Gameloft on adapting tools, tech and teams to sustain Minion Rush’s 12-year run

• Minion Rush has sustained success for 12 years with a live product mindset.
• Regular updates, brand activations, and community feedback have helped keep players engaged across generations.
• Migrating to Unity unlocked faster workflows, better visuals, and scalable development pipelines.

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Gameloft’s endless runner Minion Rush – based on Illumination’s Minions and Despicable Me franchises – has been around for more than 12 years and surpassed 1.2 billion downloads. 

Many games launch attached to well-known IPs and from that they usually get an assurance that fans of that franchise would at the very least be curious to play a game from the same world.

But simply having a game that is launched from an established franchise doesn’t mean instant or long-term success.  

“Minion Rush has stood the test of time thanks to the game being inspired by Illumination’s Minions and Despicable Me franchises, consistent live ops, and a player-first mindset,” Gameloft GM Kateryna Skrypnik tells PocketGamer.biz.

She says that the Minions themselves are instantly recognisable and have captured attention across generations, which has helped build a solid foundation. There has also been a consistent calendar of new films and brand activations over time that have helped keep things fresh. 

Due to this, Gameloft decided to treat the game less like a film tie-in and more like an evolving platform.

“From the beginning, together with our partners at Universal Products & Experiences, we invested in a live product mindset,” says Skrypnik. “Regular content updates and ongoing optimisation on player data.”

This early decision to prioritise adaptation over just nostalgia set the tone for the next decade of the game.

Future-proofing 

A major factor in designing with longevity in mind stems from the game’s ability to evolve alongside changing player expectations. Skrypnik highlights how continuous adaptation and direct community involvement become central to Minion Rush’s development.

“Each year, we’ve adapted and addressed player feedback, whether through new game modes, improved UI/UX, or teaching upgrades. We migrated the game to Unity to unlock better tools, workflows and visual quality. The shift wasn’t just about modernisation, it was about future-proofing the experience.” 

Skrypnik goes on to explain that while shaping features for the game’s ‘massive update’, the team conducted several early-access and soft-launch player feedback tests and got multiple community chats in Discord. 

“This collaborative approach with our players enabled us to deliver several strategically critical improvements in shaping features and action phase mechanics that significantly enhance the user experience.”

For Skrypnik, sustaining a 12-year presence on the app stores has required more than just reactive updates. It has meant treating the game as a long-term product from the get-go. 

“Our 12-year presence on the app stores is the result of consistent long-term vision, sharp execution, and a deep respect for both the IP and its audience,” explains Skrypnik. “From day one we’ve treated the game not as a seasonal hit, but as a scalable, evolving product with the potential to grow alongside player expectations and industry trends.”

This meant a disciplined approach to live ops, consistent updates, and alignment with both the community and the app stores themselves. 

“A key factor has been our approach to live ops. The brand is incredibly strong and evergreen, but we never relied solely on the strength of the brand. Our calendar is built with purpose, to maintain rhythm, spark engagement and drive retention without overwhelming players. This operational discipline created trust and predictability in the user experience.” 

Skrypnik also notes that staying relevant in the store for over a decade is “only possible if you’re aligned with the ecosystem itself”. She shares that the team maintained platform support by consistently meeting technical standards, embracing new distribution formats and keeping monetisation fair and sustainable. 

“That’s not just about compliance, it’s about partnership and reliability at scale. Longevity like this doesn’t happen by accident, it comes from treating every update, every feature, and every player session and an opportunity to strengthen the product. That mindset is what makes Minion Rush a benchmark.”

Reinventing with Unity

As the game evolved, the team faced technical challenges, with Skrypnik telling us that while the team was eager to introduce new content to the game, it became a challenge to keep up with the technical updates of the in-house engine. This led to the decision to switch to using Unity.

“Switching to Unity gave us a perfect balance of flexibility, stunning visuals and performance. Most noticeably, the move to Unity propelled our visual fidelity to new heights. Its advanced pipeline let us add richer materials, dynamic lighting and visual effects in the action phase”

The migration to Unity also changed the way Gameloft operates behind the scenes. Skrypnik tells us that due to the move, they restructured the entire development pipeline around more scalable and maintainable solutions.

“Without a doubt, the shift to Unity has streamlined multiple aspects of our development workflow. It enabled clearer separation between systems, which improved parallel collaboration between teams – artists could iterate on assets while engineers focused on gameplay logic, without creating bottlenecks. 

“Prefab workflows, timeline, and integrated support for version control gave us more control over iteration cycles and allowed us to deliver new features faster and with fewer errors.”

Lessons in longevity 

Running a game for over 12 years and rolling out numerous updates also brings in the risk of losing touch with what made the game appealing in the first place. The goal is to entice new players and not alienate long-term ones. Gameloft’s solution has been to put collaboration and strong alignment at the centre of development. 

“We strike a balance between innovation and staying true to the essence of Minion Rush. Over the years, the team has developed a strong internal compass for what defines the game’s core experience and where we can introduce meaningful evolution. Creativity is encouraged but always guided by strategic clarity.”

That process spans multiple teams, including product, marketing, analytics, production, and community management, working together to assess the viability of new ideas before they roll out.

“We’re not chasing change for its own sake, we’re focused on deliberate, well-informed decisions that respect what players love about the game while giving them reason to stay engaged,” says Skrypnik. “That mindset has been critical in maintaining Minion Rush’s identity while keeping the experience relevant year after year.”

Reflecting on the game’s journey, Skrypnik says the main takeaway for developers is to build for longevity from the very start, stating that a few big updates don’t sustain a long-running game it’s maintained through consistent high-quality delivery over time. 

“That requires a stable roadmap, shared knowledge across the team, and the ability to iterate while preserving team energy and motivation.”

Equally important, she adds, is never treating the player base as static.

“Player expectations evolve, and your tools, content cadence and communication need to evolve with them,” she says. “We’ve learned to invest heavily in community management, structured feedback loops, and in-game analytics to spot trends early and react with purpose.”