Top 50 Racing Games in The First Half of The Year 2021
Comprehensive overview of the most successful games in the racing category in first half of the year 2021 selected using downloads and revenue metrics.
— by Diana Levintova
This time, we decided to dig into the racing games segment and check the dynamics out there for the first half of 2021.
Firstly, let’s start from the top 50 titles by revenue and see if there are any surprises. Drawing certain attention at first glance is the game that showed extensive growth—*No Limit Drag Racing 2*—gaining $8M, even though it only began to generate money in April 2021. Keeping in mind that the drag racing type of games is not very popular overall, it is pleasant to find that the game is nevertheless nicely made with good graphics and physics, as well as the exciting opportunity to customize your chosen car.
One more game that caught our attention is Speed Drifters. This game is a clone of Nintendo’s Mario Kart Tour published by Tencent, and the very high end quality is not surprising at all. After all, Tencent knows its trade all too well.
The other four titles to turn their revenue-making game around, so to speak, are the following: - Hot Slide (19 positions up and +190% in revenue) - Extreme Car Driving Simulator (16 positions up and +116% in revenue) - Tuning Club Online (19 positions up and a whopping 1400% revenue growth!) - Mad Skills Motocross 3 (63 positions up and a $500K revenue, while only earning an income in 2021)
Lastly, there were two large falls to mention: Dirt Bike Unchained dropped 20 positions and lost more than 50% of its earnings, and Asphalt 8 lost 11 positions and 8% of its revenue.
Now, let’s move on to the top 50 games by downloads, where there are, as expected, a few big shifts in the industry. For starters, though, the ultimate segment leader that is Hill Climb Racing has held on to its top position for the second year now; however, its revenue is slowly declining.
The games we would most like to draw your attention to are Crazy Car Stunt Driving Game, Mega Ramps and Gear Race 3D, since all of them have grown impressively: 35 positions up and 28M of downloads, 17 positions up and 16M, and 29 positions up and 24M of downloads respectively.
Looking closer at Crazy Car Stunt Driving Game, one can identify that the game, as many others hovering around the top, is mostly popular in countries such as India, Pakistan and Brazil; another point to note is that it does not make that much money. Now, the game is quite simple, but products of this kind usually thrive in the mentioned countries because their players tend to only afford basic phones and are limited to low-quality internet connection; hence, the games that end up winning the audience have to be very simple, generic even, as they must be insensitive to hardware specs and internet speed. Associated state of economy in said countries also implies that these titles do not generate too much revenue from both in-apps and ads (don’t forget that you can hardly get notable ad-LTV in those countries). Another thing to keep in mind is that the popularity of such games is rather fleeting: Crazy Car Stunt Driving Game peaked in February, but since then its monthly downloads have declined 3 times from 6.5M to 2M.
Lastly, there have also been two more spikes that are worth mentioning: Riding Extreme 3D grew by 28 positions and 17M of downloads, and Shift Race performed just below that, with 26 positions up and 16M of downloads.