We have witnessed just how quickly mobile games have gained such massive popularity in the gaming industry. The rise of the mobile gaming industry came as a product of the popularization of gaming in general, advancements in infrastructure and tech innovation that has allowed companies to develop more powerful smartphones. If this trend continues, here’s what you can expect from the mobile gaming industry in the future.
Evolution of Mobile Gaming and Its Current State
Mobile gaming has come a long way in the last two and a half decades. From 1994 and the first Snake game to full HD mobile games we enjoy today, the mobile gaming industry has become one of the most lucrative ones in the gaming world. The global revenue of the mobile gaming market has reached over $100 billion last year, and mobile internet use is, expectedly, at an all-time high. The majority of this revenue comes from so-called freemium games, a concept popularized in the past few years by mobile games such as Clash Royal and Pokemon Go.
Rise of Online Gaming and Games as a Service
The popularization of mobile gaming has also helped to establish games as a service. This means that the games are provided on the basis of an ongoing revenue model. One big industry that has jumped on the bandwagon and perfectly taken advantage of games as a service is the online gambling industry. There are more online casinos than ever before, with each of them offering special bonus deals and promotions to players who decide to sign up.
The way that online casinos set up this system is the following – say that you want to sign up with an online casino, like William Hill or Leo Vegas. Each of them will offer a certain bonus if you make a deposit into them. So, for example, with a LeoVegas Casino bonus, the casino will attract new customers and make them deposit into the website, while the customer will get an extra bonus amount for placing money into the casino. This has proven to be very popular among mobile gamers, as it gives them a bit more extra money when playing the games.
What Can We Expect in the Future?
The mobile gaming market certainly has a lot of potential in it. Here are just some of the things we can expect in the near future:
Introduction of Gaming-focused Smartphones
Gaming and performance-oriented mobile phones and tablets are already very popular among mobile game players. There are a number of top gaming mobile phones currently on the market, but neither one is solely focused on gaming. There have been attempts at this, but we can expect that, in the future, we will see the introduction of gaming-focused smartphones, just like we did with PCs a while back.
Expansion of the Mobile VR Market
As smartphones become even more powerful in the future, they will be able to support more demanding and advanced features. That’s why it’s not that hard to imagine that we will also get full-fledged mobile virtual reality games that could go up against VR games published on other gaming platforms.
Shift to 5G
5G has been a controversial topic over the recent months, mainly because its commercial arrival has been met with mixed responses. Staying focused only on the tech side of this wireless network, it will undoubtedly be a game changer in the mobile gaming industry. 5G will allow us to enjoy up to 100 times faster data transfer rates and will also enable greater responsiveness. The latter one is especially important for mobile gaming, as we will be able to enjoy even more immersive and detailed games, without sacrificing any performance.
Popularisation of Mobile eSports Competitions
Most popular eSports are still reserved only for PC and console gamers. With that being said, if 5G wireless networks and gaming-oriented smartphones become a thing in the near future, we could also expect that the big gaming companies will try to bring new eSports games to mobile devices. This is a very exciting thought and opens up a whole new world of possibilities on the gaming market.
