Why We’re Building Co-op at the Core at Phantom Gamelabs

Greetings from Phantom Gamelabs!

For the past few years, we’ve been focused on one core question: what does meaningful co-op look like in modern Action RPGs? We believe it’s time to challenge the traditional ways guilds and social systems are built on mobile. Along the way, we’ve built, iterated, pivoted, and learned a great deal.

We are not the only ones evolving, the industry is changing too. The focus has shifted from cross-platform hype and genre hybrids that dominated just a few years ago to D2C stores, multi-platform distribution, AI-powered discovery, playable ads, and short-form content that increasingly feels like gameplay itself. At the same time, global dynamics have transformed the market. Chinese studios cracked international scale, Genshin Impact redefined ARPG expectations, and 4X games evolved through titles like Whiteout Survival. Habby’s repeatable playbook showed how accessibility and depth can coexist. These shifts are shaping how we build games. Mobile game developers like us must challenge old assumptions and rewrite the design docs to serve modern players.

Games Are Becoming Social Spaces

We founded Phantom Gamelabs to stay fluid and experimental, shift shape like a phantom and be less factory, more lab. I’m incredibly proud of our speed, our willingness to test often, and our ability to learn continuously. AI helps us remove friction in areas like marketing, localization and QA, allowing us to focus our energy where it matters most: gameplay and player experience.

Player behavior keeps pointing in the same direction. Extraction shooters, modern 4X games, and even dueling formats are becoming increasingly social. Roblox serves as a reference point for that, not for its mechanics, but for how it turns games into places to belong, not just sessions to play.

At Phantom Gamelabs, co-op hasn’t ever a mode but the foundation. We build ARPGs with co-op at the core. Collaboration shapes the experience, progression, identity, and long-term engagement. Our first released game, Riftbusters, is paving the way both technically and creatively. With everything we’ve learned, we’re now taking the next steps: building on the tech and knowhow we have, truly co-op-first games that evolve alongside their communities.