Nigerian video games: 12 games made in or set in Nigeria

Nigeria has a huge, young, phone-first audience, and for more than a decade its game studios have been making games that look and sound like home: okada riders, danfo buses, Lagos traffic, Yoruba gods and the card game everyone’s uncle cheats at. The industry is still small by world standards, but it is growing. BusinessDay, citing PwC, put Nigeria’s gaming market at about $176 million in revenue in 2024.

Here are twelve games made in Nigeria or set there. This is our pick, not a ranking, and mobile games come and go from the app stores, so check the store in your country before you get excited.

1. Disney Iwájú: Rising Chef

Maliyo Games · Android and iOS · 2024. A mobile game tied to Iwájú, the Disney+ animated series set in a futuristic Lagos, made by Walt Disney Animation Studios with the Pan-African company Kugali. Maliyo, a Lagos studio, made the game with Disney Games and Kugali, and it came out on the same day as the series, 28 February 2024. It was the first time an African developer had partnered with Disney Games on a title like this.

2. Whot King

Maliyo Games · mobile. A digital version of Whot, the card game Nigerians call their own. If you have only ever played it on a veranda, read our guide on how to play Whot first.

3. Okada Ride

Maliyo Games · started in the browser, 2012. One of Maliyo’s first games, about a Lagos motorbike taxi, the okada, dodging potholes and traffic. It began as a free web game, in an interview from 2012 Maliyo’s co-founder Hugo Obi called casual browser and mobile games “an untapped niche”, and today the studio lists it as Okada Rider.

4. Mosquito Smasher

Maliyo Games · 2012. A quick tapping game with a serious point: it was made to raise awareness of malaria.

5. Danfo

ChopUp · mobile. A racing game built around Lagos’s commuter buses, the danfos. It is the best-known title of ChopUp, a Lagos studio founded by Zubair Abubakar and Bayo Puddicombe.

6. Jagun: Clash of Kingdoms

ChopUp · mobile. A ChopUp game built on African warrior themes, a long way from the danfo park.

7. Gidi Run

Gamsole · mobile. An endless runner through the streets of Lagos. Gamsole was founded by Abiola Olaniran, who has been recognised by Forbes and Microsoft for his work in mobile games.

8. Candy Puzzle: Match 3

Gamsole · mobile. Not Nigerian in theme at all, and that is the point: a casual puzzle game from a Nigerian studio that has found players on app stores around the world.

9. The Wild Kingdoms

Kucheza Gaming · mobile · 2022. An adventure built on Yoruba mythology and culture. It picked up a surprising number of downloads in Brazil.

10. Oga Train Station

Kucheza Gaming · mobile. An idle tycoon game built around the Naija hustle: start small, grow the business, become the oga.

11. Go North

Tade Ajiboye · Xbox. A cosy maze-adventure that a Lagos-based independent developer built by himself over about two years. Its story is also a reminder of the barriers: he told OkayAfrica that, as a Nigerian, he could not open developer accounts for Steam, PlayStation or Nintendo Switch.

12. AJ Cities

Free in the browser · phone and computer · 18+. Our own game, so take this one with a pinch of salt. AJ Cities is an open world set in a fictional estate on the edge of Ajegunle, Lagos, where Navy Town meets Kirikiri. In the single-player story you are AJ, deported from London, broke on a veranda bench, and owing the gate police ₦2,500,000 before they will let you out. You earn it betting on street football in the bush. There is also a live side where adults make their own characters and meet other players at the estate. Nothing to download. How to play.

What Nigerian games have in common

Look down the list and three things stand out.

• They are made for phones. Most Nigerians get online on a phone, and most of those phones run Android. Nearly every game here is mobile, and the few that are not are on a console or in the browser.
• They are proudly local. Okadas, danfos, Whot, Lagos streets and Yoruba myth. Nigerian studios have found that their own stories are what make them stand out.
• They travel. Some of these games have found big audiences abroad, from Brazil to app stores around the world. A Nigerian game is not only for Nigerians.

A little history

None of this started yesterday. Big Western publishers such as Electronic Arts and Gameloft were already selling to Nigerian players by 2012, the same year Maliyo was putting Okada Ride on the web. Another Lagos studio of that era, Kuluya, was founded in 2010 and made games around African myths and stories; more than 60% of its downloads came from outside Nigeria, mainly Ghana, Kenya and South Africa. Kuluya did not survive (it had closed by 2017), but the idea it proved, that games full of African stories could find players anywhere, is now the business model for half this list.

Where to find more

If you want the people behind these games, read our guide to Nigerian game developers. For games from across the continent, from Cameroon to South Africa, see our list of African video games. And if you are wondering what Nigerians actually play day to day, which is a different question, read video games in Nigeria.

What is the most famous Nigerian video game?

There is no single answer, but Disney Iwájú: Rising Chef by Maliyo Games, Danfo by ChopUp and Gidi Run by Gamsole are among the best known.

Are there Nigerian games on console?

A few. Go North, by the Lagos-based developer Tade Ajiboye, is on Xbox. Most Nigerian games are made for phones.

Is there a Nigerian game I can play in the browser?

Yes. AJ Cities, an open-world game set on the edge of Ajegunle, Lagos, runs free in the browser on phones and computers. It is for adults, 18+.

How big is gaming in Nigeria?

BusinessDay, citing PwC, put Nigeria’s gaming market at about $176 million in revenue in 2024, most of it on mobile.