Most mobile game genres in the US experienced declines in revenues as well as the number of downloads in the first half of 2022.
Sensor Tower released a new report which reveals that the majority of mobile game genres in the US saw a decline in the number of downloads as well as consumer spending in the first half of 2022.
The report reads that the total mobile games revenue in H1 2022 in the country was $11.4 billion which reflects a 9.6% decrease compared to the same period last year, and the number of downloads fell by 2.5% to 2.4 billion.
In the second quarter of 2022, the revenue declined by 11.4% compared to the same period in the previous year reaching $5.6 billion, while the number of downloads remained relatively stable – at 1.2 billion.
In the first half of 2022, only the arcade and tabletop game genres showed revenue growth. Arcade was the fastest-growing genre showing a 14.8% increase and reaching about $176 million in revenue. Tabletop games grew by 0.9% to nearly $388.8 million.
The largest category by spending was puzzle games – these titles generated $2.3 billion, though they saw a decline of 8.8% compared to the first half of 2021. Casino games ranked second with $2.2 billion (down 10.9%) and strategy took the No.3 spot with $2 billion (down 9.2%).
In the second quarter of 2022, arcades were also the fastest-growing genre by revenue accumulating $89.4 million (up 18%). They were followed by hypercasual games which generated $27.3 million (up 2.3%). All the other game genres experienced a decline, with racing games showing the biggest drop (38%).
In terms of downloads in the first half of 2022, only action games showed growth – by 5.4% (54.7 million downloads). The leaders here were Genshin Impact, Galaxy Attack: Space Shooter, and Galaxy Attack: Alien Shooter.
Hyper-casual games ranked first in the list of the top downloaded genres in H1 2022 with 718.2 million downloads (a 13.7% year-on-year decrease). Puzzle games took the second spot and arcades took the third.
In the second quarter of 2022, however, six genres showed positive or zero dynamics in terms of downloads. The number of downloads for shooters grew by 17.5%, action games saw a growth of 12.9%, RPGs increased by 6%, sports games – by 2.5%, puzzles – by 0.7%, and the number of downloads for simulators remained stable.
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