Recap of the Week
- The game Last War:Survival VN recorded an impressive revenue growth of over 133%, surpassing major names to claim the Top 1 weekly revenue position.
- Nghịch Thủy Hàn and Dragon Traveler VN showed extremely strong promotion, climbing more than 10 spots on the revenue rankings.
- This week’s Top 50 chart welcomes new games (launched less than 3 months ago) such as Arknights: Endfield VN and Siêu Hải Tặc, alongside the return of long-released games like Summoners War and ZingSpeed Mobile.
- GAM Esports became the only Vietnamese representative to join the Esports Foundation Club Partner Programme 2026.
- VNGGames partnered with the University of Information Technology (UIT) to integrate Roblox into the game development training program for students.
Market & Game Performance
Dynamic Ranking: Many Games Record Strong Growth in Revenue Rankings
Based on Appmagic data analyzed by Gamota, the Vietnamese mobile game market experienced major shifts in rankings and revenue last week.
Rank Spike: Games with Significant Rank Increases
This week, 2 games recorded an increase of 10 or more ranks compared to the previous week. Specifically:
- Nghịch Thủy Hàn (MMORPG): Climbed 21 ranks, reaching 18th place with $35K in revenue.
- Dragon Traveler VN (Idle RPG): Climbed 11 ranks, reaching 31st place with $14K in revenue.
The breakthrough of Nghịch Thủy Hàn shows that high-quality MMORPGs still have the ability to strongly stimulate community spending through updates or in-game events that resonate with player psychology.
Revenue Spike: Explosive Revenue Growth
- Last War:Survival VN (4X Strategy): Recorded a revenue growth of up to 133.08% (reaching $201K), consequently rising to the Top 1 weekly revenue position.
- Nghịch Thủy Hàn (MMORPG): Concurrent with its record rank promotion, this game also recorded explosive revenue growth (reaching $35K), becoming one of the most prominent names in weekly monetization performance.
The revenue growth of Last War: Survival VN this week resulted from the effective combination of major in-game events and community-engaging content campaigns.
Specifically, the Color Egg Journey event and the Easter Gift Exchange Shop became the hot spots of the week. With a dense system of quests, preferential top-up packages, and a mechanism to collect tickets for exclusive skin exchange, players were strongly encouraged to spend to quickly complete progress and hunt for rare items. This directly stimulated IAP revenue in late March – early April.
Concurrently, the official fanpage fully leveraged player psychology through the content thread “Testing Luck with Monica”. By linking the Secret Treasure feature with a call to top-up at the web shop to receive a “luck buff,” the campaign created a vibrant atmosphere of community interaction. Comments showing off screenshots, “asking for luck,” or “testing luck” created strong social proof and a clear FOMO (Fear of Missing Out) mentality, urging players to enter the game and try their luck.
These activities positively impacted both UA metrics and monetization efficiency, helping the game achieve significant revenue growth. According to AppMagic data, after a period of slight fluctuation, hitting the weekly low of $21K on April 2nd, revenue saw a strong breakthrough trend for 3 consecutive days. This trend peaked on April 5th with a figure approximately $40K, demonstrating the appeal of the event top-up packages. Consequently, for the first time in the past month, Last War rose to the Top 1 weekly revenue position, surpassing its two direct competitors, Free Fire and Coin Master.
Source: Appmagic
New Entrants: Several New Games Appear in This Week’s Top 50 Revenue
- This week recorded the appearance of new games (launched within 3 months) entering the Top 50, most notably Arknights: Endfield VN and Siêu Hải Tặc. The presence of these newcomers shows that the market always has a place for new products if they possess engaging content and an effective launch strategy.
- Furthermore, this week’s Top 50 chart also saw the return of older games such as Summoners War – Funtap (48th place, launched in 2021) and ZingSpeed Mobile (50th place, launched in 2018).
Siêu Hải Tặc made an impressive debut, securing a spot in the Top 50 revenue list in its very first week of launch. This success stems from simultaneously optimizing market appeal and the product operation roadmap.
Firstly, the game effectively leveraged the resonance effect from the One Piece IP, especially the lingering impact from the One Piece Live Action Season 2 series that recently concluded. This heat is substantiated by telling figures: the game launch post on Facebook alone attracted over 14K interactions and nearly 2K shares. The community’s ongoing fascination with the grand voyage world has created a huge potential customer base ready to spend.
Source: Siêu Hải Tặc
Regarding operational tactics, the publisher established a thorough pre-launch roadmap from late March (03/24 – 03/29). “Spread the Word” events and early access downloads created an extremely large pre-registered user funnel. Immediately upon officially going On-air, the resonance from the Marine Ford theme and the “Setting Sail in April” event series strongly activated the crowd mentality. Crucially, the release of a dense gift code system, including SSR+ hero rewards right from the start, played directly into the psychology of ownership, fueling explosive IAP growth and turning Siêu Hải Tặc into a formidable competitor on this week’s rankings.
Esports & Community
GAM Esports Joins Esports Foundation Club Partner Programme 2026
Source: Vietnamplus
GAM Esports became the only Vietnamese representative among the list of 40 global clubs selected to participate in the Esports Foundation program. Through the annual fund worth $20 million, GAM has the opportunity to receive up to $1 million in funding along with robust strategic support for the Esports World Cup 2026.
Within the framework of the partnership, GAM will implement a series of community engagement initiatives throughout the season, such as: digital content production, collaboration with creators, and organizing campaigns and live events (watch parties) for fans. This move not only solidifies GAM’s strong position on the international stage—standing alongside organizations that influence over 300 million global viewers—but also opens up significant opportunities for Vietnamese esports to access top-tier resources and standards.
Industry & Business Developments
VNGGames Partners with UIT to Provide Game Training on the Roblox Platform
Source: Vnexpress
On April 2nd, VNGGames and the University of Information Technology (UIT) – VNU-HCM officially signed a joint training program for “Game Development on Roblox.” This program marks the first time that university students in Vietnam will learn and directly publish games on the Roblox platform.
The course is expected to last 3 months for 42 students from the Software Technology faculty. The program’s highlight is that the entire curriculum will be directly taught by 14 experts from the business sector. Students will experience the complete lifecycle of a game, from ideation and building to actual publishing, opening up opportunities for global monetization.
This collaboration was assessed by Mr. Lê Quang Tự Do (Director of the Authority of Broadcasting and Electronic Information) and UIT representatives as an ideal model for dismantling existing social prejudice against games. This is a strategic step to integrate an international game development platform into the formal education environment, creating a solid foundation for systematically training human resources for the globally estimated $200 billion industry.
References
- Vietnam+. (2026, April 5). Vietnamese esports club to join 2026 Esports Foundation Club Partner Programme. Vietnam+ (VietnamPlus). https://en.vietnamplus.vn/vietnamese-esports-club-to-join-2026-esports-foundation-club-partner-programme-post340509.vnp
- VnExpress. (2026, April 4). Sinh viên Công nghệ Thông tin được học làm game và phát hành trên Roblox. vnexpress.net. https://vnexpress.net/sinh-vien-cong-nghe-thong-tin-duoc-hoc-lam-game-va-phat-hanh-tren-roblox-5057770.html
