Mobile Mavens: How to survive to ’25

• Our prime objective in 2024? To make it through to 2025 because – hey – it can only be better than this year, right?

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The last few years have been tough on the games industry, with layoffs, lower investments, and games that have failed to hit their desired marks. One phrase that has been floating around the industry and at events is the idea of ‘survive to ’25’.

That is, to make it through to 2025 because – hey – it can only be better than 2024, right?

So will 2025 be the start of something better for the games industry? We spoke to our Mobile Mavens to find out how the past year has impacted the industry and whether or not they’re looking forward to a brighter 2025.

Here’s what they had to say…

The good news is that people will always play games and the demand for cool and innovative games never changed.

We always hear records here and records there, but that’s not the standard at the moment – I hear layoffs here and layoffs there. I only see good performances of a few titles with luck or big supporters in the shadows. Surprise hits of hardworking people with or without a strong community or just some sneaky tricks to get up to the charts – a banana, anyone?

Some people want to develop games for funding or a specific publisher, but at the end of the day, bait the hook to suit the fish, not the fisherman! So concentrate on players and develop a great game. Only a great product has the chance to be successful in the long run!

The market is changing, and this perfect storm will last longer than 2024 as we miss a new generation of consoles, and revenues are partly out-of-sync with the cost of development or publishing! Some platforms and stores are “self-optimising” themselves, like in the operator business in the good old mobile games days. History repeats itself, and some of us have already seen such cycles several times.

Streaming and VR did not take off as hoped! Even if there is a market, it’s not as big as some experts hoped, and the big players in that field made the same mistake again. They did not invest in content to prove their awesomeness in hardware – hardware alone is not selling. Is this market dead? Nope! It is in the “reality check” phase. But again, I am not sure if all of them will be strong enough to withstand the storm.

Our industry is way bigger than just game developers and publishers – we will see tons of companies in trouble in our surroundings. If no one has the budget for exhibitions, influencers, press, or even marketing, the money will be concentrated on the most important ones.

Hardware is not selling without content, so we will see a big transformation in many other sectors as well. Subscription services are not growing as hoped. I doubt MSFT will reach the 100 million GamePass users it aims for in the near future.

We will see several new players ramping up in 2024 and 2025 who will profit from the current market conditions, whether through M&A activities or strong commitments in specific areas. They will grow into some new major players in the future.

We will see investments from other organisations into the game sector that depend on our industry and need a steady stream of new titles or to get their IPs out in one of the biggest markets. So many players are waiting in the shadows to start the race again. So, I have good hopes for the mid or end of 2025 and beyond.

What happened when the “gold rush” was over? big hangover, but those who survived returned to reality and worked hard. Let’s concentrate on making profits, split the risks and cooperate more. Games are done by developers, not AI, as some managers out there still hope. So we need good devs and good games! Let’s keep rocking in a “dark age” of the games industry.

Martine Spaans

Owner
at Tamalaki

In my position as General Manager of the Dutch Games Association, I get more of a ‘helicopter view” of the current state of the industry.

Investors and publishers sometimes approach us for recommendations and introductions. During the last year, there were hardly any requests for that, but lately, I’ve really seen this picking up again.

My gut feeling is that investors and publishers are looking to ramp up again after a period of uncertainty, so this is a good time to pitch games and get ready.

2024 Will probably remain tight for most developers, but I have high hopes for 2025. 

Will Luton

Founder/CPO Village Studio Games

2024 has been very challenging as a founder of a venture-backed startup.

While there are breakout successes, mobile is certainly in the late stage now, and it’s nearly impossible to compete without significant resources. So, the opportunities for smaller studios are elsewhere, most commonly on PC. But even on PC, there is an abundance of content.

While it’s never been easy to create hit games, there is so much entertainment content available. It’s not just games but movies, TV, short-form videos, music, and books, and it’s all either cheap, free or on an “all you can eat” subscription. People are overwhelmed by choice.

On top of that, more and more people are playing back catalogue or games with extreme longevity. A ten year old game is not the same as a ten year old game ten years ago. New games are simply squeezed in all directions.

Over the last couple of years, I’ve noticed that my consumption patterns have shifted, and games are simply getting less time. That’s especially true on mobile, where I think games are really competing with social media for attention. When I do play, I have a tendency to return to games I’ve been playing for years.

We’ve also come to the end of a consolidation cycle, where the big have gotten bigger. This has resulted in many layoffs, which has a sad human cost, but it has also meant that there are now fewer acquirers and many small startups. This, coupled with the high interest rates, means that investment has decreased, and what is there is stretched.

However, in the short history of games, there have been periods of stagnation and reinvention as technology and business models have come and died. In my career, I think of all the sequels and stagnant genres in the PS3/X360 era, where only big, existing publishers could compete. Then came Facebook, mobile, Steam, and F2P, and there was an explosion of new gameplay, genres, and players.

Going back further, you have shifts from parlour games to mechanical bagatelle, electromechanical pinball, video arcade, and home console. Then there are all the micro shifts like 2D to 3D, optical media, GaaS, esports, etc. The games market is forever dynamic.

For the more entrepreneurial amongst us, there’s a lot of looking and hoping for that next opportunity. Hence, the rush to the mirage of Web3. VR has surprised me in that it has managed to show some longevity but has not yet reached a true mass market. Perhaps a technical solution could make VR more convenient and immersive or Web3 more accessible and equitable, but those would be black swan events.

The big unanswerable questions are: Is there another big shift? What is it? When will it happen?

I do believe that, in the short term, we are over the worst. Major layoffs will stop, and some investment will return as interest rates come back under control. Great games will continue to break out and be successful, even if they’re harder to create and less financially rewarding as they may have been a few years back. Then, at some point, something big. Maybe.

Jared Steffes

Co-founder
at Muxy

I’ve noticed three major updates to the gaming space that I’ve been tracking. 

1. Telegram App Center / TON Mini Apps. It’s a cryptocurrency wild west and feels like a hyper Zynga/Facebook and Apple App Store opportunity. There are many clickers play-to-earn games currently, but I can easily see this changing quickly into higher-quality HTML5 games.

2. Web3 games are starting to look and play like modern games. It takes a while to make a high-quality game, and adding new technology that functions at the demanding level that consumers deserve is not easy. The solutions are improving, but the real transition is still in its infancy.

3. AI game development is real and effective, and we are going to see an influx of content very soon. The number of games released every month is going to multiply compared to the known copycat ways of reskins. 

I’m excited about user acquisition opportunities and player retention tactics. I’ve been working on ways to bring mobile UA to the console and PC space.

The results have been remarkable, and I’ve realised that cross-promotion between different gaming ecosystems and media platforms does not have boundaries anymore. There just hasn’t been technology to connect them all yet!