As industry headwinds bite, in the first half of 2022, the mobile gaming market fell to $11.4 billion. The only categories that saw revenue growth were arcade and tabletop games. 

Arcade was the fastest-growing genre, with player spending increasing 14.8% year on year to around $176 million. Idler was the most popular Arcade subgenre for player spending, generating nearly $88 million, a 35.3% increase year on year.

Clawee from Gigantic was the top Arcade game in terms of player spending, generating $16.5 million in the United States during the first half of the year. It was followed by AppQuantum Publishing's Gold & Goblins at No. 2 and Century Games' Idle Mafia at No. 3.

Arcade game app promotion strategy

With so many apps available, what distinguishes the best-performing apps? The following "recipe" is shared by the best arcade games for Android and iOS:

1. Meta layers for strategic purposes

While classic arcade games were quite simple, in today's competitive app market, developers must take a hybrid-casual approach if they want to succeed. After you've created a successful user acquisition (UA) strategy, it's time to focus on retention. It is critical to develop a profitable monetization strategy that keeps your users interested, engaged, and returning after the first day.

What is the secret ingredient? Layers of metadata. Following an initial hook, this is what will create a daily habit, enticing your users to return to your app time and time again. To encourage word of mouth, include a leaderboard, decoration or dress-up elements, or a multiplayer mode. PAC-MAN Party Royale is a prime example of taking a classic arcade game (Pac-Man) and infusing it with enticing meta layers such as its dressing room to customize your Pac-Man and leaderboard with friends.



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2. The core gameplay is simple

Non-gamers typically gravitate toward arcade games while waiting at a bus stop or in a waiting room. Your game's foundation should be simple, easy to play, and quick to complete. Remember that classic arcade games had 8-bit graphics and limited color palettes. This is your chance to entice potential customers with a sense of nostalgia. Recreate the classic look and feel with saturated colors and simple graphics. Crossy Road is an excellent example of a modern developer incorporating the classic Frogger interface into a wildly popular modern app.

3. Methodical monetization

With UA and retention strategies in place, it's time to focus on monetization. This could be a freemium model, in which users pay to upgrade to a more advanced version of the game, in-app ads, or in-app purchases such as upgrades, rewards, extra lives, and other items. Of course, a combination of these methods is also possible.



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4. ASO strategy for your game

App store optimization will never be completely removed from the equation of mobile game marketing success. It's safe to say that in 2023, it's time to up the ante.

There are a few things to think about as you prepare to launch a mobile game. The first step is to conduct research. To create an ASO strategy for your game, you must first understand its categories, the keywords users are searching for, conversion trends, and so on.

Before releasing your app, conduct keyword research to determine which keywords are relevant and frequently searched for your app, and then incorporate those keywords into the mobile game's metadata.

App Store and Google Play Store algorithms use targeted keywords to determine how and where mobile games rank in search results. Title, subtitle, and keyword libraries on the Apple App Store, and title, short description, and detailed description on Google Play, are metadata fields that have a direct impact on natural search and indexing.

Conclusion

Promoting your arcade game can mean the difference between an arcade game staying in the top 2% or 25% of arcade games on app stores, and an arcade game that can't get above the bottom 25% of arcade games on app stores.

Top arcade games have higher retention rates and spend more money on in-app purchases than the bottom 25% of arcade games. So it doesn't end with developing and launching your mobile arcade game; it also doesn't end with marketing it. Set the game to changing trends and user preferences, and advertise your game constantly to retain and acquire more users at every stage of your arcade game's life cycle.