Com2uS, the Korean mobile game publisher has recently announced some pretty impressive financials for FY2015, Q3. The report is for the three months ending 30, September 2015.

Up 6% quarter on quarter, and 110% year on year, the sales hit a staggering $97 million.  Since Q2, the profits for the quarter were also up 2% to $27 million.

It has been said that their hit game Summoners War played a big role in the success for Com2uS throughout 2015. The game has reached 50 million downloads which no doubt was the engine for its success. The sales amounted to 85% of Com2uS total sales.

This was due to Com2uS heavily investing in marketing for Summoners War in both Europe and North America.

The company says that there are a number of new titles due to be released in the near future. These include Homerun Battle 3, RPG Wonder Tactics and Action Puzzle Town.

Casey Lee, the Head of Com2Us USA said recently “We’re committed to using our experience and industry know-how to continue pushing out more global hit titles,”.

“We’re looking forward to more success with what we have coming up in our pipeline and closing out another stellar year for Com2us.”

 

A recent report by SuperData has shown some interesting statistics about the global gaming market. It focused on the mobile market in Asia and is entitled “What Western Publishers Need to Know About the Asian Mobile Market 2016.”.

It focused on the mobile gaming market globally, then follows on with an in-depth outlook on South Korea, China and Japan.

https://www.superdataresearch.com/market-data/asia-mobile-games/?mc_cid=cd2ccffa4b&mc_eid=78e7afa856

Predicting to generate $6.2 billion in revenues for 2015, Japan remains the largest in the mobile market. This is a staggering figure give than it has few players than the US and China.

The report said that Android devices control 73% of China and Korea’s combined mobile revenue. This is thanks to mobile companies using the OS.

It was predicted that emerging markets will make up 46% of Asia’s mobile gaming revenue increases, through to 2018. This is due to the slowing of the main markets revenue from saturation in the smartphone market.

For more information, visit the SuperData website which has further insight into the fast growing Asian mobile games market.

 

Fallout Chat, the keyboard app based on the Fallout video game universe has now been launched by Bethesda Softworks. It’s now in both of the app stores targeting iOS and Android devices.

The app offers tabs for Fallout gifs and emoji as well as a text keyboard. Users will fill a message window with text and/or emoji and press a button to copy the message when sending a text message or emoji.

When using Fallout Chat, users can copy and paste their message into the text field before they then send it to friends. The message has a character limitation of 35 characters or emoji’s.

The text are sent with white text on a black background by default. Users can, however also select a brown or white background with black text for their messages.

Lastly, the GIFs are able to be shared by copying and pasting each GIF from the GIF tab. All together, there are approximately 20 GIF’s available to users, including the Vault Boy and ‘Please Stand By’ icon from the franchise.

Fallout Chat is available for a free download from Google Play and the iTunes App Store.

 

 

Newly launched  by FitStar in the US and Canada is the FitStar Personal Trainer app for Android devices. The app was previously launched for iOS devices and features the football star Tony Gonzelez. FitStar Personal Trainer offers exercise sessions to suit each individual user’s fitness level.

The app offers four different goal-based programs which include Daily Dose, Get Lean, Get Moving and Get Strong. It also offers users Freestyle sessions such as 7 Minute Workout and 10 Minute Abs, amongst others.

The FitStar Personal Trainer app also allows users to track time spent exercising, approximate calories burned and completed sessions. It also rewards users with badges once various achievements have been met. Like other popular apps, users can share their results and badges with others via social media.

The co-founder of FitStar, Dave Grijalva said in a recent statement “ We designed FitStar Personal Trainer to inspire people to live healthier lives. FitStar for Android has been a top priority for us for some time—it is actually the number one request we get from our users.”

In March 2015, FitStar was acquired by Fitbit and then began to integrate with Fitbit’s platform.  On a weekly basis users are provided with two customised sessions and a selection of Freestyle sessions for free. There is also unlimited access available to the platform at $7.99 per month and $39.99 yearly.

FitStar Personal Trainer is now available for a free download from Google Play in Canada and the US.

 

It has officially been announced that the gaming giant Activision Blizzard will be acquiring King in a deal valued at $5.9 billion.

The deal will be paid by Activision Blizzard at $18 per share, being paid with internal cash and remaining owing’s with a credit agreement. The deal is due to close by Spring in 2016.

Kings share price has always been known to be under its initial floatation price. Before the deal, the share value was at $15.54, creating a valuation of $4.7 billion. This deems that Activision Blizzard is paying 20 percent in premium.

Recent reports have shown that in the last financial quarter, King had profits of $164 million, cash of $786 million and revenues of $490 million.

The deal will no doubt create a strong foundation in PC, console and mobile gaming. The merger will help the company see over 500 million monthly users across 196 countries.

The merger is said to increase Activision Blizzards 2016 non-GAAP revenue by approximately 30 percent.

King will however will continue to run independently and by the CEO and Founder Riccardo Zacconi.

Zacconi said in a recent statement “We believe that the Acquisition will position us very well for the next phase of our company’s evolution and will bring clear benefits to our players and employees,”

He continued “We will combine our expertise in mobile and free-to-play with Activision Blizzard’s world-class brands and proven track record of building and sustaining the most successful franchises, to bring the best games in the world to millions of players worldwide.”

The CEO of Activision Blizzard Bobby Kotick also commented “The combined revenues and profits solidify our position as the largest, most profitable standalone company in interactive entertainment,”.

 

 

The ‘pulse’ app has now been released by SoundCloud targeting Android devices. The app allows for accounts to be managed on the go for SoundCloud’s content creators.

Content creators can now reply to comments and view updated statistics for their tracks such as the number of plays on their content for the previous day. The app also provides a notifications tab which can show users ‘likes’ and ‘reposts’ as well as their recent followers.

SoundCloud Pulse also allows users to follow other users within the app. They can also share audio that they have uploaded both publicly and privately.

Soon to come to the app will be new and enhanced features that include the ability to track information, upload tracks from within the app, view more in depth stats as well as the added feature of messaging.

According to the SoundCloud blog “We’re excited to put SoundCloud Pulse in your hands to help you share your best tracks, connect with fans and, ultimately, build a career. We’re proud to be bringing the creator experience to mobile. And we can’t wait to hear what’s next from you.”

SoundCloud Pulse is available for a free download from Google Play and will come soon the iTunes App Store.

 

Recently having been announced is that YouTube now offers users YouTube Red, a paid subscription offering of the video sharing platform. The new service is available to essentially remove ads across the platform  in exchange for a subscription rate.

Youtube users in the US are able to try YouTube Red for free for the first month. After the trial period, users will be charged $9.99 per month to hold the subscription. Users can access the platform by signing in through their account and the membership will be across all platforms that YouTube is available. Smartphone users will also be able to save videos to watch offline and play videos in the background even when they have the screen turned off or are switching applications.

Additionally, coming soon to mobile devices it the YouTube Music app. Matt Leske, the senior product manager at YouTube described the new app in a recent blog post “ YouTube Music is designed to make discovering, watching and listening to music easier than ever. Any song or artist you choose on YouTube Music will start you on a personal journey through one of the richest music catalogs; just sign in, tap a track you love, and see where your music takes you.”

The membership with YouTube Red connects with Google Play Music, so when a user subscribes they will have access to both platforms.

We will no doubt see the continued success for YouTube through the YouTube Red and YouTube Music platforms.

 

Microsoft has just recently announced that it has run a content update for its iOS and Android applications to include capabilities such as video message filters and more.

Users are now able to tap the wand button on the corner of the screen to add a filter when sending a video message. For example, they could choose a negative filter or add an overlay of balloons.

Additionally, there is now a 3D Touch functionality available to iPhone 6S and iPhone 6S Plus users that is at their device home screen and within the app.

To view more details on these features, visit the Skype blog.

By swiping the contact, or tapping “edit” and selecting the relevant options, iOS users are now able to hide and delete chats from recent conversations. Users the chat menu users also have the option to delete the chat history from inside the conversation. Lastly users can tap the contact card icon to share a contact whilst engaging in a conversation.

Recently, the app was also updated to include Moji’s, which enabled users to share movie clips and short TV clips with other users when in conversation.

Skype is currently available for a free download from the Google Play and iTunes App Store.

 

Klang Games, the Berlin-based indie studio has just made public that it has formed a partnership with Tilting Point. They hope that the partnership will support their coming title ReRunners. ReRunners is an asynchronous multiplayer racer and is currently in testing.

Only recently, Klang Games also received funding from London Venture Partners. Klang Games will have complete ownership of the ReRunners IP and still gain from the funding, marketing and live ops by Tilting Point.

Klang Games co-founder Ivar Emilsson said in a recent statement “Tilting Point sees the vision and potential in ReRunners, and impressed us with their comprehensive in-house team and clear focus on their external developer partners,”.

“They also posted some outstanding race times during their testing of ReRunners, so we decided to do the deal with them!”.

The present and co-founder of Tilting Point, Dan Sherman also seemed enthusiastic about the deal.  He mentioned that finance is not the sole object once a well-funded developer and publisher has come together. He said”  “This deal marks a new era of collaboration between independent developers and the growing ecosystem of organizations that are designed to support them,”.

He continued “we bring very different and complementary strengths to the table, which when combined give Klang and ReRunners the best shot at success.”

 

Just launched by Etsy is the new Etsy ASAP, aiming to deliver purchased items on the same or next day to New York shoppers from participating sellers. To make this happen, Etsy has teamed up with the delivery services Postmates.

There is over 5000 Etsy ASAP products available to shoppers via the mobile app and website. Users are able to select a filter to only view the Etsy ASAP products. Etsy ASAP will be displayed in the check out as well as on the item page. For a flat fee of $20, the products will be delivered on the same or next day to the users.

Users have the choice between three hour delivery windows for the products purchased via Etsy ASAP.  Order that are placed after 7:00pm can also be delivered the following day. Once an order is placed, sellers can request the delivery by Postmates via the Etsy Orders page who will then find a courier to deliver the goods.

Once the product is picked up to be delivered, the shoppers and buyers can track the item on the web or within the app. The sellers are also able to track the courier arriving for pick up.

Calia Talmor, the senior product manager from Etsy commented in a recent blog post “Etsy continues to build features that connect buyers and sellers locally online and off. The Etsy ASAP pilot follows the recent launch of the new Etsy Local mobile experience that helps shoppers on-the-go find Etsy items and sellers nearby, at both events or local shops.”

At current, the app is available to shoppers in Brooklyn, Queens and Manhatten. The initial pilot is due to run throughout the holiday season. They plan to wait for feedback from both the sellers and buyers before their next steps.

The Etsy app is available for a free download from Google Play and iTunes App Store.