To revolutionize the mobile gaming business, Ilkka Paananen, the chief executive of Supercell, is calling on his new allies to help him. He urges an emphasis on producing smaller, riskier, more imaginative gaming endeavors. Clash of Clans and Brawl Stars developer Supercell has been doing pretty well for themselves too, generating well over a billion dollars. Despite his bright outlook in general on the industry, Paananen is concerned about the present-day state of mobile gaming. For one, he notes that gamers spend an astonishing 60% of their time on titles older than six years. On the other hand, just 10% of their gaming time is spent on new games released in the last year.
According to Paananen, the mobile gaming world is in desperate need of a shakeup. Specifically, he focuses on the players’ desire for new things, new challenges. “We have to create new kinds of game experiences,” he stated, reflecting his desire for the industry to evolve beyond the familiar formulas that have dominated the market.
Supercell has a reputation for freedom and autonomy with their teams of developers. By taking this approach, they foster creativity and cultivate innovation company-wide. Despite the challenges, Paananen has doubled down on new game development and added more studios to increase capacity to do so. At any given time, Supercell has ten games in different stages of development, proof of the company’s willingness to invest in new concepts.
Not all new projects in recent years have been successes. The company’s recent debut, Squad Busters, made an excellent first impression but subsequently suffered a sharp drop in player interest. Despite all that, Paananen admitted that Squad Busters is falling short of Supercell’s expectations. He thinks that by taking bigger risks on future projects, they can make strides toward their goals.
The video game industry is experiencing increasing production budgets and a stronger aversion to risk, with gamers preferring to play known quantities. Paananen argues that traditional mega launches are becoming less effective. “Perhaps the age of the mega launches is over,” he said. He proposed that the industry could eventually move towards more incremental game launches. He emphasized that sometimes it’s more beneficial to get a game out the door earlier. This gives developers an opportunity to iterate on it based on player feedback.
These caveats aside, Paananen has an overall sunny view of the future of mobile gaming. He understands that the progress of innovation might be slow, but it’s unavoidable. So it’s not a question of if it’s going to happen. It’s not a question of if but rather of when it’s going to happen and who is going to do it,” he said.
Paananen’s aspirations for Supercell aren’t just about making fun games, they’re about making them last. He encourages his teams to ask critical questions about the future relevance of their games: “The question that our teams ask themselves is: ‘Why would people play this game in five or 10 years?’” This future-proofing strategy is designed to place Supercell in the same league as long-lasting companies such as Nintendo, which has been around for over a hundred years.
Paananen’s larger goal is to encourage creativity among teams that already exist. He’s hopeful too of the opportunities created by breakthroughs in artificial intelligence. He hopes that the definition of “game” just keeps getting bigger. In the end, it may not even look like a typical game at all. Instead, it might be the opposite experience entirely, thanks to AI, he added.
Paananen’s dedication to innovation is apparent in his arms-length management style with development teams. “We more or less told them to go wild and blow things up, just so we could be innovative,” he continued. This independence provides developers with the creative control to go out on a limb and ultimately find fresh innovative gaming experiences.
Supercell is making all the right moves to sail above the increasingly tumultuous seas of mobile gaming. With Paananen’s leadership and vision, their story doesn’t have to end there. The company is creating new opportunities through continued investments in fresh concepts and creative minds. This strategy will position them to both respond to emerging trends and be the trendsetters themselves.