

Apple dominating Android with 84 percent of mobile gaming revenue - rmah
http://venturebeat.com/2012/05/06/mobile-gaming-revenue-apple/

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cageface
_According to Newzoo, in-app purchases are where developers are really seeing
the money. Ninety-one percent of mobile gaming revenue comes from money spent
inside the game on both Android and iOS._

Freemium is king. Unfortunately this model usually incentivizes the wrong kind
of game design. The top ten tends to be dominated by Skinner boxes selling
virtual tchotchkes.

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sek
Other headline: Playing games on Android is cheaper.

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drzaiusapelord
This is an excellent point. I hate this Forbsian POV here of how making the
most money is the most important thing ever. I had an iphone for a while and
felt forced into buying 99 cent apps for basic usage. On android, a lot of
this stuff is free. Maybe android appeals to people who don't feel blowing
$100 on apps or in game items is acceptable. Regardless, I don't see android
or its app selection hurting because of it.

Not to mention, android appeals to power users who probably have a xbox or
gaming PC anyway. If I'm going to be stuck in a skinner box for hours, I'd
prefer the one with the big screen and the slick graphics.

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option_greek
It depends on which side you are on :) You might love to buy android phone but
will you develop for it knowing it wont bring as much money...

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lini
What about in-app ads? Lots of Android games have built-in ads that bring
revenue for the developer without the need for the user to purchase anything.
I remember that the original Angry Birds used to be free on the Android Market
but displayed ads, while the iOS App Store version cost a dollar.

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batista
> _What about in-app ads? Lots of Android games have built-in ads that bring
> revenue for the developer without the need for the user to purchase
> anything. I remember that the original Angry Birds used to be free on the
> Android Market but displayed ads, while the iOS App Store version cost a
> dollar._

Apps don't make anything near what an actual purchase does. Plus, nobody looks
at ads when he plays a game...

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daniel_solano
At our local Android developer's meet-up, we had a local game developer who
has released several paid and ad-supported games. There are two relevant
observations he made:

1\. He often made more money from the ad-supported free versions of his games
rather than the paid versions.

2\. The Play Store is not the only place to download/pay for Android games.
According to him, there are hundreds of alternative markets (such as
Amazon's), some of which are much more prevalent outside the U.S.

~~~
batista
_> 1\. He often made more money from the ad-supported free versions of his
games rather than the paid versions._

Besides being just one account, that might as well be because, well, his paid
versions didn't sell that well at all?

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RobAtticus
My experience is roughly the same. We aren't making hugely popular apps, but
in all cases, the ad-supported version generates more revenue than the pay
versions.

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nextparadigms
I think at this point Apple is holding carriers hostage in most parts of the
world, and they are demanding they buy a certain amount of iPhones from them
(at the full retail price) before the launch, otherwise they don't give them
the iPhone.

So at least for a few years, Apple could just keep increasing profits, by
demanding the carriers buy 30% (or whatever) more units each time, and ride
that business model for a long time, until the iPhone is not a popular item
anymore.

If the other manufacturers want to make some decent profit, besides making
great products, obviously, they also need to be more forceful towards
carriers, and also demand full retail price for their phones, rather than a
heavily discounted price for "volume" or whatever reasoning carriers have when
dealing with the other manufacturers. Those $600-$700 Android smartphones you
see in store at carriers, they pay only $400-$450 for them. Manufacturers need
to stop this practice if they want higher profits.

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bad_user
There is some truth in this, as based on my own experience, there are more
quality games in iTunes then there are in Google Play ... or maybe the Play
store simply sucks for discoverability of interesting games. And when I did
find some quality games, some of them performed poorly on my Galaxy S1,
probably because of the slightly outdated hardware.

On the other hand counting the total revenue of Android games is very
difficult, because some games make money from ads and some publishers are
going selling through alternative app stores or are self-publishing.

For instance I'm willing to bet that The Humble Bundle packs that were self-
published were not added to this count ... <http://www.humblebundle.com/> ...
although the developers did make quite the revenue.

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TazeTSchnitzel
There's a simple reason why: Google Play's app selection sucks.

Look at "top free apps". It's not filled with useful, smart and new
applications by a wide variety of developers. Instead you see Facebook,
Google's services, and Flash Player. Then look at "top new free apps". You see
very poor quality games from organisations like "Free games Play - Games
Team".

Now look at iTunes's iOS App Store. There is far more quality and variety in
the "Top Free Apps" section. And games you've actually heard of.

Edit: I'm not saying this to bash Android, I love the platform. But I am
irritated by its app selection. It's probably why I have very few apps on my
Android phone, but had far more on my iPod touch when I had it.

~~~
Kylekramer
Dunno why you are looking for free apps when discussing profits. In Top Paid
for Android, I see Angry Birds Space, Draw Something, Cut the Rope, Where's My
Water, and Osmos HD in the top ten alone. All high quality. Of course, the
real intriguing list is top grossing, which is dominated by Zygna style apps
which are making out like casinos by running a kind of legalized gambling on
both platforms. Basically using the nucleus accumbens like an ATM.

~~~
TazeTSchnitzel
Ah, good point. I'm not sure why I'm looking at free apps.

But you're right, it's very interesting to look at top grossing. There are
some non-Zynga-style apps there which just have huge sales volume. At least, I
assume that.

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joeblau
At my old job, I worked with 12 people; 10 had Androids and 2 had iPhones.
Both of us iPhone users had purchased at least 2 apps and only 1 of the
Android users purchased 1 app.

If you're trying to generate revenue, going Android usually isn't the way to
to do it. This is just my non-scientific random sampling though.

~~~
gtaylor
Yeah, that's a pretty small sample size :) I'll gladly pay up for a good game
on my Android, and do so every month when I get bored of whatever I have been
playing.

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gouranga
I get the feeling that lots of people with android phones buy them because
they need them to do serious work and don't buy a lot of games. 99% of people
I know with iPhones don't do anything serious with them and purchased them
purely for the entertainment value.

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theallan
The wonderfully ironic thing about this is that 10 years ago we would have
said exactly the same thing about Mac v PC.

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gouranga
We still do.

The PC users are the silent majority now as they were 10 years ago.

[http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:Wikimedia_OS_share_pie_cha...](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:Wikimedia_OS_share_pie_chart.png)

