The archive · Consumer Apps · Product decision · 2019–2026
Habby's Dicero! tops Korea iOS free charts at launch; $2B maker pivots to IAP
Habby (Archero, Survivor.io) launched dice-roguelite Dicero! on Apr 22, 2026, betting IAP over rewarded ads; day one: Korea #1, US and Japan top-10.
Habby (Habby Games)
What the business is
Beijing-based Habby makes casual-hybrid mobile hits (Archero, Survivor.io, Archero 2, Capybara Go!); Dicero! (六六英雄) is its April 2026 dice-roll roguelite RPG for a global audience.
How it started
Habby built its formula on Archero (2019), then Survivor.io (peak monthly revenue above ¥300M) and Archero 2 (over $250M in its first year). By 2025-2026 revenue sat at a multi-year low while rivals cloned the playbook. In early 2026 it tested three new games — Dicero!, Zoo Dice: Arena and a kung-fu title — after partnering with Korean studio 111% (Lucky Defense). Dicero! soft-launched as 'Heround' in Vietnam, Thailand and Singapore in June 2025, was renamed in March 2026, and went global on April 22, 2026 with 2,000+ ad creatives that day.
What happened
On launch day Dicero! reached top-50 iOS game-free charts in 31 markets (Korea #1, Taiwan #3, US and Japan #6) and climbed to 40 markets by April 27, including 11 grossing top-50 markets (Taiwan #10, Korea #31; US #123, Japan #127). Diandian Data measured 230k day-1 downloads, 1.02M downloads and roughly $716k revenue in four days; 170+ countries got the global launch.
How it ended up
Still live and early: within two weeks (by May 3, 2026) Dicero! had 2.7M+ downloads and ¥17M+ revenue, held top-20 free-game positions in about 20 countries, and its WeChat mini-game sat at #25 on Tencent's top-selling chart. Industry critics warned that the no-ads, IAP-heavy design clashes with the casual creatives used to buy users, so whether the pivot sustains remains unproven.
Background
Habby is a Beijing mobile-game publisher whose winning formula — casual core gameplay plus roguelike upgrades plus RPG progression — produced Archero (2019), Survivor.io (peak monthly revenue above ¥300M) and Archero 2 (over $250M in its first year). By 2025-2026 the formula had been copied across the industry and Habby's own revenue had fallen to a multi-year low, so the company began testing what it calls the next stage of its model.
That next stage is Dicero! (六六英雄 / 点点英雄：骰子传说), a dice-based roguelite RPG that launched globally on April 22, 2026 across 170+ countries. The core loop is familiar — auto-battles, three-choice roguelike growth, deep meta progression — but combat power comes from poker-style dice combinations (pair, straight, full house, five-of-a-kind), and nearly all rewarded-ad placements were removed in favor of idle-resource surplus, gear synthesis and gacha spending.
Early results were strong: #1 on iOS game-free charts in Korea, Hong Kong and Macau on launch day, top-10 in the US and Japan, 31 markets in the top-50 by day one, then 2.7M+ downloads and ¥17M+ revenue within two weeks (by May 3, 2026). Habby's lifetime revenue passed $2 billion per AppMagic. Whether the heavier, IAP-first design retains the casual audience its ad creatives buy is the open question for the company's third act.
What has to be true
- Revenue pressure: after years of hits, Habby's revenue was at a multi-year low and the market had copied its formula, forcing a search for the next scalable variable.
- Dice as front-loaded randomness: moving random outcomes from post-kill upgrade picks into every battle round made chance visible, dramatic and cheap to explain in ads.
- Monetization shift: removing rewarded-ad gates and deepening gear and gacha spend is a bet that high-ARPU core users can replace the ad-funded casual traffic that built the company.
- Partnered learning: the joint venture with Korea's 111% (Lucky Defense) and tests of Zoo Dice: Arena show the dice direction was a portfolio bet, not a one-off.
What can be applied
When a formula gets commoditized and ad-funded casual economics stall, the exit can be a heavier core with fewer ads — but keeping the same bought audience decides if it works.
Aftermath
As of 2026-05-13, Dicero! was in early post-launch: top-20 free-game charts in about 20 countries, 2.7M+ downloads and ¥17M+ revenue (Diandian via Youxi Chaguan), with the WeChat mini-game version at #25 on Tencent's top-selling chart. Habby had disclosed no retention or pay-conversion figures; analysts worried the removed rewarded-ads layer would surprise casual players drawn in by light creatives, and that dice-probability design could draw fairness complaints like those Lucky Defense faced. No announcement had been made on a full China mini-game push.
Sources
- Habby上演“师徒对决”：自家新游《点点英雄》上线，“大佬徒弟”日本畅销榜夺冠
- 新游《Dicero!》全球公测，这款Habby的转向之作成绩如何？
- Habby新作《Dicero!》全球上线冲榜：骰子，能否成为“Habby公式”的下一个变量？
- After earning $2 billion, this Beijing-based company made a "non-traditional" decision
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