Global game industry picked up its pace since the first iPhone was introduced in 2007. At the end of 2018, the entire global game industry will generate $137.9 billion. The popularity of smartphone is a turning point of game markets’ accelerated growth. Now, mobile device not only grants participating opportunity to grand general, but also let players choose their own way of enjoying games.

This year, APAC area will spend $71.4 billion on games, taking slightly over half (52%) of global revenue, growing 16.8%. So far, the area homes the largest population of game players. North America follows, taking 23% share of the market, and its revenue grows 10.0%, reaching $32.7 billion. The ever changing market of EMEA lags slightly behind North America area. Growth on its mobile game area is relatively slow, but still takes 21% of the market, equals to $28.7 billion. Latin America is chasing after major markets, with revenue expected to grow to $5 billion, acquiring 4% of the market share.

As Newzoo’s forecast, in coming years, APAC will still take the largest chunk of game revenue, while India and Southeast Asia will take up speed of growth.

Mobile game revenue is expected to reach $70.3 billion, growing 25.5% year on year. Mobile gaming will become the largest segment of game market by the end of this year, occupying over half of the market share. Smartphone will account for 80% of mobile revenue, while the remaining 20% coming from tablets.

The current saturation of mobile device in world’s population is clearly not near to an end. In the coming years, mobile game revenue growth is expected to continue and exceed the growth of overall game market, grow to $106.4 billion in 2021 as Newzoo forecasted. By then, smartphone and tablet games combined will generate 59% of revenues of the entire market.

The most prominent players of the market will be China, the US, Japan, South Korea and Germany. China will top the global game market with a $37945 million revenue and large number of players.

Newzoo estimated that Japan’s mobile game market will witness exceptionally well growth in 2018, due to continued success of mobile gaming companies in Japan. Japanese games market is now nearly the same size as North America’s with roughly one-third of gamer population. The average spending per player in Japan is 1.5 times higher than in North America, and more than 2.5 times higher than in Western Europe.

In South Korea, 28.9 million players are expected to spend a total of $5.6 billion by the end of 2018, making it the 4^th biggest games market in the world.

Among all the online population, 59% of men and 47% of women play mobile games at least once per month. The majority of game population has paying habits, with 85% of the paying gamers spent money on in-game items or virtual goods in the past six month.

Apart from playing games, a large number of online population in South Korea also like watching gaming video content, over half of them watching on mobile device.

So, where is the global game market heading to, and how it will shape our future? The industry is under constant reshaping at technological and social-economical turning points. Traditional industry boundaries enlarges and blurs.

For now, people start to enjoy games in very different ways. Some may love to play intense games, while some wish to casually have fun. Game video viewers and people who create those game play content are new comers in the game circle. This marks a step forward for gaming, in line with other hobbies like sports or movies, where participating is not necessarily the only way to enjoy it. Game company should quickly adapt the trend and create contents to build up a player community to gather all sorts of game enthusiasts.

Game developers should also notice that for some casual gamers, downloading an app may seems a way too far. Since last year, social media platforms began to introducing instant games. Facebook, Google, Line, Kakao and WeChat opens quick access to a game by a click on the social media app. The new form of game play is beneficial for all parties involved. Game developers instantly have access to the massive user base of social media, social media platform boost engagement while users get a light and easy way to enjoy a casual game.

So in all, the game industry has maintained double-digit growth for over 10 years. It is remarkable, and what’s even more legendary is, the industry is expected to continue to grow in the coming years. All these owe to the industry’s evolvements along with technology and user behavior, and all parties’ quick adaption to the changes.