Leagues with Instant Promotions

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Headline Release

Pokerist’s weekly Leagues competition takes the innovative step of allowing players to instantly advance to higher leagues by reaching currency milestones. Players can also advance to higher leagues by ranking at the top of their leagues’ leaderboards at the end of the week.

This instant promotion system allows dedicated players to work continuously toward higher leagues without having to wait for the week to end, effectively removing a time gate on player engagement and spend. Immediately promoting players who cross certain thresholds also makes the remaining players less likely to be outpaced within their current leagues, which helps quickly balance leagues in this new feature.

After the release of Leagues, Pokerist’s revenue increased 14% MoM and 9% 2Mo2M. Although there were several other releases during this period, it seems extremely likely that Leagues played a substantial role in this growth.

Release Trends

Competition features are rare in the casino market overall. Although poker apps release significantly fewer features than slots apps overall, poker apps release more competition features per app. Poker apps also release more collection, expansion, and profile features than slots apps.

Read our full analysis of Pokerist’s Leagues in this month’s Headline Release.

Market Watch

Soft-Launch and Breakout Apps

FoxPlay Casino’s main appeal is its loyalty point rewards that can be redeemed at a casino in Connecticut, continuing a trend of reward programs linked to real casinos. For other examples of this trend, see our coverage of MGM Slots Live and Choctaw Slots.

Bingo Home Design & Decorating offers a narrative-driven custom design progression similar to that of Paradise Fortune Casino, which we covered in our January ‘23 Casino Report. The app stands out by offering a mystery story with multiple subplots, exclusively single-player gameplay, and an exceptionally high win rate.

Read our complete teardowns of these apps in this month’s Market Watch.

Feature and Event Releases

Custom Design Feature — In Bingo Party’s Fantasy Aquarium, players spend tokens from various features to buy fish and decorations for aquariums. Filling an aquarium increases its rating, and reaching certain ratings unlocks new aquariums. 

Bonus Feature — In Lotsa Slots’ Space Battle, players launch rockets onto a board with pegs and earn currency when the rocket bounces off a peg.

Competition Event — In Zynga Poker’s Burn ‘Em, players start each hand of a Texas hold’em game with three pairs of cards. Players discard one pair after each round of betting and end up with one pair at the end of the hand.

Read our full teardowns of all notable releases in this month’s Market Watch.