2020 puzzle game market prediction: match-3 games: will the match-3 hegemon be transposed?
Match 3 has always been a big gold-absorbing category, monopolized by overseas leading manufacturers, FireCraft is one of the few Chinese manufacturers that have achieved breakthroughs. Recently, analysts have compared the categories and sub-categories of the 1,000 games that App Annie has topped in the last 3 years to get the market forecast for 2020.
Classification of game categories in the article This article mainly analyzes and predicts match-3 games under the category of casual-puzzle games. 2019 puzzle game market review The sub-categories of casual games and their sub-categories (income does not include advertising revenue, except placement and ultra-casual games)｜Data source: DECONSTRUCTOR OF FUN In 2019, the IAP revenue of puzzle games reached US$4.5 billion, a year-on-year increase of about 18%. Among all game categories, the IAP revenue of puzzle games is second only to SLG, ranking second in mobile game in-app purchase revenue. 1. IAP of match-3 games reaches US$3.4 billion The vast majority of puzzle game revenue comes from match-3 games. The IAP revenue of match-3 games amounts to US$3.4 billion, with an average annual growth rate of 13%. In the past few years, King, Playrix and Peak have been occupying the top positions in the match-3 game market. Although Jam City, Rovio, Tactile, AppLovin, Storm8 and other companies are also competing in the match-3 track, it is difficult to shake their dominance. In 2018, fixed user retention and monetization policies are no longer enough to create a successful match-3 game. Therefore, in 2019, in order to better cater to market demands, mergers and acquisitions focused on diversification and vertical integration have been led, such as AppLovin's Belka, which integrates vertical tracks.
Among the match-3 games, the total revenue of elimination & decoration mixed games has the fastest growth (except for Other Match, which cannot be specifically classified) Further exploration found that among the match-3 games, the fastest growing income was elimination & decoration games, especially Playrix's "Dream Garden", "Dream Manor" and "Dream Aquarium", which had a surge in downloads at the end of the year, thus taking over The leading banner of traditional match-3 games. 2. Lessons from 2019: Don't challenge Playrix? For a long time, the giants in the consumer three market have been King, Playrix and Peak. But in 2019, Chinese publisher Firecraft Studios competed fiercely with Playrix through the game "Wonderful Manor". Because "Wonderful Manor" is similar to Playrix's product "Dream Manor", it caused a strong counterattack from Playrix.
Whether it's core gameplay, themes, artistic styles, store ideas, icons or video ideas, Space-Time Fantasy Land and Playrix have similarities In order to defend its market position, Playrix has stepped up its promotion efforts, so that its installation volume has reached an unprecedented height, but this has also caused an increase in CPI costs.
Trends of installation volume of three games (pink-wonderful manor, purple-Homescapes, blue-Gardenscapes) From the perspective of installation volume, since March 2019, the installation volume of "Wonderful Manor" has been much lower than Playrix's "Dream Manor" and "Dream Garden". It is obvious that Playrix has invested more in marketing, which also brings more downloads and revenue. In 2019, Playrix's series of games "Dream Aquarium", "Dream Garden", "Dream Manor" and "Wonderful Zoo" received a total of 308 million downloads, which is more than the total downloads of King's "Candy Crush Legend" series ( 205 million) 50% higher. 3. The sequel of Big IP's match-3 drives revenue growth by 288% Last year, Rovio made waves with "Angry Birds Dream Blast", which increased the revenue of other match-3 games by 288%, which can be said to be one of the few successful IP game innovations in recent years. There are other cases of such big IP match-3 sequel games, such as Huuuge's "Traffic Puzzle" and Nintendo's "Dr Mario World".
"Angry Birds Dream Blast" (left), "Traffic Puzzle" (middle), "Dr Mario World" (right) 2020 Match Three Game Market Forecast Prediction 1: The merger will continue. The next stage of mergers and acquisitions will focus on acquiring companies that are most suitable for match-3 games. The acquired company may be: Publishers with annual revenues of more than US$10 million, such as Tactile, PlayQ, AWEM, PlayDots, etc.
nagrams and other puzzle game companies with considerable DAU. Prediction 2: Playrix will become the leader of the match-3 market. With the income of the puzzle & decoration sub-category surpassing the classic match-3 category, Playrix will become the No.1 player in the match-3 game category. There are 3 reasons: King focuses on A single franchise, combined with a conservative product and marketing strategy, left an opportunity for the competitor Playrix. .Playrix is very aggressive in terms of product and marketing. . Players are more interested in puzzle & decoration games. Prediction 3: Peak Games will go downhill If Peak Games is willing to sell, the company may be acquired in 2020. The most suitable buyer will be Zynga. Zynga has previously acquired Peak's card game business and established a strong business in Turkey through Gram Games. We predict Peak Games will go downhill and eventually sell because: This company has not released new games for several years. The growth of the puzzle game market is driven by puzzle & decoration games, which require a lot of content and therefore require larger teams, which is contrary to Peak's current small team structure. Peak has lost some senior talent. Zynga has low influence in puzzle games, so it may want to acquire a puzzle game company. Prediction 4: Catering to market demand will still be the focus of match-3 games. Inspired by the success of "Lily's Garden" and the slow sales of "Jam City's Vineyard Valley", we will see more new ones targeting mature female players Puzzle games appeared. This article is compiled from "2020 Predictions #1: Prepare to Crown the New King of Puzzle Games".
