Who is Scopely? Pokémon Go’s new owner, explained

The news about Niantic’s $3.5 billion games division sale shook up the mobile gaming community, placing games like Pikmin Bloom, Pokémon Go, and Monster Hunter Now into the hands of a company named Scopely.

With a large portfolio of games under its management and a reputation for divisive decisions with monetization and adverts, Scopely is an important name to be aware of as a Pokémon Go player. Here’s everything you need to know about Pokémon Go‘s new owner, Scopely.

Who is Scopely?

Scopely is a multinational company with a focus on mobile gaming, founded in 2011. The company has bought a number of game studios and teams, such as FoxNext Games Los Angeles, the PierPlay studio, and the Game Show Network’s gaming division, eventually being purchased by Saudi Arabia’s Public Investment Fund Savvy Games Group.

Scopely has integrated eight game studios into its portfolio with offices in the United States, Europe, Saudi Arabia, and Asia.

The games the company usually focuses on are tied to a famous IP such as Marvel, Star Trek, and—most recently—Pokémon. Alongside this, the team puts out mobile versions of table top games like Monopoly, Yahtzee, and Scrabble.

Scopely’s game portfolio

Scopely currently has 12 mobile games published. The team started with the Buddies franchise—Dice with Buddies, Jewels with Buddies, and Bubble Galaxy with Buddies—following a classic mobile game premise.

Scopely’s first collaboration with a major IP was with Hasbro to launch an officially licensed Yahtzee mobile game.

The company has been consistently releasing games ever since, releasing games such as The Walking Dead: Road to Survival, Wheel of Fortune: Free Play, Star Trek Fleet Command, Looney Tunes World of Mayhem, Monopoly Go!, and Marvel Strike Force.

Scopely’s games have been extremely successful, reaching the top-five games six times consecutively in the iOS App Store by 2016. These IP mobile games have taken Scopely to a company value of $5.4 billion as of 2021, and this number could go even higher with its acquisition of Niantic’s games division.

The team also received the Webby Award for People’s Voice in the sports games category for WWE Champions.

Scopely’s reputation

Many players have claimed in reviews and forums from across all Scopely’s games how over the years, the company’s updates have transformed games into a “money trap,” making them “pay-to-win” and enticing players to spend a lot of money in order to progress in a reasonable time.

In Marvel Strike Force, for example, a recent review from a player who claims to have played the game for four years complains about how the game gets extremely difficult unless you buy the meta team, and they have to spend much more than before to have fun.

If you don’t have to unlock characters behind a paywall, then the amount of ads can also take away from the experience, as one recent reviewer said about Scrabble GO: Classic Word Game.

What will Pokémon Go’s monetization be like under Scopely?

Now that the deal surrounding Niantic’s games division has been passed, many Pokémon Go players are curious—or in some cases, concerned—about what monetization strategies they might see pop up in-game.

At the time of writing, nothing has been officially confirmed about changes to the monetization strategies in Go or if there will be adverts in-game.

It is likely that changes will occur based on Scopely’s portfolio and usual monetization methods in games like Marvel Strike Force, but no noticeable changes have been spotted in the Go store or other areas of the game, so this is speculation on our part.

We will update this article with any further information if changes are implemented, though, so make sure to check back to learn more about this behemoth of a mobile gaming deal.