Lifespan of existing games increased by 33% in 2022, and other findings from Unity Gaming Report

Note: Unity collected data for the 2023 Gaming Report from more than 230,000 devs using its real-time development platform. More information was collected on ads data spanning over 423,000 devs on multiple platforms. An additional survey of 356 game developers was also conducted with a margin of error of +/- 5.2%.

Indie devs are shipping games faster

• The production cycle has been significantly reduced. According to the report, 62% of indie teams (1-9 people) and 58% of midsize studios (10-49 people) are now making their games in less than a year, from start to ship date.
• It is worth noting that employees at indie, midsize, and lower midmarket companies are working 1.2% fewer hours. Unity notes that this “works out to about five years of total work hours, which helps make shipping a new title more attainable for many studios.”

• For 46% of indie developers, the prototyping phase lasts less than a month. This is partly due to the fact that 62% of indie teams use between five and 14 third-party asset packages for prototyping and concepting.
• According to Unity, developers who use premade assets from the Unity Asset Store shop games 20% faster.
• 69% of studios use DevOps tools to make quicker releases, improve quality, increase security, and scale infrastructure.

Most preferred genres and platforms

• In 2022, Kazakhstan saw the biggest increase in the number of new indie games at 115.7%. It is followed by Romania (85.2%), Poland (82.1%), India (68.9%), and Ukraine (66.9%).
• When it comes to midsize studios, the biggest spike happened in Turkey — 260%, followed by Norway (200%) and France (196%).

• Action is the most popular genre among indie teams, followed by Adventure and Puzzle. Small developers also tend to make more Platform and Arcade titles.
• Larger studios (50+ people) make more MMO and Racing games, as well as Shooters and RPGs.

• Last year, large studios released 16% more multiplatform games than in 2021, and 110% more than in 2019. 88% of studios with more than 50 employees are now making cross-platform games.
• Companies that choose consoles as their first platform are more likely to also bring their games to PC and VR.
• But overall, PC remains the top choice for all developers, with 76% of multiplatform studios preferring to start with desktop.

• 90% of small studios release their games on a single platform because they usually don’t have enough resources to ship to multiple platforms.
• Desktop is the top choice for 77% of indie developers. When they choose to ship to multiple platform, they prefer PC, mobile, or web.
• Large studios, on the other hand, also choose console/web/PC or console/mobile/web/PC options.

State of mobile game development

• In 2022, developers started making more mobile-only games compared to 2021. Large studios (300+ people) saw the biggest year-over-year increase at 44%.
• According to Unity, the number of daily active users (DAUs) increased by 8% year-over-year for the median mobile game, but the rate of paying active users decreased by 2% from 2021.
• “This data suggests that more people are playing mobile games and they may be more willing and able to watch an ad rather than make a purchase,” the company noted.
• 31.2% of mobile gamers prefer IAP as the best monetization method. Almost the same percentage , 31.5%, prefer ads.
• The least favorite monetization tools among players are one-time fees (6.5%) and subscriptions (3.2%).

• In 2022, multiple genres saw some revenue model shifts. Sports and Simulation categories saw the biggest year-over-year growth in the number of games with IAP, at 15.14% and 11.78% respectively.
• Word titles experienced the biggest shift towards ad revenue at 48.7%.

More devs are leaning towards the GaaS model

• In 2022, the lifespan of existing games was extended by 33%. The vast majority of studios with 50+ people update their titles for more than six months, but only 55% of indie teams support their games for that long.

• When it comes to post-launch support, 54% of indie developers name user acquisition as their biggest challenge. And 49% of midsize studios find retention challenging.
• According to Unity, games with more frequent updates have better D30 and D90 retention.
• Achievements and challenges remain the most common ways to keep players engaged. It is worth noting that studios with 50+ people use other techniques such as timed events (66%), daily rewards (65%), and social features (54%).
• In 2022, the number of games offering battle passes increased by 27% year-over-year. Consumables and entry tickets also saw double-digit growth, while gacha mechanics declined in popularity compared to 2021.

More information, including data on VR/AR games and insights from dozens of game developers and executives, can be found in the full 2023 Unity Gaming Report.