Social casino games tops on mobile devices

Social casino games are one of the top-grossing categories in mobile gaming, says a new report by Distimo.

The publication TechCrunch says the Distimo report used data from Distimo AppIQ to see how much revenue different publishers are generating in the iOS App Store and Google Play.

The study concludes that social casino game makers have a significant presence among the top 100 grossing apps.

Distimo found that in the iOS App Store, the top overall grossing publishers globally from March 17 to March 23 included 20 publishers among the top 100 who publish at least one social casino game. On a similar leaderboard for Google Play, it found 19 publishers.

All seven of the top social casino game makers generated more revenue on the App Store than Google Play, with Big Fish Games making 84 percent of its total revenue on the App Store. Williams Interactive and Buffalo Studios tied for the biggest total revenue share on Google Play at 43 percent.

On the App Store, Playtika, the creator of Slotmania, was the number one publisher and accounted for 21 percent of total revenue among the top 10 publishers. Big Fish Games came in second, with 16 percent of the total revenue. Zynga was third, with 12 percent.

Playtika was also number one on Distimo’s leaderboard for Google Play, with 22 percent of total revenue among top 10 publishers. The next highest-grossing developer was Buffalo Studios with an 11 percent share.

Playtika is among several top publishers of social casino games that have been acquired by casino operators and game manufacturers. It is now owned by Caesars Interactive Entertainment.

Caesars has also purchased Buffalo Studios, Pacific Interactive, and the rights to the World Series of Poker mobile app from Electronic Arts.

http://techcrunch.com/2014/04/02/socialcasino-distimo/