Hyper-Casual Games: What Advertisers Need to Know About This Growing Opportunity

Within the mobile gaming landscape, many sub-categories and unique opportunities to reach nuanced audiences exist. Smaato’s Glenn Fishback takes a look at the growing realm of hyper-casual games.

There’s a reason you saw mobile in-game advertisingOpens a new window crop up in a lot of year-end industry prediction pieces: It’s huge—and its growth shows no signs of waning soon. According to eMarketer’s first-ever report on the topicOpens a new window , U.S. advertisers will spend more than $3 billion on in-game advertising this year, with the vast majority winding up in mobile environments. Overall, in-game spend has grown 16 percent this year, with double-digit growth expected to continue into 2020. eMarketer attributes the growing spend in this category to a few important factors:

• Better ad technology
• More free-to-play mobile games 
• A flood of new advertisers attracted by the relatively brand-safe environment of mobile in-game ads
   

Learn More: 5 In-App Spending Trends to WatchOpens a new window

That said, the mobile gamingOpens a new window landscape is hardly homogenous. Within this vast category, many sub-categories and unique opportunities to reach nuanced audiences exist. One of the more notable, and often overlooked, exists within the growing realm of hyper-casual games.

Understanding the Difference

Within the gaming space exists a wide variety of player experiences, which understandably appeal to different audiences. Most in-app games fall into one of four categories:

Hardcore: Immersive, detailed games, similar to a console experience and designed for longer sessions. Examples: Gangstar Vegas and Iron Blade. 

Midcore: More accessible than hardcore games; easy to learn but hard to master. Examples: Plants vs Zombies and Asphalt 9. 

Casual: Designed for a mass audience, featuring frequent, shorter sessions. Examples: Wordscapes and Solitaire.

Hyper-casual: Lightweight, simple, instantly playable via short sessions; often featuring 2D or retro graphics. Examples: Helix Jump, Sandwich!, and Icing on the Cake.

While the above distinctions aren’t new, far too few brands are recognizing the differences among in-app games when allocating their spend. Within the hyper-casual gaming category, this is particularly important. An estimated 660 million people played hyper-casual games in 2018Opens a new window , with the subcategory generating about 22 million app installs each day. Across all gaming types, data from the Smaato platformOpens a new window  indicates that hyper-casual games boast the largest share of female players, with 63 percent of ad requests. Interestingly, these experiences are particularly popular with Generation Z players (aged 13-23), who constitute 53 percent of the ad requests in this subcategory. Hyper-casual games are also particularly popular with Generation Xers (ages 39-54), who contribute 25 percent of the subcategory’s ad requests.

How to Connect with the Hyper-Casual Gamer

A combination of factors has enabled hyper-casual games to dominate the app stores’ top downloaded charts in recent years. For one, with the proliferation of smartphones and internet-enabled devices, these games have become go-to time-passers for people during periods of waiting, traveling or relaxation, large in part because they require minimal commitment. Likewise, as the in-app advertising ecosystem has matured, emerging monetization models have enabled users to download these apps for free—hence their massive adoption.

Learn More: How In-Game Advertisements Are Benefitting Brands as Well as Gamers

Advertisers looking to reach the already-vast, still-growing contingent of hyper-casual gamers have multiple format options available to them, each with unique strengths: 

Rewarded video: Smaato data shows that click-through rates are 18X higher for rewarded videos versus standard banner placements in hyper-casual games, yet their eCPMs are only 8X higher. Not only do they deliver higher conversions for advertising campaigns, rewarded videos also help gaming apps hold on to their audience. When players reach a tricky point in the game and are struggling to continue, voluntarily watching a rewarded video ad can help them out with a bonus item or hint.

Interstitial video and display: Usually placed during natural breaks in gameplay, interstitial ads are highly visual and can be delivered in both video and display formats. Interstitial video ads can generate click-through rates 24X that of banners, with eCPMs only 3X higher.

Banner: Traditional in-app banners are easily implemented into a game’s interface and can be displayed on-screen and during gameplay. They can cost-effectively reach many users with limited risk to brands testing out hyper-casual game advertising.

Hyper-casual games are designed and built for the modern in-app advertising ecosystem and monetization strategies. In contrast to other mid-core or casual gaming apps, which typically operate on an in-app purchase model, hyper-casual games mainly rely on advertising to generate revenue. As such, it’s more important than ever that brands get to know the audiences behind these popular apps and ensure that the ad experiences they deliver are built to resonate.