Recently, Phil Spencer appeared front and centre on the Official Xbox Podcast, talking at length about the recent success of the Microsoft x Activision Blizzard acquisition. He spoke a considerable amount about the concept and increasing success of mobile gaming, stressing that you’re ‘going to have to find a way to be relevant on the largest platform, which is mobile.’
He revisited the idea that Microsoft had opted to purchase Activision Blizzard to gain a stronger presence in the mobile gaming market. In his own words, there’s ‘no way to plot the future without being on the platform that most of the planet plays on.’
Mobile = Money
For years, mobile gaming has been on the up. As the technology gets better, some of the biggest games in the world are either finding their way to mobile or they’re starting natively on the platform. Here are some of the most popular mobile games and their player/download counts:
- Candy Crush Saga (King) – 500 Million
- Call of Duty Mobile (Activision) – 500 Million
- Among Us (Inner Sloth) – 485 Million
- Sonic Dash (Sega) – 350 Million
- Helix Jump (Voodoo) – 334 Million
- PUBG Mobile (Tencent) – 300 Million
There has been a particular rise in the popularity of competitive mobile games, like PUBG Mobile, Fortnite Mobile, and Call of Duty Mobile. In the future, more mobile games will be released by top-tier developers, like Ubisoft, which has plans to release a Rainbow Six Mobile and a full-fledged Assassin’s Creed mobile game, among others.
It doesn’t mean I want to turn all of our franchises into mobile franchises; it doesn’t mean everything is going to go free-to-play. I think the distribution and business model diversity that we have is a strength of the platform. We’ve got to be relevant on mobile. There is no way to plot the future without being on the platform that most of the planet plays on.
Recently, the iPhone 15 was released, and it boasts the powerful capability to play some AAA games almost effortlessly. As it’s the most accessible form of gaming in the world, there’s no way that this revolution will slow down at any point soon, and Phil Spencer is absolutely right.
For more Insider Gaming coverage, check out the news that Larian Studios still plans to launch Baldur’s Gate 3 on the Xbox this year
