iGaming Tracker insights: The trendsetters

When iGaming Tracker began monitoring over 1,500 casino pages every day two years ago, we quickly began to notice patterns, both in the frequency of game releases by supplier and also the churn of slot games on casino pages. As you can see from the EGR slot rankings’ top 20 each month, there are constantly new game releases by the large casino suppliers. Equally apparent is the rate at which most of the casino slot games fall out of the top 20 every month.

Game release patterns

The visualisation shows the frequency of game releases since February 2017 for six game suppliers. The bigger the circle, the more casino pages we have seen the game on since the launch date. As you can see there are patterns for each supplier. Companies such as NetEnt and Yggdrasil frequently release games in a regular pattern with at least one release each month. The size of each circle, i.e. the number of pages the game is present on, is remarkably consistent.

This pattern contrasts with a smaller software developer like Big Time Gaming. In the same one-month period they released three big games with a large distribution through the NYX network. Big Time Gaming’s strategy suggests quality of games rather than quantity. Likewise, Lightning Box Games also seems to follow a pattern of limited game releases but with a large impact.

Playtech is a lot more frequent with game releases, which may be explained not just by size – the supplier is present on a lot more sites and has the resources to develop and produce more games – but also by the nature of its distribution. While it has a significant presence on games pages that have content from other suppliers (especially its Quickspin and Eyecon brands), Playtech also distributes its content on pages that are exclusive to Playtech. To keep the content fresh on these pages, Playtech will have to frequently release games, more so than most other games suppliers. This is true to a lesser extent with Microgaming.

A numbers game

Each big game release by a supplier takes significant investment in time and resources to develop, market and integrate into partner sites. So why launch games at such a frequent rate? We think there are a number of reasons.

Firstly, sites like new content to keep the offering fresh. This is especially pertinent in competitive markets such as the UK and Sweden where there are many sites competing for share of wallet from the same segment of customers. Getting new and fresh game content may give the site a competitive advantage over rivals. Additionally, casino sites like new games as it gives them fresh content for marketing communications and promotions.

Games suppliers hope their new game launch will ‘stick’ and emulate the success of their big hit games; for example, Starburst, Book of Dead and Rainbow Riches. Suppliers rely on revenue from relatively few big games, so they hope each game release will be a hit and become one of their small group of hit games. We have found that major game releases by suppliers have co-ordinated release dates, with the majority of sites launching the game within a couple of days. Some sites may be slower than others due to internal release processes, but in the main they are released worldwide simultaneously across sites.

However, some suppliers will give a game exclusive exposure for a week or two on one particular website. An example is one of NetEnt’s releases this year: Hotline. The graph on the next page shows that for the first couple of weeks the game was available on a few pages (GVC and Kindred). Once the exclusive page was over after a week, the game was released to all other sites that have NetEnt content. You will see that after a few weeks the number of pages the game is present on declines.

How long?

Over the last 18 months we have found that the churn rate average is approximately 50% in the UK, though games last a lot longer in more uncompetitive markets. This may explain the constant turnover of new releases by game suppliers in the hope that their games will stick.