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Strong week one downloads aren’t enough to guarantee long-term success for your mobile title.
That’s the conclusion of a new analysis by SurveyMonkey Intelligence that looks into the launch and subsequent decline of Miitomo, the first app in Nintendo’s big mobile push.
The data compares the social game to King’s Candy Crush Jelly Saga and Supercell’s Clash Royale. Much like these two titles, Miitomo achieved a top five ranking in its first weak, even reaching No.1 on both iOS and Android, VentureBeat reports.
However, it did fall down the charts much faster – although this is probably due to a lack of marketing compared to Clash and Candy Crush.
The more worrying data shows that, on average, Miitomo was played half as often per week as Clash Royale. Stats on weekly churn shows that, on a given week, more than half of Miitomo’s users would give up on the app and not return the following weeks.
Given that the game depends on interaction with friends, a declining userbase gives players less reason to continue interacting. Similarly, Miitomo’s revenues rely on players purchasing new costumes, but – as the report states – “why dress your Mii up in a cool new outfit if there is no one to see it?”
The rate of decline is also damning. Clash Royale’s lowest number of weekly active users is just 22 per cent below its highest, while Candy Crush Jelly Saga’s is 32 per cent lower. Miitomo’s WAU fell to 74 per cent lower than its peak in a much shorter timespan.
You can check out the full report, complete with graphs, over at VentureBeat.
While this might worry some about Nintendo’s future plans for mobile, it should be noted that Miitomo was something of an experiment and used largely to set up the MyNintendo account system. Nintendo is currently working on free-to-play versions of Animal Crossing and Fire Emblem for mobile that should, hopefully, fare better.
