Gaming Market Maps
We cover the following Market Maps:
AI x Gaming (April 2025)
Mobile Game Tech (May 2025)
Ad Networks (Coming Soon)
Note: Interviews with companies are noted next to the company name with a link to the content.
#1. AI x Gaming
Below, we introduce each category and provide succinct overviews of the featured companies.
Generative 2D Art
Generative AI tools helping artists rapidly create high-quality 2D art.
Scenario: Focused on generating game-specific art assets from simple prompts.
Leonardo.AI: Empowers creators to develop stylized and realistic imagery rapidly.
Midjourney: Popular for detailed, artistic image generation widely used in creative industries.
Stability.ai: Known for Stable Diffusion, open-source image generation democratizing art creation.
Adobe Firefly: Integrated AI tools within Adobe's suite, enhancing workflows.
Playground AI: User-friendly interface for quickly producing high-quality visuals.
OpenAI (DALL·E): OpenAI's famous model known for creative and accurate image generation from prompts.
x.ai (Grok): Focused on intuitive generation tailored specifically for artists.
Artbreeder: Known for collaborative and iterative art generation tools.
BRIA: Provides AI-based visual editing and enhancement capabilities.
Layer: Specializes in flexible AI-driven image editing and optimization.
Generative 3D Art
Pioneering 3D asset creation through innovative AI-driven solutions.
Luma AI: Advanced 3D reconstruction from photos or videos for easy asset creation.
Kaedim: Automates 3D model creation from 2D references.
HunYuan3D 2.0: Tencent's sophisticated model generating realistic 3D assets.
Promethean AI: AI-assisted environment design and world-building platform.
blackshark.ai: Specializes in photorealistic 3D environments leveraging satellite imagery.
CSM: AI-enhanced tools simplifying 3D character modeling and animation.
Yellow: Easy-to-use generative 3D modeling tools for quick prototyping.
Meshy: Automates 3D mesh optimization and generation.
HYPER3D: Streamlines hyper-realistic 3D asset creation.
Atlas AI: Advanced AI toolkit for dynamic 3D environment generation.
Anything World: Accessible 3D creation platform powered by voice commands and AI.
Generative Video
AI enabling creators to produce and edit video content rapidly and effectively.
Runway: Powerful video editing and generative content creation with AI.
Pika Labs: AI tools generating short-form videos and animations quickly.
Google DeepMind: Cutting-edge generative video AI, including realistic simulations.
Meta (MovieGen): A suite of advanced AI models designed to create high-quality, realistic videos and synchronized audio from simple text prompts.
Kuaishou (Kling AI): A cutting-edge generative video model that transforms text and images into high-quality, realistic videos up to two minutes long, featuring advanced motion simulation and multimodal editing capabilities.
Jimeng AI: Chinese-language text-to-video app that creates short, realistic video clips and images from written prompts, primarily targeting casual creators in China.
OmniHuman-1: An AI model that generates realistic talking and moving human videos from a single photo and motion cues, using advanced diffusion-based transformer architecture.
Seaweed AI: A rapid video generation model capable of producing high-quality, stylized videos in under two minutes for creative and professional use.
Goku: A unified image-and-video generation model that uses rectified flow transformers to deliver fast, high-fidelity visual content creation.
Phantom: A generative video model focused on maintaining consistent subject identity across frames, ideal for personalized, coherent video synthesis.
Imagine.art: Innovative generative tools targeting creative storytelling through video.
Lumen5: AI-driven video creation designed specifically for content marketers.
Animaker: Simplifies animated video creation for broad accessibility.
Pictory: Transforms long-form content into engaging short-form video snippets.
Generative Characters & Avatars
AI-focused on highly personalized and realistic character creation.
Ready Player Me: Cross-platform avatar creation easily integrated into games and apps.
D-ID: Enhances avatars with highly realistic facial animations.
Genies: Allows users to express themselves through highly customized digital avatars.
ZMO.AI: Provides lifelike AI-driven character modeling solutions.
Wolf3D: Specializes in scalable avatar generation for immersive experiences.
Epic Games (MetaHuman): Industry-leading ultra-realistic digital humans for real-time environments.
Copresence: Real-time generative avatar platform enhancing digital interaction.
Avatar SDK: Simplified avatar generation from a single image using deep learning.
AI NPCs & Dialogue
Enriching games through advanced AI-driven character interactions.
Inworld AI: Enables sophisticated NPC interactions through real-time AI-driven dialogue.
Convai: Conversational AI optimized for immersive game environments.
Charisma.ai: Powers narrative-rich dialogues and branching storylines.
Artificial Agency: Builds intelligent NPCs with memory, goals, and adaptive behaviors to create lifelike interactions in virtual worlds.
Mindverse: Provides AI characters and co-pilots for games and virtual environments with a focus on customizable personalities and context-aware dialogue.
Character.ai: Offers a platform where users can interact with or create AI-powered characters capable of engaging, personality-driven conversations.
Ex-Human: AI NPCs focused on emotional intelligence and deeper player engagement.
NVIDIA ACE: Advanced conversational AI explicitly designed for gaming NPCs.
Code Development
AI assistance enhancing game development speed and code quality.
GitHub Copilot: AI pair-programmer significantly speeding up coding processes through context-aware suggestions.chaicode.com
Anysphere (Cursor): Provides AI-assisted code generation, debugging, and efficient codebase navigation.
Unity (Muse): Integrates AI-driven coding tools specifically tailored for Unity developers to streamline workflow.
Anthropic (Claude Code): Uses advanced language models to support safe and highly effective AI-assisted coding.Qodo+2Tabnine+2Refine+2
Windsurf AI: Offers an AI-powered coding assistant and the Windsurf Editor, an AI-native IDE that anticipates developer needs, fixes test failures proactively, and maintains flow.
Cline: An open-source AI coding assistant with dual Plan/Act modes, terminal execution, and Model Context Protocol (MCP) for VS Code, enhancing development workflows.
Bezi: Builds tools for indie studios and developers, offering project-aware AI to debug projects, iterate on scenes, and execute standardizable tasks, focusing on 3D design and development.
Replit: Provides a powerful, simple platform for software development and deployment, featuring Replit Agent, an advanced AI making programming accessible to everyone.
Tabnine: An AI code assistant that accelerates and simplifies software development while keeping code private, secure, and compliant, offering context-aware code completions and suggestions.
IndieBuff: An AI-powered game development assistant designed to speed up game creation and supercharge workflows, integrating directly with game engines.
Qodo: A quality-first AI code generation tool designed to help developers write, test, and review code with confidence, integrating AI across development workflows.
Rosebud AI: Builds generative AI tools for creating stylized 2D and animated characters, enabling rapid game asset creation directly in-engine or via browser-based tools.
Generative Music & Voice
Transforming audio and voice creation through cutting-edge AI technologies.
ElevenLabs: Offers ultra-realistic text-to-speech and voice cloning tools, enabling creators to generate lifelike voices for various applications, including audiobooks and gaming.
Altered: Provides professional-grade AI voice changer software, allowing users to modify their voices in real-time for immersive experiences.
Replica Studios: Specializes in AI-generated voiceovers, offering a vast library of voices suitable for games, films, and other creative projects.
Resemble AI: Delivers a comprehensive AI voice platform with capabilities like voice cloning, speech-to-speech conversion, and real-time voice modulation.
WellSaid Labs: Enables the creation of high-quality AI voiceovers, supporting various dialects and production styles for professional content.
Suno: An AI-powered music generator that allows users to create original songs and compositions quickly and easily.
CassetteAI: Utilizes AI to generate music from text prompts, supporting artists in crafting unique musical pieces effortlessly.
NVIDIA Broadcast: Enhances livestreams and voice chats with AI-powered voice and video effects, including noise removal and virtual backgrounds.
Generative Animation
Empowering creators to generate realistic animations through intuitive AI-powered solutions.
Kinetix: Combines AI expertise with advanced 3D animation technologies to revolutionize character motion creation.
DeepMotion: Offers AI-driven motion capture and body tracking, enabling the generation of 3D animations from videos in seconds.
RADiCAL: Provides markerless AI motion capture solutions, allowing real-time animation of 3D characters using just a single camera.
Plask: Delivers AI-powered motion capture tools that transform simple videos into professional 3D animations.
Cascadeur: A standalone 3D software that facilitates keyframe animation creation and editing, enhanced with AI-assisted tools for efficiency.
Uthana: Focuses on transforming 3D character animation using generative AI, aiming to streamline the animation process.
Move.ai: Provides AI-driven motion capture solutions, enabling lifelike animations through advanced spatial motion models.
AI Testing & Insights
Leveraging AI to improve game performance, testing efficiency, and player analytics.
Ludo.ai: Utilizes AI to provide game developers with insights into market trends and player preferences, aiding in game design decisions.
GameDriver: Offers automated testing solutions for games, ensuring quality and performance through AI-driven testing frameworks.
Applitools: Employs visual AI to automate testing of game interfaces, ensuring graphical integrity across various devices.
Headspin: Provides comprehensive AI-driven testing and analytics to enhance game performance across different platforms.
PlaytestCloud: Delivers AI-supported user testing services, offering insights into player experiences and potential improvements.
Live Aware: An AI-based analytics platform for real-time monitoring and optimization of player engagement in games.
Modl.ai: Offers advanced AI tools that automate gameplay testing and generate insightful analytics for developers.
Nunu.ai: Provides detailed AI-driven player behavior analytics to enhance gameplay experiences and retention.
Multiplayer Simulation
Facilitating realistic multiplayer scenarios through robust AI-driven simulation platforms.
Hadean: Delivers high-performance, AI-powered platforms enabling complex and large-scale multiplayer simulations.
Kythera AI: Offers intelligent middleware solutions for dynamic and believable multiplayer AI behaviors.
Unity Game Simulation: A cloud-based service (now largely integrated into Unity Cloud) that allows developers to run thousands of gameplay simulations in parallel.
Unity ML-Agents Toolkit: An open-source project that enables training of intelligent agents (including fake players or bots) using reinforcement learning and imitation learning.
NVIDIA ACE: Enhances multiplayer experiences through sophisticated AI-driven character interactions and simulations.
RLlib: An open-source scalable reinforcement learning library built on Ray, designed to train complex agents for environments like games and simulations using distributed training and a variety of cutting-edge RL algorithms.
AI Native Game Studios
Studios pioneering AI-centric game designs and gameplay mechanics.
Volley: Innovates with AI-driven casual games designed for rich, interactive player experiences.
Series: Specializes in narrative-driven gaming experiences enhanced by sophisticated AI storytelling.
Jam & Tea: Focuses on creatively embedding AI-driven gameplay mechanics into immersive games.
Latitude: Known for creating dynamic, AI-powered adventure games with endless replayability, including the AI Dungeon series.
Campfire: Utilizes AI to build emergent, story-driven games with a focus on player creativity and social play.
Wishroll: Develops AI-driven experiences, including Status, a Twitter-like AI app on mobile that hit 500K DAU within one month of launch.
Pipeworks Studios: A veteran game development studio exploring AI-integrated gameplay systems and collaborating on AI R&D to enhance large-scale, systems-driven multiplayer games.
Hidden Door: Pioneers AI-enhanced interactive storytelling, allowing for deeply personalized narratives within shared story worlds.
#2. Mobile Game Tech
🧱 Game Engines
Unity: The dominant engine for mobile games; widely adopted for its robust tooling, asset store, and cross-platform support.
Unreal Engine: Known for high-fidelity rendering, though less common in mobile than console/PC.
Cocos Creator: Lightweight and especially popular in Asia, great for 2D and casual games.
Godot: Open-source and growing rapidly among indie developers.
GameMaker: Accessible 2D engine, often used for pixel art and indie titles.
RPG Maker: Specialized for narrative-driven and 2D RPG-style games.
Construct3: Easy-to-use, browser-based game development platform focused on creating 2D games without extensive coding experience.
CryEngine: More PC/console focused, but occasionally used in high-end mobile projects.
Defold: Lightweight engine used for rapid prototyping and performance on lower-end devices.
PlayCanvas: Web-first engine with strong HTML5 capabilities.
Bevy: Rust-based, ECS-focused, early adoption among devs prioritizing performance.
O3DE: Open 3D Engine supported by the Linux Foundation, spun off from Amazon’s Lumberyard.
🧠 Backend Services
PlayFab: Microsoft's BaaS for multiplayer, economy, and analytics features.
AccelByte: Enterprise backend stack designed by ex-EA engineers.
Nakama: Open-source BaaS that supports multiplayer, chat, and live game logic.
Pragma: AAA-grade backend targeting multiplayer and live service games.
Backnd: Backend infrastructure aimed at mobile games with ease of integration.
Metaplay: Scalable backend targeting fast-paced mobile games, includes cheat prevention, liveops tooling, and analytics.
Beamable: Unity-native BaaS for live game features, focused on ease of use and rapid iteration.
LootLocker: Rapidly gaining popularity due to its easy-to-use APIs, player progression management, and inventory systems; especially loved by indie-to-mid-sized studios.
⚙️ Server Orchestration
Amazon GameLift: Managed multiplayer server hosting with autoscaling.
Agones: Open-source Kubernetes-native game server orchestrator.
Edgegap: Server orchestration and edge computing for low-latency play.
Hathora: Developer-focused server orchestration with fast boot times and global infrastructure.
Gameye: Orchestrator that handles game server scaling and deployment across regions.
Multiplay (Unity): Game server hosting and orchestration solution built for large-scale multiplayer.
Nitrado: Hosting provider often used by UGC and mod-heavy games.
📡 Netcode
Photon: Widely used real-time multiplayer netcode service for mobile and casual games.
Unity Netcode: Unity's native solution for multiplayer, with both relay and transport layers.
Unreal Networking: Part of Unreal Engine’s standard feature set.
Mirror: Open-source netcode solution for Unity developers.
DarkRift 2: High-performance server-based networking library for Unity.
FishNet: A modern Unity networking solution with strong community traction.
Normcore: Widely used for seamless multiplayer, especially popular for ease of implementation and low-latency performance.
Colyseus: Popular open-source server framework; particularly strong for scalable multiplayer.
📊 Data Visualization
Tableau: Enterprise-grade data visualization tool; less game-specific, but used by analytics teams.
Looker: Now owned by Google Cloud; good integration with BigQuery.
Mode: Collaborative analytics and visualization platform.
Sisense: Embedded analytics platform used by SaaS teams.
Power BI: Microsoft’s analytics suite; good for studios on Azure or Microsoft stack.
Qlik Sense: Popular in business analytics, used by some large game ops teams.
DOMO: Cloud-native dashboarding and business intelligence.
Metabase: Open-source, developer-friendly dashboarding tool.
🗄️ Data Warehouse
Snowflake: Popular for scalable, pay-per-query cloud data warehousing.
Amazon Redshift: Deeply integrated with AWS and used widely in gaming analytics.
Google BigQuery: Scalable serverless warehouse with great performance for mobile analytics.
Databricks: Combines data lakes and warehousing; used for ML and data science teams.
Azure Synapse Analytics: Microsoft’s solution for cloud-scale data processing.
ClickHouse: Very high-performance open-source OLAP database, rapidly gaining traction in mobile analytics due to real-time capabilities and efficiency at scale.
Teradata Vantage: Enterprise-focused, less common in mobile-first game studios.
📈 LiveOps (Analytics, CRM, Lifecycle)
Amplitude: Widely used product analytics platform for feature engagement and funnels.
Braze: Powerful customer engagement platform for push, in-app, and personalized CRM.
Mixpanel: Event-based analytics tool popular for retention and funnel tracking.
CleverTap: All-in-one analytics and lifecycle platform; strong in India/Asia.
Firebase: Google’s free analytics suite with strong developer integrations.
Unity Analytics: Very popular among mobile gaming studios for robust player segmentation and personalization.
GameAnalytics: Free analytics tailored specifically to mobile games.
Mitzu: Lightweight mobile game analytics platform offering easy-to-use A/B testing, segmentation, and retention tools.
devtodev: Game-focused analytics solution providing concise player engagement, monetization, and lifecycle insights.
🧰 Customer Support
Helpshift – An AI-powered, in-app support platform tailored for mobile games, offering features like automated issue classification and multilingual support.
Zendesk – A comprehensive customer service solution that integrates AI to streamline support across multiple channels.
Intercom – An AI-first customer service platform featuring Fin, an AI agent designed to deliver human-quality support experiences.
Freshdesk – A user-friendly help desk solution with AI-powered features, enabling efficient ticket management and customer engagement.
🎯 MMPs (Attribution & UA Analytics)
AppsFlyer – A leading mobile measurement partner providing comprehensive attribution and analytics solutions across various channels.
Adjust – An end-to-end mobile marketing analytics platform that offers accurate attribution data and in-depth reporting.
Singular – A next-generation MMP that unifies marketing data and provides cross-platform performance measurement.
Kochava – An independent platform offering unified campaign performance tracking and fraud prevention tools.
Airbridge – A mobile app analytics and attribution tool that provides a unified view of user behavior across web and app platforms.
Tenjin – A mobile marketing analytics platform offering pay-as-you-grow attribution and analytics solutions, recently recognized as an official Meta MMP.
🧲 Ad Mediation
AppLovin MAX – An industry-leading mediation platform that maximizes revenue through in-app bidding and access to a wide range of demand sources.
Unity LevelPlay – Unity's mediation solution that integrates seamlessly with the Unity Editor, providing transparency and control over ad monetization.
Google AdMob – A widely-used ad mediation platform that serves ads from multiple sources, including the AdMob Network and third-party networks.
Chartboost Mediation – A mediation platform providing access to premium demand sources and advanced optimization tools.
DT FairBid – A mediation solution that offers real-time bidding and a unified auction to maximize ad revenue.
💳 Payments
Xsolla – A comprehensive payment solution tailored for the gaming industry, offering tools for in-game purchases, subscriptions, and global payment processing.
PayPal – A widely-used online payment system that supports secure transactions and is integrated into numerous gaming platforms.
Stripe – A developer-friendly payment processing platform that enables businesses to accept payments online and in mobile apps.
Adyen – A global payment company offering end-to-end payment solutions, including in-app and mobile payments.
Braintree – A PayPal service providing mobile and web payment systems for e-commerce companies.
Paymentwall – A global payments platform offering a wide range of local payment options for digital goods and services.
Razorpay – An India-based payment solution offering a suite of products to accept, process, and disburse payments.
🛒 D2C Web Shops
Xsolla – Beyond payments, Xsolla provides tools for creating and managing direct-to-consumer web shops tailored for game developers.
appcharge – A platform enabling mobile game developers to create branded web stores, enhancing user engagement and revenue.
NEON – Offers a comprehensive solution for building and managing D2C storefronts, focusing on user experience and monetization.
Stash – Provides tools for game developers to launch and manage their own web shops, focusing on customization and scalability.
Aghanim – A platform dedicated to creating mobile-first D2C storefronts, emphasizing ease of use and integration.
Fungies – An e-commerce platform designed for selling games and digital goods, offering customizable storefronts and payment solutions.
CODA Payments – Specializes in providing alternative payment solutions and D2C services, particularly active in Southeast Asia and LATAM regions.
Terminal3 (Paymentwall) – Customizable web shop platform with global payment support and integrated fraud, tax, and compliance tools.