Mobile games do innovate: Angry Birds vets mix cards and platforming

By looking at the mobile game market, we can surmise three things: People love collecting cards, they love auto-running platformers, and they love games from Finland. Well, developer Boomlagoon’s latest delivers on all three of those things.

The Helsinki-based studio released Monsu today on the iOS App Store for iPhone and iPad. The free-to-play card-collecting platformer features colorful cartoon visuals and tap-only controls, similar to other apps in the genre. As you progress through the game, you go from spooky forests to eerie caves as your monster character slowly collects more cards that make him better at tackling challenging levels.

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As the titular troll-like Monsu, your goal is to get your treasure back from the band of thieves who stole it. While the basic gameplay is all about jumping over enemies and obstacles, players can unlock character cards that give Monsu new abilities. You can collect those cards by playing through the levels and collecting in-game currency — or you can drop a few bucks to buy powerful cards to help you advance faster. This is Boomlagoon’s big move to capture a piece of the mobile-gaming market, which should reach $21 billion in revenues this year.

“We’re focused on creating rich character ­driven experiences that players love,” Boomlagoon chief executive officer Antti Stén said in a statement. “This is what we do particularly well. We‘ve created a game that is really easy to play, instantly rewards the gamer, and provides unlimited ways to progress through fun environments.”

Boomlagoon comprises a number of developers that formerly worked on Angry Birds at developer Rovio. It also includes veteran designers from companies like Digital Chocolate, Valve, and more.

In May, the studio raised $3.6 million in funding to help pay for the development of its mobile games. Monsu is one of the results of that influx of capital.

While Boomlagoon is launching a new character-driven mobile game, Rovio — which showed that idea could make a lot of money on mobile with the Angry Birds series — is struggling to grow. Earlier today, that GamesBeat reported that company is considering cutting up to 130 jobs. While the Angry Birds characters are still popular, Rovio has not figured out how to shift from $1 to $2 games to the microtransaction-driven free-to-play model.

With Monsu, Boomlagoon is hoping it can jump right onto mobile with a character people will love while also spending money on in-app purchases.