What an IPO means for Discord, Pocketpair challenges Nintendo, and Switch 2 fuels apps surge | Week in Views

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The games industry moves quickly and while stories may come and go there are some that we just can’t let go of…

So, to give those particularly thorny topics a further going over we’ve created a weekly digest where the members of the PocketGamer.biz team share their thoughts and go that little bit deeper on some of the more interesting things that have happened in mobile gaming in the past week.

Discord CEO steps down

One of the week’s biggest stories: Jason Citron has stepped down as CEO of messaging platform Discord 10 years after it launched. 

His replacement is the experienced games industry executive and former McKinsey partner Humam Sakhnini, who has previously served as King’s president and vice chairman at Activision Blizzard.

In a blog post, Citron made no secret of the company’s ambitions to one day go public. Previous reports have claimed that could happen by the end of the year. Though I guess we’ll see what Trump’s trade wars do to the US and wider global economy to enable or dissuade the venture.

At 200 million monthly active users, Discord has become an integral platform for players to connect with each other and for developers to communicate closely with their communities. So all eyes will be on what direction the company takes post-IPO to grow its revenue and increase shareholder returns.

 
It’s kept light on monetisation thus far to bring scale, though it’s worth noting it already claims to have positive adjusted EBITDA for the past five quarters. No specifics were provided on the scale of those returns, mind.

But at some point it will need to tighten the screws on profitability. Unity developers found this out the hard way with the infamous Runtime Fee.

Investors have already pumped significant sums into the company, with a funding round in 2021 alone raising $500m.

The company said its current focus is on pursuing opportunities beyond its core consumer subscription service, including advertising, microtransactions, and providing social infrastructure to developers.

We’ll see where the line is drawn on the core experience as it is today and the demand to drive revenue growth and profits in the coming years.

Pocketpair pushes to invalidate Nintendo’s patents in Palworld lawsuit

It’s been a few months since we last heard anything about the legal battle going on between Nintendo, The Pokémon Company and Pocketpair.

So, as a quick recap, Nintendo and The Pokémon Company is saying that Pocketpair’s Palworld utilises some of its patents, such as capturing and riding on creatures. When we initially heard that a lawsuit was being filed, most assumed it would be on a copyright basis of how the creatures look, but instead, it’s all about these patents. 

Pocketpair is now pushing back, stating that these mechanics aren’t exactly anything new, and they also aren’t the only ones using them. 

We’ve spoken about this before on our podcast, and I even raised this same issue. As we love to say on the podcast, I’m not a games lawyer, but this seems obvious for Pocketpair to point out in their defence.

When I first looked into these patents, my mind immediately went to Ark: Survival Evolved, a game that shares many common features with Palworld. 

And as it turns out Ark is one of the games that Pocketpair has mentioned in its statement, among many others, such as Titanfall 2 and Rune Factory 5. Then, it mentions other games regarding the throwable objects patent, such as Tomb Raider and Far Cry 5. 

I’m curious to see how this plays out from a legal perspective. The whole thing highlights how complex intellectual property law can be to navigate, especially for smaller developers.

To me, it’s fair if Nintendo and The Pokémon Company want to protect their patents, but if other games are using them too, it surely can’t just be a case of picking and choosing who’s breaking the rules and who isn’t.

Nintendo app installs surge after Switch 2 Direct while its mobile games go unnoticed

The Nintendo Switch 2’s full reveal on April 2nd has had quite the immediate impact on installs for the Nintendo Switch Online app, with daily downloads surging by 109% that day, according to Sensor Tower data.

Having been showcased during the Switch 2 Direct, it goes to show how much of an influence the presentation had with fans eager to channel their hype somewhere.

By that same token, it seems like a wasted opportunity that Nintendo neglected Mario Kart Tour, which may well have seen similar results if at least acknowledged in a “While you wait for Mario Kart World…” capacity.

Instead, the mobile game saw no downloads boost as a result of the presentation, without even the slightest call to action for all those millions of viewers.

Perhaps with those controversial, unprecedented Switch 2 games prices, mobile really is just that low on the company’s priority list.