Week in Views – Tough talk, turning tides and big players go mobile | Pocket Gamer.biz

EGDF president Hendrik Lesser talks tough

“I’m as mad as hell and I’m not going to take this anymore!” Not the words of the European Games Developer Federation’s president Hendrik Lesser, but by god, they’re pretty close.

Lesser took to the EGDF’s blog to release his State of the European Games Industry 2024 letter and rather than trot out the same kind of corporate double-speak and industry-approved backslap that’s machine-gunned at us daily, took the opportunity to tell it like it is.

Sure, it’s a bit long. Sure, it’s delightfully expletive laden. But this guy spits truth.

Taking digs at big business (he’s coming for you Apple and Google), bemoaning the power of platforms (yup, Unity, that snipe is all yours), and even having a pop at any company that’s laid off staff recently (“some companies are laying off people as an overreaction”) it seems that no-one is safe when Lesser shoots from the lip.

Even investors and VCs get the finger (pointed at them) as Lesser complains (100% accurately) that “There is still money in the game industry ecosystem in the hands of VCs and PEs, but now many prefer to invest in already profitable studios.”

But the seal on the deal has to be Lesser’s frank admission that “2023 was a shitty year. 2024 will probably be even more shittier.” Seems that when you’re a journalist looking for headlines, Lesser really is more.

But there’s a happy ending. Lesser’s clear love of the industry and confidence in the great people that work within it shine through. “Are you a publisher or developer, it does not matter as long as you are making games. We are the ones who will get this shit together,” he predicts.

When this guy runs for European President for real, I’ll be there flying a flag with his face on.

From losing a job to millions in revenue: How Clap Clap Games began

There are lots of negative stories surrounding the games industry right now, with continuous layoffs each week impacting thousands of workers. In just the last couple of weeks, we’ve reported on job losses at Gameloft, Blizzard, Popcore and Scopely.

So it was refreshing this week to get a positive spin during a session at Kwalee’s Gamemasters Summit. Clap Clap Games CEO Gabriel Stürmer discussed the early days of the developer, which started as a result of his firing as CMO from Brazilian studio Cupcake Entertainment.

With an ambition to stay in games, Stürmer set out to start his own company. But he lacked investment, and perhaps more importantly, the skills to code. Unfettered, he got to training himself on Unity and within a few short years the company has partnered with hypercasual heavyweights Kwalee and Voodoo and has generated millions of dollars in revenue.

It’s a reminder then out of awful setbacks can come unexpected opportunities, often born out of necessity. It doesn’t make the job losses being suffered at scale right now any easier, of course, but it was nice to hear a story of someone bouncing back.

Ubisoft launches first Invincible mobile game for the 21-year-old franchise

Mobile news from Ubisoft. Findings show that Ubisoft’s mobile earnings were way down from 35% to 7%. They highlighted the studio’s quiet presence with its mobile titles, but it seems that is about to change. Ubisoft recently dropped Rainbow Six SMOL as part of the Netflix lineup of games; then we have a mobile Division game to watch out for AND Assassins Creed Jade.

Players are getting two mobile games pulled from massively popular titles, a third that is connected with Netflix Games, which allows anyone with a subscription to play and with this latest announcement, a game based on a long-running popular comic book series that has also now become a hit TV series.

It’s clear Ubisoft is cracking things up a notch in terms of mobile releases, and it’s also interesting to see the various avenues they are approaching it from, making use of popular platforms and IPs. Time will tell if it’s enough to see Ubisoft gain a stronger foothold in the mobile market, but at the very least, it does appear that change is on the horizon.

Monster Hunter Now’s half-year anniversary reveals time-limited monetisation tactics

As a Monster Hunter fan and day-one Now player, the fact it’s almost six months already since Niantic’s latest hit is frankly hard to believe. But, with so much content and quality-of-life improvements planned for the half-year anniversary, I’m not exactly complaining.

In a win-win-win for players, Niantic and Capcom, during the celebratory event there will be more monsters spawning in and more often, giving fans more to do throughout the day – and needing more potions to do it. This will inevitably lead to more player spending on potions, especially among the resource-hungry playerbase who want to forge the best weapons possible from monster parts.

And with exciting beasts like Azure Rathalos making a comeback, plus the tease of brand-new additions from the main series, March is certainly looking set to be a lucrative month.

In addition to six months of Now, March also marks three years since Rise released on Nintendo Switch and a whole 20 years since the Monster Hunter series first launched, opening the doors to plenty more celebratory content in Now. Ideally there’ll be some new monsters from Rise joining the roster…