We might be in the first month of 2025, but our analysts are still reeling from everything launched in the mobile market in December 2024. The title that got the most attention was Pokémon TCG Pocket, which continued its monumental success into the New Year after introducing its first-ever card pack expansion. .
Clash of Clans also ended the year with a bang by launching the much-anticipated new level for its Town Hall systems, which resulted in a spike of more than 200% in daily revenue on the US iOS market, as well as a month-long PvE challenge event that gave players direct control over their heroes for the first time. Meanwhile, Brawl Stars got into the holiday spirit with a generous giveaway event that saw all players gifted the game’s first-ever crossover character, Buzz Lightyear from Disney Pixar’s Toy Story.
The match3 puzzler Matching Story sledged off the December festivities with Christmas Dice Frenzy, a dice board minigame featuring three additional sub-minigames. The overarching minigame functioned much like any classic board game, with players rolling dice (acquired by playing Matching Story’s core gameplay levels) and progressing based on the number they land.
Accrued currency could be spent in a dedicated event store to purchase items that help in the main game, like boosters and cards, which is standard practice. More interestingly, the items for purchase were made available in “stages.” As players completed stages, they would progress to the Grand Prize Bar, which unlocked a special in-game decoration once full.p>
These points could be spent to open up space on the game’s merge2 board, which was almost completely locked down at the beginning of the event. Players would receive event items as they unlocked spaces, but the key rewards—such as in-game boosters and in-game currency—were specifically tied to unlocking chest tiles on the grid.
After spending more than a year in its soft launch period, Dream Games’ Royal Kingdom, the successor to Royal Match, officially released onto the mobile market on 21 November. The final product has changed somewhat since it first became playable in April 2023, going through multiple iterations. For example, it originally featured multiple PvP elements that ran simultaneously, a feature that has since been scrapped.
The game also introduced a new guild-based PvP competition mode, Team Battle, where players compete to destroy an enemy base by collecting and using barrels to damage enemy structures. The first team to destroy all the enemy items or accumulate the most barrel points was awarded a grand prize—a bundle of event currency and pet food, plus a chest.
