When’s the last time you saw a premium mobile game claim the top spot on Apple’s chart of top-grossing iOS apps? How about a spot among the top 10, or even the top 50?
Next Games’ Sulka Haro took to Twitter this morning to complain that “paid apps are truly dead” after he noticed a notable discrepancy: the #1 best-selling premium app in the US App Store was hovering around #237 in the list of top-grossing apps, which is dominated by free-to-play games like Pokemon Go and Game of War: Fire Age (pictured).
In fact, currently there seems to be only one premium mobile game among the 50 top-grossing apps in the US, and it’s Minecraft: Pocket Edition. Even when you narrow down to focus only on the 50 top-grossing mobile games in the US, Minecraft appears to be the only premium entry right now — the rest are free-to-play games.
While the dominance of F2P games on mobile isn’t novel — premium game devs have been decrying the mobile market’s F2P addiction for years now, with some seeking greener pastures on other platforms — Haro’s comments offer fresh perspective on the situation for any mobile devs still mulling the F2P vs. paid question.
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2016