2023: Investing in long-term growth & structure
2023 was an eventful year for Metacore and our first live game, Merge Mansion. We published our biggest update in the game to date by finally letting players enter the mansion, and worked with Hollywood star Pedro Pascal to make sure that the word got out. And it did: just a few months after the game’s third anniversary, we celebrated the coveted 50 million download milestone. We finished off the year with our first major brand campaign in Japan, where we partnered with Idol star Shibuya Nagisa to bring Merge Mansion’s lore to the iconic street corners and crossings of Tokyo.
However, 2023 was also a year when we invested in our long-term growth and doubled down on building a company structure that will allow us to operate more than one live game. We opened our first overseas office in Berlin to support our talent attraction and growth, and made the first key hires on the ground in Germany.
We also made our first acquisition and were thrilled when our long term partners from Piñata became permanent members of our animation and creative teams. Behind the scenes, we made some key changes to the way we operate to support both stellar live ops and new game development, including appointing a Head of New Games and starting to level up our New Games team.
We did all this while continuing to grow double digits in a competitive market: bringing in 162 million euros in revenue, up 26% from the previous year and just a few million euros short of reaching profitability already in 2023.
Towards the next major milestone: A new live game
Looking back, it’s clear that we’ve entered a new but natural phase in Metacore’s story. After investing heavily in growth and global expansion, we’re now one of the biggest contenders in the merge games category. This is a position we’ll continue to defend by constantly finding new, creative ways to entertain our audience.
But our goal has never been about being a one-hit wonder. Ultimately, we’re building a game company that can sustainably and profitably operate a portfolio of global hit games. That’s why our focus today and in 2024 and beyond is not only on Merge Mansion, but on developing Metacore’s company and operations to be able to reach our next major milestone – building and supporting a new global live game.
What’s Next for Metacore, Merge Mansion and our next game?
The merge genre may be competitive, but it’s by no means mature: there’s still plenty of room to grow by doing things differently. That’s why with Merge Mansion, we're concentrating heavily on improving the end-game player experience, as well as finding new ways to entertain all players with more engaging content, events and marketing. We’re putting special focus on developing the game’s business operations and exploring new paths for growth, with the help of the game’s newly announced General Manager.
Simultaneously, we’re developing our new games processes and product strategies, testing and iterating, and actively recruiting Designers, Developers, Artists and Game Leads for our new game teams, too. On a company-wide level, we’re continuing to focus on developing our culture, as this next chapter will no doubt bring new growth opportunities for all Metacoreans, working on both new and live games.
Although this exciting new phase we’re entering holds a lot of uncharted territory, I’m confident that the fundamentals of our culture – trust, psychological safety and wellbeing – and our player-focused game development philosophy will steer us in the right direction and find what's needed to continue leveling up Metacore and our games.