MMOexp Monopoly Go: The early answer was trial and error

[Calista]

How Monopoly Go! Turned a Classic Board Game Into a Mobile Powerhouse

What does it take to turn a 90-year-old board game into Monopoly Go Stickers a mobile juggernaut? For Scopely, the answer was seven years of development, $70 million in investment, and an unrelenting focus on reimagining fun for the modern mobile gamer. The result? Monopoly Go!—a mobile game that has surpassed $5 billion in revenue in under two years, and secured its place among the elite few in the mobile gaming world.

That path to success wasn’t straightforward. According to Scopely co-CEO Javier Ferreira, the team faced a daunting question from the outset: “How do we make Monopoly, something people already know and love, work on a phone screen in a way that’s actually fun?”

The early answer was trial and error. Initial versions of the game tried to stay too faithful to the board game’s structure, but Ferreira said they quickly realized that wasn’t enough. “What people love about Monopoly isn’t just the mechanics—it’s the feeling. The playful competition. The unpredictability. The drama of going bankrupt or collecting huge payouts.”

One of the biggest pivots came when Scopely leaned into the social aspect of the original board game. Ferreira and his team realized the magic of Monopoly wasn’t in rolling dice or buying properties—it was in the laughter, arguments, and rivalries it created around the table.

So the mobile version had to recreate that social magic. But instead of limiting interaction to in-game strangers, Monopoly Go! encouraged players to connect with their real-life friends and family. “We built the game around your real social graph,” Ferreira explained. “That was Monopoly Go Stickers for sale a game-changer.”