Pumpkins have been popping up across all mobile games in October, which can only mean one thing: it’s spooky season! Developers brewed up events to treat their players, and October brought some interesting changes in the market. Instead of being spooked by stricter US regulations, real money gaming operators are conjuring up secondary virtual-currency layers to haunt the top-grossing charts. In the hybrid casual puzzle space, an industrious ant colony crawled past established genre titans to take first place.
In non-pumpkin-related news, Playrix leveled up its board experience by introducing an Ultra Hard tier in Homescapes (for all those players for whom Super Hard just isn’t hard enough!), and merge-2 mechanics crept deeper into popular games like Coin Master and Bingo Voyage. We saw Tencent release a monster of a console IP onto mobiles in Japan and the West, and it was good to see action RPG Invokers: Titan Legacy refusing to succumb to the dreaded post-launch shark-fin decline curse with a strong post-launch performance.
Last but not least, not content with having four successful casual merge-2 games, this month Century Games has been scaling up two further 4X strategy games, first launched back in July, meaning that at the end of October, it had more than ten titles in the top 200 grossing list.
For more details on these updates, titles, and the latest mobile market trends, take a look at our full Analyst Bulletin below.
October’s casual and casino game updates
The real-money gaming (RMG) market has historically functioned separately from the broader mobile games sector. In the US, sweepstakes apps have led the category, which includes digital slots, cards, and bingo where players wager real cash. These titles process deposits through external payment gateways rather than standard in-app billing, which has kept their revenue out of app store charts. This means that operating these apps in the US requires navigating ongoing regulatory changes, as sweepstakes gambling has been banned in certain countries within the European Union and Asia, and more individual US states are introducing stricter local laws. In response, RMG developers are testing new strategies, something we saw this month.
In October, three leading sweepstakes titles (Jackpot Go, Lavish Luck Casino, and Gleaming Slots) introduced standard in-app purchase (IAP) monetization through the Apple App Store for the first time. After operating for about eighteen months without any App Store transaction revenue, Lavish Luck Casino enabled store IAPs in October and quickly appeared in the top 200 Grossing chart.
Apple’s platform rules and state gambling laws prevent cashing out store-bought IAPs for real money. As a result, developers are adding a ‘play-for-fun’ virtual currency layer to their sweepstakes model. This creates a dual-economy hybrid that combines real-money elements with social casino loops, similar to those in Slotomania. The simultaneous adoption of this model by several studios seems to suggest there’s a coordinated move happening towards broader monetization and reduced regulatory risk.
Pixel Flow led the hybrid-casual puzzle trend over the past year, climbing the download charts before being acquired by Scopely. This success then triggered a series of market experiments with color sorting and 3D deconstruction mechanics. ABI Games’ Colony Flow differentiated itself by combining the established core loop of selecting colors to dismantle a voxel board with a thematic layer where an army of ants removes the cleared cubes.
Mind you, Colony Flow is not a new release, but October was a key milestone in its commercial performance. The game surpassed both Pixel Flow and Grand Games’ Block Out to become the leading hybrid casual puzzle title by IAP revenue. It remained in the top 20 on the US iOS puzzle charts throughout the month, peaking at #17 in its subgenre and maintaining a stable position in the top 200 grossing list.
This milestone is quite notable because of how it has been achieved. Earlier hybrid casual successes depended on lots of downloads to drive ad views and microtransactions, but Colony Flow achieved top IAP revenue with a smaller download base than its competitors. As Pixel Flow’s revenue plateaued, ABI Games demonstrated that deep progression-gating and strong per-user monetization can outperform high install numbers over time.
Additional casual gaming highlights and news
Playrix added a new Ultra Hard difficulty tier to Homescapes in late October, sitting above the Regular, Hard, and Super Hard stages. Ultra Hard now appears every ten levels along the campaign. Difficulty labels have long been a reliable psychological tool in casual puzzle games to drive booster and extra-move spending, which was a tactic popularized by King’s use of the Hard Level banner in Candy Crush Saga.
Playrix is now connecting the Ultra Hard tier directly to event economies in Homescapes. In tournaments and team competitions, clearing an Ultra Hard stage gives a 10x points multiplier, compared to 1x for Regular, 3x for Hard, and 5x for Super Hard. Reaching an Ultra Hard milestone can push players further up the leaderboards, which therefore encourages more spending to secure a higher rank. Playrix also updated the visuals and mechanics of classic board obstacles, adding interactive tutorials for each one. This is a rare design refresh for a mature, top-grossing match3 game.
Merge mini-games have grown from simple side content to full-featured merge-2 mechanics, with many casual studios now adopting systems from standalone merge hits like Gossip Harbor. October saw Bingo Voyage introduce two new formats alongside its core bingo gameplay: an exploration-based digging mode and a PvE battle format in which higher-tier merged items deal damage to stage bosses.
In October, Moon Active also launched a major merge-2 integration in Coin Master called Order Express, which ran for a week with dedicated events and its own energy currency. The mode included a full merge-2 board, multi-tier customer orders, and branching production lines. Instead of using merge as a short-term novelty like we’re used to, we’re now seeing top casual publishers leveraging deep merge-2 loops to increase session length and retention across genres.
Promotional bundles are also evolving. Vizor Games ran the Create Your Own Bundle! event in Klondike Adventures, combining the progression of a multi-tier chain offer with customizable package contents. Instead of fixed bundles, players chose their own mix of resources, energy, and boosters from a curated pool before buying. This approach gave players more control over purchases, reducing any hesitation while maintaining the progression incentive of a chain offer.
October’s midcore game updates
Level Infinite launched Monster Hunter Outlanders on October 28, bringing Capcom’s flagship hunting franchise to mobile as an action RPG with open-world exploration and co-op mechanics. The game is built specifically for mobile rather than ported from the existing console version, and delivers high production values by adapting the series’ weapon systems, open-area exploration, and large-scale boss encounters for touch controls.
Monster Hunter Outlanders debuted at #1 on both the iOS top downloads and top 200 grossing charts in Japan at launch, and in the US, it reached #3 in downloads and #59 in top-grossing. While Monster Hunter: World built up the brand for Western console audiences, Western mobile action RPGs tend to see a drop-off after launch. The game’s long-term performance will depend on how Level Infinite manages cooperative matchmaking, content cadence, and LiveOps support in the coming months.
Most new mobile RPGs see a rapid spike in downloads and revenue from pre-registration and launch marketing, then quickly drop off the charts. However, Invokers: Titan Legacy is following a different trajectory. After a low-profile launch in July, its revenue has grown steadily since early August, entering the top 200 grossing on September 24 and peaking at #154 on October 1. This growth came with minimal organic downloads, as the game floated between #700 and #840 in the downloads chart, relying on strong per-user monetization.
The game’s steady revenue growth is driven by its squad-based design. Invokers presents itself as an action dungeon crawler similar to Diablo, but players control a four-hero team, with one active character and the others managed by AI, and can swap between heroes during play. Traditional solo action RPGs tend to struggle with their mobile monetization in the West. By using a squad system, Invokers incorporates character-gacha and collection-based progression, similar to turn-based hero collectors like RAID: Shadow Legends. This seemingly supports sustained monetization that solo dungeon crawlers typically do not achieve.
In last month’s bulletin, we discussed how Century Games was scaling a large portfolio of casual merge-2 titles into the US top 200 grossing chart, including Tasty Travels, Just Desserts, Hotel Legacy, and Family Farm Merge. In October, the publisher demonstrated similar momentum in the midcore segment. After building its mobile business on 4X strategy games such as Whiteout Survival and Kingshot, it has now scaled two additional 4X strategy titles that launched back in July.
Lordrush uses Kingshot‘s established progression systems with a realistic visual style and has rapidly scaled to reach #47 in the top-grossing chart. Top Force: Commander applies the same 4X territory-control mechanics but uses a cartoon military theme. Its revenue peaked at #70 on October 27, even as downloads were slowing down. Century Games continues to diversify its portfolio by reusing proven progression systems, adapting them to different visual styles for broader ad targeting, and supporting launches with significant UA investment. With Tasty Travels remaining in the top 20, Century Games ended October with over ten titles in the top 200 grossing list, which is quite an impressive feat.
In China, Basketball Girls: Fly to the Peak (篮球少女：飞跃巅峰) launched at #1 on the top downloads chart and peaked at #7 in top grossing on the Chinese iOS charts. The game combines an official NBA partnership with an anime basketball management sim and character gacha. Its training system uses roguelike deck-building and procedural training loops, a structure popularized in Asia by Uma Musume: Pretty Derby, instead of traditional stat menus. Integrating roguelike progression into a licensed sports title highlights the ongoing trend we’re seeing of genre hybridization among regional developers.
Additional midcore gaming highlights and news
Supercell began its 2026 ‘Brawl-O-Ween’ season in Brawl Stars with a four-part community event series that focused on the disappearance of Gus. The first event, #FINDGUS, introduced a point-and-click puzzle minigame located in Mortis’ Mortuary.
Rooms became available every two days, with some requiring completion of in-game battle quests to unlock. Each chamber used a classic adventure puzzle format, where players interacted with objects, managed inventory items, and followed clues from Gus’s balloon, Loony, to progress and earn rewards. It’s quite rare to see a point-and-click adventure being used as a LiveOps event in a mobile action game, but this does show Supercell’s willingness to experiment with new engagement formats for seasonal events.
