Plarium

Plarium Global Ltd. is a video game developer, publisher and subsidiary of the Australian gambling machine manufacturer Aristocrat Leisure Limited. It is known for creating mobile, desktop and browser games in various genres including MMO, RPG, action, strategy, and casual.

Plarium
TypeSubsidiary
Industrymobile, desktop and browser games
Founded2009
HeadquartersHerzliya, Tel-Aviv, Israel
ProductsFull list
Number of employees
1,300 (2022)
ParentAristocrat Leisure Limited
Websitewww.plarium.com

Plarium has more than 435 million players worldwide.[1] Its games are available on iOS, Android, the Microsoft Store[2] and on PC/Mac via the game launcher Plarium Play.[3]

The company has more than 1300 employees[4] and has established studios in Herzliya (established 2009 and current headquarters),[5], Warsaw,[6] Kharkiv,[7] Lviv,[8] Kyiv,[9] Odesa[10] and Michigan.[11] In addition, Plarium acquired San Francisco-based Rumble Games[12] in 2017 and, in 2021, Helsinki-based studio Futureplay.[13]

There are more than 20 games in the Plarium portfolio.[14] Plarium's most popular game is the dark fantasy gacha RPG Raid: Shadow Legends, which has more than 80 million downloads.[15] Other Plarium titles include Mech Arena, Vikings: War of Clans, the Stormfall franchise (Stormfall: Age of War, Stormfall: Rise of Balur, Stormfall: Saga of Survival) and Lost Island: Blast Adventure.

Plarium has worked with celebrities, content creators, and notable Esports professionals in a promotional capacity, including Richard Tyler "Ninja" Blevins,[16] Oleksandr "s1mple" Kostyliev of the Esports team NAVI,[17] and actor Jeff Goldblum.[18]

Plarium has previously employed BAFTA award winner Jesper Kyd, known for his work on video games such as Assassin's Creed and Borderlands, to compose the music for its games.[19]

History

Plarium was founded in 2009 in Herzliya, Israel, where it is headquartered, and started out by developing games for the Eastern European casual gaming market, such as Farmandia.

In 2011, Plarium began developing massively multiplayer online strategy games, and in February of that year the company released Total Domination which reached 20 million users.[20]

In November 2012, Plarium released Stormfall: Age of War, which was one of the fastest growing social games on Facebook.[21]

On November 10, 2015, Plarium licensed characters of Alien vs. Predator from 20th Century Fox to add them to its Soldiers Inc. game.[22]

On 10 August 2017, Aristocrat Leisure Limited announced its acquisition of Plarium for a $500 million upfront payment plus an earn-out arrangement to shareholders.[23]

Plarium released RAID: Shadow Legends on mobile in March 2019. The game was released on PC and Mac in 2020.[24]

The Plarium Play desktop launcher was released on PC and Mac in April 2019. It is a free launcher that serves as a distribution platform for Plarium games.[25]

On 12 August 2021, Plarium released the PvP team shooter Mech Arena on iOS and Android devices.[26] Plarium and the players of Mech Arena made a combined donation of $100,000 (USD) to the charitable foundation AbleGamers in February 2022.[27] On 3 August 2022, the game was released on PC and Mac via Plarium Play.[28]

On 10 March 2022, as a response to the ongoing suffering of its employees and the people of Ukraine,[29] Plarium Global Ltd. made the decision to remove all of its games from the app stores and ceased accepting Plarium Play and Plarium.com payments in Russia and Belarus until further notice.[30]

Reception

Plarium's Stormfall: Age of War made "Top 20 Facebook apps" chart during its 2012 launch, and was one of the fastest growing Facebook apps by monthly active users at that time.[31] Facebook's Director of Game Partnerships Sean Ryan called it a "beautiful-looking game" when it launched in November 2012.

In 2013, Facebook named Soldiers Inc. as one of the best new social games of the year.[32]

In 2014, Plarium was named one of Europe's most promising startups by Wired UK journalist Madhumita Venkataramanan.[33]

In 2014, Facebook's Director of Platform Partnerships, Julien Codorniou mentioned Plarium as one of the top global gaming companies on the Facebook platform.[34]

VentureBeat mentioned Plarium in March 2014 as one of the standalone gaming companies prioritizing social games on the Facebook platform.[35]

Plarium's RAID: Shadow Legends was nominated for the 2019 Google Play Users’ Choice Awards in the "Games" category.[36] The game was also nominated for the "Game of the Year" and "Best Audio/Visual Accomplishment" categories at the 2020 Pocket Gamer Mobile Games Awards.[37] It was featured as "Game of the Day" on the App Store[38] and won the best "App Video" award at the 2020 App Growth Awards.[39]

Plarium's game Mech Arena was the App Store's "Game of the Day'' on 15 October 2021.[40]

In July 2022, RAID: Shadow Legends crossed $1 billion (USD) in lifetime revenue, becoming "one of the world’s most lucrative RPGs."[41]

Plarium games
Game Release Platform(s)
Farmandia2010Browser
Total Domination2011Desktop
Pirates: Tides of Fortune2012
Stormfall: Age of War
Total Domination Reborn2013iOS and Android
Soldiers Inc.Desktop
Sparta: War of Empires2014Browser
Stormfall: Rise of Balur2015iOS and Android, Desktop (released 2017)
Nords: Heroes of the NorthDesktop, iOS and Android
Vikings: War of ClansiOS and Android, Desktop (released 2016)
Throne: Kingdom at War2016 iOS and Android, Desktop (released 2017)
Soldiers Inc: Mobile WarfareiOS and Android
Terminator Genisys: Future War2017
Family Zoo: The Story
Alliance: Heroes of the Spire[42]
Rio: Match 3 Party[43]
Stormfall: Saga of Survival2018 Desktop, iOS and Android
Lost Island - Blast Adventure iOS and Android
RAID: Shadow Legends 2019iOS and Android, Desktop (released 2020)
Undersea: Solitaire Tripeaks[44] 2020 iOS and Android
Mech Arena: Robot Showdown2021iOS and Android, Desktop (released 2022)

Sources
  1. "About Plarium". company.plarium.com. Retrieved August 17, 2022.
  2. "Raid: Shadow Legends". Microsoft.com.
  3. "Plarium Play Launcher - A Smoother PC Gaming experience for FREE". plarium.com. Retrieved August 17, 2022.
  4. "About Plarium". company.plarium.com. Retrieved August 17, 2022.
  5. "About Plarium's Herzliya studio". company.plarium.com. Retrieved August 17, 2022.
  6. "About Plarium's Warsaw studio | company.plarium.com". company.plarium.com. Retrieved April 12, 2023.
  7. "About Plarium's Kharkiv studio". company.plarium.com. Retrieved August 17, 2022.
  8. "About Plarium's Lviv studio". company.plarium.com. Retrieved August 17, 2022.
  9. "About Plarium's Kyiv studio". company.plarium.com. Retrieved August 17, 2022.
  10. "About Plarium's Odesa studio". company.plarium.com. Retrieved August 17, 2022.
  11. "About Plarium's Michigan studio". company.plarium.com. Retrieved August 17, 2022.
  12. "Plarium Global acquires Rumble Games". company.plarium.com. Retrieved August 17, 2022.
  13. "Plarium entered an agreement to acquire Finnish mobile game studio Futureplay to expand leadership in the casual games market". company.plarium.com. Retrieved August 17, 2022.
  14. "About Plarium". company.plarium.com. Retrieved August 17, 2022.
  15. Derrick, Connor. "RAID: Shadow Legends thanks massive fanbase with announcement of legendary version of fan favourite Death Knight". www.pocketgamer.com. Retrieved August 17, 2022.
  16. "Ninja Is A Playable Character In Raid: Shadow Legends". GameSpot. Retrieved August 17, 2022.
  17. Astle, Aaron. "Plarium partners with Navi to bring S1mple to Raid: Shadow Legends". pocketgamer.biz. Retrieved August 17, 2022.
  18. "Plarium Partners with Jeff Goldblum for "RAID: Shadow Legends" in their next Global Advertising Campaign". www.prnewswire.com. Retrieved August 17, 2022.
  19. "Jesper Kyd's Five Worlds of Plarium Soundtrack Dropping Soon". Original Sound Version. Retrieved August 17, 2022.
  20. "Plarium aims to reproduce Facebook success with Total Domination: Reborn on iOS". VentureBeat. June 6, 2013. Retrieved August 17, 2022.
  21. "Tech Roundup Plarium Gaming Company Scores a Top 20 Facebook Hit". Haaretz. Retrieved August 17, 2022.
  22. Spangler, Todd (September 14, 2015). "'Alien vs. Predator' Coming to Facebook Game". Variety. Retrieved August 17, 2022.
  23. "Aristocrat announces strategic acquisition of social gaming company Plarium" (PDF).
  24. "Plarium Releases Acclaimed Collection RPG 'RAID: Shadow Legends' on PC". www.businesswire.com. January 21, 2020. Retrieved August 17, 2022.
  25. "Plarium Play Launcher - A Smoother PC Gaming experience for FREE". plarium.com. Retrieved August 17, 2022.
  26. "Plarium Launches 'Mech Arena: Robot Showdown' On iOS And Android Mobile Devices". www.prnewswire.com. Retrieved August 17, 2022.
  27. Orr, Aaron. "Plarium donates $100,000 to games accessibility charity AbleGamers". pocketgamer.biz. Retrieved August 17, 2022.
  28. "Mech Arena on PC Launches with New Features – Plarium". plarium.com. August 3, 2022. Retrieved August 17, 2022.
  29. "Power structure Plarium". international software company that designs both mobile and browser games. July 6, 2023. Retrieved August 31, 2023.
  30. "Plarium Games". Twitter. Retrieved August 17, 2022.
  31. DarwellNovember 26, Brittany (2012). "CityVille 2, Subway Surfers, Stormfall, Snapchat, Twitter and more on this week's top 20 Facebook apps growing by MAU". Retrieved August 17, 2022.
  32. "Facebook names its top games of 2013". VentureBeat. December 9, 2013. Retrieved August 17, 2022.
  33. "Europe's hottest startups 2014: Tel Aviv (Wired UK)". May 2, 2016. Archived from the original on May 2, 2016. Retrieved August 17, 2022.
  34. Hirschauge, Amir Mizroch and Orr (September 16, 2014). "With Hostilities Over, DLD Kicks Off in Tel Aviv". Wall Street Journal. ISSN 0099-9660. Retrieved August 17, 2022.
  35. "Why one studio is still plugging away on new Facebook games". VentureBeat. March 13, 2014. Retrieved August 17, 2022.
  36. Oh, David (November 11, 2019). "Google Play Users' Choice Awards 2019 voting has begun". Android Police. Retrieved August 17, 2022.
  37. PocketGamer biz Staff. "Pocket Gamer Mobile Games Awards 2020 finalists revealed". pocketgamer.biz. Retrieved August 17, 2022.
  38. "Game of the Day: Raid: Shadow Legends". App Store. Retrieved August 17, 2022.
  39. Dogtiev, Artyom (December 7, 2020). "The 2020 App Growth Awards winners revealed". Business of Apps. Retrieved August 17, 2022.
  40. "Game of the Day: Mech Arena". App Store. Retrieved August 17, 2022.
  41. "RAID: Shadow Legends Crosses $1 Billion in Lifetime Player Spending on Mobile". sensortower.com. Retrieved August 17, 2022.
  42. Chapple, Craig. "Plarium acquires Alliance: Heroes of the Spire developer Rumble Entertainment". pocketgamer.biz. Retrieved August 17, 2022.
  43. "Plarium makes match-3 mobile game with Fox's Rio animated characters". VentureBeat. February 15, 2017. Retrieved August 17, 2022.
  44. Bald, Cameron. "Undersea Solitaire Tripeaks is an intriguing genre hybrid from the minds behind Raid: Shadow Legends". www.pocketgamer.com. Retrieved August 17, 2022.
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