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Why Carrom Never Made It Big Outside South Asia (And What That Says About Cultural Games)
MarketsGaming Culture

Why Carrom Never Made It Big Outside South Asia (And What That Says About Cultural Games)

Here's a question that doesn't have a clean answer, and it's worth admitting that upfront rather than pretending otherwise: nobody really knows exactly where carrom came from. The most commonly repeat

anunayk (aka. Moneymaker)Aug 15, 20253 min read
Brazil's Casual Gaming Boom Is Bigger Than the Headlines Suggest
Markets

Brazil's Casual Gaming Boom Is Bigger Than the Headlines Suggest

The number everyone quotes about Brazil is the download rank. It shows up in nearly every market report on mobile and casual gaming: Brazil sits consistently in the global top five for app and game do

Pavlo (International Editorial Team)Jul 18, 20254 min read
A Beginner's Guide to Online Chess Strategy: Five Openings Worth Learning
StrategyGaming Culture

A Beginner's Guide to Online Chess Strategy: Five Openings Worth Learning

Most chess advice for beginners starts in the wrong place. It tells you to "control the center" or "develop your pieces" without ever showing you what that actually looks like on a board, move by move

Shivmish (From Founder’s Diary)May 18, 20254 min read
How Turkish Game Studios Quietly Took Over the Match-3 Genre
StrategyMarkets

How Turkish Game Studios Quietly Took Over the Match-3 Genre

Match-3 looked like a settled genre for most of the last decade. Candy Crush had won, King had been acquired by Activision Blizzard for $5.9 billion in 2016, and the conventional wisdom in mobile gami

Ann (from The Game Girl)Apr 20, 20253 min read
Rewarded Ads Are Eating the Interstitial's Lunch, And Players Are Happier For It
Industry

Rewarded Ads Are Eating the Interstitial's Lunch, And Players Are Happier For It

Ask anyone who has shipped a casual mobile or web game in the last five years what they actually think of interstitial ads, and you'll usually get the same answer once they stop being diplomatic about

anunayk (aka. Moneymaker)Mar 18, 20254 min read
Why the Philippines Has Become Southeast Asia's Most Underrated Mobile Gaming Market
Markets

Why the Philippines Has Become Southeast Asia's Most Underrated Mobile Gaming Market

Ask most people in the gaming industry to name Southeast Asia's biggest mobile market and they'll say Indonesia, almost reflexively, because the population number is the easiest fact to remember. Ask

anunayk (aka. Moneymaker)Mar 18, 20253 min read
The Universal Appeal of the Five-Minute Game
Gaming Culture

The Universal Appeal of the Five-Minute Game

There's a particular kind of game that exists in almost every culture on earth, usually without anyone in one country realizing the version in another country exists at all. It has simple rules, a boa

Shivmish (From Founder’s Diary)Feb 16, 20254 min read
Browser Games Never Actually Died, They Just Went Quiet for a Decade
Gaming Culture

Browser Games Never Actually Died, They Just Went Quiet for a Decade

When Adobe finally killed Flash in December 2020, most of the internet treated it as a funeral nobody attended. The actual mourners were a strange mix: animation studios, a handful of ad agencies stil

Shivmish (From Founder’s Diary)Jan 15, 20254 min read
Indonesia's Mobile-First Gaming Culture Is Unlike Anywhere Else
Markets

Indonesia's Mobile-First Gaming Culture Is Unlike Anywhere Else

Indonesia gets called an "untapped market" often enough that the phrase has basically lost meaning, which is a shame, because the actual behavioral story underneath the cliché is specific and genuinel

Ann (from The Game Girl)Nov 17, 20243 min read