

More recently, 2025 marked a big year for the studio with the release of The Stone of Madness, which received a mixed reception, followed by Ninja Gaiden: Ragebound, a widely praised 2D action hack-and-slasher developed in collaboration with Dotemu.

The Game Kitchen also has a dedicated VR division and several unannounced projects in the works.

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• Mini Soccer Star
• Cover Fire

Viva Games Studios has quite the history. It was founded in 2017 as an independent division of Genera, focused on publishing and investing in studios. In 2019, its title Brix Block Blast was sold to Playtika in a multi-million dollar deal. In 2020, Genera, Viva and Tuscany Villa developer Genjoy, a standalone studio at Genera, reached a combined 250 staff. During that year, Scopely acquired Genera studio Genjoy (itself founded in 2019).

Did you get all that? While not joining Scopely’s great expansion in Spain, Viva has continued to grow as a top mobile games company in the country. In 2022, the publisher hit $10m in yearly revenue. It has reached 800 million downloads and employs over 100 staff. According to AppMagic, the company ranked fourth for publisher downloads in Spain’s games industry with 47.4m installs, thanks to titles like Mini Soccer Star and Cover Fire.

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• Imposter
• Charades & Headbands
• Truth or Dare

In Portugal’s nascent games hub, Cosmicode has emerged as a major games developer in the country. In 2025, it ranked number one among Portugal’s mobile games companies for downloads, picking up 31.1m installs worldwide, according to AppMagic estimates. It was also the country’s top grossing mobile studio, generating $2.2 million from player spending.

Its most recent top game is 2025’s Imposter Up, which itself has accumulated over 30m downloads to date. The social party game sends each player a secret word – except for the imposter, who must try to guess what it is without getting caught.

Elsewhere the developer has released other party games such as Charades & Headbands and Truth or Dare, each successfully picking up millions of installs.

In recent months, Cosmicode has hit record downloads and player spending, positioning it as a top studio in Portugal and one to watch.

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• Baldur’s Gate 3
• Divinity: Original Sin 2

Larian Studio’s Barcelona office plays a key technical role within the company’s expanding teams, focusing on programming, systems development and platform optimisation for the studio’s large-scale projects.

The Barcelona office works alongside teams across Europe and Canada with expertise in gameplay systems, physics, and bringing games to various platforms. Outside of this, the Barcelona studio is also expanding to include work in areas such as technical QA, design and art.

The studio’s current work feeds directly into Larian’s next phase following the massive success of Baldur’s Gate 3, which surpassed 20 million copies sold and generated over $1 billion in revenue worldwide. CEO Swen Vincke confirmed that Larian is now developing two new RPGs, including the next entry in the Divinity series, alongside a separate unannounced project focused on original IP.

As Larian moves into this next stage, the Barcelona studio remains a core contributor to these upcoming RPG titles.

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• 007: First Light
• Hitman World of Assassination
• Project Fantasy

Perhaps most notably, the IO Interactive Barcelona team has been deeply involved in the development of 007: First Light, a new origin story for James Bond, the first major Bond title released in more than a decade and a major launch for an independent IO Interactive.

Alongside this, the studio is supporting work on the company’s upcoming RPG Project Fantasy, marking the developer’s expansion into a new genre.

The Barcelona office also continues to assist with live updates and development for the studio’s core franchise, Hitman World of Assassination. Outside of the games themselves, the Barcelona studio has also helped refine the studio’s own proprietary Glacier engine.

IO Interactive has expanded across five international studios, with the Barcelona office playing an important role in that growth. Collaborating closely with other teams in Copenhagen, Malmö, Brighton, and Istanbul, the Barcelona team continues to work across all of the company’s main franchises.

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• 8 Ball Pool

Miniclip has long had a global presence through its own offices and through subsidiaries like Sybo, Easybrain, and Eight Pixels Square. For the past four years, that presence has included Portugal.

Miniclip opened an office in the western part of Lisbon, Oeiras, in 2022 and as soon as it was established, immediately declared it the largest Miniclip studio. The Portugal office was crowned even after the giant’s 20 years in the games business, with offices already located in the UK, Switzerland, Italy, and the Netherlands.

Employees in Portugal found a new home decked out with the latest tech, and a hub promising entirely sustainable electricity with a 350-person capacity. Even today that team’s still expanding, on the hunt for analysts, developers, engineers and more.

Meanwhile, Miniclip’s continuing to rake in revenue globally, with 8 Ball Pool making an estimated $76m in 2025, as per AppMagic.

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• Disney Speedstorm
• Asphalt Legends

One of Spain’s largest developers is Gameloft Barcelona with over 200 employees. It’s also one of the Gameloft’s oldest studios, having first been founded in 2000, making it one of the earlier major games companies in the region.

Over the years, the team has specialised in racing games, most recently working on cross-platform title Disney Speedstorm, and before that entries like Asphalt 9: Legends and Asphalt: Xtream. It also worked on Despicable Me: Minion Rush, which racked up 1.2 billion downloads worldwide.

The studio is currently at work on a new Dungeons & Dragons project for PC and console, reflecting a shift in Gameloft’s output from mobile to other platforms. The title was first announced in 2024 as a co-op title built around a hybrid of survival, life simulation, and action RPG. The title was revealed as being led by the company’s Montreal team.

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• Nightholme
• State of Survival: Zombie War
• Frost & Flame: King of Avalon

Best known for its impact in the 4X scene, FunPlus flagship State of Survival: Zombie War has over $2bn to its name. According to AppMagic, it picked up almost $100m more in 2025 alone. Frost & Flame: King of Avalon and Guns of Glory: Lost Island are both on their way to $2bn too, leading a powerful library of dozens of games.

As for Iberia, the company has a studio in Barcelona and in 2024 opened a new Lisbon office called Studio Ellipsis, focused on transmedia opportunities with the aim to transform FunPlus’ hit IPs into film, TV, and comics. It’s an environment attracting fresh talent, industry pioneers, and creative minds.

Studio Ellipsis is also developing Nightholme, where players will face off against eldritch horrors. The team’s mission is to connect generations through culture and leave a mark on the entertainment landscape for years to come.

ASSOCIATED COMPANIES

Studio Ellipsis

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• Neva
• Gris

Barcelona-based Nomada Studio was formed by ex-triple-A developers Adrián Cuevas and Roger Mendoza, and artist Conrad Roset, the latter of whom was said to have been itching to bring his art to the video games space.

By combining experienced developers with artists outside the games space, who have experience in illustration, painting, and graphic design, Nomada Studio has become a maker of standout games that Spain’s games industry can be proud of.

The first title from the developer was platform-adventure game Gris, a visually stunning title that has gone on to release across console, PC, and mobile, racking up more than 3 million unit sales. The title has overwhelmingly positive reviews on Steam and has picked up a string of awards and nominations, including recognition at the Bafta Games Awards, the Game Developers Choice Awards, The Steam Awards, and The Game Awards, to name a few.

Nomada followed up with another visually distinct puzzle-platformer in 2024 with Neva, which focused on the tale of a young woman and her lifelong bond with a wolf as they traverse through a dying world. A prequel, Neva Prologue, was released in 2026. Neva has earned accolades at the Apple Design Awards 2025, the BAFTA Games Awards, and the Annie Awards.

It’s not always about global blockbusters earning millions of dollars – though Nomada Studio has been very successful. The studio has helped grow Spain’s reputation around the world as a hub for creativity, firmly putting its stamp on the country’s industry as a true homegrown success story that’s built two successful new IPs.

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• Is This Seat Taken?

If you’ve read our full region report on the games industry in Iberia, and specifically Spain, there’s one ambition that sticks out. The country has built strong foundations with a large talent pool, along with a mix of homegrown studios and a wealth of international players setting up shop in the country.

And while there are some global hits, the goal is to start launching more worldwide successes to truly put Spain’s games industry on the map, just like hubs such as Türkiye and China have in recent years.

Success doesn’t always require big teams or even a blockbuster title. Indie game developer Poti Poti Studio was formed by duo Sergi Pérez Crespo and Ausiàs Dalmau Roig after the latter was laid off. After Crespo quit his job, the two began working full-time on logic puzzle game Is This Seat Taken?.

The title, available across platforms and described as “cozy, silly and relatable”, has been a great success for this indie studio, which also credits other developers as well as its founders. The game has “overwhelmingly positive” reviews on Steam, has received praise from critics, and has been named in a number of awards shows around the world.

Is This Seat Taken? was a finalist for Family accolade at the Bafta Games Awards 2026, hosted in the UK, while it also received honourable mentions at the US-based Independent Games Festival for Excellence in Design and Excellence in Visual Art. At the BIG Festival Awards in Brazil, which took place during Gamescom LATAM, the title won the top prize for Best Casual Game.

Spain is full of big name companies that have either made a splash or are looking to make one on the global stage. The indie development team Poti Poti Studio shows that it doesn’t just take big teams to earn recognition across the world.

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• Word Search
• Yatzy
• Water Sort Puz

One of many Barcelona-based teams in this list, Bluetile is a casual gaming studio that ranked as Spain’s second top publisher by downloads in 2025 with 93.6 million installs, just behind Axes In Motion in top spot.

With a focus on building mobile games that players return to day after day, and building solid foundations with its own internal tech for live ops, monetisation, and analytics, its portfolio is said to now reach 20m monthly active users worldwide.

Accumulating 93.6m downloads, per AppMagic estimates, made 2025 the company’s best year yet. And the studio looks to be keeping up a similar pace so far in 2026, too. Player spending across the company’s portfolio is also moving in the right direction, hitting a record estimated $5.2m last year. Once again, 2026 could be on track to surpass that figure.

Bluetile runs a number of titles across genres, 15 to be precise, though all in the casual space. Its most popular titles are 2020 release Word Search, which has hit an estimated 105m downloads, puzzle game Water Sort Puz with around 50m installs, and Dot Link with over 31m downloads.

Its top grossing game by player spending its Yatzy, based on the classic dice game. The title has generated $13.2m to date, along with close to 16m downloads.

Perhaps all that is why Indian games publishing giant Nazara agreed to acquire a 50% controlling stake in social gaming platform Bluetile Games and its rewarded engagement arm BestPlay Systems for ₹918 crores ($100.3 million) in March 2026. The deal marks another major international games company to set up shop in Spain, either through setting up its own studio or snapping up top talent like the proven team at Bluetile.

ASSOCIATED COMPANIES

Nazara

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• Extreme Car Driving Simulator
• Car Stunt Races: Mega Ramps
• Extreme SUV Driving Simulator

Based in Seville, Axes In Motion was first set up in 2014, focused on developing free-to-play mobile games, just as that market was picking up Steam in Europe.

According to the company’s website, the studio employed 30 staff, while its portfolio has amassed more than 1 billion downloads.

In fact, just one of its games, flagship title Extreme Car Driving Simulator, has managed over 1bn installs itself. According to AppMagic estimates, the title picked up 94.7 million downloads last year, which made it the 18th most downloaded mobile game worldwide across the App Store and Google Play.

Furthermore, it ranked as the third most downloaded simulation game globally, and the number one vehicle simulator. If categorised in the racing genre, it would have topped that list, too. Not bad for a game that first launched in 2014.

Axes In Motion has other titles in its portfolio, too. The studio says that another 2014 release, Extreme SUV Driving Simulator, has accumulated around 72m installs, while Car Stunt Races: Mega Ramps, launched in 2019, has now surpassed 50m downloads.

In more recent history, the developer has tried its hand at launching other titles too. Extreme Motorcycle Simulator released in September 2025 and has picked up an estimated 9 million installs to date. Extreme Card Driving Stunts, meanwhile, has generated 5.8m downloads, per AppMagic.

Overall, Axis in Motion’s games were downloaded 105.6m times in 2025, making it the top Iberian publisher by downloads last year.

Axes In Motion has become one of Spain’s top exports – just through garnering more than a billion downloads, but perhaps more importantly for the country’s ecosystem, has achieved success through homegrown IP. And it’s done that with a culture of working in small teams, which it believes can help it react swiftly to changes in the ever-evolving mobile market.

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• Dragon City
• Monster Legends
• Two Dots

Socialpoint’s Trinity Studios serves as Zynga’s Barcelona headquarters. The studio has multiple hits to its name such as Dragon City, Monster Legends, and Two Dots, and has been operating out of Spain for almost 20 years.

Founded by Horacio Martos and Andrés Bou in 2008, Socialpoint’s workforce has grown to over 350 staff across 30 nationalities and languages. They deliver games to more than two million players globally every day, with over 870m downloads achieved to date.

Socialpoint’s latest launch was Top Troops, which made a multi-millions splash of cash after its 2023 release. The game may have ended service now, but not before surpassing the $20m mark. According to AppMagic estimates, it made almost $25m in player spending over its run.

The studio has continued to develop new games since, testing hypotheses and learning from them, focused on making fun games with a player-first mindset. While new games are in the pipeline, old classics continue to rake in millions of dollars.

Dragon City made another $27m in player spending just last year. Over its lifetime, the game has made well over half a billion dollars in player spend alone – and is one of the few 2012 games still around today.

Twelve-year-old Two Dots is still here too, bringing in over $1m per month in player spending after propelling to unprecedented success during the pandemic. Socialpoint took the on title in 2022 after its creator Playdots closed down, and generated over $40m through the title just one year later. Two Dots has made over $300m in its lifetime.

Monster Legends has done just as well, earning over $300m in the past decade alone – and even more if you go right back to its 2013 origins. It saw a surge of its own during the pandemic, earning close to $5m in player spending some months, and even today it continues to generate more than $1m every month.

ASSOCIATED COMPANIES

Take-Two Interactive

Zynga

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• Candy Crush Saga
• Candy Crush Soda Saga
• Candy Crush Solitaire

King’s presence is felt all over Europe. It may be headquartered in Stockholm and London, but Barcelona actually represents this sweet mobile giant’s second-largest office in the world. In the centre of the city’s tech hub, this office covers six floors with 600 employees hard at work, right the way up to a 16th floor terrace.

Barcelona has been a key hub for King since 2012, the same year as flagship Candy Crush’s launch, and the location continues to play an important role in Candy Crush marketing and technology today. Teams in Barcelona also span King’s wider portfolio, collaborating as part of a global workforce.

King’s portfolio of games includes Candy Crush Saga and spinoffs like Candy Crush Soda Saga, Candy Crush Solitaire, and Candy Crush Jelly Saga. There are also other IPs like Farm Heroes Saga and Pet Rescue Saga, the former generating over $2bn in revenue even without that famous Candy Crush branding.

As for the flagship, it’s made over $20bn in lifetime earnings and has more than 20,000 levels to play through. Over more than a decade, the marketing teams – in Barcelona, London and elsewhere – have continued to crack the Candy code with gamified content, memes, UGC and even IRL activations like a sports event takeover. They’re focused on retaining fans and reaching newcomers – and even tackling the challenge of attracting players who haven’t seen Candy Crush since 2012.

Earlier this year, King also launched Candy Crush Crushable to compete in the growing daily games market, with a new puzzle to solve every 24 hours. More recently, the studio’s been hard at work revamping All Stars, giving its competitive tournament a fresh coat of paint with a sporty new aesthetic. It’s designed to reach competitive players, while other campaigns continue to keep casual fans in mind.

ASSOCIATED COMPANIES

Activision Blizzard

Microsoft

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• Invincible: Guarding the Globe
• Assassin’s Creed 3 Remastered
• Tom Clancy’s Rainbow Six Siege
• Hungry Shark Evolution

Ubisoft Barcelona operates across both triple-A co-development and mobile live service support, with studio’s time split between its console/PC and mobile divisions. Over the years, Ubisoft Barcelona has contributed to both blockbuster franchises under the wider Ubisoft portfolio and its own independently led projects.

On the mobile side, Ubisoft Barcelona Mobile recently led development of Invincible: Guarding the Globe, created in collaboration with Skybound.

The free-to-play RPG expanded the studio’s portfolio with a major name IP. Per AppMagic data, the title has generated approximately $45m to date and 6.5m installs – with 2026 almost already its best yet, just five months into the year, a surge coinciding with the release of season 4 of the show.

Ubisoft Barcelona is also well known for its management and ongoing live development for Hungry Shark Evolution and the wider Hungry Shark franchise. Although originally developed by Future Games of London – later called Ubisoft London and closed in 2023 – Ubisoft Barcelona has since overseen updates, seasonal events, and long-term content support.

Beyond mobile, Ubisoft Barcelona also plays a significant role within the publisher’s global triple-A games business. A permanent team contributes to the continued evolution of Tom Clancy’s Rainbow Six Siege, supporting live operations, gameplay and seasonal content that help toward the title’s longevity. The studio has also collaborated with Massive Entertainment on Tom Clancy’s The Division 2.

Ubisoft Barcelona has had a hand in one of Ubisoft’s biggest IPs, the Assassin’s Creed franchise, serving as a key support on Assassin’s Creed Valhalla. While much of the studio’s work is around collaborating across Ubisoft’s other projects as a support, the team did lead the full production through the Assassin’s Creed 3 Remastered title.

With a combination of mobile live-service experience, a supporting role across long-running core franchises within the wider Ubisoft portfolio and involvement in major triple-A productions, Ubisoft Barcelona has established itself as a key part of the Ubisoft machine.

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• Europa Universalis V
• Europa Universalis IV

You might have noticed a theme throughout the Top 30 Iberia Game Makers – Spain has become the home of many of the most notable games companies in the business.

One such company attracted by the promise of Spain’s ever-growing development hub is strategy games specialist Paradox Interactive. The outfit has published titles including Age of Wonders 4, Crusader Kings III, and Stellaris in the past.

Paradox set up its Barcelona studio, Paradox Tinto, back in 2020 with the aim to build classic grand strategy games. The team was formed under the direction of Paradox Development Studio 25+ year veteran Johan Andersson, the creator of the Europa Universalis series of games. The plan was to quickly staff up to around 200 employees as soon as by the end of 2020.

The developer started out life shepherding post-launch content for Europa Universalis IV from 2020, which included DLC such as Winds of Change and Domination.

Paradox Tinto also turned its attention to the next entry in the series: Europa Universalis V. The title is set between 1337 to 1837 and tasks players with using war, trade or diplomacy to “satisfy your grandest ambitions and dominate five centuries”. Grand strategy indeed.

The title launched in November 2025 and has more than 12,000 reviews with a mostly positive rating at the time of writing and has garnered “generally favourable” reviews on Metacritic. Meanwhile, the game received nominations for Most Innovative Gameplay at The Steam Awards 2025 and Strategy/Simulation Game of the Year at the DICE Awards.

Paradox has described Europa Universalis as “central” to the company. The fifth edition comes 12 years after the previous release, with the Barcelona studio given the keys to bring the franchise back front and centre of the publisher’s portfolio.

SOFTOGRAPHY

• Lingokids

When educational games platform Lingokids raised $120m in a funding round in 2025, you might have been forgiven for thinking the company was actually based in the US.

But despite the lack of mention in its press release, Lingokids, which wants to become the “ultimate digital destination for kids”, has its roots firmly planted in Madrid.

Launched in 2015, the app has racked up more than 185m downloads around the world and features more than 4,000 interactive games, songs and shows – all completely ad-free. The platform is currently targeted at children between the ages of two and eight. Last year, the company said it reached 20 million kids through its platform every single month. Not just through its mobile app, Lingokids content is even available on American Airlines flights.

And while fun is a key element, the app is also designed to educate users across subjects such as maths, literacy, science and more. The company has collaborated with the likes of NASA for lessons on space, Stanford Scientists to offer nutritional insights and the World Literacy Foundation to teach kids the fundamentals of reading and spelling.

Meanwhile, Lingokids has also worked with brands including Blippi, Pocoyo and others. It even has a partnership with Disney for classic characters and IPs such as Mickey & Friends, Zootopia, Spider-Man, Lilo & Stitch and others.

According to AppMagic estimates, Lingokids was one of the most downloaded kids apps in the world in 2025 and ranked second for user spending, only behind children favourite Toca Boca World.

Lingokids is one of the best showcases of Spain’s games industry potential on the global stage. With a new $120 million funding boost, it’s aiming to become a category leading and spearhead the educational gaming space, powered by Spanish game development talent.

SOFTOGRAPHY

• Monopoly Go

When considering the top spot for our Top 30 Iberia Game Makers 2026, we took into account some key criteria that stems from the trends and ambitions from the region.

Firstly, and most importantly, is the company making great games that are being played globally? Then, how influential are they both locally and internationally? We also consider areas like investment, company expansion and even potential.

Having pondered these key factors, it made sense that the number one position should go to publishing giant Scopely.

“But Scopely is a US company,” we hear you say. Well, the publisher may be headquartered in the States, but its beating heart is in Spain. Today, it has more than 1,100 ‘Scopeleans’ – its affectionate name for employees – in the country. Much of that is based in Barcelona, while it also has a growing hub in Seville, where it houses almost 150 staff.

Scopely first set up shop in Barcelona back in 2017 – its co-CEO Javier Ferrera is himself a native Spaniard. From a team of five, the company’s presence has expanded substantially in the country. It has acquired the likes of casual mobile studio GenJoy and Barcelona’s Omnidrone over the years.

Its teams in Spain work on the company’s in-house technology platform Playgami, while its in-house creative agency Flamed was built in Barcelona.

What’s more, Scopely’s teams in Spain played a key role in the development of a certain multi-billion dollar smash hit mobile game: Monopoly Go. That title has gone on to become the fastest mobile game ever to surpass the $6 billion mark – a milestone reserved for only the cream of the crop.

Scopely director of operations Néstor Pequeño says Spain has become one of the publisher’s “most strategic global markets”. It serves as a testament to the nation’s top development talent and is just one example of why the world’s leading games companies are increasingly flocking to Spain.

ASSOCIATED COMPANIES

Savvy Games Group