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Ruby Games Studio: Fun for Everyone

rubygamesstudio

Innovation that makes mobile gaming hit new levels!

Creating successful game titles nowadays is a pretty challenging and expensive task. However, in the global game market, there’s an emergence of a new genre, one with simplicity and accessibility at its core.

These are hyper-casual games that are quickly becoming the obsession of many players and the focus of more and more studios. Mert Can Kurum could easily recognize this growing niche and came up with an idea to create reality-simulating mobile games.

In 2018, he launched Ruby Games Studio with a specific goal in mind: to develop hyper-casual games and eventually expand to hybrid-casual gaming and beyond.

Located in Izmir, Turkey, the company has developed over a dozen top-quality titles and has published some of the best games in the USA and globally. Let’s discuss the story behind Ruby Games Studio, its success, and how Mert created the company and all its popular titles!

When Dreams Come True

Mert grew up in Izmir, where he spent most of his free time playing with friends. During his childhood, he enjoyed all types of games and eventually discovered and fell in love with online gaming.

When he wasn’t immersed in games with his peers, Mert focused on his studies. He was a diligent student, and as soon as he graduated from İzmir Atatürk High School in 2010, he joined Dokuz Eylul University to study Computer Science.

While at university, Mert did a summer internship at VeriPark and later became a part-time employee there for around 2 months. He also interned at Esebe Software and graduated from university in 2015 with plenty of knowledge and experience to show for himself.

Now that he had his Computer Science degree, Mert returned to his work at VeriPark and became a software developer. This position inspired Mert to hone his skills and keep boosting his knowledge with practical work.

Although he had taken the job at VeriPark, Mert’s dream was to create games, so he knew he wouldn’t stay with this employer forever. Fortunately, Mert didn’t have to wait a long time to get a shot at starting his dream career. After about 10 months, in 2016, he got hired at Masomo Gaming as a developer.

Once Mert joined the gaming industry, he realized that a good company could easily become a worldwide hit if it published quality games players wanted to see. In 2017, he finally decided to build his own company where he could develop and publish whatever he chose and penetrate the growing hyper-casual market.

Not only was this a business opportunity for Mert, but a passion. He had loved games all his life, so engaging hyper-casual titles drew him in both as an entrepreneur and a gamer.

Anything Is Possible With a Great Team

The following year, 2018, was significant for Mert as he would, for the first time, be in the gaming industry as CEO of his very own company. However, he didn’t want to jump into the business unprepared.

Mert did comprehensive research, talked to experts, and learned all about monetization via ads. He then hired the best game designers, product managers, marketing experts, data analysts, and game publishers he could find and launched the Ruby Games Studio in January 2018. The dedicated team helped Mert to turn his idea into a reality – everyone worked hard, ideas were thrown around, and new game titles were developed from the very first day.

Initially, Mert tried to maintain a realistic outlook and lower his expectations. After all, it’s not a good idea to go into business and await miracle growth within the first year. However, both he and his team believed that Ruby Games would enter the top charts sooner rather than later.

This thought motivated everyone in the company to continue developing top-notch games. Thanks to the dedication of both Mert as CEO, and his employees, pretty soon, the first Ruby Studio title was launched.

Creating a Gaming Sensation

After Ruby Games Studio released its first game – Sling Drift – in 2018, it immediately attracted the attention of a lot of people. The titles that followed saw moderate to great success, but in a bit over a year, Ruby Games would release its most significant game – Hunter Assassin.

This is by far the most popular title from the studio, and it helped the company reach new heights. The game was launched in September 2019 and has been downloaded over 300 million times. In 2020 Hunter Assassin became the 6th most downloaded game worldwide!

The company already had a little traction, but after this, it started to amass a huge number of fans and became a recognizable brand in the game industry.

Mert and his team were ecstatic as, in 2020, Ruby Games Studio entered the list of the Top 30 Game Publishers Worldwide, ranked in the 25th position. The company was open to hiring new talents that would help them develop even more engaging games.

At this point, the company also considered making new partnerships that would allow them to accomplish more and propel the game studio even further ahead.

Joint Forces for Better Results

The company found pretty quick success, and naturally, it wasn’t long before more prominent names in the industry, like Rovio Entertainment Company, took notice. In December 2021, the Turkish Ruby Games Studio became a part of the Finnish brand Rovio Entertainment Corporation.

Rovio is the game developer that created the mega-hit Angry Birds, so the Ruby Games studio was more than happy to work alongside its team. It’s safe to say that this collaboration invigorated both companies.

Rovio helped Ruby grow its team and achievements while maintaining a comfortable and fun environment. In turn, Ruby provided a way for the Finnish brand to enter the hyper-casual market. All in all, the studios helped each other grow as both focused on increasing game quality and strengthening advertising campaigns.

The acquisition deal between the two companies means that it will take some time before Rovio has full ownership of Ruby Studios. In the first phase of the agreement, Rovio bought 20% of the Ruby Games shares for $10M in cash.

The second phase will take place in autumn 2022, when Rovio is set to receive 50% of Ruby Games shares for $80M. The remaining 30% of the Izmir-based company will be bought over the following five years at a sum based on Ruby’s financial performance.

This acquisition and joining of forces was great news for Mert and his team. They were eager to partner with a company so successful in its own right and expected to quickly see the first fruits of this agreement.

Ruby Games Studio IPO

Ruby Games Studio is a private company with no current plans to go public. The game developer is still quite young but has greatly impacted the industry with relatively few funding rounds.

Mert and his team of experts have raised $10M, and in the first half of 2021, the studio made $7.8 million in revenue. After the Rovio acquisition, Ruby Games got a serious boost in financials and will likely continue its upward trajectory and revenue increase.

Ruby Games Studio Today and Tomorrow

Today Rudy Games Studio is taking a significant step forward by introducing new game titles in the fast-growing hyper-casual game market. As the company expands, more rivals show up that wish to achieve the success Ruby Games has reached so far.

However, although the competition is heating up, Ruby manages to stay on top and still produce engaging, fun, and successful titles. It’s published 13 games so far, 9 of which ranked in the first ten games in the US Top Charts. All of the hyper-casual games in the company’s portfolio have been downloaded over 600 million times.

Mert has been CEO of Ruby Games since its inception, and he doesn’t plan on changing that anytime soon. He and his team plan to keep up the exemplary work as they develop new launches.

Ruby Games also expects to spend the following years expanding its team, adopting new strategies, and trying out novel ideas. With a CEO like Mert and a proficient team of the best game developers and software engineers, we can only expect next-level performance from Ruby Games Studio.