KRAFTON and Neptune Announce Global Hybrid Casual Game Competition

KRAFTON and Neptune are jointly hosting the "Flick x KRAFTON Casual Game Challenge Season 01" with a $5 million prize pool. This competition targets hybrid casual games, and selected projects will be published under Neptune's "Flick" brand.
イベントNQ 40/100出典:PR Times

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  • 📰 Published: April 10, 2026 at 22:10
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(株)KRAFTON (CEO: Kim Chang-han) and Neptune Co., Ltd. (CEO: Kang Yul-bin) in Korea will jointly hold the global hybrid casual game challenge "Flick x KRAFTON Casual Game Challenge Season 01" with a total prize money of 5 million US dollars.

This challenge is open to game developers and indie game studios worldwide, and applications will be accepted on the official website from Tuesday, April 21, 2026, to Monday, May 18, 2026.

The selection results are scheduled to be announced in July 2026 after review.

Selected works will be tested and polished through Neptune's hybrid casual game publishing brand "Flick" and aim for expansion into the global market.

"Flick" is a publishing brand aimed at rapidly verifying and scaling developers' ideas in the market. Through collaboration with KRAFTON, it integrates global publishing expertise and data-driven operational strategies to support projects from the initial development stage to commercialization.

This initiative integrates KRAFTON's global market publishing experience and insights with Neptune's ad-tech capabilities, investment power, and operational know-how in casual game development. Through this, we aim to discover competitive hybrid casual games and build a sustainable global publishing system.

Furthermore, the official website for this challenge provides information such as details about "Flick" and evaluation criteria, and projects in the prototype stage, not just completed titles, can also be applied.

Official Website: https://krafton-jp.com/4mlfZYh

Hybrid casual games are a genre that combines the ease of hypercasual games with deeper growth elements, characterized by a revenue model that uses both in-app advertising (IAA) and in-app purchases (IAP). This is a rapidly growing sector in the global market in recent years.

Through this challenge, KRAFTON aims to discover promising hybrid casual IPs and further strengthen its global publishing system in collaboration with Neptune.

About Neptune Co., Ltd.
Neptune is a South Korean company engaged in mobile game development and publishing, as well as an ad-tech-based advertising monetization platform business. Established in 2012, it was listed on KOSDAQ in December 2016.

Its main subsidiaries include PlayHard, NCROQUIS, EK GAMES, Prettybusy, FANTOME, and Nimble Neuron, with representative works such as "Infinite Stairs", "Cat Snack Bar", "Rumble Heroes", and "Eternal Return".

In addition, in the ad-tech business, "AD(