Umamusume: Pretty Derby (mobile game)

Umamusume: Pretty Derby
Kanji	ウマ娘 プリティーダービー
Romaji	Umamusume Puritī Dābī
Game Information
Developer	Cygames
Publisher	JP Cygames KR Kakao Games TW Komoe Game CN bilibili
Platform(s)	Windows (through DMM) Android iOS
Release	JP (Android/iOS) February 24th, 2021 JP (Windows) March 10th, 2021 KR June 20th, 2022 TW June 27th, 2022 CN August 30th, 2023
Website Backloggd

Umamusume: Pretty Derby (ウマ娘 プリティーダービー, Umamusume Puritī Dābī) is a mobile game produced by Cygames available on Android, iOS and Windows PCs released in February 24th, 2021.

History

The Umamusume project started as a multimedia project first announced at AnimeJapan 2016, with the release of the first PV and a mobile game scheduled to release on Winter 2018. The first PV of the mobile game was released on AnimeJapan 2017, looking very different from the actual game, but with many of the gameplay mechanics being the same. In an interview with Famitsu in January 2017, the then-producer Akihiro Ishihara claimed the game was "about 25% complete", and to look forward to "the end of [2017]'s G1 race". Cygames then kept releasing other several PVs throughout 2017 and 2018, and released the first season of the anime in Spring 2018.

On December 2018, the game was officially delayed, with an unknown release date on 2019. On April 2019, Akihiro Ishihara, the producer back then for Umamusume, left Cygames, and on December 2019 the game was delayed once again to 2020, date mentioned on CyberAgent's (Cygames' parent company) Q2 and Q3 reports. From 2019 to mid-2020, the project as a whole had almost no new content, until Umayon's release in Summer 2020 and the announcement of the Cinderella Gray manga.

After 5 years from the original project's announcement, on a Pakalive stream in December 2020, the game was announced to release on February 24th, 2021, with pre-registrations opening on February 10th, and a PV release which is the game we see now.

Releases outside of Japan

There's currently three active releases outside of Japan, with a global release confirmed. These have been released after the Japan release, so events/cards are not synced.

• Korean release
  • This was the first release outside of Japan, released on June 20th, 2022. The game is published by Kakao Games, and is localized to Korean. According to the publisher, the game hit a million pre-registrations within 2 weeks.
    • This version received backlash shortly after the release due to various issues as to how the game was being managed by the publisher Kakao Games. These included localization issues, missing features compared to the Japan release, gacha banners being cut short without notice, and a Champions Meeting event being announced with less than a week of anticipation, compared to the normal 4 weeks in the Japan release. These prompted users to have an 8 hour discussion with higher-ups of the publishers, but after being unhappy with the answers given, Kakao Games was sued by +7,000 players for an amount of 9 billion won ($6.4 million at the time). The lawsuit was later dropped by the players after "most of their demands were met". This was after Kakao Games replaced most of the managers were replaced and an "improvement task force" was set up, managed directly by the CEO.
      • Worth noting that during the 8 hour discussion between the players and the company, out of the 6 members of the company, only one played the game.
      • While this was happening, the game reached a review rating of 1.1 stars in the Google Play Store.
• Traditional Chinese release
  • This released shortly after the Korea release, on June 27th, 2022. The game is published by Komoe Game, and is localized to Traditional Chinese.
• Chinese release
  • The Chinese version released on August 30th, 2023. The game is published by bilibili, and is localized to Simplified Chinese. The game released with a title change and some race name changes, due to Chinese laws.
    • The game was pulled out of app stores a week later on September 7th though. Although the official reason for this was due to "technical upgrades", fans speculate that it was due to bilibili not complying with Chinese censorship laws. The game has not returned to app stores as of June 2024, and although the game can still be played if downloaded during the first week, as the game can't push updates through app stores, the server has been stuck on the URA training scenario and with rerunning events and banners.
• Global release
  • The global version of the game was announced during a PakaLive TV livestream on June 24th, 2024. The publisher of this version has not been officially announced yet, although fans believe it might be self-published by Cygames. More information will be given on Cygames' booth at Anime Expo during July 2024.

Gameplay

Training is the main gameplay element of the game. There are a few things to keep in mind before doing a training run. Horse girls are differentiated between playable characters and supports cards.

• Playable characters are what you actually train, and their stats will be affected by the affection level of the horse girl and her inheritance before starting the run.
• Supports cards are what gives you stat boosts and skills during the training. They all have different events that can occur during training, which have some story and gives you some extra bonuses. Because of this, you can't have a support card of the horse girl you're currently training.

You train your horse girl in order to compete in races, in the hope of winning them. Before starting a race you'll have the chance to change her running strategy, but during the actual race, you'll just spectate from the stands. For a more in-depth guide and introduction, there are different community-made guides, including Gametora's Beginners Guide and Erzzy's Reference Doc.

Reception

The game by the end of 2021, according to Sensor Tower, made $990million in gross revenue, becoming the 9th most grossing game worldwide for the year. By March 2024, a month after the game's third anniversary, Sensor Tower claims that the game has made over $2.4billion in revenue throughout its lifetime, accounting for 72% of Cygames' mobile game revenue share. Worth to note that Sensor Tower only tracks mobile revenue, and this number may be higher due to the Windows version.

Thanks to Umamusume's success, Abema, one of CyberAgent's subsidiaries, was able to live stream the 2022 FIFA World Cup free of charge, for the first time in Japan.