‘The most profitable mobile devs are not F2P’

Free-to-play games do not create the most profitable developers on mobile platforms, claims the CEO of board games studio Days of Wonder.

Speaking to Pocket Gamer, Ticket to Ride creator Eric Hautemont said that paid for titles were still the best way of making money on Android and iOS, with many just using the freemium model to grow their number of users rather than revenue streams.

"There are very few games on the F2P side that are really making significant money for their developers," said Hautemont.

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"Yes, it’s true they are making lots of money, but I think the few that are making lots of money are hiding the rest.



"Because a lot of the industry is driven by investor and venture capitalist money, they are looking for growth of some sort, and if their company can’t grow revenue they try to grow number of users or number of downloads."

Despite his feelings toward free-to-play, the Days of Wonder CEO did not rule out creating his own title using the model, but that charging up front was still more successful for developers.

"We still believe there’s a lot of money to be made on the paid side," he said.



"If you look at companies like Rovio or something like Minecraft, I’d say that some of the most profitable developers are still on the paid side, not the F2P side."