In today’s installment of “this is why we have free to play" news is a recent tweet by ustwo, the studio behind the fabulous Monument Valley ($3.99). Oh, and if you haven’t played the game yet, you really should. We gave it our runner up game of the year award and loved it in our review. Anyway, here’s the tweet in question:
Interesting fact: Only 5% of Monument Valley installs on Android are paid for. 40% on iOS. There’s a sneak peak of data!
— ustwogames (@ustwogames) January 5, 2015
Now, ustwo has clarified these are paid installs as the game has been given away for free via a promotion on Amazon’s Android App Store. Regardless, that 40% on the iOS side is pretty depressing especially considering the number of awards the game has won from individual web site awards to an Apple Design Award. If there ever was a game worth paying for, it’s Monument Valley.
Either way, this is just another fine example of why the App Store is continually moving towards free to play. Mobile gamers have consistently proven, in shockingly large numbers, that they just won’t pay for things- Regardless of how low the price is or how universally critically acclaimed something is. With statistics like these, the typical anger towards developers when free to play stuff is announced seems incredibly misguided. All they’re doing is reacting to a market that is saying loud and clear, “We will not pay."
