Collaborating with popular franchises can be a highly effective way for mobile games to drive engagement, and that has never been more clear than it was during September. Over the course of the month we saw a remarkable number of crossover events, encompassing everything from Monopoly GO! and Marvel, to Transformers and Squad Busters, and even Spongebob Squarepants and Brawl Stars.
But September wasn’t just surprising for its focus on collaborations, it was also notable for the return of classic purchase options. While free-to-play normally dominates the mobile scene, the highly-successful launch of Balatro’s mobile port has proved that there’s still room for one-time purchase fees in today’s highly-competitive market.
Elsewhere, we saw Bethesda’s Fallout Shelter-inspired take on The Elder Scrolls finally launch worldwide. Despite a lengthy soft launch period, the title has fallen out of the top-grossing charts almost as quickly as it entered. It was a better month for League of Legends: Wild Rift, which saw the second-biggest spike in daily revenue in its entire lifetime following the launch of a special, double prize pool gacha.
You can find information about all these titles, as well as other significant updates to some of the most popular mobile games, in our latest analyst bulletin below.
September’s casual game updates
The first big collaboration of the month was Monopoly GO!’s Marvel-ous crossover, which kicked off towards the end of September with a flashy cutscene that showcased the arrival of Iron Man, Thor, Spider-Man, and other iconic superheroes. Given that Scopely already has a dedicated comic-book title in Marvel Strike Force, which it acquired as part of FoxNext Games in 2020, it’s likely that this crossover emerged from the company’s existing licensing partnership with Marvel.
The main draw of the crossover is the new Seasonal Collectibles album, where, for this season, players can complete several Marvel-themed sticker sets like “Deadpool Double” and “Spidey’s NYC” to earn Marvel-themed tokens, emojis, and more. Several other regular Monopoly GO! events also got a Marvel
Match Masters delivered a double punch by debuting both its first-ever minigame and an all-new storytelling mode. Focusing on the minigame first, Matchinko—as the name implies—is an amalgamation of the game’s usual match3 offering and pachinko-inspired gameplay. To play, users had to first acquire a Matchinko Token, which could be found in regular matches, daily task events, and more. Doing well in the minigame awarded event currency, which could be used to obtain various items from a dedicated shop.
The minigame also awarded event tokens known as “Sparks,” which were used to progress the new narrative-focused mode Seasonal Stories. The more Sparks a player obtained, the more of the story was unveiled to them. For example, this first iteration of the event was a pig lost at the airport. At first, the pig has almost nothing on his person, but as players progress, he gets a boarding pass, luggage, and everything else ready for the flight. Players also received actual in-game rewards as they reached certain progression milestones, such as gacha sticker rewards, various boosters, perks, and more.
This event adds a new seasonal progression layer to Match Masters, creating a feature that interconnects with other in-game events. It also complements the existing Seasonal Ranked Ladder and Sticker Albums, enhancing the overall experience for players.
Following its immensely successful run on PC and console, the roguelike-poker hybrid Balatro came to mobile on September 26, launching as a premium title for a one-time fee of $10. Generally, premium titles are a rarity on the mobile market today as they struggle to deliver the same financial performance as their free-to-play counterparts. Despite that, Balatro has been a significant success, peaking at #56 in the US iOS grossing charts on launch day.
Since then, revenue has sharply declined, although that’s to be expected given the game’s one-time purchase nature. Balatro’s card-based gameplay and poker table-esque aesthetic have made it a good fit for mobile, and we suspect many existing fans may have picked up the mobile version so they can also play anytime, anywhere.
Hexa Sort, a hybrid casual puzzle game from Lion Studios that launched in November last year, reached an all-time high in September (peaking at #73 in the US iOS grossing charts) following a steady but sustained growth in its overall performance.
While Hexa Sort’s performance was slow at first, Lion Studios has been gradually improving the core gameplay experience by introducing new block tiles and seasonally aligned content, such as the new Autumn camping-themed battle pass season and a new Autumn-themed buildable island. While Hexa Sort’s rotation of live events is relatively modest, its success has also been bolstered by Treasure Quest, an all-new social win streak event added in August that caused a notable boost in downloads.
