New data from the Liftoff platform tells us about the casual sector of the market, which is predicted to grow. They particularly highlight the puzzle genre, which is seeing an exceptionally high percentage of ad view completions for rewards.

While the mobile gaming industry boomed during the pandemic, growth has slowed due to loosening restrictions. In the first quarter of 2022, user spending fell 6% from last year to $21.2 billion, down from $22.6 billion in the same period in 2021.

Despite this market correction, mobile gaming remains the most prominent gaming platform, with a share of more than 60% — 3.3 times that of console games.

The data breaks down casual games into three genres: lifestyle, puzzle and simulation, and is based on 76.1 billion ad impressions and 3.4 billion clicks on 58.5 million installs between May 1, 2021, and May 2022.

Advertising Research by Liftoff

In the report, Liftoff highlights the completion rate of ads with rewards: puzzle games have an ad completion rate of 97%, indicating that players are willing to watch and participate in advertisements in exchange for in-game rewards.

Hidden object games also proved themselves, with audiences completing 90% of ads, which is 60% higher than the median rate. Colouring games followed them at 69.03% and comic book games at 69.02%. Word games had the lowest ad completion rate at 11.24%.

This data suggests that advertisers are potentially expecting better results in the puzzle genre than in other types of casual games. However, in lifestyle games, the return on ad spend was higher, at 10.57% on day 7 and 22.56% on day 30.

Consumer price inflation declined from $1.45 in May 2021 to $0.83 in March 2022, jumping 19% to $1.02 in April. Despite this, ROAS remained relatively stable throughout the year, with ROAS on Day 7 ranging from 16.14% to 18.60% and ROAS on Day 30 starting at 6.72% and peaking at 7.31%.

The Liftoff report notes that the casual gaming market will continue to grow in the future and will retain a place as a mobile game for a broad audience.

Side note: Hyper-casual games market review for August 2022.

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