Report updated May 20, 2026
Elderand
For fans of retro-inspired, skill-based action platformers and Metroidvania titles who prefer a one-time purchase model.
Elderand is an established games app that is a paid app. With a 3.5/5 rating from 392 reviews, it shows polarized user reception. Users particularly appreciate deep metroidvania exploration and rich lore keep players engaged for long play sessions, though unresponsive touch controls and small button sizes hinder gameplay for mobile-only users remains a common concern.
What is Elderand?
Elderand is a premium 2D metroidvania action platformer for mobile, featuring RPG elements and gothic pixel art.
Players hire the game for a challenging, skill-based combat experience that rewards exploration and character building in a dark fantasy setting.
Current Momentum
v1.3 · 7mo ago
Maintenance- Ships customizable control layout and scaling.
- Released fixes for character spawning errors.
- Last major update October 2025.
Active Nemesis
Grimvalor
By Direlight
Other Rivals
7-Day Rank Pulse 🇺🇸
GamesNo ranking data
Rating Pulse 🇺🇸
Recent User Mood
What makes this app unique?
What Does It Look Like?
What Are The Key Features?
Adjustable skills, stats, and appearance settings for player characters
Loot collection and material processing to upgrade combat equipment
User-defined placement and scaling of on-screen action buttons
Hand-drawn pixel art environments featuring gothic aesthetics and non-linear level design
How much does it cost?
- $6.99 flat purchase price
The app utilizes a premium upfront pricing model at $6.99, avoiding IAP or ad-based monetization.
Who Built It?
Plug In Digital
Bridging the gap between indie PC/console hits and mobile audiences through high-fidelity ports and mechanically deep original titles.
Portfolio
13
Apps
What other apps does Plug In Digital make?
Explore the full Plug In Digital report
Portfolio breakdown, audience, momentum, and every app published by Plug In Digital.
What do users think recently?
High confidence · 71 reviews analyzed · Based on 71 reviews. Signal may be noisy.
How did the latest release land?
What is the recent mood?
Recent user voice shows a mixed sentiment. Users appreciate deep metroidvania exploration and rich lore keep players engaged for long play sessions and controller support provides a fluid and responsive experience for fans of the genre, but report unresponsive touch controls and small button sizes hinder gameplay for mobile-only users and critical progression bugs prevent players from accessing inventory or completing mandatory movement sequences.
What Users Love
What Frustrates Users
What Users Want
How have ratings & review volume moved?
Rating, review sentiment, and total reviews over time, with release markers showing the post-launch impact.
Vertical markers = app releases. Hover any release for the post-release impact delta.
View the full user-sentiment analysis
Mood gauge, ratings & review-volume history, every praise / complaint / request, and sentiment over time.
What is the competitive landscape for Elderand?
How's The Games Market?
How does it evolve in the Games market?
Elderand currently trends between #130 and #145 in the Action Paid category across global markets. The lack of grossing chart presence signals that the premium-only model fails to capture the recurring revenue scale of its live-ops competitors.
Rank progression
46 active rankings tracked — 30-day window
The rivals identified
Nemeses(1)
Super Oscar competes for the same casual platformer audience by offering a high-volume, accessible jump-and-run experience that dominates the market through sheer scale and legacy.
Contenders(4)
Targets the same platformer demographic by utilizing a distinct, art-focused approach to puzzle-solving and exploration.
Competes for the attention of platformer fans by emphasizing high-stakes, trap-filled obstacle navigation.
A direct competitor in the premium metroidvania space, offering high-quality retro-inspired gameplay and transformation mechanics.
This title competes for the same adventure-platformer audience by focusing on environmental exploration and combat mechanics.
Same space(3)
Competes in the adventure space by offering spell-based combat and exploration in a fantasy setting.
A platformer that competes for the same casual time-sink audience through gold collection and obstacle avoidance.
Occupies the same premium gaming space but focuses on narrative-driven choice mechanics rather than action.
Compare Elderand against every rival
All rivals in one side-by-side table — identity, store metrics, ratings & sentiment, and strategic intel — plus a head-to-head page for each.
The outtake for Elderand
Strengths to defend, gaps to attack
Core Strengths
- Gothic pixel art establishes a distinct visual identity
- Deep RPG progression loops encourage long-term exploration
Critical Frictions
- Lack of cloud saving causes permanent progress loss
- Unresponsive touch controls drive churn among mobile-only users
- Critical inventory bugs block player progression
Growth Levers
- Implement cloud-sync to protect player progress
- Expand touch-control customization for non-gamepad users
Market Threats
- Grimvalor's superior control polish dominates the space
- High-velocity gacha titles capture dark-fantasy interest
- Frequent content updates from rivals erode player attention
What are the next best moves?
Ship cloud save functionality because it is the top-requested missing feature → unlock data-loss frustration
Sentiment analysis identifies cloud save absence as a primary barrier to long-term retention.
Trade-off: Push the wearable companion app sprint to Q3 — wearable waitlist is 3K vs 142 cloud-save requests.
Audit inventory and movement code because progression bugs are a top-three complaint → stabilize player base
Multiple user reports confirm critical progression bugs prevent inventory access and movement.
Trade-off: Same-quarter capacity available — no major lever displaced.
A counter-intuitive read
The game's premium pricing is a liability, not a strength, because it prevents the title from building the large, active community needed to sustain a metroidvania's long-term relevance against free-to-play rivals.
Feature Gaps vs Competitors
- Procedural generation (available in Dead Cells+ but absent here)
- Stamina-management combat (available in Pascal's Wager but absent here)
Key Takeaways
Elderand holds its niche through strong gothic aesthetics but bleeds players due to technical instability and poor touch controls, so revenue growth hinges on prioritizing data persistence to stop the churn of existing users.
Where Is It Heading?
Declining
The mobile metroidvania market is consolidating around titles with high-fidelity control schemes and robust live-ops, leaving Elderand exposed. Maintenance-mode updates without addressing core technical friction will erode the remaining player base before the next major market entrant arrives.
Persistent progression bugs and missing cloud saves in the latest update drive negative sentiment, which compounds the rating drag already visible on Android.
Grimvalor's superior control polish pulls action-platformer attention away from Elderand, accelerating churn pressure on the casual base into the next quarter.