It's been again an eventful week for the Finnish Game Industry. In Kajaani, the Northern Game Summit and the 'Game Industry in Turmoil' workshop where, lots of great thoughts and tricks were pinted and shared. Fingersoft brought exciting news by joining forces with Konami Digital Entertainment, bringing Super Bomberman R 2 into Hill Climb Racing 2. Supercell announced another major collaboration for Squad Busters with Hasbro's Transformers. Good news is that at the game industry still seems to have money to be invested as Supercell has invested in Redly Games, an independent Helsinki-based studio.
Supercell has invested in new Finnish Game Studio, Redly Games. Critical Force has reached 100 million instals for Critical Ops in Google Play. Solid and beautiful new Finnish games have been released this week, with even more arriving next week. Plus, several standout Finnish titles are available to add to your Steam wishlist. Big surprise of the week was Brawl Stars has teaming up with WWE star John Cena to launch its SpongeBob (alias Paavo Pesusieni!) SquarePants collaboration. It is worth to mention that 1939 Games is harnessing the power of Golden Whale’s machine learning and data analytics to optimize its player insights.
Sega has officially completed its acquisition of Rovio Entertainment. The Playing for the Planet alliance, in which Neogames proudly participates, has just announced the inaugural Playing for the Planet Awards. In an exciting fusion of art and games, the Finnish National Gallery is bringing national art treasures to Fortnite with the launch of the "Art Heist" island, offering players an immersive experience combining iconic art and strategic gameplay. Lastly, a quick reminder: the DigiDemo application period for demo grants closes TODAY at 4 p.m.
This week, good news from the Finnish Game Industry includes Remedy and Annapurna announcing a strategic cooperation agreement on Control 2 and plans to bring Control and Alan Wake to film and television. Makea Games has launched their highly anticipated parkour game, Supermoves on Steam. Metacore is celebrating significant milestones, with Merge Mansion surpassing $500 million in lifetime revenue and 55 million app downloads. A big highlight for Neogames was that KooPee Hiltunen and Suvi Latva had the honour of introducing the Finnish Game Industry to top-level Chinese ISBN authorities. Lastly, don't forget — TODAY is the last day to apply for the Games First 2024 event!
This week has been an exciting whirlwind at Gamescom. Neogames rolled the Nordic All Stars booth. There was a great success among Finnis Devs at Pocket Gamer Mobile Games Awards 2024. Another great news is that Return Entertainment’s is partnering with Aethir GPUs to bring cloud gaming to smart TVs. Don't forget, registration for Games First 2024 is now open! In broader industry news, Epic's Mobile Store launched this week, and it's also worth noting that Apple is now requiring developers to display their address, phone number, and email on the App Store in the EU.
This week, we are proud to spotlight the newly established Sustainable Games Alliance, a non-profit initiative led by industry veterans, dedicated to reducing the environmental impact of the global games industry by developing unified reporting standards. Next week marks the start of Gamescom, one of the world's largest game events, where Neogames will operate the Nordic All Stars Booth (hall 4.1 at stand C-020 G), showcasing companies and game clusters from Finland, Norway, and Estonia. (Don't miss the Happy Hour on Thursday at 5 PM, sponsored by Reaktor!). Check the list of other Finnish Devs participating to Gamescom, from our newsletter. Lastly, a quick reminder: the application deadline for the Avek demo grants is fast approaching—submit your applications by 6th September!
This week in The Finnish Game Industry: Social First secures $4.2M in seed funding to revolutionize social gaming, offering a fresh perspective on how we connect through play. Meanwhile, Shipyard Games announces its closure. However, other great news is that Bugbear Entertainment launches Wreckfest 2, bringing even more chaotic demolition action to the forefront, Makea Games releases ultimate Parkour Party Game; Supermoves on 28th August, and Secret Exit introduces the latest sequel in the legendary Turbo Dismount series, Turbo Dismount 2.
Assembly Summer game event is currently underway, showcasing fascinating lectures, games, and game demos. How are we doing at The Finnish Game Industry? Pocket Gamer interviewed Finnish developers and executives to find out. Excitingly, Barotrauma by FakeFish has topped GameRant's lists for Best Survival Game (that lacks base-building mechanics) and Best Game Set Around Jupiter.
We are back on duty after the summer holidays and are excited to bring you our newsletter again! Here are the bright highlights of the Finnish Game Industry from the past three weeks: Bitmagic has raised a $4 million seed round to revolutionize game development with its generative AI platform. End-all Entertainment's game, Paradigm Island, received the first-ever IGDA Finland Grant. The Games First Helsinki event is scheduled for October 30th, with more information coming in August.