What 2025 taught us – with Bob Slinn

2025 Reflections for FunPlus and the Gaming Industry

 

Hello everyone, and welcome back to our exclusive “Insiders Info” interview series, where we share with you unique insights into FunPlus, FunPlus People, and our World!

Today, we’re thrilled to introduce Bob Slinn, the Vice President of Business Development at FunPlus.

In this two-part interview, Bob shares his insights on:

  • The most significant trends in the gaming industry in 2025
  • FunPlus’s achievements throughout the year
  • Adapting to Platform Innovations
  • Exploring new partnerships

 

Ready to deep dive? Let’s get started with Part I!

 

FunPlus - What 2025 Taught Us with Bob Slinn

FunPlus

The 2025 Gaming
Landscape

How would you summarize the most significant trends in the gaming industry throughout 2025, and what impact have they had on business development strategies?

To address this question, I will break it down into two perspectives:

First, on the consumer side, I will look at what’s happening with players and game trends. Then, the industry side, where I will dive into some of the challenges and opportunities.

Consumer:

2025 has been another mixed year for gaming overall, with the industry overall returning to growth in players and revenues, with some breakout hits in certain categories, particularly in the PC premium space.  

Audiences and revenues are growing slowly on a global basis, with regional bright spots in MENA and LATAM. 

However, the largest markets, including the US, EMEA, China, and Japan, are fighting an oversaturation of games, challenging discovery, and players who are downloading a few new games as they remain loyal to their favourite live service titles. 

PC titles such as Clear Obscure Expedition 33, Hades 2, and Hollow Knight: Silksong demonstrate that compelling, original game concepts and high-quality experiences can still break through in an extremely crowded marketplace. 

Genres like 4X strategy and puzzle have continued to see strong growth with both established titles (Last War + Whiteout Survival in 4X and Royal Match and Candy Crush in Match 3) reaching new heights, while newer titles like Kingshot in 4X and Match Villains in Match 3 are proving that new titles can grow and find an audience.  

Industry:

It continues to be a challenging time for many in the industry as many studios, big and small, are struggling to get their games to market or to find the necessary funding to move forward, which has led to more layoffs and downsizing, particularly in the West.  

As competitive pressures continue to grow globally, studios based in lower-cost/higher-efficiency markets like Vietnam, Turkey, and China are seeing more success, particularly in specific genres (Turkey for casual/puzzle, China for 4X strategy, Vietnam for hyper/hybrid casual).

Mobile gaming is more and more a mature market that favours larger, diversified studios who have the scale to support larger game development budgets and the technical expertise to build the ever-more sophisticated toolset required to operate and scale games successfully, including: 

  • UA tracking and targeting, 
  • data-driven, 
  • AI-powered creative production and optimisation, 
  • and D2C and payments platforms.

As mentioned briefly above, UA and specifically creative optimisation using AI and other tools has become a key differentiating prerequisite to help games, new and established, find and scale their audience efficiently.     

FunPlus

 

“2025 has been a mixed year with growth in players and revenues.” – Bob Slinn

 

“Studios face challenges with funding and layoffs, especially in the West.”- Bob Slinn

IP integrations have been a hot topic in 2025. Which one has been your favorite? Think even outside of the Gaming Industry!

Tell us, how have these collaborations shaped the competitive landscape of the gaming industry?

IP collaborations, and specifically in-game integrations, have become a very popular but still effective way to differentiate live ops events or new content releases for established games.  Developers continue to experiment with a broad range of IP from kids’ favourites like Lego to more adult fare like The Walking Dead and Terminator.  

One of the most interesting integrations of the year was actually a dual game crossover event between Subway Surfers and Brawl Stars, two of the biggest games on the planet. The partnership brought IP from both franchises into each other’s games and also added new game-play modes that tied to the relevant IP (e.g. new competitive mode in Subway Surfers).

IP integrations have generally shifted towards deeper, higher-quality in-game experiences, with the most effective weaving the 3rd party IP directly and deeply into the game narrative.

Initially, IP integrations were once seen as a way to lower user acquisition costs, but the emphasis is now generally placed on supporting big content updates or live ops events.  These activations help developers to increase engagement and monetisation of existing players rather than acquiring new ones. 

Another ‘2025 hot topic’ – the changes in payment systems – Please share with us the notable shifts that have occurred in the industry this year.

How have these changes influenced player behavior and monetization models?

At the bottom of the funnel, all large mobile-first developers are now operating sizable direct-to-consumer operations with varying levels of sophistication, ranging from a simple web shop to fully featured out-of-app experiences across community, loyalty, developer news, and payments.

Led by Epic’s litigation in the US and regulators elsewhere, both Apple’s and Google’s policies are slowly evolving to give developers more flexibility and freedom to build direct relationships with their players.

The US ruling allowing direct, no-fee payment linkouts in the US was the biggest single change of 2025, and while there will no doubt be more changes due to the ongoing legal battles taking place in the US courts, this represents a huge opportunity for all game developers.

With the opportunity comes a big challenge for game developers to develop the necessary expertise to reach, communicate to, and transact directly with their players.

Mobile game developers will need to learn from e-commerce experts in other verticals in everything from CRM to payment tactics like fraud management, basket abandonment, as well as higher-level, longer-term lifecycle management across games and experiences.

All of these changes should allow developers to build deeper, longer-term, higher-value relationships with their players.

However, it will require real investment and effort to realise the upside potential, given the complexity and costs associated with building these tools and services.

Players should benefit from better value as developers provide discounts and incentives in their attempts to convert players to direct payments, while they will also need to contend with additional complexity as they potentially create multiple payment accounts across different developers and platforms.

 

FunPlus

FunPlus's Achievements
in 2025

Reflecting on FunPlus’s journey in 2025, what are the key achievements that have driven the company’s growth and innovation this year?

FunPlus has had a positive 2025 with the launch of 3 new 4X strategy titles, with two of them full licensed IP games:

Both games have been well received and have helped attract new audiences to 4X titles and allowed FunPlus to diversify its offering in the genre.

We also launched Tile Survive!, which is showing positive results so far and is tapping into the trend of making strategy games more casual to help make them more appealing and accessible to a broader group of players.

FunPlus has also continued to focus on expanding and enhancing our D2C out-of-app experiences, adding more compelling features like an expanded loyalty program to deliver more value to our most engaged player base.

Lastly, we continue to innovate in our marketing efforts, both in the mix of channels we leverage to find new players, but also in our creative approach and ongoing optimisation efforts.

These continuous improvements allow us to bring new players to our range of games in the most cost-effective way possible.

Can you share some examples of the most successful IP collaborations during 2025 that have been very successful with players and expanded FunPlus’s reach?

IP integrations have again played an important role in supporting State of Survival’s event strategy in 2025. These are key moments for players as they introduce new storylines, new community activities, and most importantly of all, new heroes.

Hitman, Terminator 2, and Silent Hill integrations brought iconic and widely loved characters to the post-apocalyptic world of State of Survival, which helped to keep our players engaged and excited about the game.

 

 

FunPlus

And that’s a wrap on Part I. More great insights and exclusive information are coming your way in Part II.

Here’s a hint for the next installment: What’s next in 2026?

We will discuss expanding horizons and strengthening partnerships. Whether you’re a seasoned gaming professional or new to the industry, you won’t want to miss the continuation of this engaging dialogue.

Sounds interesting? Then, keep your eyes on this space!

 

Updated 11th December 2025:

Next installment is now out! Read now Part II: What’s next in 2026? 

 

FunPlus -What 2025 Taught Us with Bob Slinn

 

 

About FunPlus

FunPlus is one of the largest privately held companies in all of gaming. Founded in 2010, it is a global creator of interactive entertainment experiences powered by technology, with cross-platform game development and IP creation at its core.

FunPlus is an organization that fosters top industry talent, with around 2,000 team members based in offices and studios across three continents. These talented creative teams are well-known for developing hugely popular cross-platform titles, including DC: Dark Legion, State of Survival, King of Avalon, Guns of Glory, Stormshot,  Sea of Conquest, Misty Continent, Tiles Survive, and Foundation: Galactic Frontier.

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