As expected, February included a number of seasonal events in mobile game markets with events like Valentine’s Day and the Chinese New Year. However, our analysts also spotted some interesting collaborations and surprisingly themed events, so let’s see what our analysts have gathered for us this time.
The data and examples shown here are gathered from the GameRefinery service, which you can access here. If you’re interested in checking more than 2.5k unique, high-quality overview pages across our genre taxonomy & markets, you might want to pay a visit! 😉
US Market Overview
- Roblox’s 8th annual Bloxys (Roblox awards gala) are on the way, and players can vote for their favorite nominees to earn a special badge. With the update, a mysterious research station area was released as a Roblox game, teasing something bigger to be released when the Bloxy winners are released.
- Genshin Impact’s latest update brings the Lunar New Year event Lantern Rites, which is even bigger than the previous events so far. The event is divided into four sections: “All That Glitters,” “Lantern Rite Tales,” “Theater Mechanicus,” and the “Xiao Market.” Each supports the other in different ways.
- Harry Potter: Hogwarts Mystery deepens its relationship-features by adding Romance options. Players can start dating various characters with a high enough friendship level (the old relationship-mechanic). On top of this, Jam City also added interesting Charisma-mechanic, which is a multiplier for relationships earned from logging in on a daily basis
- Archero introduced a huge update including synchronous PvP-mode where you can fight random players (costs gems and affects ladder ranking) or your friends (free casual matches with no ranking effect) in 1v1 arenas.
- Forge of Empires had a St. Patrick’s Day event, which included a brand new idler-type system.
As expected, February included a bunch of different Valentine’s Day events (e.g., Lily’s Garden, Cooking Diary, Dragon City Mobile, Two Dots) and Chinese New Year updates in games.
Dragon City Mobile also introduced a Dragon TV collection, an event based on watching incentivized ads in the game. What makes this interesting is that we haven’t usually seen events that are themed around watching ads.
Other interesting highlights of the month included the MMORPG Warhammer: Odyssey’s global soft launch and Top War: Battle Game’s significant revenue gains, which accelerated the game’s break into top-grossing 20 in the US. We spoke shortly about Top War in the previous Analyst Bulletin.
China Market Overview
- Genshin Impact’s Lunar New Year Event.
- Sausage Man (香肠派对) had a big update with lots of new features and content, such as a new Fall-Guys-inspired PVP mode, where players race each other on imaginative obstacle courses.
- QQ Speed (QQ飞车) introduced a new game mode 跳跳派对, which also shares many familiar gameplay elements with the popular Fall Guys-phenomenon.
- Dragon’s nest 2 (龙之谷2) had a Guild territory wars event, where first guilds fight for a ranking, and then the highest-ranking guilds fight against each other.
- Plants vs. Zombies 2 (植物大战僵尸2) opened a Japanese Heian Period world.
- Xinshenmo Dalu (新神魔大陆) added an auto-chess-inspired mode 魔宠远征.
- Romantic MMORPG Fu-sheng Wei Qing-ge (浮生为卿歌) added a childbirth system called “Prince.” Players can now give birth to a child with their virtual partner after marriage.
- MMORPG Xin Xiao-ao Jiang-hu (新笑傲江湖) organized an in-game singing contest event.
- Romance of the Three Kingdoms – Strategic version (三国志·战略版) added a new strategic element, the use of fire. Players can now set fire to grids on the world map, and the spread of the fire is controlled by the strength and direction of the wind, which is a new environmental variable that players will have to consider in their tactics.
Most of the games celebrated the Chinese New Year, often synchronously with the beginning of the new battle pass/competitive season. Some games also celebrated western Valentine’s Day (e.g., Langrisser 梦幻模拟战).
Our game analysts have recently spotted multiple casual PvP TD-games in China’s top download list. One of them, called Fusion Crush: Hero Orbs also recently entered the top-grossing list for the first time. Moreover, the previously mentioned 4x-merge hybrid Top War: Battle Game has also risen in the top-grossing ranks.
Another interesting and maybe even amusing observation from the Chinese mobile game market is the several KFC collaborative events that have frequently been popping up in various games in the Chinese market, the latest being Jiang-nan Bai-jing-tu (江南百景图), a classic city-building tycoon game set in Ming dynasty China.
Japan Market Overview
- Maken Densetsu (魔剣伝説) had a collaboration event with Ys VIII: Lacrimosa of Dana.
- Dragon Quest Tact (ドラゴンクエストタクト) had a Dragon Quest II event.
- 実況パワフルサッカー added a new beta PvP-mode called Fes Match. Also, a new playable school was added with the event.
- Jampuchi Heroes (ジャンプチ ヒーローズ) celebrated 11 million worldwide downloads. The celebrations included several battle stages (released in succession) and event tasks. The update also introduced a new type of skill called un-tokusei (luck traits) that only some of the characters possess.
- Princess Connect! Re:Dive (プリンセスコネクト！RE:DIVE) celebrated the third-anniversary with a story event titled “Kizuna, Tsunaide. Kokoro, Musunde.”
- Langrisser Mobile (ラングリッサー モバイル) added a figurine building-function. Players can now collect, build and set up figurines of the heroes, units, and NPCs.
- With the latest update, Tales of Crestoria (テイルズ オブ クレストリア) celebrated both its half anniversary and Valentine’s Day. The half-anniversary event is quite the gacha bonanza with five different gachas!
February also brought a number of Valentine’s Day or chocolate-themed and some Lunar New Year events into Japan’s mobile game market. For instance, games, such as The Seven Deadly Sins (七つの大罪 光と闇の交戦 : グラクロ) and Re:Zero Kara Hajimeru Isekai Seikatsu (Re:ゼロから始める異世界生活) introduced seasonal event content in their February’s updates.
We recently wrote an article on how seasonal events provide a perfect excuse to find new and exciting ways to drive player engagement. Check out the blog post, if you’re interested in how to implement seasonal content into your game.
Also, Japan’s top-grossing list got a new top 1 last month. Cygames’ Uma Musume Pretty Derby (ウマ娘 プリティーダービー) is an interactive story about derby horse girls. The story’s plot is that great racehorses of the past have a chance to be reborn as “horse girls”, girls with the ears and tails of horses as well as their speed and endurance, and who then race for fame and fortune.
