New Promo Offers a Free Month (or Two) of Apple Arcade
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Apple’s online gaming subscription service, Apple Arcade, has been on a pretty good roll lately, introducing PGA Tour Pro Golf and adding reimaginings of classics like Katamari Damacy and Angry Birds over the last few months — and there’s even more to come in August.
However, if you’re not yet sold on Apple’s all-you-can-play gaming service, the company has teamed up with Halfbrick, the game developer behind the venerable Fruit Ninja, to offer up to two months of Apple Arcade for free.
The deal is available for both new and returning Apple Arcade subscribers. Halfbrick is offering a free month for everyone, so if you’ve never signed up for Apple Arcade before, you’ll get two months, as this can be stacked on top of Apple’s standard one-month trial for new members.
The free trial is Halfbrick’s way of promoting the special Bluey event that it’s running in Fruit Ninja Classic+, which it wants to give everyone a shot at.
The Bluey takeover brings four fun-filled events – Featherwand, Sticky Gecko, Asparagus, and Fruit Salad – rolling out from June through August. Whether you’re playing with Bingo and her Featherwand or helping Bluey catch Gecky off the ceiling, each event brings plenty of adventures and exclusive rewards for players of all ages to enjoy.
You can sign up to receive a trial code on Halfbrick’s website. Sadly, the promo isn’t available everywhere, as it relies on country-specific promo codes, and therefore is only available in the United States, Canada, Australia, the United Kingdom, Germany, Japan, the Philippines, Brazil, and Mexico, according to the drop-down on the sign-up page.
It’s also likely there are only a limited number of promo codes, so you may want to sign up right away if you’re interested. Note that you won’t be able to use these promo codes to claim a free month if you’re already a subscriber to Apple One, although you might be able to get a month off from an individual Apple Arcade subscription.
A standalone Apple Arcade subscription costs $6.99 per month. It’s also included in all Apple One plans, which start at $19.95 per month for an Individual plan, which is a bit of a misnomer as that only applies to Apple Music; the other bundled services, Apple TV+ and Apple Arcade, can be shared with up to five other family members, and you also get iCloud+ with 50 GB of storage. When you factor all that in, you’re essentially getting $1 off the price of Apple Music and Apple TV+ and getting Arcade and iCloud+ for free.
Sadly, Apple Arcade hasn’t been as enthusiastically received by gamers as Apple and its developer partners would like, despite being a welcome respite from the world of freemium and ad-laden titles on the traditional App Store. Many smaller indie developers, tired of nickel-and-diming their audiences, have turned to Apple Arcade to ensure a steady income from Apple without relying on more invasive and predatory tactics.
Apple has also made it clear that Arcade is about fun rather than profit for Apple. In the grand scheme of things, Apple’s primary goal is to provide a vibrant gaming ecosystem for both its customers and indie game developers, and it’s done a good job of making space for games that wouldn’t have survived in the more cut-throat App Store gaming economy. It’s also helped the company emphasize a “family-friendly” approach by providing a curated set of games that parents can trust are both inoffensive and won’t tempt kids to beg their parents for in-game purchases.
