The Price for App Store Games is Declining

Distimo takes a look at Mobile Gaming Trends: Popularity, Pricing and Monetization in its latest report.

Notably, the average selling price of the top 300 games has declined during the past year. The average selling price was $2.01 in June 2010, however it has since declined by 28% to $1.44 as of June 2011.

The major findings are:
● The average selling price of games declined by 28% over the last year, while the revenue generated by the most successful freemium games increased tenfold during this period in the Apple App Store for iPhone.
● The presence of virtual currencies within games is one of the main reasons behind the popularity and monetization success of in-app purchases. 35% of the 300 most popular free games in June use some sort of virtual currencies to monetize in the Apple App Store for iPhone.
● Looking at the 300 most popular paid for applications, 72% of downloads are generated by games while the remaining 28% of downloads are generated by applications other than games in the Apple App Store for iPhone.
● The total revenue generated by top grossing games increased by 79% year-on-year in the Apple App Store for iPhone.
● A small number of publishers dominate total game downloads: ten publishers account for more than half of all downloads among the 300 most popular paid games in the Apple App Store for iPhone.
● Notwithstanding the popularity of games, the growth rate of the number of applications other than games is higher than the growth rate of the number of games in most stores. The number of games has increased faster than other apps only in the Apple App Store for iPhone, the Apple App Store for iPad and GetJar, but the growth rate for games in other stores is lower than for other applications.


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