Mobile revenue data suggests Europe loves strategy, Asia likes RPGs

Mobile market analytics firm App Annie has put out a special report breaking down which categories of mobile games generate the most revenue in different regions of the world. The most notable takeaway is that Android and iOS games in the strategy subcategory (like Clash of Clans and Game of War - Fire Age) generated the most revenue across most of Europe and North America in the second quarter of 2014. Mexico was the only outlier, as the region's mobile markets saw the most revenue from games in the action and casual subcategories. In the same period, mobile titles subcategorized as role-playing games dominated most of the Asian markets -- with the exception of China, where action games leapt to the top of the mobile game revenue charts. App Annie representatives note that five of the six top-grossing mobile action games in China during the second quarter of 2014 were published by Tencent via its WeChat mobile messaging platform, which suggests that the gated distribution service continues to be a dominant force in the Chinese mobile market. Tencent posted big profits in its most recent earnings report, and predicted that WeChat would grow to encompass 438 million users by the end of the fiscal quarter. App Annie compiled the data to hype its presence at GDC Europe this week, and the full report is worth reading if you'd like some interesting insight into the growth patterns of various mobile game categories across the global market.