Mobile gaming update time.

The Clash of Clans… clan is going strong. Our core is now around upper TH9 and a few of us are working at the early/mid stages of TH10. Personally my main account is midway through TH10, while my alt account is a near-max TH9. We do still have a good group at TH8 as well, and overall we also have a couple open spots for new recruits.

The difference between TH9 and TH10 is pretty interesting in terms of wars. Offense is stronger at TH9 than defense, which means in wars you are always aiming for 3 stars, and not getting 3 usually means someone is cleaning up for you. At TH10 a 3 star verse a decent base is rare, and feels like a thrill, while only getting one star is more common than at TH9. This impacts not only the importance of a solid attack at TH10, but also in how you build your base. Do you try to make the base a tough base to fully 3 star, or focus on preventing a 2 star attack (heavy protection of the TH)? It’s a very fun challenge.

CoC has also started doing events, where one unit or spell are significantly cheaper to produce, and you get a small gem reward if you successfully attack three times using that unit/spell. It’s not a major change to the game, but it’s a nice little change of pace, and keeps CoC a little fresher between updates.

In Clash Royale, the addition of the clan chest has made keeping our roster active much easier. I’m currently removing people who fail to get at least 10 crowns per chest, and since we get FLOODED with people applying as soon as a spot opens up, so far this has worked fairly well. Even the 10+ minimum is low, as technically everyone needs to get 30+ for the group to get the top reward, but we are lucky in that we have a few players who are very active (100+ crowns) and pull everyone else up.

I also like what SuperCell is doing in CR for new card releases. Rather than dropping a bunch in an update, they now roll one card out every few weeks, and when that new card is released, they also launch a special challenge mode around it. The challenge mode allows you to build a deck out of all the cards in the game, whether you have them or not, and forces you to use the new card in the deck. So far it’s always been fun, as it completely shakes up the meta and really gives a nice break from ladder grinding.

After a hot start and then some stumbling (first version of tournaments), I think SuperCell has CR in a good spot right now, and this shows in terms of how high the game ranks on the mobile app revenue charts.

We are still on break for Boom Beach.