Aream & Co., the largest independent investment bank focused exclusively on interactive entertainment and working with Founders, CEOs, and Boards, has shared its Q2 2026 report on the games industry.
Below is the general executive summary and analysis of the Turkish gaming market.
How well did Turkish companies did in Q2 2026
- Grand Games and Spyke Games both posted strong growth in the U.S. market, ranking fifth and sixth, respectively, in incremental IAP revenue.
- More than four years after its launch, Royal Match ranked fourth among the top 20 highest-grossing IAP mobile games worldwide.
- Türkiye ranked fifth globally in annual gross IAP revenue by publisher, generating $4.6 billion, up 25% year over year.
- Akın Babayiğit’s Arcadia Gaming Fund ranked among the most active early-stage gaming VCs over the past 12 months, leading 12 investment rounds, including deals involving TaleMonster Games and Loom Games.
Gaming Market Environment
- Steam sustained double-digit LTM growth (+13% YoY), with peak conccurrent users near all-time highs in Q2 despite the usual seasonal softness, reinforcing PC as one of the most resilient gaming platforms.
- Console revenue was broadly flat (+3% YoY), as the Nintendo Switch 2 cycle drove +90 YoY quaterly growth and more than offset continued declines at PlayStation (-5% YoY) and Xbox (-7% YoY).
- Mobile IAP spend posted softer results, with quarterly gross revenue down 4% YoY and installs down 12% YoY, hitting multi year lows.
Dealmaking Activity
- M&A activity continued to improve, reaching 54 transactions with $2.3bn of capital deployed, led by the closing of the ~$1bn Loom acquisition and the announcement of the~$0.6bn WeMade founder’s stake sale.
- Mid-market activity remained the major driver, with $100m+ gaming content acquisitions reaching their highest level since the pandemic boom, led by PC gaming (Playstack, Fenris Creations/CCP) and casual mobile studios (Loom, JustPlay, Bluetile)
Capital Markets
- Public capital deal count surged (+67% YoY) with major announcements being Liftoff’s ~$0.5bn IPO, ~$0.35bn PlaySimple listing plan, and public spin-off intention from Fellowship Entertainment
- Public gaming stocks remained under pressure, posting year-to-date declines across the board despite relatively robust reported results
- Private investment surged ~6x YoY to $3.1bn on broadly stable deal count, led by mega-rounds in AdTech (AppsFlyer ~$1bn) and AI tech (General Intuition, Odyssey, Decart)
The full report is available to download here.
