As daily casual games gain momentum, the puzzle may be the hook, but the surrounding rituals can be just as important to keep players engaged.

Over the past few years, daily casual games have been one of the brightest points in the gaming industry, encouraging audiences that had never engaged with video games before to pick up their phone and play a game on a regular basis. Media platforms of both the traditional and social variety have embraced this trend to stir up engagement and unlock new revenue streams. 

At GamesBeat Next 2026 in San Francisco on November 3, some of the leaders building today’s most popular daily casual games sat down for a panel discussion exploring the similarities and differences between their approaches, as well as how the best practices of daily casual game development had evolved over time. 

Moderated by Beast Industries vice president of partnerships Tina Tran, the panel featured the voices of New York Times chief game officer Jonathan Knight, LinkedIn group product manager for games Helen Smith, and Kenny Rosenblatt, the chief executive and co-founder of the daily casual game studio Arkadium. 

The throughline of the panel was that for daily casual gamers, the experience surrounding a game can be just as important as the gameplay itself. Arkadium CEO Kenny Rosenblatt noted that his company had observed that gameplay represented “about 50 percent of the offering” developed by Arkadium. He said the other half of his platform’s user engagement came from “meta systems” around the game, including recordings of gameplay videos and blogs about how to solve daily puzzles.

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