[A dollar bill, Photo Credit to Unsplash]

According to figures cited by Clash Royale content creator Hachanpong, the game’s monthly revenue reportedly fell from $58 million to $36 million in the month following Supercell’s controversial late-2025 update, as players voiced their strong criticism against the introduction of Hero Cards and an increase in the maximum card level.

Supercell announced the update, titled “Hero Holiday,” in November 2025.

It introduced a new category of cards called Hero Cards and raised the maximum card level from 15 to 16.

Users criticized the update even before it was released. 

They insisted that the new ‘Hero Cards’ were an unbalanced ‘Pay to Win’ strategy employed by the company.

Users also highlighted that the operation team broke the promise they made not to increase the max level anymore. 

Partner creators and professional players also urged Supercell to reconsider the update. 

For example, Sandbox CR, a South Korean professional player, insisted that 

the operators are ruining one of the best-selling mobile games in the world just to earn more money in a short time.

In this situation, Marko, one of Clash Royale’s operation team members, gained people’s attention.

He claimed that although there are some people who want the new ‘Hero Cards’ to be removed from the game, he will not cancel the update because he thinks this update will bring positive effect in a long-term perspective, and ultimately make the game better.

In addition, Marko often instigated conflicts in the discord server of Clash Royale. 

When users argued about what the operation team had done, such as collapsed in-game balance, he often replied to them sarcastically by making fun of their profile pictures.

For instance, when one of the users commented to him, “U truly are anhorrible person.’, he replied “My bad mister, Mbappe and a bike as a profile Pic.”

The conflict reached its peak when Mohamed Light, the best Clash Royale professional player in the world, said the balance team needed to be shot in the head because of the negative effects of the update. 

Although it was a highly inappropriate remark, many users agreed about his opinion of how strong the unexpected effect of the update was, and showed him empathy.

The number of concurrent users, which means the amount of users playing the game at the same time, was reduced by half, and the remaining players were having a hard time of matchmaking and often ended up getting matched against AI.

More than two-thirds of its profit decreased in 6 months, and its role as the company’s best-selling game is now moved to ‘Brawl Stars’.