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Fan Index Reveals: The MOST Popular Gaming Character of ALL TIME

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The most popular gaming character is Mario, receiving a whopping 451 points from the fan index
In second place is Sonic the Hedgehog with 394 points, receiving a staggering 59,700,700 Google searches in the last year
Legend of Zelda’s Link lands third place with 377 points, holding the largest number of Reddit mentions
The least popular gaming character is Jack from BioShock with just 48 points!

We’ve spent a lot of time at home, getting to know our favourite video games more than ever before, falling even more in love with a whole range of gaming characters. However, there is plenty of debate about which characters are the nations’ favourite!

With this in mind, experts at Stashbird.com wanted to discover the most popular gaming characters of all time from the best-selling video game franchises*. To thoroughly investigate, Stashbird.com created a gaming fans’ index by analysing the following factors:

Sales of the franchise
Average worldwide searches over the past year
Number of hashtags on Instagram
Number of Reddit mentions
Gamers’ popularity score (survey)

The top 10 most popular characters

Stashbird.com can reveal that in first place, and crowned the most popular gaming character, is Mario with a massive 451 fan index points!

Mario ranked first for franchise sales with a staggering 653,000,000 worldwide copies of Mario games sold, bagging him an easy 100 points. The fun-loving character also ranked sixth for average worldwide searches with 4,606,547 (86 points) in the past year alone! Despite these results, Mario only ranked 10th for popularity, with 45% of gamers choosing him as their ultimate favourite.

Not far behind in second place is Sonic the Hedgehog with 394 points. The extraterrestrial hedgehog ranked second for worldwide searches (59,700,000), giving him 97 points! He was voted the favourite by only 21% of gamers surveyed, however bagged himself 91 points for his 94,300 Reddit mentions.

Link from The Legend of Zelda places third, accumulating 377 points! It is no surprise as the star of the Nintendo series to have ranked top for Reddit mentions (3,920,000) and popularity score (74%), receiving 100 points for both! Interestingly, he ranked lower down for search volumes, with 1,196,200 average searches over the past year.

At number four is Donkey Kong with 354 points, scoring high with 3,930,000 yearly average searches (83 points), 570,000 Instagram hashtags (77 points) and 26,400 Reddit mentions (80 points).

To complete the 10 most popular gaming characters, the results are as follows:
5. Master Chief (Halo) 323 points, Crash (Crash Bandicoot) 323 points, Sora (Kingdom Hearts) 323 points
6. Cloud Strife (Final Fantasy) 314 points
7. Pac-Man (Pac-Man) 308 points
8. Kirby (Kirby) 306 points
9. Geralt of Rivia (The Witcher) 294 points

Closing the top 10 is Ezio Auditore Da Firenze, star of four of the Assassin’s Creed games, with 291 points!

Just making the bottom 10 is Joel Miller, ranking 25th out of a possible 34 places, from the Last of Us. This is not surprising as the franchise only scored 14 points for its 24 million sales. He also scored low on Reddit searches, receiving just 29 points for his 1,670 mentions.

John Marston from Red Dead Redemption and Simon Belmont from Castlevania were both among the least popular with 94 and 74 points, respectively.

Bioshock’s Jack rounds off the bottom 10 list with measly 48 points – a staggering 403 points less than first place contender Mario.

Methodology
1. *Stashbird.com analysed the list of best-selling video game franchises that have sold at least 20 million copies and pulled the most popular/recognised character from each to compile the list of 36 most popular gaming characters of all time.
2. The team then created an index looking at several factors, including sales of the franchise, search volumes using SemRush, the number of Instagram hashtags per character and the number of mentions on Reddit.
3. Finally, to complete the index Stashbird.com surveyed 4,567 gamers worldwide to ask them to vote for their favourite from the list to give each character a popularity score.
4. Games where there is no playable main character were excluded from the list.
5. Stashbird normalised the data by using the PERCENTRANK.INC function in Excel. This function returns the rank of a value in a data set as a percentage of the data set between 0 and 1. These values were then multiplied by 100 to make the range between 0 and 100. The maximum score a character could receive was 500.This enabled the team to rank the 36 characters from most to least popular based on their total points. The data was collected on 29/02/2021 and is correct as of then.

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Vegangster Powers Reels Points, the New Coin-Based Loyalty System on Reels.io

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Reels.io has added Reels Points, a new loyalty layer powered by Vegangster. Players earn coins by playing casino games or placing bets. Coins can be tracked in the player profile and redeemed in the Vegangster-powered Lootbox Shop.

Two bigger steps are next. The first is on-platform: coins will soon be spendable across a selection of games as in-play credit, opening up a second use case beyond the Lootbox Shop. The second is on-chain. Reels.io is heading toward a $REELS Token Generation Event, at which point accumulated Reels Points will convert into Reels Tokens, a publicly traded cryptocurrency.

That turns the loyalty layer into a stake in the brand itself, and gives players a real choice along the way: spend coins now on lootboxes and in-game perks, or stack them for the token conversion later.

The system is 100% Vegangster-developed and currently available only on Reels.io. It will roll out to select partners first, then be offered to all Vegangster clients, with the crypto layer as an optional component depending on each operator’s market.

Michael Oziransky, Chief Product Officer at Vegangster, commented: “Reels.io is the kind of brand that pushes a system to its limits, which is exactly why we wanted them as the first deployment. They are running the points layer and the Lootbox Shop now, with in-game spending and a token conversion already mapped out. What works for them sets the bar for the version we roll out across the rest of our network.”

The Reels.io launch is the first deployment of what Vegangster sees as a long-term loyalty product. With the points layer live, the Lootbox Shop active, and a clear path toward in-game spending and token conversion, the system is built to grow with the brands running it.

About Reels.io

Reels.io is an online casino and sportsbook offering a wide library of slots, table games, live dealer content, and sports and esports markets, along with regular rewards and promotions for active players.

About Vegangster

Vegangster provides a full iGaming platform built for speed, scale, and operator control. Its turnkey, white-label, and sweepstakes solutions bring casino and sportsbook content, payments, CRM, compliance, and social features together in one mobile-first system. With Vegangster, operators can launch quickly and grow with confidence.

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N1 SEO Traffic Cup: final results coming soon

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N1 SEO Traffic Cup the first tournament in the N1 Traffic Cups series is coming to an end, with April 30 as the final day of the promo. Over the 2 months, around 300 teams joined the promo, driving SEO traffic to N1 Partners’ casino and betting brands.

Participants competed not only on volume, but also on efficiency, strategic thinking, and scaling. The more brands a partner drove traffic to, the higher their coefficient for score calculation was. The final results depend entirely on each team’s own performance — that makes the tournament fair and engaging.

The winners will be announced by May 10. In this article, you’ll find out which brands delivered the strongest results in the N1 SEO Traffic Cup, along with key trends in working with this traffic source.

N1 SEO Traffic Cup: Wrap-Up 

The N1 Partners expert team answered the hottest questions about the tournament wrap-up — insights that can be valuable for partners who keep running SEO traffic to N1 brands.

1.  Which brands showed the best performance during the tournament?

Several brands clearly stood out:

  • HollyWin
  • Slot Mafia
  • Lucky Hunter
  • RollXO
  • Slot Lounge

2. What do the tournament results say about the current state of SEO traffic in iGaming?

The key takeaway: SEO remains one of the core channels in iGaming. However, it’s evolving and adapting in response to Google updates. This is no longer about writing articles and getting traffic — it’s about systematic unit economics management.

An interesting point — the tournament mechanics focused not on volume, but on efficiency (FTD + coefficients). This clearly shows that iGaming SEO is shifting from mass traffic to controlled performance.

It’s also worth noting that the rule “There are no fixed winners — KPI execution matters more than leaderboard position” gave every participant a real shot at top prizes, while competitors’ results served as additional motivation for growth.


3. What key trends did you observe among top participants?

Several major trends stood out:

  • Multi-brand strategy = a must-have
    Top performers don’t rely on a single offer — they build strategies around a portfolio of brands. This proves that SEO is moving closer to media buying.
  • Aggregators, comparison pages, and multi-intent pages are effective
    Among the top-performing approaches: offerwall pages, cross-brand strategies, and parasite SEO.

Stay tuned for updates on the N1 SEO Traffic Cup from N1 Partners to find out who landed in the prize tiers and what rewards the top teams received — final results will be announced separately by May 10.

And this isn’t the end — a new tournament from the N1 Traffic Cups series will start very soon. Follow the announcements not to miss your chance and jump back into the competition, sharpen your skills, as well as compete for even bigger prizes.

N1 Partners is: 

  • 14+ casino and sportsbook brands with high Reg2Dep
  • 10+ Tier-1 GEOs
  • CPA up to €700 and RevShare up to 55% + NNCO for top partners

Be number one with N1!

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Spinmatic Inks Strategic Tie-Up with Fonbet Greece

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The supplier says the integration is complete and plans missions, bonus campaigns and tournaments to support Fonbet’s casino growth strategy.

Spinmatic has launched its slot content with Fonbet.gr in Greece, formalising a new partnership focused on growing Fonbet’s casino offering in the market.

Spinmatic said Greece is a priority territory in its expansion strategy and that the deal is designed to introduce its slot portfolio to Fonbet’s customer base via the operator’s cross-selling approach from sportsbook to casino.

The supplier said the partnership will be supported by a roadmap of activations, including bespoke missions, bonus-driven campaigns and competitive tournaments, aimed at driving sustained engagement and “long-term GGR growth” as play shifts toward the casino vertical.

Norbert Mathies, Managing Director at Spinmatic, said: “Greece is a market where we see incredible potential, and partnering with a reputable brand like Fonbet is a key step in our growth journey. We have been following their work in building a solid casino vertical with great interest. By combining our engaging, mobile-first slot games with Fonbet’s proven ability to activate and retain players, we are creating a powerful synergy. We are fully committed to supporting this partnership with a dedicated strategy to ensure our content becomes a firm favourite among their Greek audience.”

Mr. Yiannis Gangas, Heading Casino at Fonbet.gr, added: “At Fonbet, we continuously aim to strengthen our casino offering by introducing engaging and high-quality content. Our collaboration with Spinmatic marks an important step in that direction, allowing us to further diversify our portfolio with games that combine strong design, proven mechanics, and player appeal. We see this partnership as an opportunity to build long-term value, leveraging targeted activations to gradually grow our casino vertical and deliver a more dynamic entertainment experience.”

The post Spinmatic Inks Strategic Tie-Up with Fonbet Greece appeared first on Eastern European Gaming | Global iGaming & Tech Intelligence Hub.

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