1 in 3 Quest house owners have downloaded Gorilla Tag, making it probably the most profitable recreation ever on standalone VR. Gorilla Tag, created by studio One other Axiom, has emerged as a standout success within the digital actuality gaming house, not simply as a recreation however as a cultural phenomenon. Launched in 2021, it has rapidly amassed over 12 million customers and generated greater than $100 million in income.
Visitor Article by JP Minetos
JP Minetos works on the Funding Staff at Hartmann Capital, a frontier enterprise fund investing in Video games, VR/XR, Generative AI, and immersive know-how, with firms together with Flat2VR, Sinn Studio, Tripp, and ShapesXR. JP focuses on VR and Social Gaming, and has labored carefully with many high builders on the Quest retailer. His X account is @jpminetos the place he shares information and views on XR & the video games market. Funding inquiry could be made through DM on X or LinkedIn.
Whereas different video games have seen success in VR, Gorilla Tag is exclusive in that it combines social interplay with a motion system that solely works in VR. Very like different revolutionary free-to-play video games, corresponding to Fortnite and League of Legends, Gorilla Tag has carved out its personal house by fostering a community-driven ecosystem that retains over one million gamers coming again every day.
Its rise additionally indicators the emergence of a brand new sector of video games—these constructed solely for VR—pushed by the immersive expertise solely this platform can provide. On the coronary heart of this success is the sport’s social nature, compelling gameplay loop, and artistic use of free-to-play monetization. Nonetheless, being primarily performed by younger youngsters, it sits outdoors the cultural zeitgeist as a preferred recreation and isn’t coated to almost the identical scope as different profitable titles. So why is Gorilla Tag so fashionable?
Why Gorilla Tag is Profitable
While VR falls brief towards different gaming platforms in compute energy, the medium has an over powered function for engagement: Participant embodiment. In contrast to flatscreen video games the place customers management a personality with a keyboard or controller whereas taking a look at a display screen, VR gamers embody characters, making them really feel as if they really are the principle character.
Because of this spatially native social interactions are extra akin to hanging out in actual life, moderately than zoom. The technical-social disconnect is closely diminished. Gorilla Tag is at its core a social house with a recreation of ‘tag’ because the engagement loop. Just like a poker evening with pals or a pickup basketball recreation, the rationale folks play is partly for the sport itself and partly social.
Gorilla Tag is designed with this in thoughts and is constructed to replicate the social nature of the sport. Gamers spawn in a small hub inside a tree. As quickly as they step outdoors, they’re positioned in a random social foyer and thrusted into the playground with a dozen others already there; no looking for servers or ready for matchmaking.
Voice chat is turned on by default and doesn’t require a press-to-talk motion. Gamers communicate into the world, and everybody within the server can hear them. The audio makes use of spatial proximity chat, the place voices differ in place and quantity based mostly on gamers’ bodily places relative to at least one one other.
These circumstances foster pure camaraderie, as gamers kind friendships with these they spend time with. They usually ‘pal’ each other on the Horizon platform (Meta Quest’s Working System) and create non-public lobbies to proceed enjoying collectively at completely different occasions.
Some of the intriguing observations in person interactions is the pure adherence to in real-life (IRL) social norms. Whereas children could spam phrases, teams usually bodily collect, kind social circles, make eye contact, and concentrate on the speaker. Nonetheless, if a dialog turns into uninteresting, it’s not seen as impolite to depart and begin climbing branches. There’s little useless social time or awkwardness. With sufficient folks in a server, a number of subgroups usually kind, permitting gamers to hop between them or be a part of a special server, given the ~50,000 concurrent customers on-line.
A typical critique amongst older Gen Z is the “loss of life of the third place”—an area to collect outdoors of faculty/work and residential. Social media has poorly crammed this void, as genuine interplay feels fragmented and lacks the depth of real-life connections.
It’s clear that Gorilla Tag, predominantly performed by boys aged 10-18, has turn out to be their third place. One-third of the sport’s month-to-month gamers are logging in every day, with server exercise peaking after college hours. Youngsters are drawn not simply by the sport itself, however by the possibility to fulfill pals and play on a digital playground.
To foster a social atmosphere, customers have to spend time in a devoted house for interplay. Whereas Gorilla Tag’s common session time isn’t publicly obtainable, the typical for Quest content material general is round half-hour—considerably larger than conventional social media. I estimate Gorilla Tag’s common session time to be even longer, just like different profitable VR multiplayer titles, round 60 minutes.
This might align with the typical PC gaming session size of roughly 58 minutes (with the highest 12% of gamers reaching 5 hours, making this a conservative estimate).
It’s essential to notice that these statistics replicate single periods, and customers usually have a number of periods in a day. Nonetheless, Gorilla Tag excels in retaining customers inside a single social house, in contrast to social media, the place customers regularly soar between completely different threads or interactions.
Standing and In-Sport Purchases
The important thing query stays: how has a free-to-play recreation like Gorilla Tag managed to generate $100 million in income?
Whereas the sport is free on the Meta’s Horizon Retailer, it’s priced at $20 on Steam, although the overwhelming majority of installs—over 90%—are on the Horizon platform.
Previous to the cell gaming revolution, most video games monetized by way of conventional fashions corresponding to paid titles, downloadable content material (DLC), or subscription providers like World of Warcraft. Nonetheless, cell gaming was a pivotal second for the free-to-play mannequin, which has since developed to embody extra complicated monetization methods, together with microtransactions in AA and AAA titles.
With 12 million distinctive customers and $100 million in income, Gorilla Tag boasts a formidable figures for a free-to-play recreation. However how precisely does the sport generate this income? The reply lies in in-game cosmetics.
Given Gorilla Tag’s emphasis on social interplay, gamers naturally search methods to specific their individuality and standing inside the recreation. Cosmetics provide a strong software for this, permitting gamers to personalize their characters in ways in which replicate their personalities and achievements. This creates a way of identification and social status inside the neighborhood, particularly when sure gadgets turn out to be standing symbols.
Inside the recreation, there’s a devoted retailer space that gamers bodily journey to. Sizzling and seasonal gadgets can be found on a rotating foundation, usually for a restricted time, including a way of urgency to purchases. This setup mimics real-world procuring experiences and faucets into scarcity-based client psychology, the place gamers wish to exhibit their distinctive or uncommon cosmetics to others within the recreation.
The in-game buying course of is frictionless. Gamers can rapidly browse and choose gadgets inside Gorilla Tag with just one further Horizon OS affirmation pop-up to finalize transactions. By minimizing the steps wanted to make a purchase order—and a shopping and try-on course of that mimics real-life procuring—Gorilla Tag ensures that gamers can seamlessly purchase new gadgets, making the shopping for expertise clean and unobtrusive.
Consequently, gamers often buy new gadgets to maintain their avatars contemporary and distinctive. This fixed cycle of beauty updates, mixed with a user-friendly transaction circulate, has confirmed to be a extremely efficient monetization technique, resulting in the sport’s vital monetary success, unseen earlier than for free-to-play VR titles. One other VR title to surpass $100 million in income, Beat Saber, expenses for the base-game, with further income because of DLC choices which add extra songs and ranges to the sport.
Proceed on Web page 2: Much less friction → Extra play time »
Much less friction → Extra play time
One of many greatest hurdles for widespread VR adoption is the inherent {hardware} and person expertise (UX) friction related to accessing VR content material. On the {hardware} facet, customers want a charged headset, an appropriate play space, and the motivation to bodily placed on the headset. These challenges are common throughout all VR functions, together with Gorilla Tag.
To alleviate the impression of that friction, Gorilla Tag addresses a special kind of friction, particularly tied to UX design. A typical criticism in VR gaming is the tedious course of gamers undergo simply to start out an expertise, usually involving 2D menus, loading screens, and a number of steps earlier than coming into the sport world. This could really feel clunky and counterintuitive for a 3D atmosphere, and if gamers encounter too many obstacles, they might lose curiosity or abandon the session altogether.
Gorilla Tag mitigates this friction by streamlining the participant’s journey from recreation launch to social engagement. When gamers begin the sport, they bypass conventional essential menus and sophisticated interfaces. As a substitute, they’re instantly positioned right into a hub from which they will ‘bodily’ navigate right into a social foyer with no further steps. This straightforward design considerably reduces the time between launching the sport and taking part in its core expertise.
All the course of—from urgent begin on the Quest residence display screen to being inside a social foyer—takes about 10 seconds. This near-instant transition eliminates a lot of the friction sometimes related to VR gaming, permitting gamers to leap proper into the motion. By making the sport loop accessible in seconds, Gorilla Tag removes one of many key frustrations of VR, contributing to its excessive retention and every day energetic person base.
Demonstration of going from placing on my Quest to being in a Gorilla Tag social foyer: ~12 seconds.
Distinctive to VR: Gorilla Tag’s Groundbreaking Locomotion
Once we consider probably the most talked-about and profitable VR video games, what do all of them have in widespread? They share a design philosophy that leverages the core strengths of VR—particularly, the immersive tech stack that features movement controls, six levels of freedom (6DoF), and spatial consciousness. These parts create experiences which might be uniquely tailor-made to VR, making them unattainable to copy on conventional gaming platforms.
Gorilla Tag exemplifies this method, providing an expertise that’s not solely compelling but additionally essentially tied to the VR medium. On the coronary heart of that is its modern locomotion system, colloquially often called ‘Gorilla Locomotion.’ Historically, participant motion in video games has been managed by joysticks or different digital inputs, the place characters transfer within the route indicated by the controller. Gorilla Tag, nonetheless, breaks this mould by requiring gamers to bodily swing their arms to propel themselves by way of the sport world.
As a substitute of counting on button presses, gamers use their actual, bodily arms (that are mirrored by their digital arms) to push themselves within the desired route. The one different management enter is a seize perform that enables gamers to cling to surfaces. This technique is intuitive but difficult, like studying to trip a motorcycle. It feels awkward at first, however over time, gamers turn out to be extra expert and fluid of their actions. This design invitations a extra immersive type of play that’s unattainable to copy with conventional recreation controllers.
There may be solely a primary, self-serve tutorial to show the basics of motion. Nonetheless, new gamers are sometimes inspired to ask for suggestions from extra skilled gamers, fostering a way of neighborhood and shared studying. Veteran gamers regularly help newcomers, exhibiting them grasp the sport’s core mechanics, corresponding to swinging from branches or scaling timber.
This dynamic motion system sits within the ‘straightforward to be taught, tough to grasp’ vary, making it extremely rewarding for gamers as they enhance. It’s just like genre-defining video games like Counter-Strike or Rocket League, the place mastery comes with observe and dedication. This rewarding suggestions loop is a serious motive why gamers preserve coming again. Gorilla Locomotion has been so profitable that it has spawned its personal class of VR locomotion, incentivizing different builders to create motion techniques that may solely exist in digital actuality.
Gorilla Tag has designed a system that feels pure but difficult and ensures that its gameplay stays deeply tied to the physicality and immersion of VR. This isn’t a recreation that might be ported to a standard display screen with a joystick—it’s essentially a VR expertise, and it helps to maintain participant retention inside the sport.
The Memeability and Social Media Presence of Gorilla Tag
One of many key drivers of Gorilla Tag’s virality is its reputation throughout social media platforms. Its memeable nature and easy-to-share gameplay have made it a success amongst content material creators, significantly on platforms like TikTok, YouTube, and Twitch. The sport’s distinctive artwork type and chaotic, bodily motion make for extremely entertaining clips, resulting in tens of millions of views and shares. The rise of user-generated content material, from memes to full-length gameplay movies, has contributed to the sport’s rising neighborhood, with gamers usually showcasing their abilities, humorous interactions, or surprising moments in lobbies. The sport’s open-ended nature and social core make fertile floor for this type of user-generated content material.
Specifically, Gorilla Tag lends itself to the kind of natural, spontaneous content material that social media algorithms favor. Movies of gamers flailing their arms to maneuver, dramatic chase sequences, or hilarious voice chat moments rapidly go viral, attractive new gamers to hitch in on the enjoyable. Creators throughout completely different platforms have constructed whole followings based mostly on Gorilla Tag content material, additional embedding the sport into the social media cloth. Consequently, the sport advantages from fixed word-of-mouth advertising and marketing, with every viral clip performing as free promoting. In an period the place video games usually dwell or die by their presence on platforms like TikTok, Gorilla Tag has mastered the artwork of staying related by being inherently shareable.
Gorilla Tag’s Impression on the Way forward for VR Gaming
Gorilla Tag has not solely confirmed to be a monetary success however has additionally set a brand new customary for what VR video games can obtain. Its modern method to participant motion, its seamless integration of social interplay, and its free-to-play mannequin are shaping the way forward for VR gaming.
In an trade the place {hardware} limitations and person friction are widespread obstacles, Gorilla Tag has proven {that a} well-designed recreation can break by way of these challenges and create an enduring impression—divorcing the concept VR video games will not be commercially scalable.
As VR know-how continues to evolve, the teachings from the sport’s success influences the following technology of VR titles. From its distinctive locomotion system to its natural social areas, Gorilla Tag has set the precedent on how VR can provide experiences which might be unattainable on different platforms. In doing so, it has helped usher in a brand new period of social VR gaming, recentering the definition of social.
With its ongoing updates, increasing participant base, and cultural resonance, Gorilla Tag is greater than only a recreation—it’s a motion. Its success reveals that digital actuality has the potential to rework gaming by providing gamers a very immersive, social, and unforgettable expertise.
The VR social renaissance is quickly in full swing—and Gorilla Tag is just the primary of many extra success tales to come back. We’re right here to search out the following.
