Observed Signal · Jul 24, 2026 · Conference Presentation · Source: PocketGamer.biz · Impact: 2/5 · Sentiment: Positive
Rovio: Live Ops Shifted Mobile Games to Event-First
At Pocket Gamer Connects Barcelona, Anastasiya Kara, lead product manager at Rovio, argued that live operations (live ops) have transformed mobile games from a core-first model to an event-first model, driven by time-limited events, offers, content updates and retention strategies. She traced modern live ops features back to social casino titles like Slotomania and cited Clash of Clans, Coin Master and Royal Match as examples of escalation in social, gating and monetisation mechanics. Kara highlighted a new wave where hypercasual cores are adopting full live ops — Color Block Jam is the cited example — and predicted further cross-genre feature adoption (mini-games, merge mechanics, pets) and continued copycatting across studios.
Highlights an ongoing trend in mobile game monetisation—live ops becoming the primary engagement and revenue driver and hypercasual titles adopting live ops—which is relevant to game studios and mobile monetisation strategies but not a platform-level AdTech shift.
Key Takeaways & Evidence Grounding
- Anastasiya Kara is lead product manager at Rovio and spoke about live ops at Pocket Gamer Connects Barcelona.
- Kara argued live ops shifted mobile games from a core-first to an event-first model centered on time-limited events, offers, content updates and retention tactics.
- She traced many modern features back to social casino titles such as Slotomania and cited Clash of Clans, Coin Master and Royal Match as influential examples.
- Kara said user-acquisition marketing drove rapid revenue growth (citing a 161% revenue climb around the 2019 UA boom) and intensified in-game feature escalation.
- Kara highlighted hypercasual titles adopting live ops, naming Color Block Jam as an example that added albums within 10 months.
Connected Companies & Entities
5 Entities mappedScopely
Investor / PELive-ops publisher of free-to-play mobile games.
“Kara joined the industry at Gameloft before working with Product Madness, Scopely's Monopoly Go and now Rovio....”
Rovio
Mobile games publisher behind Angry Birds and Rovio Ads.
“Anastasiya Kara, lead product manager at Rovio, spoke at Pocket Gamer Connects Barcelona....”
Aristocrat
Gaming supplier spanning casino hardware, gaming platforms and mobile games.
Pocket Gamer
Mobile gaming publisher, industry media and events operator.
“The session was covered on pocketgamer.biz and took place at Pocket Gamer Connects Barcelona....”
Gameloft
Mobile game publisher with in-game advertising and B2B gaming services.
“Kara joined the industry at Gameloft before working with Product Madness, Scopely's Monopoly Go and now Rovio....”
Ontology Mapping & Concepts
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