Tag: social games

Mobile gaming users double for Storm8

The company’s mobile games have been played by over 400 million users.

Storm8 Inc., the California-based company and the leading developer of social games for Android and iOS, has seen an increase in its mobile gaming network, which has two times the amount of users it did in the previous year.

Storm8 is excited about mobile games and the future.

According to the company’s chief executive Perry Tam, “We’ve been around for five years, and I’ve been extremely excited about how we’ve done in the last year. We believe that is an exciting achievement, and we are excited about the future of mobile gaming.”

On average, Storm8 has approximately 50 million active users per month and offers 40 free-to-play mobile games. For over 20 quarters the company has been profitable and its high earnings have allowed it to maintain a workforce of over 250 people.

Its recent milestone has occurred despite the fact that Storm8 is not a huge name in the mobile gaming industry. It hasn’t produced any major titles like Candy Crush Saga developed by King or Clash of the Clans from Supercell. Nevertheless, even though it has not reached this fame quiet yet, Tam has said that six of the company’s games are always in the top 100-grossing games on iOS. He said that for April’s top-grossing ranks, Storm8 was among the top 10 of the biggest game publishers.

Storm8’s mobile gaming plans include launching 12 new games in 2014.

Mobile Gaming - increase in game usersThe company publishes one game per month and intends to release 12 titles this year. While they mostly produce casual games, they also develop games that cover a range of diverse genres. Some of Storm8’s more popular titles are Bubble Mania, Dragon Story, Bingo! and Jewel Mania.

Storm8 has been profitable since 2009 when it was first established by Tam and others who once worked for social media giant, Facebook. At no point during its existence has outside funding ever been raised by the social gaming company.

A large number of its customers are from the United States, Canada, Australia and Western Europe, but the majority of its customers are in Asia and in emerging markets. Tam commented that there are billions of mobile users and the company wants “to encapsulate as many of them as possible” by continuing to grow its mobile gaming network.

Spending in mobile games dominated by “whales”

Playnomics sheds some light on spending in mobile games

Playnomics, a social game analysis firm, has released new data concerning the financial aspects of mobile games and in-app purchases. Mobile games are typically free to obtain, which is partly why they have become so popular among consumers. Because many of these games are free, developers rely heavily on advertisements and in-app purchases to generate revenue. In-app purchases, often referred to as microtransactions, are somewhat controversial among consumers, but any controversy surrounding the issue has not been enough to deter consumers from actually spending money on mobile games.

Spending dominated by top 1% of consumers

According to the data from Playnomics, there is a significant disparity among the consumers that are spending money on mobile games. The data shows that the top 1% of new consumers spending money on these games represent 33% of all spending on these games. These consumers are referred to as “whales” in the mobile games space because they hold considerable purchasing power. The data also shows that the top 20% of consumers represent more than 90% of all spending in mobile games.

Mobile Games SpendingMajority of consumers are not spending money on mobile games

Playnomics has examined the behavior of more than 1.7 million consumers that play mobile games and social games. The company found that approximately 0.77% of these consumers were spending money on in-app purchases. The data suggests that the vast majority of consumers are not spending any money on mobile games, apart from the price they pay to acquire games that are not free outright. Playnomics notes that the top 1% of consumers spending money on these games represent the majority of the spending being seen in the mobile games space.

Data shows that a single consumer can spend as much as $7,400 on mobile games

The data shows that a single consumer that is in the 1% bracket can spend as much as $7,400 on in-app purchases. The average consumer will spend approximately $43 on mobile games and in-app purchases. Playnomics notes that consumers will typically spend nearly 30 minutes per play session and complete an average of 5.9 play sessions in any given day.