“Game Face” or “Game Phase”?
Millions of Indians took to gaming to shoo away their lockdown woes. Little wonder that we are now seeing the emergence of home-grown unicorns in mobile gaming (Read More). India, though unlike other markets has an unlikely app leading the fray.
The King Plays…Ludo
Ludo King is the clear leader by a long margin. I even know people who have Ludo tournaments amongst their friends and family — you cannot make this stuff up. I suppose, if people can play Poker, Dream11 and Rummy online then LUDO seems quite obvious given its wider base of appeal and social engagement.
The secular dip in Monthly Active User during March 2020 is interesting. The lockdown in India started on the 25th of March. Gaming, presumably, would not have been as top of mind. However, there is a return to trend in terms of average MAUs and even a bump up during the peak of- the lockdown.
Penetration wise, “Casual games” (such as Candy Crush & Ludo King) lead the pack, it’s the more involved and engaging categories like Action and Strategy that have more active users compared to the rest. High Daily Open Rates also show that Action (games like PUBG, GTA & Garena Free Fire) and Strategy categories (games like ‘Clash of the Clans’ & ‘Minecraft’) have the most engaged users.
Total Session Time (the number of minutes spent gaming in a day, on average) is where we see the full effect of the lockdown on mobile gaming. Strategy, a somewhat more ‘involved’ category saw high session times while Casual games — perhaps by definition — were played rather casually and saw lesser engagement.
Where the ‘Action’ is
Dominated by a few well-known names — ‘Action’ as a category saw session time peak at the height of the lockdown. Usage grew during the lockdown and hasn’t slowed by much with easing of lockdowns, showing its stickiness with users.
PUBG is one of the most popular games in this category and 2020 was an eventful year for it. While it did get an impetus post the lockdown (especially PUBG Lite), it also became the target of boycotts in India, and eventually an official ban imposed by the Government following rising anti-China sentiment. CoD seems to have benefitted in installs from the ban on PUBG but the true beneficiary was — Garena Free Fire which had already gathered strong tailwinds.
Users spent nearly 2.5 hours on PUBG Mobile at the height of the lockdown! For context that is nearly double for Netflix. While the trend on time spent is similar across popular Action games, differences can be clearly seen across games.
Compare these session times with the otherwise popular Casual category, and the engagement with Action games stands out. The session time for the top Action game is 3x that of the top Casual game.
“Stickiness” post-lockdown is also higher for Action games amongst its users. The base of games such as LUDO King however, is much higher — nearly a fifth of Indian Smartphone users have downloaded it and 67% of them used it last year.
With an ever-growing population of young smartphone users in India — more games being developed, and smartphones tailored to gaming — COVID19 has been a boon for the gaming industry. We expect mobile gaming to remain the big game in town.
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Thanks for your time,
- Rhitu
rhitu@kalagato.co
