Fallout Shelter: X10 Daily Revenue
The Amazon Prime Fallout TV series has significantly boosted the mobile game Fallout Shelter, increasing its daily revenue 10 times! Using LiveOps and App Store Optimization, developers have effectively engaged players with new content and themed quests. This success highlights the potential of transmedia strategies in enhancing video game franchises.
— by Andrei Zubov
The recent launch of Amazon Prime's Fallout TV series has gotten great reviews from critics and audiences alike. But what’s truly important is how well it was received by gamers. After watching the show, thousands of players are either revisiting the Fallout universe or exploring it for the first time.
While the PC and console entries are dominating Steam charts and being prominently featured across console stores, there's an equally significant success story that might go unnoticed: the mobile version of Fallout Shelter has grown its daily revenue 10 times! But this growth wouldn’t have been possible without the efforts of the developers, who used the momentum and converted the newly found attention into great success.
PC & Console: Fallout Is Not Falling Out Of The Charts
Before analyzing the success of Fallout Shelter, let’s see how the games are performing on their primary platforms. Though it’s hard to tell the exact sales numbers, there's an undeniable increase in player activity across all platforms where the games are available. For example, at the day of the writing, on April 30, Fallout 4 ranked 9th among the top 100 most-played games on Steam.
This success is even more significant since Fallout 4 is the highest-ranked purely single-player game that day. All the games positioned higher on the list are either entirely multiplayer, like CS2, Dota 2, PUBG, and Apex, or incorporate multiplayer aspects, such as Stardew Valley and GTA V. Meanwhile, other games in the Fallout series also performed well;* Fallout 76* ranked 33rd, and Fallout New Vegas was the 53rd most played title. Thus, the TV series' success was able to place three Fallout games among the top hundred on Steam. What’s more, the games have been holding their positions in the Top for at least two weeks already!
Additionally, the games are actively promoted by stores of the main consoles: Xbox marks Fallout games as bestsellers, while PlayStation features the entire game series on a dedicated landing on its console. On April 26, Bethesda also released a free next gen update for Fallout 4, which is likely to serve as additional motivation to play the game for the owners of Playstation 5 and Xbox Series. Though tracking the results is more challenging, there is an undeniable interest in the Fallout universe on consoles. Let’s hope Microsoft will shed some light on the success in one of its future reports!
Fallout Shelter: Using LiveOps And ASO To Onboard New Players
While observing this overwhelming interest in the Fallout legacy, it is easy to overlook the exceptional growth of Fallout Shelter on mobile. Released in the summer of 2015, this real-time strategy offers a unique formula focused on block construction, shelter management, and hero collection. It inspired many other games like Hustle Castle, Assassin’s Creed Rebellion, and American Dad Apocalypse Soon.
Since its launch, Fallout Shelter has been downloaded over 79M times and generated over $122M of lifetime revenue. Even after 9 years on the market, the game still managed to rake in around $500k a month.
The loyalty of the core audience and the strength of the IP kept the game afloat, but the franchise needed a big boost to change the status quo. With Fallout 76 being poorly received by the players and Fallout 4 aging since its 2015 release, there was a noticeable void in the Fallout community. And the TV series more than managed to fill that void.
During the first quarter of 2024, the game was generating around $18k per day. After the debut of Amazon Prime’s TV show, the revenues skyrocketed to over $200k per day!
Almost three weeks after the release of the TV series, Fallout Shelter maintains its revenue at around $200k daily. Though the popularity of the series is clearly what drives new players to the game, we should give credit to how the developers onboard new players and satisfy their longing for more of the series-related content. Right after the launch of the TV show, Bethesda announced exclusive content for the mobile version of Fallout Shelter. For a limited time, until May 7, Fallout Shelter mobile players can obtain five new characters—Lucy, The Ghoul, Maximus, Ma June, and the Snake Oil Salesman—and two companions, Snip Snip and CX404, as well as a Vault 33 jumpsuit and other gear from the show.
The TV series dwellers and other items can be unlocked by **completing a series of new themed quests **rather than being purchased directly from the store. This approach further engages the players and allows Bethesda to monetize through their core: instead of just buying the dwellers, players need to progress and develop their shelter and dwellers to finish the quests. These decisions not only boost retention but also add extra value to the rewards, making them feel more earned and meaningful.
Meanwhile, to capture the attention of the TV series fans, developers have refined the game’s app store optimization (ASO). The game's store page is now packed with references to the series. Not only does it feature an image with the scenery and characters from the game, but its description is also filled with multiple triggers: from names of the main characters to repeated mentions of the two key words—“TV series”. These features are strategically placed to grab and hold the interest of potential players.
As a result, Fallout Shelter has climbed to the top of the post-apocalyptic mobile games category and has remained there for over two weeks already. During this period, the game has been the most featured and ranked second in both revenue and downloads. Whiteout Survival stood its ground, however, surviving the threat of the popular TV series and keeping its leadership in the setting!
Of course, earning $200k a day may not rival the top-performing games across all genres, but it remains an impressive achievement and a definite success that is likely to inspire other publishers in the future.
Video Games TV Series Is The New Black
The underlying success of Fallout Shelter is yet another example of the well-executed IP expansion to different media. Together with other critically and publicly acclaimed TV series like The Last of Us, Arcane, or Cyberpunk: Edgerunners, it shows the growing importance of franchise development and transmedia strategies. In the mobile market, about 30% of in-app revenue comes from games based on existing IPs, showing how much players are drawn to familiar brands.
Fallout Shelter, perhaps, is one of the best examples of how the developers can welcome new players and gradually integrate them into the game. It also demonstrates one of the best combinations of transmedia projects that can improve the consumer experience. For example, single-player experiences like The Last of Us and Cyberpunk couldn’t really adapt to be loved more by the shows’ viewers, while Arcane is based on MOBA, which is one of the most skill-sensitive genres.
With a much lower entry-level and flexible tools to adjust the game, Fallout Shelter has it all to satisfy the fans of the show. Moreover, both the game and the TV show are true to the original design, atmosphere, and themes of the Fallout series. That is why, after the show, players can enjoy the same elements of the beloved franchise, from satirical humor to the same mascots, brands, and environments.
That said, Fallout Shelter is solid proof that, while a franchise at its peak can provide a significant boost to the game, it's the ability to adapt and satisfy new players with LiveOps and ASO that can turn this advantage into tangible success.