Top 5 mobile games of all time

The gaming industry generated a whopping $180 billion (R271 trillion) in worldwide revenue in 2021, which is more than the sports and movies industries combined.

Mobile gaming accounts for just over 50% of the gaming industry’s revenue, which is not much of a surprise considering there are 6.6 billion smartphone users in the world today.

The mobile gaming market is a force of nature unto itself, and some titles have made trillions of rands thanks to a combination of charm and gameplay.

The top five highest-grossing mobile games of all time are ranked below.

5. Clash Of Clans (R11.6 trillion)

Publisher: Supercell (Tencent)

Genre: Strategy

Release Date: August 2, 2012

In Clash of Clans, you play as a chief of a village who is tasked with building a clan while fortifying his village with the resources he’s pillaged from other clans.

These resources can also be used to upgrade your army so that you can defend your village and attack your friends and other online players.

Although Clash of Clans’ revenue peaked at R2.7 trillion in 2015, it can still be found in the top 10’s on both the App Store and Google Play Store.

4. Pokémon Go (R11.69 trillion)

Publisher: Niantic / The Pokémon Company

Genre: Augmented reality

Release Date: July 6, 2016

Combining augmented reality with one of the most popular franchises in the world resulted in a truly unique game.

Pokémon Go incorporates the real world into the hunt for Pokémon and was originally positioned as a family-friendly activity that would encourage people to leave the house and get some exercise.

Unfortunately, Pokémon Go received some bad press after its unique mechanics resulted in a number of negative incidents such as players walking in front of on-coming traffic.

Although this may have cooled the incredible hype levels when it launched in 2016, there are millions of players still active in 2022.

3. Puzzle & Dragons (R12.9 trillion)

Publisher: GungHo

Genre: Puzzle RPG

Release Date: February 20, 2012

Puzzle & Dragons is a tile-matching game like Candy Crush.

However, this game has taken it one step further by adding a combat mechanism that you must perform simultaneously to matching tiles.

Puzzle & Dragons was the first game to break $1 billion (R1.5 trillion) in revenue within its first year of being released.

The game’s success created a whole franchise, as it branched from mobile to console, had a spin-off game for Nintendo 3DS, and had an anime series created in its image.

2. Monster Strike (R14.9 trillion)

Publisher: Mixi

Genre: Strategy RPG

Release Date: August 8, 2013

Monster Strike is evidently inspired by Pokémon as its gameplay requires players to throw their monsters at the enemy.

Despite its domestic success in Japan, Monster Strike is relatively unknown at the international level, as the English version of the game was discontinued in 2017 due to its unpopularity.

In Japan, however, the game is so popular that it was adapted into an anime series and an entire anime film trilogy.

1. Honor of Kings / Arena of Valor (R20.1 trillion)

Publisher: Tencent

Genre: MOBA

Release Date: November 26, 2015

Honor of Kings is a MOBA game that was developed by the Chinese gaming giant Tencent.

After its success in China, the game was adapted to suit the international market and was renamed Arena of Valor.

Like many MOBA games, there are a variety of different characters and game modes to try out.

Arena of Valor has dominated the mobile market in the same way that League of Legends dominated on PC, and with a gross revenue of $2.45 billion (R3.6 trillion) worldwide in 2020 alone, it is the highest-earning mobile video game of all time.