Observed Signal · Aug 20, 2026 · Earnings Report · Source: PocketGamer.biz · Impact: 2/5 · Sentiment: Neutral
Love and Deepspace revenue plunges 68% after Valko controversy
Infold Games' mobile title Love and Deepspace saw a dramatic fall in player spending after backlash around a planned character named Valko. AppMagic estimates the game earned $10.3M across Google Play and the App Store in July 2026, a 68% month-on-month drop from $32.4M in June. Version 6.0 launched in early July but the Valko love interest was removed at the last minute; daily spending peaked at $906k (a 177% uplift) versus a $6.7M single-day peak during the version 5.0 launch. The controversy included concerns tied to an in-game file labelled A-0731 and a large global petition; Infold Games said it will not add additional love interests and will instead expand existing romances.
Shows a major mobile game's monetization vulnerability to player backlash and content controversy—relevant to mobile monetization, product risk, and publisher revenue trends but not industry-shifting.
Track AppMagic Signals & Market Shifts in Real-Time
Polaris7 autonomous intelligence agents track regulatory filings, primary sources, executive changes, and deal flow 24/7. Create your free Explorer workspace to monitor these entities.
Key Takeaways & Evidence Grounding
- Infold Games' Love and Deepspace earned an estimated $10.3 million in gross player spending in July 2026 (Google Play and App Store) according to AppMagic.
- July 2026 revenue represented a 68% month-over-month decline from June 2026's $32.4 million (AppMagic estimates).
- Version 6.0 launched in early July 2026 but the planned new love interest Valko was removed at the last minute and did not ship with the update.
- Daily spending on release of version 6.0 peaked at $906,000 (a 177% increase), compared with a 427% daily boost and $6.7M single-day revenue for version 5.0's release.
- Infold Games stated it will not introduce additional love interests going forward and will focus on expanding the five existing romance options.
Connected Companies & Entities
2 Entities mapped“According to AppMagic estimates, the dating simulator earned $10.3 million in gross player spending between Google Play and the App Store la...”
Ontology Mapping & Concepts
Related Market Signals & Shifts
Recent verified developments and strategic activity across this market segment.
Infold Games Cancels Valko Romance Addition
Infold Games has cancelled plans to add Valko, a werewolf romanceable character, to its mobile title Love and Deepspace after significant player backlash. Valko had been scheduled to arrive on July 9 as part of the version 6.0 update. The announcement generated large-scale negative feedback — reportedly more than 200,000 complaints on Weixin — amid concerns about expanding the number of love interests, potential dilution of content per character and gacha rate impacts. The developer posted an apology and said it had introduced Valko prematurely. Infold Games now says it will not add further love interests and will focus on developing the stories of the five existing romance options.
Love and Deepspace Cancels Bilibili World 2026 Appearance
Infold Games cancelled Love and Deepspace’s planned panel and appearance at Bilibili World 2026 after backlash over a now-removed love interest character, Valko. The studio apologised via its Xiaohongshu account, said it would reimburse ticket, airfare and hotel losses for affected fans, and confirmed it would conduct internal training while honouring Chinese culture and history. A fan petition asking Infold and Paper Games to restore Valko has surpassed 230,000 signatures. Infold also said it will not introduce additional love interests and will focus on expanding stories for the game's five existing romance options.
Hot Five: Mobile gaming roundup — Roblox AI, Play Store changes
This PocketGamer 'Hot Five' roundup (published 2026-07-20) summarizes five mobile gaming stories: HoYoverse's Zenless Zone Zero surpassed $600M in mobile revenue over two years but saw a 51% fall in player spending in year two; Poki grew to 100 million monthly players over five years, per COO Stein Janssen; Google and Epic Games withdrew a settlement as Google prepares to list rival app stores on the Play Store in the US starting July 22; Roblox unveiled Build, a mobile-first AI game-creation feature that generates playable starting points from text prompts using the same back end and AI models as Roblox Studio; and H1 2026 saw $40 billion in mobile gross player spending, with strategy leading while puzzle rose to second and RPGs declined year-over-year.
Track Real-Time Market Signals & Shifts
Set up custom watchlists to receive automated, evidence-grounded executive digests whenever material signals or shifts occur across your tracked landscape.